Asked on Meet The Press if he planned to run for President in 2012, Mayor Bloomberg was unequivocal.

“I will rule out a run for President,” he said. “I have the best job I possibly could have.”

In 2007, when as we know, he actually was considering a run for President, Bloomberg also denied his interest by saying, “I’ve got the greatest job in the world.”

Is there a difference between having a job that is the greatest in the world, and a job that is greatest the Mayor thinks he “possibly could have?”  In that little phrase, the mayor seems to recognize his political ceiling, and that his appeal may not extend beyond the five boroughs. Or, as he often put it back then, “How can a 5-foot-7, divorced, billionaire Jew running as an independent from New York possibly have a chance?”

And speaking of 2012, it will be interesting to see if Diana Taylor’s vocal musings about replacing Kirsten Gillibrand in the Senate have any effect on the Mayor’s relationship with President Obama. Team Bloomberg has cultivated the Obama Administration assiduously. Initially, they wanted to neutralize the possibility that Obama would campaign hard for the Mayor’s then-rival Bill Thompson. Since then, the Mayor has generally refrained from criticizing the President. But by 2012, the Democrats will likely have a much smaller majority in the Senate, and if Taylor runs and wins, she could help bring about an ever smaller majority or a flip to Republican control.

The prospect of the president campaigning against the mayor’s companion could be enough for Bloomberg to dissuade Taylor from taking the plunge—assuming that she is still persuadable by then.

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