By 
Rupert Murdoch, the 84-year-old Australian-born media billionaire (estimated net worth $13 billion) has a dream. He would like to see his billionaire friend, Michael Rubens Bloomberg (net worth $38 billion), the 73-year-old former three-term mayor of New York City, enter the 2016 Presidential Election race today.But that isn't going to happen - now, later or even in the near future. Not that Bloomberg, in any public debate anywhere in the country, couldn't easily whip Republican nominee candidates Donald Trump (net worth $8 billion), Ben Carson, Jeb Bush, Carly Fiorina, Democrats Hillary Rodham Clinton or Bernie Sanders.
But the hard facts are:
(1) Bloomberg left the Republican Party in 2007 after a speech criticizing the current political climate in Washington. He previously left the Democratic Party in 2001 to run for mayor of New York City as an Independent on the Republican ballot line.
If he decided to run for the Presidency, Bloomberg would continue to run as an Independent, but probably wouldn't be backed by either the Republican or Democratic parties. As an Independents, the would find it almost impossible to win the crucial Electoral College votes. Each state is assigned a number of electoral votes according to its population.
(2) The political climate in the United States has changed drastically in the last eight years. A large segment of the voting populace no longer trusts or wants a career politician to run the country. They want a grass-roots candidate, like Trump or Carson, even though both are Republicans whose voting members are blamed for much of the country's slow growth in the past decade. Bloomberg currently runs his own 35-year-old, multi-billion-dollar media company, Bloomberg News L.P., in New York City.
(3) If elected, Bloomberg would be the first Jewish President in the 240-year-old history of the United States. That would be a historic first, along with another first - Roman Catholic John F. Kennedy elected in 1961 and Barack Hussein Obama, elected in 2008 as the first African American to lead the country for two terms. If Hillary Rodham Clinton were elected in 2016, she would be the country's first woman president.
Bloomberg could adapt to the third set of facts regarding his not-running or not-wanting-to-run for the Presidency. But he would find it extremely difficult to overcome the first and second reasons cited above.
At another time, in another era, Bloomberg's poll ratings might have easily topped Trump's current average 30 percent level. But not today.
His stand on various public issues, however, is not unlike several of the top 10 candidates now vying for Republican presidential nomination.
The Boston-born Bloomberg considers himself social liberal or progressive. He backs abortion rights, same-sex marriage, strict gun control measures, government involvement in public welfare, the use of coal for energy, federal funding for embryonic stem cell research and quick citizenship for illegal immigrants.
As a philanthropist, Bloomberg and his Bloomberg Philanthropies, have donated more than $3.3 billion to a wide variety of causes and organizations totaling about 1,500.
It is on the immigration issue that Bloomberg and Trump would clash sharply. Trump wants to deport all 12 million illegal immigrants now living and working in the U.S. He also wants to put up a 30-foot high concrete wall at the Mexican-Texas border.
Bloomberg calls Trump's immigration ideas preposterous and totally unrealistic. Instead, Bloomberg supports a federal ID data base that would use DNA and fingerprint technology to keep track of all citizens and to verify their legal status.
He has said whenever asked: "We're not going to deport 12 million people, so let's stop this fiction. Let's give them permanent status."
Like Trump, Bloomberg supports large-scale real estate developments. And also like Trump, Bloomberg is outspoken most of the time. He has often said: "If somebody asks me where I stand, I tell them. And that's not the way to get elected, generally."
However, that shoot-from-the-hip stance is working for Trump as he continues to top poll ratings monthly in almost every state he visits.
Like Trump, Bloomberg could easily afford and probably outspend Trump in what many insiders say will become a $1 billion campaign before the next President is elect in November 2016.
On the negative side, Bloomberg has often been cited for not allowing many emergency officials who responded to the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the Twin Towers in New York City, or even any clergy to attend the 10th anniversary observation of that day.
On the personal side, Bloomberg divorced Yorkshire-born Susan Brown in 1993 after an 18-year marriage. He states, however, they continue to be good friends. Bloomberg has two daughters, Emma 37 and Georgina 33. His sister Marjorie Tiven has been commissioners of the New York City Commission for the United Nations, Consular Corps and Protocol since 2002.
On the educational side, Bloomberg was graduated in 1964 with a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering at John Hopkins University. In 1966, he was graduated from Harvard Business School with a Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree.
During his 12 years as mayor of New York City, he brought his innovation-driven approach to city government. He turned around a broken public school system by raising standards and holding schools accountable for success.
Bloomberg's economic policies are cited as helping New York City experience record levels of private-sector growth, often in formerly depressed neighborhoods and even during a deep national recession.
Trump says he will do all that and more. But the facts are, Mr. Trump, that Bloomberg has already done it.
And that's the way it is at this moment.
