REGIME CHANGE IN NEW YORK: TONY AVELLA RUNS FOR MAYOR; NORMAN SIEGEL RUNS FOR PUBLIC ADVOCATE
UP FRONT News April 29, 2007
Published by Tom Weiss
Editorial Advisor: Willard Whittingham
“The paper that can’t be bought and can’t be sold.” www.tomsupfrontnews.blogspot.com
REGIME CHANGE IN NEW YORK: TONY AVELLA RUNS FOR MAYOR; NORMAN SIEGEL RUNS FOR PUBLIC ADVOCATE
There is a real possibility of true regime change coming up in not only the presidential election of 2008 but the Mayoral race in New York City in 2009. By regime change I mean not just a shift in personalities and parties but an end to government by private interest such as has characterized the reigns of, among others, the Clintons and the Bushes, but also Rudolph Giuliani, Michael Bloomberg, Betsy Gotbaum, Christine Quinn and a bunch of members of the New York City Council. During all these administrations the poor have consistently been punished, there has been a tsunami of housing gentrification as well as a pattern of civil liberties infringement, favoritism, greediness and the habitual subordination of human rights to property rights.
Among the most blatant and gross acts of greed was perpetrated by the combination of City Council Speaker Quinn and Mayor Bloomberg when, in a time of intensifying poverty and related stresses, they rammed through a totally unwarranted salary increase (Intro. 458) for the Councilmembers and a bunch of high paid Mayoral aides. This maneuver was conducted in a sneaky manner with almost no publicity. That explains why I was one of very few people at the Council testifying in opposition. It also explains why Quinn looked at me as if I were Che Guevara. Quinn was a dud when I was her constituent and brought to her attention the fact of staff abuse of homeless people at Peter’s Place, a drop-in center in the heart of her district where I stayed for some months. Quinn is also responsible for a Resolution, #802, in 2001 on the Genocide in Tibet - which I did just about all the lobbying for - that was rhetorically eloquent but politically impotent because did not oppose the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. She has refused to respond to my January 30, 2006 e-mail to her about this and numerous others contacts. Christine Quinn, described by one prominent human rights advocate in New York as “two-faced”, in fact marches to Hillary Clinton’s corporate beat. Quinn wants to be mayor and has used the Clinton-supporting Rupert Murdoch and his New York Post as her press agent.)
The most vigorous Council opposition to the salary increase came from Councilman Tony Avella, a Democrat from Queens, who not only denounced the raise as an act of greed but refused to take the money, which Quinn paid herself and her colleagues, while soup kitchen and food panties are overloaded and some City workers have to depend on food stamps. (We learn nothing about people like Nero - or Spartacus for that matter.)
Mr. Avella, who strongly opposes the Bloomberg-Quinn pro-development and gentrification policies, is running for Mayor. A number of other Democrats are also expected to run. If the election was held today and other candidates were Avella and Quinn, I’d vote for Avella.
One of the Mayoral wannabes is Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum, who, in her term limited second term as Public Advocate, seems to think she can only move up. Betsy Gotbaum, with whom I have been acquainted personally through a family member of mine since 1979, is not qualified to be Public Advocate, let alone Mayor. Betsy Got- baum is a paranoid public official who seeking to keep from the public her links to the Central Intelligence Agency (this watchdog is watching us), has personally harassed me big time. Once, as I was waiting for my scheduled appointment with her Chief of Staff Scott Coccaro to discuss the staff abuse of the homeless problems that had already been covered up by Quinn, Gotbaum tried to have me arrested, citing an imaginary “threat.”
Fortunately the police sergeant from the NYPD’s Intelligence Division she called turned out to be a good deal more rational than she and, after a brief interrogation, suggested I go home and leave Gotbaum alone for awhile. Gotbaum made things much worse when, no doubt angry that I supported civil rights attorney Norman Siegel for Public Advocate against her, she complained to him that I was “stalking” her. Like the police officer, Mr. Siegel and I understand what is going on. In 2005 during her run for re-election, in a televised campaign debate, she explained her refusal to reveal her appointment schedule by once again making reference to “homeless stalker.” As far as I am concerned that assertion was defamatory and the matter became a story in Newsday, The Daily News, and The New York Times and so my side got out to a great many people. The story in the Staten Island Advance by Tom Wrobleski, the taciturn don’t-rock-the-establishment political editor there, Tom Wrobleski, contained serious errors and was slanted toward Gotbaum.
Gotbaum’s notions of being stalked are delusional. Being delusional is not an asset for a Public Advocate or for a Mayor. She is a phony.
Norman Siegel and I were observers at a recent Critical Mass bicycle ride as it got started in Union Square and I was glad to learn from him that he will run for a third time for Public Advocate. Mr. Siegel said that as Public Advocate he would have staff present at for example Critical Mass rides to make certain that no one’s civil rights are threatened. I supported Mr. Siegel, with whom I’ve been acquainted for several years, in his last two campaigns against Gotbaum. As far as I am concerned, he was defeated for two reasons. One was Gotbaum’s money and Democratic Party machinery. The other was that Mr. Siegel’s campaign was influenced by populism-spouting elitists like Howard Deaniac Tracy Denton (a person who, in her loyalty to the Lyndon LaRouche-linked Jonathan Tasini, last year tried to have me arrested at a candidates’ night when I was running for the U.S. Senate against Clinton) who rendered the gentrified Siegel campaign remote from thousands of poor people. Norman Siegel would be a very good Public Advocate and Betsy Gotbaum might consider seeking employment as a spy.
* * * * * * *
Published by Tom Weiss
Editorial Advisor: Willard Whittingham
“The paper that can’t be bought and can’t be sold.” www.tomsupfrontnews.blogspot.com
REGIME CHANGE IN NEW YORK: TONY AVELLA RUNS FOR MAYOR; NORMAN SIEGEL RUNS FOR PUBLIC ADVOCATE
There is a real possibility of true regime change coming up in not only the presidential election of 2008 but the Mayoral race in New York City in 2009. By regime change I mean not just a shift in personalities and parties but an end to government by private interest such as has characterized the reigns of, among others, the Clintons and the Bushes, but also Rudolph Giuliani, Michael Bloomberg, Betsy Gotbaum, Christine Quinn and a bunch of members of the New York City Council. During all these administrations the poor have consistently been punished, there has been a tsunami of housing gentrification as well as a pattern of civil liberties infringement, favoritism, greediness and the habitual subordination of human rights to property rights.
Among the most blatant and gross acts of greed was perpetrated by the combination of City Council Speaker Quinn and Mayor Bloomberg when, in a time of intensifying poverty and related stresses, they rammed through a totally unwarranted salary increase (Intro. 458) for the Councilmembers and a bunch of high paid Mayoral aides. This maneuver was conducted in a sneaky manner with almost no publicity. That explains why I was one of very few people at the Council testifying in opposition. It also explains why Quinn looked at me as if I were Che Guevara. Quinn was a dud when I was her constituent and brought to her attention the fact of staff abuse of homeless people at Peter’s Place, a drop-in center in the heart of her district where I stayed for some months. Quinn is also responsible for a Resolution, #802, in 2001 on the Genocide in Tibet - which I did just about all the lobbying for - that was rhetorically eloquent but politically impotent because did not oppose the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. She has refused to respond to my January 30, 2006 e-mail to her about this and numerous others contacts. Christine Quinn, described by one prominent human rights advocate in New York as “two-faced”, in fact marches to Hillary Clinton’s corporate beat. Quinn wants to be mayor and has used the Clinton-supporting Rupert Murdoch and his New York Post as her press agent.)
The most vigorous Council opposition to the salary increase came from Councilman Tony Avella, a Democrat from Queens, who not only denounced the raise as an act of greed but refused to take the money, which Quinn paid herself and her colleagues, while soup kitchen and food panties are overloaded and some City workers have to depend on food stamps. (We learn nothing about people like Nero - or Spartacus for that matter.)
Mr. Avella, who strongly opposes the Bloomberg-Quinn pro-development and gentrification policies, is running for Mayor. A number of other Democrats are also expected to run. If the election was held today and other candidates were Avella and Quinn, I’d vote for Avella.
One of the Mayoral wannabes is Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum, who, in her term limited second term as Public Advocate, seems to think she can only move up. Betsy Gotbaum, with whom I have been acquainted personally through a family member of mine since 1979, is not qualified to be Public Advocate, let alone Mayor. Betsy Got- baum is a paranoid public official who seeking to keep from the public her links to the Central Intelligence Agency (this watchdog is watching us), has personally harassed me big time. Once, as I was waiting for my scheduled appointment with her Chief of Staff Scott Coccaro to discuss the staff abuse of the homeless problems that had already been covered up by Quinn, Gotbaum tried to have me arrested, citing an imaginary “threat.”
Fortunately the police sergeant from the NYPD’s Intelligence Division she called turned out to be a good deal more rational than she and, after a brief interrogation, suggested I go home and leave Gotbaum alone for awhile. Gotbaum made things much worse when, no doubt angry that I supported civil rights attorney Norman Siegel for Public Advocate against her, she complained to him that I was “stalking” her. Like the police officer, Mr. Siegel and I understand what is going on. In 2005 during her run for re-election, in a televised campaign debate, she explained her refusal to reveal her appointment schedule by once again making reference to “homeless stalker.” As far as I am concerned that assertion was defamatory and the matter became a story in Newsday, The Daily News, and The New York Times and so my side got out to a great many people. The story in the Staten Island Advance by Tom Wrobleski, the taciturn don’t-rock-the-establishment political editor there, Tom Wrobleski, contained serious errors and was slanted toward Gotbaum.
Gotbaum’s notions of being stalked are delusional. Being delusional is not an asset for a Public Advocate or for a Mayor. She is a phony.
Norman Siegel and I were observers at a recent Critical Mass bicycle ride as it got started in Union Square and I was glad to learn from him that he will run for a third time for Public Advocate. Mr. Siegel said that as Public Advocate he would have staff present at for example Critical Mass rides to make certain that no one’s civil rights are threatened. I supported Mr. Siegel, with whom I’ve been acquainted for several years, in his last two campaigns against Gotbaum. As far as I am concerned, he was defeated for two reasons. One was Gotbaum’s money and Democratic Party machinery. The other was that Mr. Siegel’s campaign was influenced by populism-spouting elitists like Howard Deaniac Tracy Denton (a person who, in her loyalty to the Lyndon LaRouche-linked Jonathan Tasini, last year tried to have me arrested at a candidates’ night when I was running for the U.S. Senate against Clinton) who rendered the gentrified Siegel campaign remote from thousands of poor people. Norman Siegel would be a very good Public Advocate and Betsy Gotbaum might consider seeking employment as a spy.
* * * * * * *
posted by Tom Weiss at 10:21 AM
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