de Blasio spox tells PR underlings about "combative media environment," advises "attack" strategy to control media coverage

de Blasio administration PR staff told to "attack" the media in "incredible" and "truly historic" pep talk

RELATED Following bombardment of bad press, Mayor de Blasio spinning his way back to illusion of competency (NYC : News & Analysis) 'We need to attack, not react,' de Blasio press secretary tells PR staff in pep talk (The New York Daily News)

Mere weeks after Ginia Bellafante excoriated the de Blasio administration's record of accomplishment in a Sunday edition of The New York Times, the mayor's spokesman, Phil Walzak, strikes back ! “We need to attack, not react – no bunker mentality,” City Hall Press Secretary Phil Walzak said at a Thursday gathering of about 50 city agency PR staffers, according to a tipster to The New York Daily News, adding, "Be aggressive. Tell your story loudly and proudly," before he noted that, "We live in a very combative media environment." Mr. Walzak's instructions to "attack" the media came the same week when the de Blasio administration continued to deny reporters access to the police arrest report for City Hall supporter Bishop Orlando Findlayter, even though the court system reached a disposition of Bishop Findlayter's case in his favor, as City Hall expected. Bishop Findlayter peaded guilty to lesser charges in exchange for being sentenced to time served. Apparently, denying Freedom of Information Law, or FOIL, requests is now part of City Hall's efforts to "attack" and "control" the media. Is the de Blasio administration afraid of being held accountable for delivering on a progressive reform agenda that combats public corruption ? Many New York City-based political bloggers and reform activists wonder if Mayor de Blasio's new-found aggression towards media scrutiny of his administration has anything to do with the public corruption scandals playing out right now from City Hall all the way up to Albany.

Wave of ethics scandals threatens to engulf Queens Library, and its leadership

PUBLISHED : FRI, 27 JUN 2014, 12:17 PM
UPDATED : SAT, 28 JUN 2014, 09:24 AM

Not even Councilmembers with former leadership posts at the corrupt Queens Library can reign in rampant public corruption at the troubled lending library

RELATED Sack them all : Bye-bye to Queens Library chief Tom Galante — and the board members who enabled his reign of greed (The New York Daily News) Queens Public Library trustees plan to remove Thomas Galante as director — then give him consulting job that pays $800G (The New York Daily News) Gov. Cuomo signs bill to reform operations at embattled Queens library system (The New York Daily News) City Councilman Jimmy Van Bramer explodes at colleagues over charges he's too close to corrupt Queens Library President Thomas Galante (The New York Daily News)

Just hours after Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed an emergency bill into law, giving Mayor Bill de Blasio and Queens Borough President Melinda Katz powers to remove from office the corrupt Trustees of the troubled Queens Borough Public Library, the Editorial Board of The New York Daily News published a scathing editorial, encouraging the mayor and the Queens beep to do exactly that. The Editorial Board wants the Queens Library Board of Trustees to be held accountable for the charges of corruption against the nonprofit's president, Thomas Galante. "De Blasio and Katz must sack all those who aided and abetted Galante and appoint top-notch replacements, who will open the library’s internal workings under him to full scrutiny before paying him a penny." Can the Queens Library survive this ethics and financial scandal ? Queens Library President Galante has seen his management of the lending library come under immense scrutiny once it was reported by The New York Daily News that he was earning nearly $400,000 per year, enjoying six-figure office renovations, and receiving other perks, including a reported $37,000 annual car allowance. Mr. Galante was seen as perversely milking the Queens Library dry at the same time that the lending library was laying off low-paid employees. A report in The New York Daily News indicated that the Queens Library has eliminated nearly 130 jobs over the past five years. Not even Councilmember Jimmy Van Bramer, who formerly served in the leadership of the Queens Library, was able to hold his former colleagues accountable for the wave of ethics scandals that now threaten to engulf the Board Members of the troubled lending library. Queens residents don't know how the Queens Library can survive a scandal of these proportions if its nonprofit trustees failed to each of keep a check on its governance, administer "normal" compensation for its executives, propose and award construction contracts based on sound business judgement, and reasonably determine other perks, such as the awarding of car allowances. According to a report by a library watchdog group, the Queens Library is "currently under investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and city Department of Investigation." Strategically-important community nonprofits in New York City, which have collapsed in recent years under governance and financial scandals, include the Bronx Community Pride Center and People of Color in Crisis, or POCC. The swift passage of the Queens Library reform bill through the corrupt state legislature and Gov. Cuomo's swift enactment shows that there is a way for Albany to clean up public corruption in New York State. Many New York City-based political bloggers and reform activists wonder why does one lending library in Queens receive this kind of rapid response, but the public corruption scandals playing out right now from City Hall all the way up to Albany get no immediate legislative attention at all.

Sal Albanese looks at exploitation of LICH closure through political lens of post-Bloomberg New York

LICH Leftovers : Mayor de Blasio has been very quiet about the closure of Long Island College Hospital on his watch, outraging the community allies he exploited to use LICH as a campaign prop to get elected.

RELATED LICH Leftovers (The Huffington Post)

"The powers that be back down from a public fight only to pull the plug in a backroom deal days later," wrote former New York City Councilmember Sal Albanese about the bitter fight to save Long Island College Hospital. Mr. Albanese's essay, published on The Huffington Post, is his second installment on the post-election political realities playing out in New York City. His first essay in this series was published earlier this month. The allusion to backroom deals is a damning indictment of how Mayor Bill de Blasio has abdicated his public health policy responsibility to voters with LICH closing on his watch. "But LICH already served its purpose as de Blasio's campaign prop," Mr. Albanese concluded, informing voters about how duplicitous Mr. de Blasio was in last year's mayoral campaign. Let's hope more voters read Mr. Albanese's writings and follow him on Twitter. Mr. Albanese's political analysis offers voters an unvarnished truth about how politics plays out in New York City -- sadly, often to the detriment of voters' demands for reforms.

Controversial LGBT Poster Debuted At Brooklyn Pride, First Project of "The Reformers"

(Some Of) The Faces That Sell-Out The LGBT Community

We're celebrating Brooklyn Pride pic.twitter.com/jiRcM5pff2

— Louis Flores (@maslowsneeds) June 14, 2014

RELATED The Faces That Sell-Out The LGBT Community (LGBT Sell-Outs)

At the Brooklyn Pride festival yesterday, the city's LGBT community turned out for food and entertainment, a street fair, and a rude wake-up call. A poster showing the faces and names of 16 LGBT leaders, who, over the years, have stopped fully advocating for the community on whose behalf they serve, was taped up along several blocks of Fifth Avenue in Brooklyn. Some posters were affixed to the front doors of Port-A-Potties, a popular place for festival-goers to congregate. Outside one Port-A-Potty, a group of gay men surveyed the poster. One remarked of the leadership of the Human Rights Campaign, or HRC, the largest LGBT advocacy organization in the United States, by observing, "HRC doesn't hire people of color." This observation is backed up by criticisms made by many LGBT civil rights activists, most notably, by the San Francisco-based blogger and activist, Michael Petrelis. When Mr. Petrelis blogged about HRC's sudden funding of LGBT equality efforts in Alabama, Mr. Petrelis noted the lack of any people of color in HRC's partner for that state. Mr. Petrelis is not involved in the postering effort in Brooklyn, but his observations help to underscore how many activists raise criticisms about the LGBT community's leaders, which our leadership organizations never fully address. The failure of LGBT community groups to be fully accountable and transparent to the broader constituency forms the basis of the controversial "LGBT Sellout Faces" poster that was taped up along the route of the Brooklyn Pride festival.

LGBT sellout poster reaction : "HRC doesn't hire people of color." pic.twitter.com/l1j4RvC1qz

— LGBT For Change (@lgbt4change) June 14, 2014

Another reaction to LGBT sellout poster : "OMG I have friends on this, but you're right." #BrooklynPride pic.twitter.com/hq0Kzyp2wp

— LGBT For Change (@lgbt4change) June 14, 2014

Besides poster-sized forms that were taped up along the route of the Brooklyn Pride festival, a flyer of the poster was also handed out by activists calling for reform of LGBT community groups and their leadership. At one point, a flyer was handed to a volunteer for HRC. The volunteer said he refused to take an "anti-HRC flyer." A companion HRC volunteer refused to take the flyer, as well. But a third HRC volunteer, perhaps a supervising volunteer, accepted the flyer, and this third volunteer inquired about the nature of the flyer.

When told that veterans, including Lt. Dan Choi, and GetEQUAL pressed for DADT repeal, HRC volunteer had no reply. @lgbt4change

— LGBT For Change (@lgbt4change) June 14, 2014

When a reform activist told the third HRC volunteer that the flyer represented LGBT leaders, who have "sold-out" the community, the volunteer noted that former HRC President Joe Solmonese, who appeared on the flyer, was no longer in a leadership post at HRC, but the volunteer asked why was the current HRC president, Chad Griffin, appearing on the flyer ? The activist responded that under Mr. Solmonese, HRC was not responsive to the LGBT community's demands for reform, which is why he was forced to step down. Mr. Griffin, in his relative short tenure at HRC, has created controversy by claiming credit for the nation-wide movement for marriage equality, a claim that flies in the face of the truth that grassroots activists have been pressing for equal civil marriage rights for decades before Mr. Griffin's ascention into HRC's top leadership post. The HRC volunteer replied that volunteers are "told to respond" by saying that "HRC repealed Don't Ask, Don't Tell," referring to the U.S. military's former discriminatory policy against LGBT recruits. When challenged with the truth about how U.S. servicemember veterans, such as Lt. Daniel Choi and others, as well as members of the grassroots group GetEQUAL lead the charge to press Congress and the White House to repeal DADT, and that HRC was busy soliciting donations from military contractors to fully press for a revolutionary end to the Defense Department's discrimination against LGBT servicemebers, the HRC volunteer responded that volunteers are "told to respond" by saying that HRC was responsible for passing the Matthew Shepard Act, referring to the hate crimes law named after a student, who died in 1998 of torture-related injuries he received in a vicious hate crime attack in Laramie, Wyoming. The way HRC claims the progress and successes in LGBT equality made by other groups is a long-standing complaint about how HRC disrespects the grassroots role of many LGBT activists and their grassroots organizations. As it appeared pointless to continue the conversation with the third HRC volunteer, the activist distributing the "LGBT Sellout Faces" flyer walked away, leaving the HRC volunteer with a copy of the flyer. In the last year, many grassroots LGBT activists have been questioning the equality movement's leadership. In New York City, voters rejected the fordmidable mayoral campaign of former New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn. Former Speaker Quinn, the highest-ranking LGBT politician in New York City government, spent 15 years in office without having enacted one transformative LGBT equality law during her incumbency in office. In the same year when former Speaker Quinn's political career came to an abrupt halt, LGBT activists succeeded in unseating former Gay Men's Health Crisis CEO Marjorie Hill. GMHC, as the agency is better known, suffered a series of grave financial reversals under Ms. Hill's leadership. Other agency officers, such as Dirk McCall, separated from GMHC during the management reshuffle. In San Francisco, LGBT activists are working to unseat San Francisco Board of Supervisor Scott Wiener, who is viewed by many as a neoliberal Democratic politician working to serve wealth campaign contributors and real estate developers instead of San Francisco's LGBT constituency. The "LGBT Sellout Faces" poster was the first project of "The Reformers," a new activism group formed by the documentary filmmaker Wolfgang Busch and the blogger Louis Flores, who are calling on a political and nonprofit overhaul in LGBT leadership.

New revelations about possibly greater coordination between controversial anti-Quinn attack Super PAC and official campaigns

Anybody But Quinn Used Voter Info From Other Advance Group Campaigns : Sources

RELATED Anybody But Quinn Used Voter Info From Other Advance Group Campaigns: Sources (The New York Observer) Did New York State Election Officials Create a Dual Mandate Loophole to Campaign Finance Caps ? [UPDATED] (NYC : News & Analysis)

Somebody from the corrupt “Anybody But Quinn" Super PAC has leaked new information about possibly illegal campaign coordination to the reporter Will Bredderman of The New York Observer relating to how information sharing was done behind the scenes at The Advance Group. That customized voter registration information belonging to official campaigns was, inturn, used by the Super PAC adds to a pattern of coordination following revelations that campaign cash flowed circuitously amongst the Super PAC, its contributors, and the official campaigns managed by The Advance Group in the last election. As if that wasn't enough, many activists taking part in the Anybody But Quinn movement carried the banner for reforms to end Quinn-like government and campaign corruption. But as soon as the new mayor was elected, the entire Anybody But Quinn movement ceased their calls for reform, raising the obvious quesiton : what was the real intention of the Anybody But Quinn Super PAC, if it was not to press for reforms of the broken political system ? It's getting ugly, but it's only when the system turns against itself, as demonstrated by the leaker of these latest revelations that voter registration information was shared, that voters find out the real truth about the duplicitious role of dubious campaign consultants, lobbyists, and other political operatives in setting up corruptive Super PAC structures, and controversies such as these are the only things that can lead to reforms to end the corruptive role of Super PAC's in our elections system. But more people need to join the call to press Mayor Bill de Blasio to make good on his outstanding campaign promises made during last year's mayoral campaign to further reform the city's campaign finance system. "The important thing is to respect the fact that we may not like the way the law is, but it's the law," Mr. de Blasio said last year after he was confronted with questions over a controversial Super PAC's attack TV ads against former Council Speaker Christine Quinn. "I certainly will put energy going forward into trying to further reform the campaign finance system," he added, but Mr. de Blasio has so far failed to keep true to his campaign promise to reform the city's corrupt campaign finance laws. Here's an opportunity to use the growing campaign finance controversy engulfing The Advance Group to press for reforms. Voters can make this opportunity work for them, to bring about reforms, but voters need to take action to demand that the mayor keep his campaign promises to reform and update the city's corrupt campaign finance laws that allow Super PAC's to exploit our elections system.

Long history of prosecutorial and ethical misconduct by Brooklyn D.A. Hynes triggers proposal for state disciplinary commission

In New York, the state Attorney General has lost control over his wayward District Attorneys. Now, the State Legislature wants to appoint a disciplinary commission to review the corrupt acts of the state's "Dirty D.A.'s"

RELATED Prosecutor misconduct commission moves forward in “Hynes” legislature (The Brooklyn Paper) After Bitter Election Loss, Charles Hynes Shredded His Office Documents : Sources (The New York Observer)

The New York State legislature, that swamp of corruption, is hoping to create an independent commission to investigate the prosecutorial misconduct of New York’s state prosecutors. The commission members would be able to recommend disciplinary actions against prosecutors engaging in "improper activity or whose performance displays a degree of incompetence not suited for the office," The Brooklyn Paper reported. The possibility that the state's district attorneys have become corrupt is too much for the state's attorney general, Eric Schneiderman, to handle. The only way hot political corruption cases like this can be handled is to outsource it to an incompetent commission, which Gov. Andrew Cuomo can then disband if the political heat becomes too much to bear, like what he did with the do-nothing Moreland Commission. The scandal with Brooklyn D.A. Hynes is only coming up now, because Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara is investigating JCOPE ethics complaints and Moreland Commission corruption files. Were it not for Mr. Bharara's ongoing campaign to clean up government corruption, the city's lazy Department of Investigations would not have investigated any of the corrupt district attorneys in New York's five boroughs, much less D.A. Hynes. Naturally, there are rumors being shared amonst activists that the DOI probe into former D.A. Hynes may have been politically-motivated, like all the other take-downs in New York City. Of course, nothing is going to happen in respect of this proposed district attorney investigation commission, unless Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver blesses this commission, which voters know he won't, because Speaker Silver has a long history of enabling corruption all across New York state. But some New York City-based bloggers and activists privately wonder if just the fear of the idea of this commission will scare the crap out of some corrupt local district attorneys, like Manhattan D.A. Cy Vance, who many good government reform activists believe avoids prosecuting political corruption cases. Besides Mr. Vance, the new Brooklyn district attorney, Ken Thompson, also avoids thorny political cases. For example, Mr. Thompson failed to examine the slimy circumstances of how one of the mayor's loyal political supporters was allowed to basically get out jail for free. The long-time Queens district attorney, Richard Brown, refused to find any wrong-doing when the New York Police Department kidnapped and held prisoner the whistleblower Adrian Schoolcraft in the psychiatric ward of a Queens hospital. In New York, whenever political or law enforcement corruption becomes so bad, the only way the corrupt justice system handles it is by outsourcing the investigation to an independent commission or to an independent prosecutor, because the district attorney, attorney general, or federal prosecutor with normal jurisdiction doesn't want the political blowback from these kinds of investigations. Look at how the Staten Island district attorney appointed a special prosecutor to investigate the corrupt Working Families Party ; the Staten Island D.A. didn't want to touch that investigation. These kinds of cases are TOO HOT for the normal investigators to handle. Investigators race to outsource probes to others, who can either afford to take the political heat or who are too stupid to know the difference. But if only voters could see why these investigations have to get outsourced, then that would show voters how the justice system truly has become corrupt, because there should be no reason why there should be a "tale of two justice systems" for political corruption. Meanwhile, as Albany considers more and more layers of supervision over the state's crumbling law enforcement apparatus, it was reported this week that Mayor Bill de Blasio has yet to appoint a chair to the city's Civilian Complaint Review Board, a do-nothing oversight panel meant to push papers about in respect of civilian complaints against the NYPD, in spite of the fact that the NYPD appear to be openly engaging in racing profiling in respect of the low-level marijuana arrests that police are making under the de Blasio administration.

Still no arrest by AG Schneiderman in "dirty DA" Hynes corruption probe

A stunning probe by the city’s Department of Investigations revealed last week that former Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes may have used drug money to pay more than $200,000 to the political Svengali Matz, and that was just in 2013.

RELATED The state’s top cop is looking into possible criminal charges against former Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes. (Attorney General Eric Schneiderman subpoenas former Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes aides in state theft probe, says source * The New York Daily News) Hynes's campaign committee paid over $600,000 to The Advance Group. (NYC : News & Analysis)

How broken is the system ? You have the normally do-nothing state Attorney General begrudgingly have to investigate corruption by one of his very own former district attorneys. This is the very tip of the iceberg of how corrupt the justice system is. Since this story first broke last week, police have raided housing projects for youth gang members not yet committing any crimes, but here you have the normally do-nothing city Department of Investigations and the press conclusively prove that Charles Hynes used the seized assets from drug deals gone bad to pay for one of his campaign consultants, and still there is no arrest. But the true booby prize is that we are only hearing about how corrupt former Brooklyn DA Hynes is because he was unfortunate enough to get on the wrong side of the mayor and his supporters, thus making the Hynes take-down all about dirty, vindictive politics -- and not actually about reforming the broken justice system. At this rate, the only way to expose the other dirty district attorneys, is to elect a mayor, who is their sworn political enemy. This is the best we can expect from the current state of the broken political system.

The New York Times wakes up to a harsh reality about de Blasio's piling examples of selling out

PUBLISHED : WED, 08 JUN 2014, 01:46 PM
UPDATED : THURS, 13 JUN 2014, 19:35 PM

The NYTimes' Ginia Bellafante on Mayor Bill de Blasio : The absence of any real template for governing from the vantage point of economic liberalism

RELATED For de Blasio, Deals, Drama and (Maybe) Progress (The New York Times)

In today's Sunday edition of The New York Times, the columnist Ginia Bellafante examined new mayor Bill de Blasio's record of broken campaign promises and other compromises in his young administration. "For years since, you could get by calling yourself a liberal in New York State politics simply by loving pro-choice arguments and same-sex marriage as much as you loved Wall Street and real estate developers. That is no longer so, which leaves centrists moving toward compromises that look semi-noble, and liberals in the position of seeming to have settled for too little and sacrificed their souls too much." On the closure of Long Island College Hospital, Ms. Bellafante wrote that, "the sense that Mr. de Blasio exploited the issue, declared victory in the face of a loss and then moved on has clearly taken hold." Ms. Bellafante's observation is backed up by a column by Liza Featherstone in amNewYork : "Bill de Blasio betrayed his believers in Cobble Hill," in which the author of the column wrote : "There are signs de Blasio is willing to fight for ordinary New Yorkers. Additional paid sick leave and universal pre-K are nothing to dismiss. But when the interests of ordinary New Yorkers conflict with those of the real estate industry, which donated heavily to de Blasio's campaign, is Mayor 99 Percent setting aside his protest placards? Many in Cobble Hill think so." In respect of the de Blasio administration's plans to preserve affordable housing, Ms. Bellafante noted that there was a "mounting sense that he has reneged on promises to involve neighborhoods in decisions that intimately affect them." This is backed-up by the relentless postings on the Atlantic Yards Report blog, and you can begin by reading this post : "As de Blasio announces affordable housing plan, Atlantic Yards (delay, modular, lack of neighborhood planning) remains an awkward backdrop," in which the author of the blog noted of the mayor's affordable housing plan : "There was no mention of the planned affordable housing that he and others cited to justify their support for Atlantic Yards, likely because that housing has taken so long to be built--and perhaps because it recalls the absence of ground-up neighborhood planning." (emphasis added) With respect to Mayor de Blasio enabling Gov. Cuomo to lock up the Working Families Party nomination, Ms. Bellafante wrote : "When Mr. de Blasio recently facilitated a deal between the leftist Working Families Party and Mr. Cuomo to secure the organization’s endorsement of the governor for re-election, it pushed certain quarters of the left toward lamentation." This is backed up by one of numerous tweets in the aftermath of the WFP deal to endorse Gov. Cuomo, brokered by Mayor de Blasio, such as this one by Tom Watson : "Still some surprise/horror that progressive deBlasio cut a deal with Cuomo in the #WFP saga. Of course he did, it's politics." (emphasis added) Ms. Bellafante also provided a balance to her criticism, by noting some achievements in Mayor de Blasio's first five months in office. Taken as a whole, Ms. Bellafante's article is an indication that growing liberal disappointment with Mayor de Blasio is seeping into the pages of The New York Times, something that took 15 years to happen with former Council Speaker Christine Quinn's political career. This change is due to the impatience with which voters now express about political deals made between politicians that betray campaign promises, such as with the embarrassing Working Families Party endorsement, an observation that Ms. Bellafante herself made when she wrote, "What looked like a mayoral assertion of authority to some felt like abdication to others."

de Blasio's high poll numbers amongst minority electorate may sink, if the NYPD continue their racially-tinged, broken windows policing tactics

RELATED Mayor de Blasio’s Approval Rating Improves, Poll Finds (The New York Times)

A majority of Black and Latino voters said that they approved of the job Mayor de Blasio was doing, a new poll shows, The New York Times reported. But it is not clear that this new poll factored in the immense anger in the Harlem community in response to a shock and awe invasion by the New York Police Department to round up innocent young public housing tenants on trumpted up charges of conspiracy to commit gang activities. Already, the new poll shows that the new mayor has lost more than half of the support amonst whites. If the police continue their crackdown that targets people of color, it won't be too far long before the mayor loses support amongst his minority base.

VOCAL-NY expects Bratton to support marijuana legalization, even though mayor blocks it

The Twilight Zone that is the Veal Pen

Member groups of CPR use tortured logic, such as expecting NYPD Police Commissioner Bill Bratton to support marijuana legalization now that Gov1% Andrew Cuomo made a campaign promise he doesn't intend to deliver, all in an effort to ignore any criticism of Mayor1% Mayor Bill de Blasio, who last week opposed the drug law reform.

Mayor Bill de Blasio broke a campaign promise by announcing he no longer supported marijuana legalization, contrary to his pledges last year, and now the many community groups, which have become the targets of criticisms for failing to hold the de Blasio administration accountable to other campaign promises to overhaul the scandal-ridden police department, find themselves going to great lengths to avoid any criticism of the mayor, even though the mayor is most responsible for updating laws that govern law enforcement in New York City. The backpedaling community groups are members of an umbrella coalition called Communities United for Police Reform, or CPR, and the groups are mimicking the mayor's own backpedalling, leading some political observers to note that the mayor had installed the lobbying firm of Berlin Rosen to supervise external communications of these community groups, in order to keep these community groups in check. Berlin Rosen has been being paid simultaneously to do the political and lobbying work for the mayor.

One CPR member community group, VOCAL-NY, is seizing on the fact that the Working Families Party has extorted a worthless campaign promise from Gov. Andrew Cuomo to decriminalize possession of small amounts of marijuana, as a way to increase public pressure on NYPD Police Commissioner William Bratton so that he can begin to support marijuana legalization. What does Gov. Cuomo have to do with how Commissioner Bratton runs the NYPD ? Nothing. What does Gov. Cuomo's empty and meaningless campaign promises to the WFP have to do with the racial bias in NYPD drug arrests ? Nothing. Maybe VOCAL-NY should pressure the WFP to hold Mayor de Blasio accountable for his own now worthless campaign promise to legalize marijuana. The mayor runs the NYPD, not the governor.

Will Bratton evolve now that Cuomo pledged marijuana decriminalization to WFP in de Blasio brokered deal? http://t.co/NPDl3dWGdx @BrentNYT

— VOCAL-NY (@VOCALNewYork) June 1, 2014

Mayor @BilldeBlasio does not support legalizing marijuana, despite campaign promise. http://t.co/McsnnRzuGK

— de Blasio Sold Out (@deBlasioSoldOut) May 30, 2014

DeBlasio & Bratton Increasing Marijuana Arrests In NYC http://t.co/hJ2BsgY7oV via @PopResistance

— jess cochrane (@jkcochrane) June 1, 2014

Former Members of do-nothing Moreland Commission will receive taxpayer-paid criminal legal defense representation

Even investigators of rampant corruption need legal counsel to fend off investigations of corruption, how's that for government integrity ?

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has arranged for Michael Koenig, a former federal prosecutor who is now a partner at Hinckley, Allen & Snyder LLP, a law firm specializing in government investigations, to represent the former members of the do-nothing, now-defunct Moreland Commission. Taxpayers will pay for Mr. Koenig's representation of the Moreland Commission ex-members.

• RELATED : Criminal Defense Lawyer Hired for Members of Ethics Panel Disbanded by Cuomo (The Wall Street Journal)

Once empaneled, the members of the Moreland Commission were nominally tasked with investigating runaway political and campaign finance corruption across New York State, but the Moreland Commission never, ever -- not once -- prosecuted any crime. In the run-up to his re-election campaign this year, Gov. Cuomo disbanded the Moreland Commission, before it exposed any corruption that would embarrass him during a gubernatorial election year that may determine whether he will ever be popular enough to run in 2016 for president of the United States, a victorious dream that eluded his father, former Gov. Mario Cuomo, in part, some say, because of potential controversies in Andrew's young adulthood.

It was reported earlier that U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara had empaneled a grand jury, which was issuing subpoenas right and left, from Manhattan all the way up to Albany, for records of what exactly the do-nothing members of the Moreland Commission actually did. A member of the Editorial Board of The New York Times, Eleanor Randolph, had previously complained that the Moreland Commission's first interim report was watered down to the point of being practically meaningless. That the members of the Moreland Commission believe that they need criminal defense representation has led some legal observers in the New York City activism circles to conclude that perhaps federal prosecutors were obligated to go on the record about possible forthcoming criminal indictments.

Schneiderman Scrambling To Arrest Corrupted Officials Before Federal Prosecutor Hands Down Embarrassing Grand Jury Indictments [UPDATED]

PUBLISHED : WED, 07 MAY 2014, 05:54 PM
UPDATED : SUN, 11 MAY 2014, 06:00 AM

Attorney General Eric Schneiderman Finally Gets Around To Arresting Councilmember Ruben Wills On Investigation That Is Over Two Years Old

With federal prosecutors hot on a corruption crackdown across New York state, the state's attorney general, Eric Schneiderman, today arrested New York City Councilmember Ruben Wills on a charge of misusing some of the proceeds of a $33,000 state grant to New York 4 Life, a charity the councilmember managed.

• RELATED : Councilmember Ruben Wills was charged with misuing tens of thousands of dollars in taxpayer funds -- even spending some of the money on a $750 Louis Vuitton designer handbag. (Ruben Wills, Queens city councilmember, busted in corruption investigation * The New York Daily News)

The $33,000 grant to Councilmember Wills' charity was sponsored by former New York State Sen. Shirley Huntley in 2008. Two years ago, Councilmember Wills' charity refused to fully comply with a subpoena issued by the state's top prosecutor's office, forcing state prosecutors to file a court motion to compel the charity to comply. After that, the state's case went dormant. During this time, Gov. Andrew Cuomo formed an anti-corruption panel to great fanfare, but the governor ditched the panel as soon as it appeared that the panel would investigate the governor's own questionable political supporters. Recently, the outrage by good government groups and government reform activists reached such a fevered pitch at the government's inept prosecution of corruption that the top federal prosecutor in Manhattan, Preet Bharara, took over the corruption investigations of the now-defunct anti-corruption panel, known as a Moreland Commission. In the time since the feds took over, Mr. Bharara has empaneled a grand jury, obtaining subpoenas for corruption records. As government reform activists await possible grand jury indictments, all of a sudden the state's attorney general has begun to look busy. One fruit from Mr. Schneiderman's scurrying efforts was today's arrest of Councilmember Wills.

Ruben Wills Arrested : Best comment : "You know election day is getting closer. @AGSchneiderman did something." https://t.co/8qWDK3nwhc

— Informed Voting (@informedvoting) May 7, 2014

But Councilmember Wills' corruption arrest is complicated by many factors. One of the publicly-elected officials, who State Sen. Shirley Huntley was asked to wiretap and photograph as part of an undercover FBI sting operation on political corruption, was Councilmember Wills, according to Politicker. Prior to that, former City Council Speaker Christine Quinn endorsed Councilmember Wills for re-election one day after he had appeared in court to face a misdemeanor stealing charge. Councilmember Wills earned his incumbency on the City Council in a special election in southeast Queens in 2010 to succeed Thomas White, who died in August in 2010, and Councilmember Wills was re-elected in 2011 to continue to serve the remainder of White’s four-year term. Councilmember Wills later appeared in court in March 2011 on charges in connection with a 1996 incident. He was accused of damaging a wall and removing a fan and track lighting at a downtown business.

After Councilmember Wills' March 2011 court appearance, Speaker Quinn defended Councilmember Wills. "I'm extraordinarily proud of my City Council and proud of the members that I get to serve with every day on behalf of the people of the City of New York," she told The New York Daily News at the time.

In spite of Councilmember Wills' troubles, Speaker Quinn had awarded Councilmember Wills $584,000 in discretionary funding in the city's 2012 budget.

That Councilmember Wills is being singled out in the attorney general's sudden efforts to catch up with the state's long backlog of corruption investigations is troublesome. As has been noted by others, it can sometimes appear that state and federal prosecutors seem to obsess with the petty crimes of minority politicians, which conveniently allows larger corruption scandals to go uninvestigated and unprosecuted. It doesn't help when the media portrays the political corruption problem as only being isolated to Queens, for example. Corruption is a bigger problem, and the bigger corruption scandals rarely receive the kind of scrutiny as petty crimes. Councilmember Wills was arrested for allegedly misusing the proceeds of a $33,000 state grant. Former Sen. Huntley is serving a one-year prison sentence in connection with the misuse of $80,000 in tax payer money. Meanwhile, there's still no update on whatever happened to the corruption probe into how Aqueduct Entertainment Group landed a multibillion-dollar casino contract. But in that AEG probe, two more black leaders, State Sens. John Sampson and Malcolm Smith, appear to be targets. Each of Sens. Sampson and Smith are also being investigated in connection with still yet other corruption charges. Another possible corruption scandal in Queens, a questionable $20 million construction project by the Queens Public Library, will probably drag on for years before any indictments or arrests are made. State Sen. Jose Peralta, another minority leader from Queens, is the subject of a possible corruption investigation that is almost five years old involving over $500,000 in taxpayer money that was funneled to Corona-Elmhurst Center for Economic Development, a dormant non-profit organization. No arrest or indictment has yet to be made in connection with state Sen. Peralta's non-profit. Moreover, there's also been no update into an alleged investigation into the awarding in January 2010 of a $50 million voting machine contract to Election Systems & Software by New York City election officials. The new voting machines turned out to be an embarrassment to city officials, when it was revealed that the new machines would be unable to timely tally votes for the primary and general elections, even though they are "electronic" machines, forcing New York City elections officials to drag out clunky voting booths that work with levers, pulleys, and wheels in the last mayoral primary election. Even after the $2 billion fiasco that is the ECTP 911 emergency call EMS system that keeps crashing over and over -- and over again -- there's still no investigation into cost over-runs, failures, or other possible wrong-doing. Also pending is the outcome of the city's investigation into the corrupt campaign spending by Super PAC's administered by one lobbying firm, The Advance Group. And all there is, is silence about the other corrupt Super PAC's from last year's municipal elections.

• RELATED : The Advance Group Federal Complaint Referred To Moreland Commission (NYC : News & Analysis)
• RELATED : Roger Bennett Adler, a special prosecutor investigating the Working Families Party's corrupt relationship with Data & Field Services, a corporation formed by the left-leaning party to provide its candidates with get-out-the-vote staffing and expertise at possibly illegal discounts, has sought an interview with one of Mayor Bill de Blasio's highest-ranking aides, Emma Wolfe, people familiar with the matter said. Data & Field Services, a corporation formed by the left-leaning party to provide its candidates with get-out-the-vote staffing and expertise. Mr. de Blasio was elected in 2009 to become the city's public advocate thanks to, in part, the deeply discounted services of Data & Field. (Prosecutor in Working Families Corruption Case Seeks Interview of de Blasio Aide, Emma Wolfe * The Wall Street Journal)

While the attorney general follows up on the missing $33,000 that Councilmember Wills cannot fully explain, there are millions and billions of taxpayer dollars in outstanding corruption investigations, and allegations that may call into question the integrity of our entire election system, that appear to be going cold. This pile-up of corruption cases proves that city and state prosecutors are inept at fully investigating political corruption. Instead, state and local prosecutors just looked the other way, and the incidence of corruption just kept piling on up until nothing less than a dedicated Moreland Commission would be needed to flush all this corruption out of the system. But since Gov. Cuomo scuttled the Moreland Commission, now the task of prosecuting all this corruption lands on the laps of the U.S Attorney's Office. Indeed, federal prosecutors received the files of about two dozen possible investigations from the now-defunct Moreland Commission that city and state investigators never got around to worrying about before now. When the governor first formed the Moreland Commission, the press never asked why lazy city and state prosecutors had allowed corruption to grow to become a stage 4 cancer on our government. Once the feds excise this cancer of corruption from our body of government, will we have enough good officials left to right this ship ? After all this is over, one of the first things voters should demand is for the elected officials to determine why did the state's attorney general and all of the district attorneys let corruption become so out-of-control in New York in the first place. Prosecutors should also determine the legality of allowing government officials to subvert the conduct of the public's business by elected officials, who use private e-mail services to hide the government's official work from the reach of sunshine laws, a tactic embraced by Gov. Cuomo. The shady use of private e-mail accounts to subvert the reach of freedom of information laws or the discovery process of litigation is a practise typical on Wall Street and their big money law firms. Now, Gov. Cuomo has apparently rolled out this shadowy machination to New York state government. Gov. Cuomo's pattern of political subterfuge may have contributed to the failure of the Moreland Commission to refer any criminal case for prosecution before its disbanding, and the appearance of sabotage is said to be being the focus of federal prosecutors. Government reform activists privately hope that Gov. Cuomo's interference with the doomed Moreland Commission can meet the legal definition of obstruction of justice, opening the door to a political pressure point to force government reforms, if not at least to give federal prosecutors additional evidence to hand down indictments against more crooked politicians, who are responsible for enabling political corruption in New York state government.

• RELATED : After Pledge of Sunlight, Gov. Cuomo Officials Keep Their E-mail in the Shadows (ProPublica)
• RELATED : Good government group calls for investigation of Cuomo administration's e-mails (The New York Daily News)
• RELATED : Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington requests that New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman investigate the Cuomo administration's controversial use of private e-mail accounts and Blackberry PIN messages to deliberately hide official government business (CREW Letter to Schneiderman)

In the meantime, Speaker Quinn's successor, Councilmember Melissa Mark-Viverito has indicated that she will not allow Councilmember Wills to decide the fate of his slice of this year's City Council slush funds. Instead, her office will decide where his allocation of the discretionary funding will go, in consultation with the chair of the Queens Councilmembers' delegation. At all costs, the Council Speaker's office is intent on keeping its councilmember slush fund. Even though many officials have been charged with fraud in connection with the misuse of the City Council's discretionary funds, the corrupted elected officials are too addicted to the power that comes from doling out these grants.

• RELATED : Rigging Campaign Finance to Rig Elections (The Wall Street Journal)
• RELATED : Mark-Viverito spent big on speaker race (Crains Insider)
• RELATED : The lobbying firm, Pitta Bishop Del Giorno & Giblin, which helped Melissa Mark-Viverito win her races for City Council and Council speaker, has now lobbied her on behalf of four clients. (The New York Daily News)

Last year, former Council Speaker Quinn approved the disbursement of $3.2 million in member items requested by Councilmember Dan Halloran, even though the councilmember had been charged in a conspiracy and bribery scheme relating to his member items. In the criminal complaint against him, Councilmember Halloran suggested to an undercover FBI agent that Councilmember Halloran could increase the size of the discretionary funds he was using as a bribe by calling in favours from other councilmembers. For all the corruption that the City Council did to hide the speaker's multimillion-dollar slush fund, former Speaker Quinn herself was never prosecuted.

Lazy @AGSchneiderman hustling to arrest backlog of corrupteds before @SDNYnews hands down indictments. http://t.co/BNrkY2cSl6 #Moreland

— Informed Voting (@informedvoting) May 7, 2014

With millions and billions in taxpayer dollars at stake in uninvestigated political corruption, law enforcement under the de Blasio administration continues to focus on NYPD Police Commissioner William Bratton's obsession with his "broken windows theory" of policing. Instead of focusing on the "criminal networks" of political corruption and corporate corruption, law enforcement instead over-police the poor and people of color, targeting them, amongst other places, on public transportation systems of subways and buses, a regressive move that may violate the Civil Rights Act.

Barfing into bags, voters face a moment of truth about Democratic Party incumbents

Democratic Party bouncers give voters no choice but to re-elect Gov. Cuomo

"Every place is not Greenwich Village," said Assemblyman Keith Wright, who is also chair of the state's Democratic Party, referring to a lack of support in the rest of New York State as an excuse for why Gov. Andrew Cuomo has failed to roll out any liberal reforms.

• PEOPLE'S EXHIBIT A : Get out your barf bags : Assemblyman Keith Wright pitches Gov. Cuomo to Manhattan progressives (Capital New York)
• PEOPLE'S EXHIBIT B : Don't put your barf bags away, yet : Former Council Speaker Christine Quinn returns, to help Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and Gov. Cuomo (Capital New York)
• PEOPLE'S EXHIBIT C : Time for fresh barf bags : Gov. Cuomo huddles with Eric Cantor, Working Families Party, veal pen reformers on watered-down campaign finance machinations (Capital New York)
• PEOPLE'S EXHIBIT D : Forget bags, we need barf barrels : Queens residents fed up with constant corrupt lawmakers (The New York Post)

The ironic thing is that everybody knows where there are concentrations of liberal thought. Gentrification does a very good job of corroding these neighborhoods to disperse like-minded individuals. Dissent almost doesn't exist anymore, and nobody respects autonomy. The last few hold-outs are haggard, and true solidarity has all but shriveled up. After the number that real estate developers have done to the Village, especially the harvesting of St. Vincent's Hospital before the poor corpse had even died, isn't it more true that Mr. Wright's quote should be, "Greenwich Village has become like every place ?"

The hopeful thought would be that activists would realize that going back to fighting for single issues is the fastest way for everybody to lose. Thinking small is a losing way to think. Caring about our own pet issues makes us unprincipled, because it means we are only in this for ourselves and not for all of us. This pressure is real. After all the evidence of corruption coinciding with the Cuomo administration, look at how the only ones practising discipline are Democratic Party "leaders," who want your votes in exchange for more cheap-ass talk. Somebody complained yesterday that there is nobody, who can run against Gov. Cuomo, but that is a lie, because there are other people running against Gov. Cuomo. But people seem to be more impressed with the celebrity of a candidate than with casting a vote for an alternative that involves the slightest bit of taking a chance on a new face. Keeping voters in this place of fear works nicely for incumbents.

If people fail to achieve solidarity and fail to take a chance on someone new, then the only winners here will be Gov. Cuomo, Democratic Party bouncers, and their permanent government operative insiders, who double as big business lobbyists. It's enough to make one barf.

Preet Bharara Expands Crackdown on Political Corruption, Empanels Grand Jury, Subpoenas JCOPE Complaints [UPDATED]

PUBLISHED : WED, 30 APR 2014, 09:51 PM
UPDATED : TUES, 05 MAY 2014, 10:30 AM

"Bharara’s broadening probe of pay-to-play Albany corruption is sure to send shockwaves through the state capital in an election year."

Weeks after Preet Bharara, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, took possession of the investigation files of the now defunct Moreland Commission, the corruption-fighting prosecutor has empaneled a grand jury that has now subpoenaed each of the complaints lodged with the state's ethics panel known as the Joint Commission on Public Ethics, or JCOPE, and the records from members of the aborted Moreland Commission.

• RELATED : Federal prosecutors' grand jury issues another subpoena, this time seeking emails, text messages, and other records from all the members of the anti-corruption Moreland Commission that Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo abruptly disbanded for political reasons. (U.S. Said to Seek Records From Anticorruption Panel’s Members * The New York Times)
• RELATED : Manhattan US Attorney Preet Bharara, who is waging a crackdown on political corruption in New York, has requested all the complaints of wrong-doing filed against public officials with the state’s ethics panel, Joint Commission on Public Ethics (JCOPE), sources told The New York Post. (Feds widen crackdown on New York political corruption * The New York Post)

Mr. Bharara's subpoena of the JCOPE complaints will give him a larger understanding of the corruption landscape across New York state. JCOPE has existed since 2011, and it was tasked with investigating ethics complaints of the state's executive and legislative branches. Against the JCOPE complaints, the federal prosecutor's office will be able to match, supplement, or cross-reference the aborted Moreland Commission investigations. And the fact that Mr. Bharara empaneled a grand jury means that federal prosecutors are seeking criminal indictments in possible connection with the aborted Moreland Commission corruption investigations. Whatever the USAO learns from the JCOPE complaints and commission member records may be the "icing on the cake," so to speak, to garnish other corruption evidence that federal prosecutors may have been able to independently gather from prior wiretaps, other investigations, and possible whistleblower-activists.

The U.S. Attorney's Office has been resoundingly criticized for the apparent free pass to Wall Street following the 2008 global financial crisis and recession. The media, notably PBS's Frontline, showed that the U.S. Department of Justice's Washington office, known as Main Justice, was compromised by officials, such as Lanny Breuer, who refused to prosecute top Wall Street executives. Even Attorney General Eric Holder, who oversees the DOJ and advises the USAO's district offices, created a scandal when he confirmed the Obama administration's aversion to prosecuting corrupt Wall Street executives, known colloquially as "too big to jail," validating a Frontline investigation and widespread public perception. Indeed, Main Justice appears to serve as a revolving door recruitment outpost for large, wealthy law firms representing corrupt Wall Street executives. For his part, Mr. Bharara has bemoaned the Washington budget cuts to the USAO that many government reform activists claim are intentionally made to curtail regulatory oversight and criminal prosecution of corruption, but some activists believe that Mr. Bharara never prosecuted Wall Street corruption stemming from the 2008 financial crisis and recession due to his close ties to Sen. Charles Schumer, who many see as enabling the corruption culture on Wall Street. Mr. Bharara's political career came to prominence when he served as chief counsel to Sen. Schumer, making the senator the prosecutor's "political daddy." Mr. Bharara has also carried out his own oppression against whistleblowers when he prosecuted Jeremy Hammond for exposing corruption by Strategic Forecasting, part of the DOJ's larger persecution of whistleblowers, including government whistleblowers. The DOJ was further seen to have become politicized under President Obama and Attorney General Holder, when the DOJ began to target journalists in an effort to undermine a free press whilst carrying out the government's vindictive prosecution of whistleblowers. Separately, the DOJ was shown to stall a Freedom of Information Act request seeking records about its vindictive prosecution of activists.

• RELATED : The Advance Group Federal Complaint Referred To Moreland Commission (NYC : News & Analysis)
• RELATED : The Nexus of Campaign Donations, Super PAC's, and Legislation : de Blasio's Mayoral Race and the Delayed Horse-Drawn Carriage Ban (UPDATED) (NYC : News & Analysis)
• RELATED : Permanent government political operative insider and former fundraiser for Mayor de Blasio now earning $8,000 per month advising City Hall (The New York Daily News)
• RELATED : Ex-member of Moreland Commission says there are cases of potential government corruption that need review (The New York Daily News)
• RELATED : In the midst of the Moreland Commission investigation of corruption in state government, Gov. Andrew Cuomo disbanded its members and ended their investigation, a give-away for the complicit who faced exposure. (Gov. Cuomo abandons principles of Moreland Act * Press Connects/Gannett)

Locally, it is supposed to be the Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus Vance, who is supposed to oversee the criminal prosecution of political and corporate corruption. He works for the New York State attorney general, Eric Schneiderman. Both D.A. Vance and Mr. Schneiderman have pretty much abdicated corruption prosecution to Mr. Bharara. More so than the others, D.A. Vance is vulnerable to the political realities of how he can run for office. District attorneys in the five boroughs of New York run for office with the approval of the local county political organization. Since New York is overwhelmingly a Democratic Party enclave, the county Democratic Party chair of each borough must approve of each respective district attorney candidate running for office, meaning D.A. Vance would not dare sacrifice his political career by prosecuting political corruption of officials, operatives, or lobbyists loyal to the county political organization that approves of his candidacy. That is to say, D.A. Vance will not prosecute candidates for public office, who may be engaged in questionable electioneering activities and who run with approval of the Manhattan Democratic Party chair, otherwise he risks alienating himself from his own political supporters. Instead, D.A. Vance touts his prosecution record against activists, paralleling the DOJ's own suppression campaign against activists.

Mr. Bharara's crackdown on political corruption may be his way of being able to attack the special interest money and lobbyists of large corrupt corporations, at least as they intersect with government officials, one activist said. Plus, it allows him to restore his reputation for prosecutorial independence after his and others' failures at the USAO and the DOJ. It also separates Mr. Bharara from D.A. Vance's failure to prosecute corruption of either Wall Street or elected officials.

The increased prosecution of New York political corruption cases by Mr. Bharara is taking place during the run-up to this year's state-wide election cycle, and it follows a spectacular spree of federal political corruption arrests of officials from City Hall to Albany. With the added access to JCOPE complaints and commission member records to augment his trove of Moreland Commission investigation files, Mr. Bharara may now be poised to lead a historical renewal of government integrity, regardless of his motivation. For all of Mr. Bharara's imperfections, activists in New York have not pressed the Obama administration to reform the USAO and the DOJ. Mr. Bharara's like Batman in "The Dark Knight" : not the hero that Gotham needs, but, rather, the hero Gotham deserves.

Will JCOPE subpoenas show complaints against The Committee to Save New York, ie, any donor ties to Cuomo campaign ? http://t.co/HeOKDfvzAh

— Informed Voting (@informedvoting) May 1, 2014