Defying Mayor Bloomberg and his top cop, Raymond Kelly, the City Council passed two bills Thursday morning to rein in the NYPD’s use of stop and frisk.
City Council passes 2 bills to rein in the NYPD's use of stop and frisk
ERIN DURKIN
Thu, 27 Jun 2013 07:24:42 GMT
Bill de Blasio anchors frontrunner Christine Quinn to NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly in a new web ad focused on the top cop's contention that African-Americans are "understopped" by police. Public Advocate de Blasio, along with Quinn, former Comptroller Bill Thompson and ex-Councilman Sal ...
Bill de Blasio Cuffs Chris Quinn To NYPD Boss Ray Kelly In New Anti-Stop And Frisk Web Ad
The Daily Politics
Fri, 03 May 2013 15:26:55 GMT
The FBI busted Democratic state Sen. Malcolm Smith of Queens Tuesday and was set to haul in City Councilman Dan Halloran on charges they conspired to rig the 2013 mayoral election by buying Smith a spot on the Republican ballot, sources said.
FBI busts State Sen. Malcolm Smith in mayoral election rigging plot
Greg B. Smith
Tue, 02 Apr 2013 12:50:21 GMT
Here is my story (with an assist from Reuven Blau) on Vito Lopez that ran today: Pervy Assemblyman Vito Lopez found a 14-year-old intern so sexy that he fantasized aloud about living in a state where it was legal to sleep with underage girls, a source told the Daily News. After ogling the ...
Vito Lopez Lamented State's Statutory Rape Laws While Ogling Intern: Sources
The Daily Politics
Mon, 11 Mar 2013 10:50:17 GMT
Columbus, Ohio
THE legal scholar Derrick A. Bell foresaw that mass incarceration, like earlier systems of racial control, would continue to exist as long as it served the perceived interests of white elites.
Thirty years of civil rights litigation and advocacy have failed to slow the pace of a racially biased drug war or to prevent the emergence of a penal system of astonishing size. Yet a few short years of tight state budgets have inspired former “get tough” true believers to suddenly denounce the costs of imprisonment. “We’re wasting tax dollars on prisons,” they say. “It’s time to shift course.”
Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker, shocked many earlier this year when he co-wrote an essay for The Washington Post calling on “conservative legislators to lead the way in addressing an issue often considered off-limits to reform: prisons.”
BY John Marzulli
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERMonday, March 28th 2011, 8:11 PM
Ward for News
Former state senator Pedro Espada Jr. is now in trouble with the feds.
The feds unsealed a superceding indictment Monday charging ex-Bronx state Sen. Pedro Espada Jr. and his son with tax evasion.
He, and son Pedro Gautier Espada, were also hit with a new wire fraud charge in connection with a bid-rigging scheme to win a janitorial contract.
Pedro Espada Jr. is accused of filing personal tax returns in which he under-reported his income in the years 2005-2007.
His son is charged with filing falsified corporate returns for the janitorial service in 2004-2005, according to the indictment filed in Brooklyn Federal Court.
Both men are free on $750,000 bail and will likely be arraigned on the new indictment next week.
They are accused of stealing more than $550,000 from Soundview Medical Center coffers to pay for expensive dinners, tickets to Broadway shows and and sports events and a downpayment on a Bentley.
Federal prosecutors indicated the government will seek forfeiture of the Espadas' ill-gotten profits if they are convicted.
Pedro Gautier Espada's lawyer declined to comment. Pedro Espada Jr.'s lawyer could not immediately be reached.
Feds unseal indictment charging Pedro Espada Jr. and son with tax evasion
Rafael Martínez Alequín
Tue, 29 Mar 2011 01:01:00 GMT
McCain and Team Have Many Ties to Gambling Industry[CLICK HERE FOR MORE]
By JO BECKER and DON VAN NATTA Jr.
Senator John McCain was on a roll. In a room reserved for high-stakes gamblers at the Foxwoods Resort Casino in Connecticut, he tossed $100 chips around a hot craps table. When the marathon session ended around 2:30 a.m., the Arizona senator and his entourage emerged with thousands of dollars in winnings.
A lifelong gambler, Mr. McCain takes risks, both on and off the craps table. He was throwing dice that night not long after his failed 2000 presidential bid, in which he was skewered by the Republican Party’s evangelical base, opponents of gambling. Mr. McCain was betting at a casino he oversaw as a member of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, and he was doing so with the lobbyist who represents that casino, according to three associates of Mr. McCain.
Is Everyone A Little Bit Racist?
Carol Platt Liebau
Sunday, September 21, 2008
If Barack Obama’s primary campaign had had a Broadway theme song, surely it would have been “One Enchanted Evening” from “South Pacific;” Democrats saw “a stranger from across a crowded room” and fell for him – hard. But in the general election, the words have changed and the song no longer remains the same. Last week, it became clear that the Rogers & Hammerstein classic has been replaced by an anthem from the modern Broadway hit “Avenue Q”: “Everyone’s A Little Bit Racist.”
CNN’s Jack Cafferty surely spoke for legions of Obama supporters – and doubtless, a good deal of the press – when he proclaimed that it “doesn’t make sense” that the presidential polls remain neck-and-neck “unless it’s race.” In fact, by week’s end, the Associated Press was touting a poll it conducted with Yahoo News finding that one-third of Democrats “harbor negative views toward blacks.” From that, AP reporters concluded, “the percentage of voters who may turn away from Obama because of his race could easily be larger than the final difference between the candidates in 2004.” In other words, they claimed that voter racism alone could cost Barack Obama the election.
Certainly, the meme perfectly encapsulates elite views on the “latent racism” of regular Americans. The only problem? It’s logically flawed. It suggests that just because some voters may “harbor negative views” about African Americans in the abstract, they will refuse to vote for this particular African-American candidate just on that basis.
The piece undermines its own premise by conceding, “Many whites who see blacks in a negative light are still willing or even eager to vote for Obama.” Of course they are. Despite even negative preconceptions, people are capable of evaluating specific individuals on their own merits. That’s why – so long as he remains vigorous and seems in good health -- John McCain can still hope to win over those who generally believe that the seventy-plus set belongs in retirement homes, not The White House.
Or take gender as an example. No doubt plenty of men who would label women as “flighty” or “over-emotional” in the abstract are ardent supporters of Sarah Palin. And feminists like Gloria Steinem – who have eagerly purveyed negative stereotypes about men in general – have been enraptured with Bill Clinton, a man whose personal behavior encapsulates everything they purport to oppose.
It’s time to accept the fact that almost everyone (including America’s elite) stereotypes others – consciously or unconsciously, favorably or unfavorably – on the basis of age, gender, race, ethnicity, religion, socio-economic status and a myriad of other characteristics. Indeed, Barack Obama himself has done it, with his comments about the “bitter” people “clinging” to guns and religion; similarly, most of the liberal rage at Sarah Palin stems from her refusal to conform to many Democrats’ cherished stereotype of a “woman leader.”
But the mere fact that stereotypes exist doesn’t mean they’re determinative. The AP report admits, “Race is not the biggest factor driving Democrats and independents away from Obama.” In fact, more Americans are concerned about his competence – and should be worried about his far left policies, inexperience, naivete and obvious discomfort with American exceptionalism. Chances are, if Obama can address those issues, the matter of his race will largely take care of itself.
Although it’s tempting for his supporters to blame his defeat prospectively on the bigotry of the American public, in truth, it’s almost impossible to predict how and whether Barack Obama’s race will hurt him. Many Americans, especially the young, have been attracted to Obama – not despite his race – but because of it. After all, it’s hard to imagine a white, first-term politician, from a northern state and with the most left-wing voting record in the Senate having been made his party’s standard bearer four short years after first emerging on the national scene. What’s more, Obama enjoys nearly unanimous support among blacks, and can count on unprecedented voter turnout in the African American community. Most importantly – contrary to many elite stereotypes – the American public is both decent and fair, and its members will vote accordingly.
Ultimately, all the energy expended on frenzied societal self-flagellation about stereotyping would be better spent on recognizing and correcting for the biases that all of us have. And that’s a process that would be infinitely easier if robust discussion about our misunderstandings and differences hadn’t become so taboo. As the cast sings at the conclusion of “Everyone’s a Little Bit Racist,” if “everyone stopped being / So PC / Maybe we could live in /Harmony!”
[courtesy of townhall.com]
