Bill de Blasio’s spokeswoman claims the mayor wrote his own jokes for his first appearance on The Daily Show, so naturally Monday’s interview was chock full of dad humor – and jabs at his predecessor, teed up by Jon Stewart. After Stewart claimed it never snowed during the Bloomberg years, De Blasio quipped, “I think he paid the right guy. I mean, he had the money.” When the host mused that Bloomberg could have paid for citywide pre-K himself, the mayor said the $2.6 billion “could have been a gratuity.” But the biggest target was the new mayor himself – specifically, his shameful habit of transferring pizza to his mouth using a fork rather than his hands.
“Bloomberg, as you know, used to have his food chewed and put back into his mouth, like a baby bird — but this is unacceptable,” said Stewart, offering De Blasio a slice from a fresh sausage-and-mushroom pie. “As mayor of Napoli – I mean New York City — we are always ready for our pizza,” said De Blasio, pulling a knife and fork from inside his jacket.
After watching Stewart’s demonstration, De Blasio managed to consume pizza like a normal New Yorker, and was rewarded with his own (not so) Big Gulp. “Oh, you are gigantic,” said Jon. “In his hands, it looks like a regular soda.”
