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firm should hire him because he was a state Senator. That was the implication of it -- the nature of the business that he would attract as a state Senator. It got terrible reviews.

I'll tell you one Fred Berman story, and then we'll have to stop. He subsequently became the rent commissioner under Lindsay, and one day I was at a meeting uptown and he was there. He said, “Can I take you back down to city hall, Ed?” He had his own car and chauffeur and a telephone in the car. He's a very pompous guy, very pompous guy. So I got in, and I never liked him. You know, once you run against somebody, you never really like him. And I had run against him, not in the primary but pre-primary, and you just never like these people. There's always something in there that gets you angry. They did something unfair or you did something unfair. At least that's been my experience. And I felt I'm better than he is, and here he became the state Senator. That bothered me.

Okay. Now I'm a city councilman and he's the rent commissioner. He invites me into his car. And also he has a car paid for by the city. That might have ticked me off, too. So he wants to impress me, and he says to the driver, “Call the office and see what telephone calls I have and what mail is there.” This guy says, “I don't know how.” (laughs) So Berman is a little embarrassed. “Give me the phone,” he says. And it's not a regular phone at that time. It is a radio phone. “This is Rover One.” It's