It has long been clear that Michael Bloomberg’s third term as New York City mayor is presenting unexpected difficulties for a usually canny politician. Beyond the controversy over his third term itself, the mayor has had to contend with the botched response to last winter’s “Snowpocalypse,” unprecedented hurricane evacuations, dipping approval ratings, and tent-city protests.

A closer look at Mayor Bloomberg’s more recent media appearances, and very Twitter-public donations, however, suggests an effort toward mending some substantial missteps.

For many New Yorkers, the mayor’s legacy was damaged most by his role in the NYPD’s response to the Occupy Wall Street protests. After the police cleared Zuccotti Park by arresting over one hundred protestors who had been camping there as well as journalists from major news outlets, the mayor held a press conference, saying, “No right is absolute and with every right comes responsibilities.” 

He explained that when the goals of public health and safety conflict with upholding the First Amendment, “the health and safety of the public and our first responders must be the priority,” confusing countless city residents who could have sworn that the Bill of Rights mentions nothing specific to public health and safety. Rights to free speech and assembly, on the other hand, are emphasized especially.

More troubling news for the mayor came just yesterday, when a Quinnipac University poll “found that 56% of city voters said they trust United Federation of Teachers while 31% trust the mayor.” This poll comes just weeks after the union began a media campaign against the mayor’s record on education and his plan to “quickly shut and reopen 33 city schools, shedding half the current staff in exchange for up to $66 million in federal funding from the state.” School reforms have been central to Bloomberg’s policy ambitions during his mayoralty, though the mayor has even worse numbers among parents who actually have children in city schools.

Additional dissatisfaction with the mayor’s opposition to a minimum-wage raise to ten dollars an hour, coupled with his unrelenting support for the financial industry, led The Guardian to note that these controversies have “prompted a critical rethink in some quarters of just how Bloomberg has run New York and the legacy he will leave behind.”

What paths are open to a mayor beleaguered? As with most things, a net worth of $19.5 billion can help. Our mild billionaire mayor gave $311 million in 2011 “to 1,185 nonprofits that support the arts, human services, public affairs, and other causes,” making him the fifth most generous donor in the country. When Susan G. Komen for the Cure announced last week that it would cut $700,000 worth of grants to Planned Parenthood, our mayor used his Twitter account to announce, “I’m supporting #PlannedParenthood’s lifesaving breast cancer screenings by matching $250,000 in donations http://bit.ly/ylZqbs #standwithPP”  El Bloombito shared similar sentiments.

Whether the mayor’s financially-expressed frustration had a material impact on the Komen foundation’s decision to reverse its stance, the pledge gave the mayor an opportunity to bolster liberal support. “Anything that covers the mayor’s left flank helps him these days,” the New York Times quoted Ken Sherrill, a professor at Hunter College, as saying. “This will remind people of the good Bloomberg.”

As it happens, the good Bloomberg was on the loose in January as well, when he helped launch the bipartisan coalition “Mayors for the Freedom to Marry.” Bloomberg suggested a parallel with the civil rights movement of the 1960s, saying, “Throughout American history, it has been the cities that have led the march of freedom. And I believe that the cities of America can do that again with marriage equality.”

These flourishes cannot form the basis of a complete political rejuvenation. Though skillful pivots to the left might help the mayor’s legacy with progressive New Yorkers, the wider populace, historically, has rewarded Bloomberg’s political centrism, for which he had found no recent public demonstration.

Then came this Sunday’s Super Bowl, and with it another opportunity for Gallatin students to feign a lack of knowledge about popular events. The mayor too found an opportunity in a thirty second advertisement, where he appeared not as some sushi-eating finance head honcho, but as a sports fan in an over-sized jersey with an important message for every American.

After the obligatory lauding of bagels, Bloomberg addressed gun control, calling for “common sense reforms that would save lives.”

With an eye toward political rehabilitation for all city institutions, the mayor would do well to apply common sense reforms to those enforcing the law as well.