TrueNews

Friday, August 20, 2010

Mosque Developers: We Never Planned To Meet With Governor No Charges Filed Against

Working Families Party (NYT)

Air Espada Slams ‘Puppet’ Opponent Rivera (YNN)

Queen of Queens
While Services are Cut to the Masses the Marshall Spends 82,500 to Take Her Picture

Forgetabout the fact that Queens leads the city in homeowners losing their homes, Marshall wants to make sure she looks good on film. Anyone still believe that government budgets can't be cut?

Queens Borough President wants $85K for personal photographer Last year, she plunked down $82,500 in public funds to pay for 200 office chairs, including four "guest chairs" that retailed for $2,936 each.She also spent $5,000 to refurbish her official desk and cabinet, another $4,985 on drapes, and $4,994 for picture frames. (NYP)

Looks like the same City Council who extended their term limits now control the Charter Commission
One standard for all: Two terms is two terms, incumbents included (DN Ed) * Comptroller Tom DiNapoli Disapproves Of Way He Became Comptroller * Will Charter Commission Revise Term Limit Vote?—UPDATED * Bloomberg, de Blasio Split on Term Limits (WSJ)

Not Registered
Joseph Mercurio Go Jay good op research. Tea party activist Gary Berntsen, in a GOP primary with Jay Townsend, has said he last voted by paper ballot in 2008 from his Queens address, but a look at city records shows he has never been registered in New York City. Berntsen's blank voter file - Maggie Haberman - POLITICO.com

Pay to Play Huntley An education group co-founded and headed by Sen. Shirley Huntley’s daughter that shares the lawmaker’s address has received $30,000 from the state since she took office.

Election 2010 Nydia Velazquez Goes With Anti-Vito Lopez Slate In Brooklyn Elections

Mosque's Mexican Standoff: Nobody's Blinking
Gov. Paterson Says Mosque Situation Is Getting "Out Of Hand"

Imam's wife 'won't cave' on Ground Zero mosque, blames GOP (NYP) * Blessed be the peacemaker (NYP Ed) * Islamic Center Exposes Mixed Feelings Locally (NYT) * Imam Behind New York Project Starts Mideast Tour (NYT) * Giuliani Says Mosque 'Divisive' (WSJ) * New Front Opens in Vendor Wars (DN) * More losing faith in mosque: poll (NYP) * A new campaign ad from Rick Lazio features images from 9/11 and merges Andrew Cuomo's face with the destroyed twin towers, Grace Rauh reports. * TIME Poll: 61% of Americans Oppose 'Ground Zero Mosque' *NJ nonprofit wants to replace Ground Zero mosque with 9/11 rehab center * "White House deputy national security adviser and counterterrorism czar John Brennan won’t wade into the Lower Manhattan mosque debate, but said today there is no evidence terrorists have yet to use the mosque flap as an anti-U.S. propaganda tool in the Islamic world," blogs our Ken Bazinet.

Mob and Gambling: So What Else is New
Company likely to run racino may have troubling mob link (DN) * Genting, "The company likely to run the Aqueduct racino operates a high-stakes VIP room in a Macau casino partly owned by the daughter of a Chinese businessman with mob ties."

Rob Polner wonders where today's Gov. Hugh Carey is when we need him

NY Economic Meltdown New York is near the top of the list of states that lost jobs, according to new Labor Department stats.

Joseph Mercurio The Labor Department today released regional job information and it was bad news for New York workers. Here are lists of the top states for job loss: Georgia 92,300, Missouri 57,500, Wisconsin 57,400, Indiana 57,400 and New York with 50,100 is number four. Let’s send a big thank you to Governor Paterson. (Twitter)

FDNY overtime could cost city $120M unless judge makes ruling: fire official (NYP) * Ax FDNY hiring ban or city will pay, brass tells judge (DN) * FDNY: Hiring halt burns OT budget (NYP)

Laid off MTA agents hand out postcards mocking Walder (DN)

Unions Lose Election Bid Sought to Lift Restriction on Spending (WSJ)

Food On the Street
New Front Opens in Vendor Wars (WSJ) * Brooklyn blogger has only street eats on her menu (DN)

A dispute over condoms and Catholic values has left Greenwich Village without an urgent care clinic six months after St. Vincent's Hospital closed its doors in bankruptcy

Know-nothing Neil: State senator writes the law but doesn’t know what it says (DN Ed)

It's a tower power play (NYP)

Law and Order Supermodel Seymour files to get estranged hubby’s private eye under oath (NYP) * Parks Worker Is Raped at Playground in Brooklyn (NYT) * Hospital Bribe Alleged (WSJ) * Clerk at kosher liquor store gunned down saving girlfriend (DN) *Brooklyn liquor-store slaying (DN)* NYer who found mosque location says he didn't know plan * No party as Queens girl in drug bust turns 13 *Court win for widower of slain 'Waitress' writer Adrienne Shelly (NYP) * Push for DNA in plea deals (NYP) * Clerk Gunned Down Inside Kosher Liquor Store (NY1) * Burglar Tries To Enter S.I. Home Twice In An Afternoon (NY1) *Jayson Williams Pleads Guilty To DWI Charges (NY1)

Foreclosures Grind On The Obama administration will need to do more in order to help Americans hold on to their homes. (NYT Ed)

A fool on the Hill: Clemens’ perjury charge over steriods is his own stupid fault

Why Donate to True News Keep Real News Alive. Put simply, True News -- and the truth – cannot do more and could even end without financial help from the people who want to hold the government accountable for their actions. As you know True News, without any support, has fought to keep the real NYC’s investigative and analysis reporting era of great journalism alive. True News is a living memorial to publisher John Peter Zenger who was jailed in 1733 by the King for reporting to New Yorkers what was going on in their city. It is also in the tradition of the Ben Bradlee generation that believes that all reporters would not be doing their job if they did not follow the story until they got to the truth. Today’s reporters copy press releases from elected officials and lobbyists hired by the special interests who want to control the message. The lost circulation of newspapers has created a generation of young reporters who not only rely on elected officials and lobbyists for stories, but don’t even Google to find the historical context or, more importantly, the truth behind the stories they write. In this era of sell-out journalism, the public has become disconnected, powerless and trapped by a permanent government that has turned against them. The media blames an apathetic public for not voting even after democratic consultants act like an Orwellian 'Big Bother' threatening them to vote or be looked into. True News reports that the reason for the decreasing turn-out is the public no longer feel their votes matter. If you value hard hitting Investigative Journalism, don't let True News go the way of the Passenger Pigeon. The Newfield, Barrett, Kempton, Hammel of yesteryear are no more. Local TV news limits itself to good looking women and men reading about breaking fires and crimes, with few exceptions. What's left that isn't tabloid is a wasteland of superficial news, driven by political and corporate PR machines, sowing the fertile seeds of corruption public and private hand in glove. Despite the soft news we see, standard bearers play a significant albeit vestigial role. Newspapers constantly pick up stories from True News (without crediting us of course) avoiding the costs to investigate themselves. Without True News, the New York Press and this blog's over one and half million readers will be utterly lost in the wilderness. Only True News is explaining: How Blacks, the Poor and the Middle Class are Being Pushed out of Brooklyn Because of Albany's Tax Breaks for Luxury Developers and Apartments Gives Details How Lobbyists and Developers Run A Secret Shadow Government that Also Controls Elections With Big Money and Their Control Over the Media Investigates How Political Party Bosses Have Been Replaced By Lobbyists' Privatization of the Tammany Hall Machine Reports How the WFP and the Elected Officials Who Are Supported By Them Have Abused and Aggressively Broken Campaign Finance Laws. True news is not funded by special interests like the other news blogs. True News has been self-funded all these years. True News does not make nice with sitting politicians, developers, lobbyists to fund it or to provide its young clueless reporters with story ideas. True News wants nothing more than to scratch out a modest living in its aim to investigate, connect the dots, and get to the truth of every newsworthy story. To carry on in this mission, True News needs funding from people like you -- People Who Want Better Journalism in order to learn what is really going on in their government and fight the corrupt politicians. It's been written about True News Those of you who have an involvement in the dangerous game of politics, it may be of interest to know who’s telling the truth these days, and, whether the articles we read are real or imagined disinformation, emanating directly out of a governmental PR department. No genuine journalist would ever rely on such a source for the truth. As publisher of the SoHo Journal, through personal experience, take it from me that it is possible to become a political target for simply writing about the truth. And the mainstream media and writers eat their own for sales— as well as take orders from their masters— corporate, financial and political masters. Always pay attention to the agenda. Read between the lines. That is the basis of real reporting and political comprehension. Not the rehashing of a press release. OWS had a handle on this reality as well. Pay attention to the current daily blog written by Gary Tilzer. His True News is one of the few remaining sources for political investigative reporting. His fearless reporting of the truth in political circles is worth noting. Contributors names are confidential

Other Views

On October 15, 1958, veteran broadcaster Edward R. Murrow delivered his famous "wires and lights in a box" speech (VIDEO) The Last Lion of Tammany HOW JIMMY McMANUS, MANHATTAN’S LAST GREAT TAMMANY DISTRICT LEADER, HELPED TO REVIVE HELL’S KITCHEN AND THE THEATER DISTRICT c By James S. Kaplan f On January 13, 2011, the law firm of Proskauer Rose moved into 11 Times Square, which is located on 42nd Street between 7th and 8th Avenues. In moving west to the final building of the City’s Times Square redevelopment, the Proskauer firm joined such other major law firms as Cravath, Swaine & Moore, Covington & Burling, Roberts & Holland, and the advertising firm of Ogilvy & Mather. That such major professional firms, along with a number of newly constructed luxury apartment buildings on 42nd Street from ninth to eleventh avenue and trendy restaurants and off Broadway theaters would be located west of 8th Avenue in midtown would have been almost inconceivable fifty years ago. Tammany Last Stand Continued

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"I don't care a straw for your newspaper articles, my constituents don't know how to read, but they can't help seeing them damned pictures." Boss Tweed

"When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny." Thomas Jefferson

The Internet is a large-scale version of the "Committees of Correspondence" that led to the first American Revolution

Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. ” -Thomas Jefferson

“Nearly all the newspaper accounts published at the time were manufactured by journalists at a distance, and were not only inaccurate in their facts but intentionally misleading.”
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Gene Kelley in “Inherit the Wind” described the job of a newsman: “Comfort the afflicted; and afflict the comfortable.”

In the beginning of the last century, Lincoln Steffens and Jacob Riis were the muck rakers. Steffens tried to rouse the public to take action against the misdeeds of government and corporate leaders. Jacob Riis, a Danish immigrant, was the pioneer of photo journalism. He took his camera into the miserable tenement slums of the city. Depicting the plight of the poor, he wrote a book called “How the Other Half Lives.”

"Through the years of the 20th century even the most mercenary of newspaper owners were, above all, conscious of their duty to inform the public and they backed their reporters to the hilt. It was not just a matter of right or wrong---but common sense. The ethics of good journalism in this era, alas, seems to have been forgotten." Gabe Pressman

"A typical vice of American politics is the avoidance of saying anything real on real issues." Theodore Roosevelt

As a 19th-century Manhattan politician once observed, “no man’s life, liberty or property are safe while the Legislature is in session.”

"Trying to determine what is going on in the world by reading newspapers is like trying to tell the time by watching the second hand of a clock." — Ben Hecht

Kempton once said, "There's no excuse for kicking somebody unless he's up." Murray Kempton used to kick people who were up all the time, and though he was half their weight and underpaid it was beautiful to watch. Quite beautiful.

Journalism is printing what someone else does not want printed. Everything else is public relations. - George Orwell

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