Maybe I was wrong about the 2016 election, just a little bit. I said it would be Jeb! and Hillary. I said that they’d form a unity ticket and restore civility and decency to America. Everybody was saying this around that time, so I don’t feel contrite. 

Perhaps I was wrong about 2012, when I predicted Romney by a landslide, because what voters care most about is thickness of eyebrows and binder maintenance. In my defense, Romney’s eyebrows are considerably thicker than Obama’s. 

Okay, did I say that war with Iraq was the right decision? That it was our moral imperative? That the war would last three days—five, tops—and be an unambiguous moral and strategic victory for America? That every Iraqi would send us a thank you card every year on Christmas, and within a decade we’d all be saying “Merry Christmas” everywhere around the world? Yes, I said this. But you need to understand: Everybody was saying exactly this at the time. It was the conventional wisdom. I was merely taking the temperature of the room, refracting back to my audience an accurate, honest picture of everybody’s view in 2001. I am simply that attuned to the goings-on of this country, and humble enough to admit it. 

I’m glad we got all that sorted. Did I say that Mitt Romney would run in the 2020 Republican primary because “he has the courage, gumption and eyebrows it takes to defeat Trump?” I did say this, and it almost happened. It still might happen—you don’t know! Did I say in 2019 that Howard Schultz would emerge as the only reasonable, moderate, respectable, nice, cool, good, sexy, viable choice for the Democratic nomination? I did, but you must remember how he hurt his back just before his inevitable surge in the polls. 

Now, notwithstanding all of the above, I come with a dire warning for the Democrats: Not making Michael Bloomberg your nominee will spell your doom. He has all the qualities that people across this country are looking for: Like Joe Biden, he has no patience for Malarkey; like Steyer, he is filthy rich for no good reason; and, like a certain Op-Ed columnist, he lives in New York and loves charter schools. Checkmate. Game over. Who wouldn’t vote for the most exciting candidate in this race: Michael Bloomberg? 

If you don’t vote for Michael Bloomberg, like some kind of Communist, I urge you to vote for Amy Klobuchar, or Pete Buttigieg, or Joe Biden, or Corey Booker, or Tom Steyer, or Elizabeth Warren, or Andrew Yang, or Donald Trump, or write in Mitt Romney. Look at that wealth of options. Please, choose somebody from this list and nobody else. Be reasonable. I’m setting aside my own interests to tell you in good faith and from the bottom of my heart that the right choice is Bloomberg and the second best choice is somebody on this list and nobody else. 

Have I been wrong in the past? Yes. Because I’m a human. Despite that e-mail you may have seen that called me a re-animated garbage bag full of dog turds and Brookings Institution talking points (incredibly uncivil), I am in fact a human being. So, human to human, I’m going to level with you: I have the intelligence and the authority to draw conclusions you should listen to, and I am the correct amount of down-to-earth because I’ve been wrong in the past. Vote for Bloomberg.