© Spencer Platt/GettyMayor Bloomberg is sounding the alarm bell over the nation's struggling economy.
Mayor Bloomberg warned Friday there would be riots in the streets if Washington doesn't get serious about generating jobs.
"We have a lot of kids graduating college, can't find jobs," Bloomberg said on his weekly WOR radio show.
"That's what happened in Cairo. That's what happened in Madrid. You don't want those kinds of riots here."
In Cairo, angry Egyptians took out their frustrations by toppling presidential strongman Hosni Mubarak - and more recently attacking the Israeli embassy.
As for Madrid, the most recent street protests were sparked by widespread unhappiness that the Spanish government was spending millions on the visit of Pope Benedict instead of dealing with widespread unemployment.
Bloomberg's unusually alarmist pronouncement came as President Obama has been pressuring reluctant Republicans to pass his proposed job creation plan.
"The damage to a generation that can't find jobs will go on for many, many years," the normally-measured mayor said.
Bloomberg gave Obama kudos for coming up with a jobs plan.
"At least he's got some ideas on the table, whether you like those or not," he said. "Now everybody's got to sit down and say we're actually gonna do something and you have to do something on both the revenue and the expense side."
And everybody's got to share in the pain.
© APThe streets of Cairo erupted in violence this spring.
"When you start picking and choosing which groups do and do not, that's when it becomes unfair in a lot of people's minds," the mayor said. "But we're all in this together."
Obama didn't create this economic mess, it developed "over long periods of time," Bloomberg said.
Obama's approval rating has sunk along with the economy, but the ratings of the Republicans who have stymied his attempts repair the damage are even worse, most polls show.
Already, House Speaker John Boehner, an Ohio Republican, has drawn a line on raising taxes on the rich to pay for Obama's proposed $447 billion jobs plan, which aims to help the middle class.
To get something rolling, you often have to start by pushing it.
Notice that he used the word "riot" per this report, not "demonstration."
So apparently Bloomberg wants riots more than he wants demonstrations.
This person and this article are fear mongering.
What about some solutions?
The real solutions are going to come from capital. That rules out most working people and their governments. They're all in debt.
But if that capital was stolen (and I think much of it was), then we need some mechanism for getting it back. I don't think riots is that mechanism.