The FBI and prosecutors from Manhattan US Attorney Preet
Bharara’s office are probing Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver in
connection with money he received from a small law firm that specializes
in arranging real-estate tax reductions.
The firm, Goldberg & Iryami P.C., made the payments over about a
decade — but Silver failed to list the income on his
financial-disclosure forms, a source told The Post.
The prosecutors from Bharara’s office want to find out exactly what
Silver did to earn the money, the source added. The payments from the
law firm were “not substantial,’’ the source said.
The investigation is “moving along slowly,’’ the source added.
The probe grew out of the investigation conducted by the Moreland
Commission panel looking into corruption in Albany that was abruptly
shut down by Gov. Cuomo, according to The New York Times.
Among the issues it had been looking into is how state lawmakers earn money from their non-government jobs.
Silver is a personal-injury lawyer associated with the firm of Weitz and Luxenberg.
Goldberg & Iryami specializes in an arcane form of law known as “tax certiorari,’’ according to the Times.
That involves challenging real- estate tax assessments and seeking
reductions for developers who own residential or commercial property.
It appears to have only two lawyers, according to the Times.
Since 2001, the newspaper said, the firm and its principals have made six donations to Silver, totaling $7,600.
The most recent was in February, when it gave him $1,800.
The Times added that the small law firm has sought tax reductions for
many properties on the Lower East Side, which is the area Silver
represents.
Among the buildings the firm has represented is Silver’s own co-op,
as well as a commercial building nearby that houses his campaign
committee, according to the Times.
The speaker has long been a controversial figure.
Silver has faced criticism over how he handled allegations of sexual misconduct of one of his top aides in 2003.
He became ensnared in the Vito Lopez sex-harassment case when it
became public that he hired two firms to defend the disgraced former
assemblyman, spending nearly $700,000 in public funds.
Silver was nearly ousted as Assembly speaker by his fellow Democrats
in 2000 when they unexpectedly challenged his leadership position.
Silver, through a spokesman, declined to comment on the new probe. Additional reporting by Carl Campanile
Acts of passive-aggressive contempt aimed at Mayor Bill de Blasio by New York
police officers are disgraceful, and they are damaging the department’s credibility.
Credit
Shannon Stapleton/Reuters Mr. de Blasio isn’t going to say it, but somebody has to: With these
acts of passive-aggressive contempt and self-pity, many New York police
officers, led by their union, are squandering the department’s
credibility, defacing its reputation, shredding its hard-earned respect.
They have taken the most grave and solemn of civic moments — a funeral
of a fallen colleague — and hijacked it for their own petty look-at-us
gesture. In doing so, they also turned their backs on Mr. Ramos’s widow
and her two young sons, and others in that grief-struck family.
De Blasio and Bratton at the police-promotions ceremony on December 19.Photo: Mark Peterson/ReduxIt’s late afternoon on Friday, December 19, and Police
Commissioner Bill Bratton is surprisingly serene. Fourteen floors below
his office at One Police Plaza protesters are massing, once again, to
block the entrance to the Brooklyn Bridge. They’re chanting, “Hey, ho!
Racist cops have got to go!” as a smaller, pro-cop rally starts to
gather directly across the street. In the waiting room outside Bratton’s
office, the flat-screen TV tuned to NY1 is playing and replaying
cell-phone video showing an NYPD plainclothes cop punching a suspect as
he is being handcuffed.
Bratton is concerned, certainly. Yet he remains visibly unruffled,
reclining in a leather armchair. A puppet replica of his late great
sidekick and co-strategist, the former deputy police commissioner Jack
Maple, is propped on a shelf. Yes, Bratton says, in hindsight it was
probably a bad idea to sit on one side of the mayor with the Reverend Al
Sharpton on the other at a City Hall press conference back in July,
after the death of Eric Garner. True, his first year back atop the NYPD
has been stressful, particularly in the past month. Two weeks ago, on
the afternoon a Staten Island grand jury announced it would not indict
Officer Daniel Pantaleo, the cop who had wrapped his arm around Garner’s
neck, Bratton was briefly hospitalized for dehydration.
The
fresh Garner controversy came against the backdrop of the “fraying”
relationship between cops and community that he inherited, Bratton says:
“Commissioner Kelly and Mayor Bloomberg seemed to be somewhat tone-deaf
that stop, question, and frisk was causing a lot of growing tension.”
Now the protests have taken their own toll. Morale in the NYPD is not
good, and he knows it’s a serious problem that his officers feel
besieged. The media haven’t helped, Bratton says, with their portrayals
of his boss, Mayor Bill de Blasio. “The New York Post hates him with a passion,” he says. “If the cops are reading the Post,
they’re not going to like the mayor, because it’s hanging the mayor 24
hours a day.” Not that he thinks the other side of the
ideological-journalistic aisle has been much better: “The New York Times
doesn’t particularly like him because he’s not far enough to the left
for where they want to be. Most of the cops aren’t reading the Times in
any event — they just see it as the enemy because it’s been leading the
charge on the racial profiling and the allegations of racism.”
All the phony controversies, Bratton insists, misrepresent de Blasio:
“This guy’s heart is in the right place. He likes cops. He appreciates
what they do.” Six days earlier, two officers were attacked and injured
during a protest on the Brooklyn Bridge. Did the mayor visit them in the
hospital? Bratton’s temperature and volume rises. “Anytime a cop’s
injured, he calls me to get their number. He’s come to the hospital with
me. Let’s stop the bullshit.”
But the moment passes quickly. Despite all the turmoil, the
department has kept crime at historic lows, and Bratton says de Blasio
has given him an extra $200 million to spend on retraining and
technology, so next year will be even better. “The test of leadership is
in crises, not when things are running very well,” he says. “Look at
the crises that have occurred here this year. They’ve been dealt with
without the place going up in flames.” He smiles. Sure, it’s been a
tough stretch, but Christmas is right around the corner.
The corner of Tompkins and Myrtle Avenues the day after officers Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu were shot and killed.
Photo: null/Anadolu AgencyLess than 24 hours later, the city was aflame, at least emotionally, and Bratton’s eyes were brimming with tears. Two cops sitting in a patrol car in Brooklyn had been shot and killed by a gunman
who then shot himself. Rumors were swirling that the killer’s Instagram
postings said he was motivated by the deaths of Michael Brown and Eric
Garner. As de Blasio and Bratton entered a press conference at Woodhull
Medical Center that night, moments after meeting with the heartbroken
families of officers Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos, cops lining the
hallway turned their backs on the mayor and his commissioner in a
stunning act of disrespect. An hour later, the ugliness escalated, with
the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association president, Pat Lynch, roaring that de Blasio’s lenient treatment of demonstrators was to blame.
“There’s blood on many hands tonight,” he said, standing on a hospital
ramp just after the ambulances carrying the bodies of Liu and Ramos
pulled away. “That blood on the hands starts on the steps of City Hall,
in the office of the mayor.”
It was an outrageous claim. But Lynch’s diatribe played on anger in
the ranks that had been building, even among the many fair-minded cops,
since the 2013 campaign, abetted by a contract stalemate between the
city and the PBA. Now, in the aftermath of the shootings, the
combination of grief and grievance threatened to eclipse not just de
Blasio’s first-year accomplishments but his next three years in office.
Until December, the mayor had been heading to a mostly upbeat finish
to his rookie year. He cruised into office with 72 percent of the
general-election vote, promising to lead a progressive crusade, and is
indeed tugging New York leftward on social and economic policy, from
wages to immigration to speed limits.
He started 2014 in a protracted public wrangle with Governor Andrew
Cuomo and emerged bruised but with $300 million in state money to expand
the city’s prekindergarten programs, delivering on one of his main
campaign promises. He has since negotiated union contract deals with
more than two-thirds of city employees, combining raises with
medical-benefits changes that could end up saving the city millions of
dollars. His administration’s preparation for an Ebola case was
impressively thorough, and the mayor’s response to the city’s lone patient was nimble.
But those victories have come with a growing recognition of the
complicated necessities of keeping the city running efficiently — and of
tending to the old-politics power realities. So, for instance, de Blasio’s vow to create or preserve 200,000 units of affordable housing has meant not running afoul of the real-estate developers he needs to build those apartments.
His dealings with Bratton and the NYPD are a crucial case in point.
The tragedy in Bed-Stuy highlighted the high-wire act that came to
define de Blasio’s first year in City Hall and also the challenges he
faces in fulfilling his populist pledges while maintaining the city’s
stability. In 2013, de Blasio’s campaign flayed the NYPD’s overuse of
stop and frisk. That helped him win the election, but it left much of
the rank and file feeling as if they were being blamed for all the evils
of racism. The Garner protests have bred more skepticism and bitterness
toward de Blasio within the Police Department. Yet the same cops for
whom he’s mandated retraining are the ones the mayor needs to keep crime
low. De Blasio’s goal is to fundamentally change how his officers
police without undermining Bratton and alienating the force. The mayor’s
first year has been about learning how to walk that line. And lately
he’s been lucky to have a strong partner to lean on when he stumbles.
Outside City Hall on December 19, where protesters and supporters of the NYPD faced off.
Photo: Mark Peterson/ReduxThey don’t seem like natural allies. Bill Bratton, 67, became
internationally famous as the tough-guy police commissioner for
tough-guy Republican mayor Rudy Giuliani, cleaning up the city in the
early ’90s with a combination of computer crime tracking and an
aggressive crackdown on low-level, “quality of life” offenses like
fare-beating, a cluster of tactics given the catchy name “broken
windows.” Bill de Blasio, 53, spent his formative professional years as a
left-of-center operative in Democratic politics, then won an upset
victory in last year’s mayoral race by championing the city’s have-nots;
a sizable portion of his political base believes “broken windows” is
inherently racist. When Bratton was a young beat cop in Boston, he
policed civil-rights and antiwar demonstrations in which de Blasio could
have easily been a protester. (“No, I would have noticed him, he’s so
tall,” Bratton says with a laugh.) These days, Bratton spends his
off-duty time with one-percenters who he says disdain the mayor;
de Blasio’s downtime is more likely to be spent sweating in souvenir
T-shirts at the Park Slope Y.
But both men are deeply ambitious, and two years ago they found
themselves with overlapping needs. Bratton, even after more than six
successful years as chief of the Los Angeles Police Department, yearned
for a second shot in New York, a chance to erase the bad ending of his
first tour at One Police Plaza, where Giuliani chased out Bratton for
stealing the spotlight. De Blasio, the lefty long shot, saw in Bratton
not just a proven crime-fighter but a man who could cover for him with
the city’s Establishment. And both wanted to show they could bridge the
divide between cops and minority New Yorkers.
There have been firestorms (over the cop-bashing boyfriend of Rachel Noerdlinger, de Blasio’s wife’s chief of staff)
and setbacks (the accidental shooting death, by an East New York
housing cop, of 28-year-old Akai Gurley). But the mayor and the police
commissioner were still making steady headway in some ways, driving down
both the number of stop and frisks and the number of homicides. And
when their biggest test loomed, the release of the Garner-grand-jury decision,
they tried to get ahead of the trouble. The mayor rolled out
announcements of declining crime statistics and plans to equip cops with
body cameras earlier than originally intended.
On December 3, when the grand jury decided against indicting
Pantaleo, de Blasio traveled to Staten Island to meet privately with
aggrieved family members and community leaders. Then he delivered an
impassioned speech in a church. Back at City Hall, the mayor’s aides
were closely monitoring social media for reaction, poised to promote the
speech’s themes on Twitter with an assortment of hashtags. But then
they saw that de Blasio’s use of the slogan “Black lives matter” in the
speech registered with viewers organically and attached to positive
tweets.
Many cops, and mainstream media outlets, picked up on a different
passage: de Blasio’s description of “training” his son, Dante, to be
wary of encounters with police officers. The mayor’s empathy was
appropriate. But de Blasio, in his Staten Island speech, missed an
opportunity. If he had gone on to talk about how thousands of teenagers,
black as well as white, are able to walk home safely at night thanks to
the NYPD, he might have won the respect of cops who were looking for de
Blasio to be a passionate mayor for the entire city.
Instead, on December 12, Lynch, the PBA boss, launched an
inflammatory campaign to ban de Blasio from any future NYPD funerals.
The next night, two cops on the Brooklyn Bridge were attacked and
injured, sending one to the hospital with a broken nose. This was a
turning point in the protests that had been weaving and splintering
their way through city streets, peacefully if noisily, for almost two
weeks. Two days after the bridge mess, Bratton had vouched for de
Blasio, testily declaring that the mayor “misspoke” in describing the
assaults as “alleged.” Then Bratton went on to not-so-subtly pressure de
Blasio to start making an effort to wind down the protests by declaring
that they’d cost the city $22.9 million in overtime and were becoming
“a significant drain on the manpower of the city.”
Pro-Police and Anti-Police Protests
Photo: Mark Peterson/Redux
The next afternoon, four days before the shootings in
Bed-Stuy, the mayor is just getting off the phone with Bratton. The
police commissioner had described the briefing he’d just completed, over
at One Police Plaza, which included unveiling photos of the seven
people wanted in the Brooklyn Bridge attacks. On his end of the
conversation, the mayor told Bratton of his plans to meet with members
of the Justice League NYC — not the team of comic-book superheroes but a
group of protest leaders.
De Blasio steps from behind Fiorello La Guardia’s old desk and
settles into a red upholstered chair. In front of him is a table piled
with policy binders, family photos, and newspapers — the clutter looks
as if it had been transferred straight from his cramped family home in
Park Slope. He’s jacketless, in white shirtsleeves and a red tie with
gold dots, and does his best to sound relaxed. “I think I’ve always felt
a sort of familiarity and a comfort in the relationship with him just
on a human level, just a human connection, in part because we come from
some of the same reality,” de Blasio says of Bratton. “It was always
clear to me that we would be philosophically kindred.”
For all the personal bonding and professional teamwork, though, the
way he and Bratton have handled the tumultuous end of 2014 has been
driving down de Blasio’s job-approval ratings — and opening a huge
racial split — in public polls. The mayor brushes off the validity and
importance of those surveys. Does his own polling show anything
different? “I am not,” de Blasio says sharply, “getting into my own
polling.”
He is, however, unrestrained in defending the speech he’d given on
the day of the Garner decision and says its description of his warnings
to Dante has been distorted. “I’ve tried to do a lot this year to
support the police, to support the commissioner, to support the
department. Throughout that whole process, I didn’t hear people saying
we’re concerned about what you said about your son very openly last
year,” the mayor says. “The way [Garner] died, his voice, his family,
what we learned afterwards, I think it left just a deep, searing pain
for so many people. And so what I wanted to say was that I understood in
some form what people were feeling and that I was committed to the
changes we needed. People were searching for a direction, and that’s
what a leader is supposed to do, provide some sense of where we’re going
and some sense of solace, and so I’m very comfortable with what I did.”
Beyond the uproar over the NYPD there has also been, in New York’s
business and cultural communities, a growing sense that de Blasio is
indifferent to important sectors of city life. “If it doesn’t fit in the
inequality bucket, he’s not interested,” a banking executive says. Some
of that feeling is, as one real-estate executive puts it, “a Bloomberg
hangover” — after 12 years of their being lavished with attention, the
shift in focus to the city’s marginalized has been disorienting for the
elites. But there’s more at work than the whining of Wall Streeters.
Even Democrats sympathetic to the mayor’s policy objectives have been
disappointed by what they believe is his limited range. “He sees the
world through the lens of the people he has to make happy — this narrow
world of Democratic-primary politics,” a strategist says. “Yeah, you’re
gonna get reelected, but you’re not going to be a good mayor if you’re
governing for 10 percent of the city.”
De Blasio bristles at the suggestion that his words on Staten Island,
and his larger agenda, are pitched solely to his political base. “Well,
nothing could be farther from the truth,” he says, leaning forward, his
jaw clenched. “I think the facts are a vast percentage of our
population will qualify for the affordable-housing program. The
universal pre-K program was universal. I’ve spoken to
upper-middle-class parents who have benefited, and I’ve spoken to
several of the lowest-income in the city who have benefited. I think
we’ve been able to drive down crime in a lot of major categories. That
affects everyone. People across the board wanted to see reform of stop
and frisk. I mean, we’re executing the platform. This is what we came
here to do. It is still about the tale of two cities. It’s about healing
that and changing that and creating actual material change in people’s
lives.”
Now, though, de Blasio’s challenge is governing a city where millions
still haven’t made up their minds about him — while trying to regain
the trust of his Police Department. One hundred and eleven cops are smiling. They have good reason
to be happy, early on the afternoon of December 19: They’re in
full-dress uniform, surrounded by proud family members, marching into an
auditorium at One Police Plaza to be promoted to detective. The NYPD
band is playing “Louie Louie.” Then a stirring video, A Day in the NYPD,
is projected onto three massive screens hanging from the ceiling. It’s
full of scenes of cops shaking hands with grocers, strapping on
bulletproof vests, and keeping a benevolently watchful eye over the
city.
Before their names are called — Algabyali and Espinal and Yoon as
well as McAloon and Vitello, a vivid illustration of the inspiring
ethnic diversity of the modern department — and their detective
certificates distributed, the cops listen to speeches. First up is the
mayor, whose schedule today is a reminder of the straddle de Blasio is
attempting: This morning was his meeting with leaders of the Justice
League, and now he’s addressing the people the Justice League has been
protesting.
De Blasio says all the right words in his speech to the rising
detectives, and he no doubt believes what he’s saying. “Any act of
violence against our police officers is an act of violence against our
values,” he says. “On behalf of all 8.4 million New Yorkers, I want to
thank you.” Yet his manner is deferential instead of commanding. He
stands with his left hand in his pants pocket, and there’s little sense
of personal connection with his audience. It’s Bratton, up next, who
stirs spirits.
An hour later, up in his office, I ask the police commissioner about
another speech he gave recently, at the Association for a Better New
York, in which Bratton laid out a strong defense of “broken windows”
policing. “Stopping small things before they get big is essential,”
Bratton had told the business group. Wasn’t he, unfortunately, proved
right on the Brooklyn Bridge? Hadn’t weeks of managed disruptions led to
worse behavior, the attacks on his officers? “It hasn’t led to worse
behavior, except among a small group that was intent on creating
behavior because there was not enough happening,” Bratton says. Right,
but isn’t that the point of the anti-crime theory to which he’s deeply
loyal, that if minor disorder isn’t addressed, it inevitably grows? Not
in this instance, he argues. “If anything, that was the frustration:
that there was not enough police misbehavior, because what they
want to do is provoke misbehavior, and it wasn’t happening. So it’s not a
contradiction with ‘broken windows.’ Policing is all about situation.
You police to the situation.”
Bratton clearly recognized the urgency of the situation after the shootings in Bed-Stuy. He went on the Today show and said the murders were “a direct spinoff” of the protests.
It was a highly charged statement, but it appeared to have the desired
jolting effect: Six hours later, at a Police Athletic League lunch, de
Blasio called for a temporary moratorium on protests. Behind the scenes,
Bratton brokered a time-out with union leaders. The combination may
provide a chance for the mayor to lower the rhetorical heat and for
Bratton to shore up his credibility inside the NYPD. City Hall and One
Police Plaza insist the two men are closer than ever. But the mayor is
emerging from this drama even more dependent on his police commissioner.
In the longer run, the risk for Bratton is that cops become cautious,
unwilling to take the risks that keep everyone safe because they’ll be
villainized for any mistakes. Bratton says he hasn’t seen any evidence
that cops are on their heels. Besides, he’s lived through worse racial
animosity, back in the hometown that formed both him and de Blasio. As a
young cop in Boston in the ’70s, Bratton witnessed the vicious reaction
to forced desegregation of the schools, especially in Dorchester, the
blue-collar Irish-Polish neighborhood where he grew up.
“You wondered, How could this ever get better?” he says.
“Attitudes have changed dramatically. The Boston experience makes me
very optimistic about dealing with the issues we’re dealing with now.”
He says that the brutal murders in Bed-Stuy, and the war of words with
the unions, won’t make it more difficult to achieve the vision he and de
Blasio have set out — of a fairer, safer city for everyone. “Not at
all,” Bratton says two days before Christmas, as he prepares to head to
Boston to visit his 89-year-old father. “If anything, it’s moved things
back to the center. There was a very heavy leaning of momentum toward
the demonstrations. Now that this awful tragedy has occurred, it’s kind
of changed some of the dynamics of the discussion. It’s allowed
breathing room for the issues with the union and the mayor, even with
the demonstrators. I’m optimistic that out of this we’ll find some
degree of common ground. There really is no other option, is there?” The
city has to hope Bratton is right. Though it says a great deal about
the volatility of the current moment that anyone would think a
comparison to the 1970s is reassuring. *This article appears in the December 29, 2014 issue of New York Magazine.
Officers of the world's seventh biggest army, the New York Police Department, defied
their commander in chief, mayor de Blasio, by turning their back to him
while he gave a funeral eulogy for one of them. de Blasio had earlier
refrained from endorsing the killing of an unarmed black man by some N.Y.P.T. officers. Such racist murder by policemen is a regularoccurrence in New York.
One officer though did not follow the sheeple. Billmon rightly compares the picture above with this one. It was shot, I believe, in 1936 in Hamburg, Germany.
The story did not end well for the man in 1936. How will it end for the black N.Y.P.D. officer?
de Blasio should fire every officer that defied him. That likely
would not even increase the number of criminals on New York's streets.
They would only no longer wear a uniform.
Posted by b on December 28, 2014 at 08:00 AM | Permalink
Comments
Thank you for finding that picture. I was disgusted when I saw black
officers turn they're back on the Mayor. Some of his policies I do not
necessarily agree with (supporting Israel for one)but to turn their
backs shows a great deal disrespect not only for Mayor DeBalsio but all
the residents of NYC. I am sorry but the NYC police must earn the
respect of the people. If I do something wrong then I must be held
accountable same applies to them. Just because you are a police officer
does not mean you are immune. I hold DeBalsio does not buckle from this
and maybe he's the one to finally fix this corrupt Nazi fascist union
that believe they themselves are above the law. Enough. Below is an
article stating even black officers fear fellow white officers when they
are out of uniform. Does not surprise. Meet the new KKK. Same as the
old with the uniform being a different color. http://www.politicususa.com/2014/12/27/black-cops-fear-feel-threatened-white-officers.html
Posted by: NewYorker | Dec 28, 2014 8:29:39 AM | 1
"...de Blasio should fire every officer that defied him. That
likely would not even increase the number of criminals on New York's
streets."
It's been done... and, no, crime didn't rise. It actually went down.
Posted by: Monolycus | Dec 28, 2014 8:45:26 A
ill
de Blasio came to the office of New York City Mayor with an agenda for
reform of the New York City Police Department. He is quickly finding out
why his predecessors have had so much difficulty accomplishing the very
same thing.
The NYPD is the nation’s largest police department. It
is also one of the most corrupt, violent and entrenched. The NYPD is
also very savvy in the political ways of “The Big Apple.”
When NYPD officers turn their backs to de Blasio, one
of their objectives is to get him off their backs. This was planned
before the killings of officers Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos. As early
as December 12th, the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association (PBA) was
promoting a de Blasio shunning to its members, with the admonishment
“Don’t Let Them Insult Your Sacrifice!” referring to Mayor de Blasio and
Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito.
De Blasio has been very open about his desire for
reform within the NYPD, and the police have been just as open about
their determination that it will never happen.
The NYPD and the PBA, on behalf of the officers, paint
this as an officer safety issue. “City officials who want reform cost
cops their lives.” Not racist murders of unarmed New Yorkers – that of
course never creates animosity toward the police. But it does.
In fact, nothing puts the lives of America’s police
officers in greater jeopardy faster than racially motivated, unjustified
killings. If Eric Garner had not been needlessly killed, where would we
be today? Would officers Liu and Ramos still be alive?
There is an apparent perception on the part of the
NYPD rank and file and their union representatives that attempts at
reform are somehow bad for the department and the safety of the
officers. In fact transparency, accountability, the right training, and
attracting better educated personnel are the very things that would make
officers and the public they serve more safe.
What is really behind the well planned attacks on de
Blasio and the long standing resistance to change within the department
is a desire on the part of the NYPD old guard to maintain their power
structure.
The well choreographed insult to de Blasio at the
funeral of Officer Rafael Ramos was not only an insult to the mayor, but
to the dignity of the people of the city of New York.
At a time when unity is important to the police, the
community, and the city fathers, the NYPD and the PBA have chosen
cheap-shot, self-serving politics as the legacy of the two fallen
officers, amounting to yet another tragedy.
No good is served by police officers dying. A great
deal of good will result from the death of the NYPD old-guard power
structure.
To accomplish that, de Blasio will be tested.
Marc Ash was formerly the founder and Executive Director of Truthout, and is now founder and Editor of Reader Supported News.
Former president Jimmy Carter. (photo: Sara Saunders/The Carter Center)
By Jimmy Carter, The Washington Post
27 December 14
s we contemplate how to strike back at North Korea because it is believed to be behind the hacking of Sony Pictures Entertainment’s
computer network, the foremost proposal is tightening sanctions. In my
visits to targeted countries, I have seen how this strategy can be cruel
to innocent people who know nothing about international disputes and
are already suffering under dictatorial leaders.
The imposition of economic embargoes on unsavory
regimes is most often ineffective and can be counterproductive. In Cuba,
where the news media are controlled by the government, many people are
convinced that their economic plight is caused by the United States and
that they are being defended by the actions of their Communist leaders,
who are therefore strengthened in power. I have visited the homes of
both Castro brothers and some of the regime’s other top officials, and
it is obvious that their living conditions have not suffered because of
the embargo. Many Cuban families are deprived of good incomes, certain
foods, cellphones, Internet access and basic freedoms, but at least they
have access to a good education and health care, and they live in a
tropical environment where the soil is productive and where some
fortunate families may have trees that bear bananas and other fruit. In
addition, Cubans receive about $2 billion annually in remittances from friends and relatives in the United States.
The situation is more tragic in North Korea, where
none of these advantages exist. The U.S. embargo, imposed 64 years ago
at the start of the Korean War, has been more strictly enforced, with
every effort made to restrict or damage North Korea’s economy. During my
visits to Pyongyang, I have had extensive discussions with government
officials and forceful female leaders who emphasized the plight of
people who were starving. The United Nations’ World Food Program
estimates that at least 600 grams of cereal per day
is needed for a “survival ration” and that the daily food distribution
in North Korea has at times been as low as 128 grams. In 1998, U.S.
congressional staffers who visited the country reported a range of 300,000 to 800,000 dying each year from starvation.
In 2001, the Carter Center arranged for North Korean
agricultural leaders to go to Mexico to learn how to increase production
of their indigenous crops, and the U.S. contribution of grain
rose to 695,000 tons in the late 1990s during a brief period of
U.S.-North Korean reconciliation. However, the contribution was
drastically reduced under President George W. Bush and then terminated
completely by President Obama in 2010. I visited the State Department
then and was told that the main problem was North Korea’s refusal to
permit any supervision of food deliveries.
In 2011, I returned to North Korea, accompanied by
former president of Finland Martti Ahtisaari, former president of
Ireland Mary Robinson and former prime minister of Norway Gro
Brundtland, a physician who had been director of the World Health
Organization. We stopped first in Beijing for briefings from regional
World Food Program officials, who said there were no restraints on
monitoring of food deliveries to families in North Korea. They followed
us to Pyongyang and accompanied us to rural areas where tiny food
allotments were being distributed to families. The government gave an
official guarantee that all such food deliveries could be monitored by
the United States and other donors. I reported this to Washington, with
the assessment that one-third of North Korean children
were malnourished and stunted in their growth and that daily food
intake was between 700 and 1,400 calories per person, compared with a
normal American’s 2,000 to 2,500. Our government took no action.
There is no excuse for oppression by a dictatorial
regime, but the degree of harsh treatment depends at least partially on
the dissatisfaction of the citizens. Starving people are more inclined
to demand relief from their plight, protest and be punished or executed.
As in Cuba, the political elite in North Korea do not suffer, and the
leaders’ all-pervasive propaganda places the blame for deprivation on
the United States, not themselves. The primary objective of dictators is
to stay in office, and we help them achieve this goal by punishing
their already suffering subjects and letting them claim to be saviors.
When non-military pressure on a government is
considered necessary, economic sanctions should be focused on travel,
foreign bank accounts and other special privileges of government
officials who make decisions, not on destroying the economy that
determines the living conditions of oppressed people.
Maritza Ramos, center, the widow of Officer Rafael Ramos, with her two sons at the funeral for her husband on Saturday.
More than 20,000 police officers came together for the funeral of
Officer Rafael Ramos, who was fatally shot in his patrol car on Dec. 20,
at Christ Tabernacle Church in Queens.
As Mayor Bill de Blasio spoke at the funeral of Rafael Ramos, scores of
mourning police officers turned their backs to him, a sign of the
discontent he faces.
Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan delivered the homily at St. Patrick’s
Cathedral on Wednesday night, pointing to the tensions that have beset
the city recently.
A day after two police officers were fatally shot
in Brooklyn, Mayor Bill de Blasio faces the challenge of reassuring New
Yorkers and repairing a rift with the Police Department.
Ismaaiyl Brinsley, who the authorities say shot
and killed Rafael Ramos, below left, and Wenjian Liu in Brooklyn on
Saturday, had a history of firearm arrests and was accused of shooting
his former girlfriend earlier in the day in Maryland.
The
article below is satire. Andy Borowitz is an American comedian and New
York Times-bestselling author who satirizes the news for his column,
"The Borowitz Report."
he
banking giant Citigroup announced on Friday that it would move its
headquarters from New York to the U.S. Capitol Building, in Washington,
D.C., in early 2015.
Tracy Klugian, a spokesperson for Citi, said that the
company had leased thirty thousand square feet of prime real estate on
the floor of the House of Representatives and would be interviewing
“world-class architects” to redesign the space to suit its needs.
According to sources, Citi successfully outbid other
firms, including JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs, for the right to move
its headquarters to the House floor.
The Citi spokesperson acknowledged that the extensive
makeover of the House is expected to cost “in the millions,” but added,
“It’s always expensive to open a new branch.”
Explaining the rationale behind the move, Klugian told
reporters, “Instead of constantly flying out from New York to give
members of Congress their marching orders, Citigroup executives can be
right on the floor with them, handing them legislation and telling them
how to vote. This is going to result in tremendous cost savings going
forward.”
Klugian said that Citi’s chairman, Michael E. O’Neill,
will not occupy a corner office on the House floor, preferring instead
an “open plan” that will allow him to mingle freely with members of
Congress.
“He doesn’t want to come off like he’s their boss,”
the spokesperson said. “Basically, he wants to send the message, ‘We’re
all on the same team. Let’s roll up our sleeves and get stuff done.’ ”
De Blasio with Puerto Rico’s Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla in Old San Juan. (AP Photo/Ricardo Arduengo)
San Juan, Dec 17 (Prensa Latina) Puerto Rican governor, Alejandro
Garcia applauded today the decision of United States President Barack
Obama, to re-establish diplomatic relations with Cuba.
In this regard, Garcia warned that Puerto Rico should be 'increasingly
ready" due to the competition that will generate the change in the
economic arena.
"I firstly congratulated President Obama as he again made us look well', he said.
The announcement of the re-establishment of the diplomatic relations in
Washington by the US leader was in parallel with the one made in Havana
by Cuban President Raul Castro, however it does not include the end of
the economic blockade imposed on Cuba in 1962.
On the same line,
the president of the Puerto Rican Independence Party, Ruben Berrios,
considered the announce marks the beginning of the end of arrogance and
aggression against the island.
"This is the beginning of the end
of a policy of arrogance and aggression against Cuba, which will have
far reaching consequences in Latin America and the Caribbean", he
stated.
"Now it is needed the rectification in relation to Puerto Rico', he added.
He pointed out that isolation did not work with Cuba just as colonialism does not work in Puerto Rico.
Obama has reworked his government's position because the U.S. position
on Cuba -always contrary to the interests of Cuba - is also contrary to
the interests of the United States.
The negotiations to free Alan P. Gross, an
American aid worker, and reopen U.S. ties with Cuba took a year and a
half, in nine meetings held in Canada and the Vatican.
On Wednesday December 10 the UN hosted a pledging
luncheon of member states and other invited guests. The purpose was to
try to close the gap in funding to construct a memorial that was chosen
in a competition to honor the victims of slavery, of the transatlantic
slave trade. The memorial will be constructed on UN grounds.
According to Fanny Langella, the Deputy Spokesperson for the
President of the General Assembly, “the total cost for the memorial will
be $1.7 million. The funding gap at the time the luncheon was held, was
about $500,000. The provisional figure for the amount raised at the
luncheon was about $430,000, to be confirmed when the payments do come
in.”
In his welcome to guests at the luncheon, Jan Eliasson, the UN Deputy
Secretary General, explained that not only would the memorial raise
awareness of the historic injustices like the transatlantic slave trade,
but it would also honor “the slaves, the abolitionists, the unsung
heroes who fought to end this oppression. It will promote recognition of
the contributions that slaves and their descendants have made to their
societies. And it will remind us that people of African descent, and
victims of slavery across the world, continue to struggle under this
legacy. And there is still a lot of work to be done.”
The competition received 310 entries from 83 countries. UNESCO
shortlisted sixteen entries. From the semi-final entries, there were
seven finalists.
Of the seven finalists in the competition, Rodney Leon’s design, “The
Ark of Return” was selected as the the winning design. Leon is of
Haitian descent. Eliasson commended the winning design explaining that,
“It reminds us that in order to heal and make progress, we must
acknowledge and understand the past. We must draw the consequences, and
the conclusions from this understanding.”
Eliasson then noted that in his office there is a photograph of
Martin Luther King, Jr. This photograph, Eliasson said, “was given to me
by a person who was there in Selma, Alabama, at the march in 1965.”
Eliasson described how Martin Luther King was in the front line of
marchers, and behind him in the photograph were some flags, one of which
was the flag of the United States and another flag, the flag of the UN.
For Eliasson the presence of the UN flag in this demonstration
symbolized the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was
proclaimed 66 years ago at the UN, on the same date, December 10, as
this luncheon event.
The winning design prominently features the words “Lest We Forget”.
Move over, George Washington!
Mayor de Blasio wants to revamp the art collection at City Hall to
spice up the mostly vanilla collection of portraits of historically
prominent white men.
“The Mayor and First Lady believe the art at City Hall should reflect
the vibrant diversity of New York City, and discussions on how to
update the building’s collection to celebrate that diversity are
underway,” Mayoral spokeswoman Marti Adams said Friday.
City Hall has an extensive collection of portraits by renowned
artists such as Charles Wesley Jarvis, John Trumbull and John Vanderlyn.
There are portraits of past presidents, former mayors, military heros
and others who had a significant connection to New York City.
The announcement angered art historians who said the move was a
calculated politically correct move that would destroy an irreplaceable
collection.
“You do not dismantle a major historical collection or remove it from
the walls because it doesn’t appeal to your particular sense of taste
or your particular idea of the city now!” fumed Michele Bogart, a former
vice president of the Public Design Commission, which oversees the City
Hall portrait collection.
“It’s an absolute disgrace to take the efforts of staff of the previous administration and basically spit on them.”
‘It’s an absolute disgrace to take the efforts of staff of the previous administration and basically spit on them.’ - Michele Bogart, former Public Design Commission VP
Discussions are underway for what will be a long-term project and no
decisions have been made about what art would be removed and what art
brought in, city hall officials said.
This isn’t the first time City Hall’s monotone portrait collection has stirred up drama.
Then-incoming City Councilman Charles Barron said in 2001 that he
wanted to toss out the Thomas Jefferson portrait and replace it with a
bust of Malcolm X, calling the third president “a pedophile” who had a
sexual relationship with his young slave Sally Hemings.
Barron also said at the time that he would seek legislation to line
City Hall’s walls with portraits of black and Hispanic leaders – and
reportedly even gave the incoming speaker a hammer and nails so he could
hang portraits of the “brothers and sisters.”
Mayor Bloomberg liked the portraits just the way they are – a
non-profit organization he founded raised $1.7 million to restore and
conserve the collection of paintings in 2008.
Several portraits have already been taken down and stored as part of recent renovations, city officials said
The
article below is satire. Andy Borowitz is an American comedian and New
York Times-bestselling author who satirizes the news for his column,
"The Borowitz Report."
ormer
Vice-President Dick Cheney on Tuesday called upon the nations of the
world to “once and for all ban the despicable and heinous practice of
publishing torture reports.”
“Like many Americans, I was shocked and disgusted by
the Senate Intelligence Committee’s publication of a torture report
today,” Cheney said in a prepared statement. “The transparency and
honesty found in this report represent a gross violation of our nation’s
values.”
“The publication of torture reports is a crime against
all of us,” he added. “Not just those of us who have tortured in the
past, but every one of us who might want to torture in the future.”
Saying that the Senate’s “horrifying publication” had
inspired him to act, he vowed, “As long as I have air to breathe, I will
do everything in my power to wipe out the scourge of torture reports
from the face of the Earth.”
Cheney concluded his statement by calling for an
international conference on the issue of torture reports. “I ask all the
great nations of the world to stand up, expose the horrible practice of
publishing torture reports, and say, ‘This is not who we are,’ ” Cheney
said.
The January 2015 cover of
Vanity Fair shows Bradley Cooper with billiard balls. The headline on
the ball at far left seems, with a little imagination, to allude to the
mayor.
Tucked into the corner of the current cover of Vanity Fair,
which features a photograph of Bradley Cooper playing pool, is a
billiard ball with a partially visible, Esperanto-like headline: “ill
lasio ex ape!”
The
phrase, cut off at the left edge of the page, reads as nonsense. But
readers with a little imagination — particularly readers in New York —
might be forgiven for mentally filling in the blanks. Add a few missing
letters, et voilà :
Juan Flores, a leading theorist of Latin American studies and a pioneer
in the field of “Nuyorican” culture, the arts and language of Puerto
Ricans in New York who toggle culturally between the city and the
Caribbean island, died on Dec. 2 in Durham, N.C. He was 71.
(Reuters) - Mexican authorities on Sunday said that mounting
evidence and initial DNA tests confirmed that 43 trainee teachers who
were abducted by corrupt police 10 weeks ago were incinerated at a
garbage dump by drug gang members.
Attorney General Jesus Murillo
told reporters that one of the students had been identified by experts
in Austria from a bone fragment in a bag of ash and bits of burned tire
found in a river where drug gang members said they tossed the students
remains.
"This scientific proof confirms that the remains found at
the scene coincide with the evidence of the investigation," Murillo
said. "We will continue with the probe until all the guilty have been
arrested."
President Enrique Pena Nieto is facing his deepest crisis over his
government's handling of the probe. The case laid bare Mexico's deep
problem of impunity and corruption and it has overshadowed Pena Nieto's
efforts to focus on economic reforms.
One month ago, Murillo said
that drug gang members had confessed to murdering the students and
burning their bodies in a pyre of tires at an isolated dump.
But
parents of the missing students have refused to accept the government's
version and at a demonstration in Mexico City on Saturday night they
said they would continue to demand more answers even after they had
heard word of the DNA test results.
The apparent massacre has
spurred widespread and sometimes violent protests throughout Mexico.
Federal authorities waited 10 days after the students disappearance to
intervene in the case, insisting it was a local matter.
Murillo
said that 80 people have been detained in the probe, including the mayor
of Iguala and his wife who are accused of ordering the police to get
rid of the students from a radical left-wing college after they staged a
demonstration in his town. Murillo promised more arrests, including 16
fugitive policemen.
During the search for the students in the
state of Guerrero, dozens more bodies were discovered in mass graves.
More than 100,000 people have been killed in Mexico in gang-related
violence since 2007.
"There is a lot of rage, but it is not just
this case," said political science student Jimena Rodriguez at the
Saturday night march. "There are so many missing, and they do not have
the least interest in really investigating." (Reporting by Michael O'Boyle; Editing by Chris Reese)
When Mayor Bill de Blasio,
shown Wednesday, was asked on ABC's "This Week" on Sunday if the outcome
of the Eric Garner case had been just, he said, “I make it a point not
to talk about any element of judicial process per se.”Credit
Richard Perry/The New York Times
By MICHAEL M. GRYNBAUM 1:34 PM ET
When asked on ABC’s “This Week” if the grand jury made the right
decision not to indict the officer in the death of Eric Garner, Mayor
Bill de Blasio wouldn’t say.
Mayor Bill de Blasio:
We’ve just come from a meeting of clergy, and elected officials, and
community leaders here in Staten Island. And there’s a lot of pain and
frustration in the room this evening.
And, at the same time, a lot
of purposefulness. Everyone here, having spent so much of their lives
trying to address some of the divisions that afflict us – in particular,
our brothers and sisters who are members
of the clergy, having devoted themselves to comforting and supporting
people in all sorts of situations. Yet, tonight, there was a particular
sense of challenge, and of pain.
I want to thank everyone who
gathered together, in common purpose. I want to thank Bishop Brown for
hosting us, for his leadership. I want to thank Speaker Melissa
Mark-Viverito and Public Advocate Tish James. I want
to thank Borough President Jimmy Oddo. I want to offer a special thank
you to Council Member Debi Rose, who has been in the center of so much
of what’s happened in these last months, to help people understand what
we have to do together to move forward, but
also to listen, and absorb the pain and the frustration so many people
have faced. I know it has not been easy, council member, but I want to
thank you for your profound leadership.
And to so many of the clergy
that you worked with, who have been such important partners in
reminding people we have to find a way forward. And we have to find a
way forward together, by definition.
It’s a very emotional day
for our city. It’s a very painful day for so many New Yorkers. That is
the core reality. So many people in this city are feeling pain right
now. And we’re grieving, again, over the loss of
Eric Garner, who was a father, a husband, a son, a good man – a man who
should be with us, and isn’t. That pain, that simple fact, is felt
again so sharply today.
I spent some time with Ben
Garner, Eric’s father, who is in unspeakable pain. And it’s a very hard
thing to spend time trying to comfort someone you know is beyond the
reach of comfort because of what he’s been through.
I can only imagine. I couldn’t help but immediately think what it would
mean to me to lose Dante. Life could never be the same thereafter, and I
could feel how it will never be whole again – things will never be
whole again for Mr. Garner. And even in the
midst of his pain, one of the things he stopped and said so squarely
was, there can’t be violence. He said Eric would not have wanted
violence, violence won’t get us anywhere. He was so sharp and clear in
his desire, despite his pain. I found it noble. I could
only imagine what it took for him to summon that. No family should have
to go through what the Garner family went through.
And the tragedy is personal
to this family, but it’s become something personal to so many of us.
It’s put in stark perspective the relationship between police and
community. This issue has come to the fore again,
and we have to address them with all our might. We can’t stop. We have
to act, with the assumption that it’s all of our jobs to never have a
tragedy again – that’s what we have to fight for.
This is profoundly personal
for me. I was at the White House the other day, and the President of the
United States turned to me, and he met Dante a few months ago, and he
said that Dante reminded him of what he looked
like as a teenager. And he said, I know you see this crisis through a
very personal lens. I said to him I did. Because Chirlane and I have had
to talk to Dante for years, about the dangers he may face. A good young
man, a law-abiding young man, who would never
think to do anything wrong, and yet, because of a history that still
hangs over us, the dangers he may face – we’ve had to literally train
him, as families have all over this city for decades, in how to take
special care in any encounter he has with the police
officers who are there to protect him.
And that painful sense of
contradiction that our young people see first – that our police are here
to protect us, and we honor that, and at the same time, there’s a
history we have to overcome, because for so many
of our young people, there’s a fear. And for so many of our families,
there’s a fear. So I’ve had to worry, over the years, Chirlane’s had to
worry – was Dante safe each night? There are so many families in this
city who feel that each and every night – is
my child safe? And not just from some of the painful realities – crime
and violence in some of our neighborhoods – but are they safe from the
very people they want to have faith in as their protectors? That’s the
reality. And it conforms to something bigger
that you’ve heard come out in the protests in Ferguson, and all over
the country.
This is now a national
moment of grief, a national moment of pain, and searching for a
solution, and you’ve heard in so many places, people of all backgrounds,
utter the same basic phrase. They’ve said “Black Lives
Matter.” And they said it because it had to be said. It’s a phrase that
should never have to be said – it should be self-evident. But our
history, sadly, requires us to say that Black Lives Matter. Because, as I
said the other day, we’re not just dealing with
a problem in 2014, we’re not dealing with years of racism leading up to
it, or decades of racism – we are dealing with centuries of racism that
have brought us to this day. That is how profound the crisis is. And
that is how fundamental the task at hand is,
to turn from that history and to make a change that is profound and
lasting.
In the here and now, so many
New Yorkers will ask the question, what will happen next? They’ll ask,
will there be a full airing of these facts? Will there be some
investigation that means something to them? And I
think the truth is important here.
One chapter has closed, with
the decision of this grand jury. There are more chapters ahead. The
police department will initiate now its own investigation, and make its
own decisions about the administrative actions
it can take. The federal government is clearly engaged and poised to
act. Just before the meeting began with the leaders here on Staten
Island, I received a phone call from the United States Attorney General
Eric Holder, and from U.S. Attorney Loretta Lynch.
They made clear that the investigation initiated by the U.S. Attorney
would now move forward, that it would be done expeditiously, that it
would be done with a clear sense of independence, and that it would be a
thorough investigation. It was a palpable sense
of resolve – the federal government will exercise its responsibilities
here, and do a full and thorough investigation, and draw conclusions
accordingly.
We’ve experienced one
challenge after another in these last weeks. The events of Ferguson may
have most sharply framed this discussion nationally. For all of us here,
what's happened in our own community is what we
feel most deeply. It was hard for any one of us, as a human being, and
particularly any of us who is a parent, to not be deeply pained by the
death of Tamir Rice in Cleveland – a 12-year-old boy – something that's
very, very hard to fathom. And
all of these pains add up and demand of us
action. It is powerful, even in the midst of the pain, that our
President is acting. It is powerful that our President is focusing on
changing our approach to policing, to focus on community
policing, focus on the value of body cameras as a new tool for
accountability and transparency. It's powerful that our Attorney General
is focused.
These
things will matter. These things will lead to change. Here in this
city, change is happening. Even in this moment, people are feeling pain
and frustration
and confusion. Change is happening right now and I said in the meeting
change is happening because the people willed it to happen. We're
leaders, we all strive to serve and help our people, but the people
willed this change to happen. The people believed the
broken policy of stop and frisk had to end and it has ended. The people
believed there were too many young people of color arrested and saddled
with a record for the rest of their lives simply for the possession of a
small amount of marijuana and that policy
has been changed. The people demanded something different. It's my
responsibility and responsibility to everyone standing here with me to
achieve that on behalf of the people.
When
I named Commissioner Bratton as our Police Commissioner, I knew him to
be – I knew it at the time and I've seen it even more since – I knew him
to
be one of the greatest reformers and change agents in policing in the
history of this country. I have seen that ability and those values play
out each and every day.
I
saw it today at the New York City Police Department Academy where not
only did we talk about what body cameras will mean in terms of changing
the relationship
between the police and community, we talked about the re-training of
the entire police force, something that has never been done in this city
before. We talked about helping our officers understand the different
ways to diffuse confrontations. We talked about
bringing our officers closer to the community from the point of their
training, from the first moments of their experience as law enforcement
officers, emphasizing the partnership they needed with the community.
And I
remind you, my faith in Commissioner Bratton is based on the actions he
has taken over decades and it is also based on the clarity of his
message
to all of us. He gathered his top commanders a few weeks ago. It was
well-reported. He said very publicly, the department will act
aggressively to ensure any officer who is not meant to be in this work
no longer is. He talked about those who don't live up
to the values of the uniform, who have "brutal", who are “corrupt”, who
are “racist”, who are “incompetent”. This was our police commissioner
making clear his standard that people who sadly fit those descriptions
would not be members of the NYPD.
These
changes will matter. They will affect millions of people. They will
take time, but that is not in any way an excuse or an unwillingness on
our part
to do anything but the fastest change we can. It's an honest leveling
with our people that not every change can happen overnight, but they're
happening resolutely and forcefully, more happening every day. Each
change builds upon the next. There is a momentum
for change that will be felt in every neighborhood in this city.
And,
again, it doesn't come first and foremost, from City Hall, or from One
Police Plaza, it comes from the people of this city who have demanded
it. This
change is about the values of our people, the will of our people, the
goodness of our people. That's where change comes from. And everyone has
an opportunity to play a role in that change by continuing to work for
it. And that is across every community.
I
have to emphasize, and we've seen this all over the country, but I know
it's true here, and I have an experience from last year that I think is
evidence.
This is not just a demand coming from the African American community.
It's not just a demand coming from the Latino community. It's coming
from every community. It's coming from people from all faiths who want a
city of fairness, who want violence to end,
who want no family to go through the tragedy the Garners did.
So,
people will express themselves now, as they should in a democracy. I ask
everyone to listen to what Ben Garner said and what Eric Garner's son
said
as well – if you really want a dignified life of Eric Garner, you will
do so through peaceful protest. You will work relentlessly for change.
You will not sully his name with violence or vandalism. That doesn't
bring us closer to a better community. The only
thing that has ever worked is peaceful protest. Non-violent social
activism is the only thing that has ever worked.
And
the Garner family has made the abundantly clear. Michael Brown's family
made that abundantly clear. People should listen to those we say we
stand in
solidarity with, fulfill their wishes and work for change the right
way.
I'll just finish with a couple more points and then I want to say something in Spanish before I depart.
So
many of us steeped in the teachings of Dr. King, there are many great
leaders, but perhaps no one more definitional in the work of social
change and
the work of justice than Dr. King and he said something so fundamental
that should remind us how we need to handle this moment. He said,
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." This is a
problem for all New Yorkers. This is a problem for all
Americans. It has to be treated as such.
Anyone
who says to you this is a problem only felt by people of color or only
pertinent to young people and this is what's going on here. It's all our
problem
– and anyone who believes in the values of this country should feel
called to action right now. Anyone who cares about justice, that
American value of justice, should understand it is a moment that change
must happen. Change is as good as the people that we
represent.
We
have a lot of work to do together. I want to thank all of my colleagues
who have been working so hard here in the neighborhoods of Staten Island
and
so many all over the city. Their work matters. Their work is being
felt. It will continue to be felt as we continue the work of change and
reform. I want to thank again Bishop Brown for bringing us together. I
want to thank all of the leaders here today. I'll
turn to Bishop Brown and Speaker Mark-Viverito and Public Advocate
James and they'll continue talking to you.
I
want to thank you, everyone, for this chance to talk about this moment
that we're all facing together. And we will address our problems in this
city together.
Thank you.
ill
de Blasio came to the office of New York City Mayor with an agenda for
reform of the New York City Police Department. He is quickly finding out
why his predecessors have had so much difficulty accomplishing the very
same thing.
s we contemplate how to strike back at North Korea because it is 
he
banking giant Citigroup announced on Friday that it would move its
headquarters from New York to the U.S. Capitol Building, in Washington,
D.C., in early 2015.
ormer
Vice-President Dick Cheney on Tuesday called upon the nations of the
world to “once and for all ban the despicable and heinous practice of
publishing torture reports.”
http://www.politicususa.com/2014/12/27/black-cops-fear-feel-threatened-white-officers.html