Like most of the New York media, we expected yesterday’s mayoral election to be a quick, uneventful affirmation of incumbent mayor Michael Bloomberg’s popularity, which is probably why NYU Local was one of the only blogs covering the election live. And except for a nude attacker outside a polling station, most of the day was generally pretty boring. For the first few minutes after polls had closed, the slaughtering of Bloomberg’s Democratic opponent Bill Thompson seemed imminent — the gap had widened to over 30 percentage points at one point. As we noted in our post last night, the New York Times (and apparently NBC) both declared Bloomberg victorious early, even with more than 80% of precincts yet to report their votes.

However, as votes from the outer boroughs were counted, Bloomberg’s commanding lead rapidly became slimmer and slimmer until Hizzoner was only one percentage point ahead of Thompson. Reporters on NY1, which refrained from declaring a victor early, were visibly stunned. NBC officially retracted their endorsement and the Times changed their headline from “Bloomberg wins” to “Bloomberg projected to win.” Not only had the tables turned in a matter of minutes, but the city’s richest and most powerful man was also close to losing his job. For about a moment here, the biggest upset in recent New York history was in reach.

But just as interviews with Bloomberg campaign stuff got unbearably awkward — “we knew this would be a close race” — Bloomberg’s lead ultimately increased to a comfortable, yet incredibly disappointing 5% as the final thousand votes were being reported. All media outlets finally relented and announced that the Mayor would indeed be serving a third term. Howard Wolfson, Bloomberg’s superstar spokesman, struggled to frame the unimpressive results as a major success, resorting to “hey, a win’s a win” banter.

It was clear to voters, though, that Bloomberg’s “win was not actually a win,” as one NY1 pundit put it. The supposedly beloved Mayor who spent nearly $100 million on his re-election campaign (as opposed to Thompson’s $6 million) did win, but by five percentage points. Five percentage points! To put this number in perspective, the last Quinnipiac opinion poll before the election suggested a twelve point lead for Bloomberg, and that was considered bare.

What does this losing victory mean for the Mayor? Well, New Yorkers spoke and, by nearly electing Thompson (who led a primarily anti-Bloomberg campaign), effectively told Hizzoner that his aggressive elitism he once excused with “pragmatism” no longer flies so easily. For pretty obvious reasons, 46% of voters simply could not support that A) the city’s wealthiest man was running the most expensive campaign in U.S. history, B) the city’s most powerful man was overturning term limits to keep his authority, and  C) the dude has probably never seen the New York City Jay-Z raps about.

In terms of policy, however, the thick-skinned Mayor probably won’t adjust any of his direction in response to the election outcome. Although Bloomberg might reconsider initiatives — whatever this means – that seem to reinforce his dictatorial reputation, expect more of the same policies that have dominated New York for the past eight years, which might not necessarily be a bad thing. Actually, make that the past sixteen years.

In his victory speech, the Mayor said, “while we can’t fix the national recession, we can and we will get our city through these tough times and we’ll come out stronger than ever. We’re going to show we can keep outperforming the rest of the country.” No matter how much it costs!

Photo from NYDailyNews.