Christine Quinn's Image-Making Machine
The candidate's disclosure that she has struggled with bulimia and alcoholism may make her more "relatable," but it doesn't change her record on First Amendment protections.
"Given her record, Quinn's sympathetic personal history seems largely irrelevant. Is she resilient? Apparently. Can she be trusted with power? Apparently not," wrote Wendy Kaminer in The Atlantic.
In a posting on The Gothamist : A Mini-Giuliani Is Creeping Around Inside Quinn, Former ACLU Chief Warns, we now can read the lawyerly response from the attorneys for NYC Is Not For Sale 2013, in defense of the successful "Smoke-Filled Room" TV commercial that has done serious damage to New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn's mayoral campaign.
"Norman Siegel, the former head of the NYCLU who is now representing the group that's sponsoring the ads, sent a letter to the managers of NY1 and Time Warner urging them to "reject the threats... which attempt to chill and interfere with our clients’ First Amendment rights," wrote The Gothamist. Below is the full letter from Mr. Siegel and his co-counsel, and following that is the full threatening letter from Speaker Quinn's campaign.
2013 04 10 Norman Siegel Christine Quinn NY1 Time Warner First Amendment NYC is Not for Sale Letter
And here is the malicious, menacing letter from Speaker Quinn's political campaign committee, authored by an attorney at Stroock, which almost borders on intentional interference with NY1's normal business objective, namely, the selling of time for TV political campaign commercials during an election year :
2013-04-08 Christine Quinn NY1 Stroock Threatening Letter by Connaissable
Read more on The Gothamist : A Mini-Giuliani Is Creeping Around Inside Quinn, Former ACLU Chief Warns
Hello all of America. Hello Mister president. We are Anonymous. Dear Mister president, We would like to ask you, are you happy with what you have allowed the United States to become? The entire country a war machine, people rising in protest against you, and the city governments allowing the brutal beatings and arresting of citizens across America. By allowing this to happen you are a disgrace to the office of presidency. You mister president, you need ought rightfully to set your political career aside and focus on the city streets of your own country. So far you have done nothing about the thousands of people arrested in the streets for exorcising their first amendment rights. Stop and listen to the people you took an oath to uphold, stop treating the people of America like terrorists with the building of FEMA camps to imprison all who stand up against political control. You Mister President are a failure to America.
Citizens of the United States. The corporations that profit from permanent war need us to be afraid. Fear stops us from objecting to government spending on a bloated military. Fear means we will not ask unpleasant questions of those in power. Fear permits the government to operate in secret. Fear means we are willing to give up our rights and liberties for promises of security. The imposition of fear ensures that the corporations that wrecked the country cannot be challenged. Fear keeps us penned in like livestock.
And yet, Who will govern the governors? There is only one force in the nation that can be depended upon to keep the government pure and the governors honest, and that is the people themselves. We alone, if well informed, are capable of preventing the corruption of power, and of restoring the nation to its rightful course if it should go astray. We alone are the safest depository of the ultimate powers of government.
It is for this reason that our constitution was written. America, and the world at large is becoming informed and in turn preparing. Soon, We the people will no longer stand by in silent consent. This is a call to every citizen, this is a message to all of government.
Knowledge is free. We are anonymous. We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us.
NYPD continue to monitor peaceful activists in violation of the Handschu Agreement. In this latest case, NYPD officials are visiting this blog even though NYPD refuse to answer to a Freedom of Information request by the author of this blog.
Remember, this is on top of the fact that there have been allegations that Speaker Quinn has instructed the NYPD to use physical force against the author of this blog.
If Speaker Quinn can't find a way to violate due process by firing you, then she puts the NYPD on the case, to harass and cybermonitor you ?
2012 11 24 NYPD Cybermonitoring Louis Flores Handschu AgreementWas the wrongful termination of Viola Plummer a case of intolerance, control issues, and violation of due process run riot ?
From The Gothamist :
NEW YORK (10 July 2007 12:35 p.m.) - City Council Speaker Christine Quinn fired Councilman Charles Barron's chief of staff Viola Plummer yesterday. Quinn had required Plummer to sign a letter agreeing to behave during meetings, after Plummer heckled Quinn during a meeting about street namings and made reference to an "assassination" of Councilman Leroy Comrie, but Plummer refused (she has maintained that she meant a "assassination" of Comrie's character and/or political prospects). And Plummer filed a $1 million racial discrimination suit against Quinn.
Plummer's lawyer says that Quinn has no authority to fire Plummer under the city charter (though Quinn supposedly checked the charter to make sure she could).
NYC IndyMedia reported that Plummer's lawsuit charges Quinn of "abuse of power, racial discrimination, violation of the First Amendment, and violation of due process." The case is due in Federal Court on September 24.But Plummer still went to work yesterday. Barron escorted Plummer to work, and though Plummer's ID card was deactivated, she received a visitor's pass to enter the building where Barron's offices are located. Plummer says she'll volunteer for Barron's staff and still attend council meetings, which she can do as a visitor.
And some wonder if this dispute will help Quinn's plans to run for mayor. Some pundits tell the Sun she needs to build a reputation for toughness. Civil rights attorney Norman Siegel, though, finds the firing "constitutionally suspect."
Transcript of Public Meeting of CCRB. Testimony given by Suzannah B. Troy, beginning on Page 18.
20130410 Pubmeeting CCRB Suzannah B Troy Transcripts Louis Flores by Connaissable
Ms. Troy mentions that I have yet to receive any word from CCRB, and yet the Board Members didn't act like anything was wrong. I guess they think it is O.K. for CCRB not to have to answer any complaints that get filed ? The transcript is filled with strange errors. For example, Ms. Troy mentioned on Page 23 that I was shoved. Instead, the transcriber wrote that I was shot ! Even if I had been shot, the Board Members didn't even care. How sad is that, that they don't take brutality seriously, be it being shoved by a police officer or being shot by a police officer. Now, I see how the families of all of the police shooting victims feel : the police don't care.
I invite everybody to read Ms. Troy's testimony in full. It is very revealing.
My latest video, discussing New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn's use of officers" from the NYPD Intelligence Division to provide domestic surveillance outside her fundraising events :
Video of NYPD making it difficult for a senior citizen, who has special needs due to healthcare issues (a bad back).
Video that was reported about by The Wall Street Journal, which shows NYPD Officer Lamonica pushing the LGBT activist and blogger, Louis Flores, who was only peacefully trying to take pictures for this blog.
An officer threatened to put the blogger and artist Suzannah B. Troy in handcuffs solely because she is a character and has what we all have in New York City, an attitude. Since when is speaking your mind a crime ?
Louis Flores was pushed and threatened with arrest by an NYPD officer ; citizens question Speaker Christine Quinn's use of NYPD to intimidate protesters
A few weeks ago, NYPD gave us wrong information about where peaceful activists could stand on a broad, wide sidewalk during a peaceful protest :
Continuation of NYPD plain clothes officer, who never identifies himself with his name or his badge number ; this police officer's only intent is to carry out a deliberate campaign to undermine the First Amendment rights of activists :
We've seen how NYPD use brutality, pepper spray, and injuries to subdue and squash political activism. Last week, NYPD even arrested people in wheelchairs at a demonstration in support of the Americans with Disabilities Act :
Update : True News From Change NYC Blog Has Been Restored
Google Blogspot Blog Has Been Removed For No Reason ; Blogger Community Suspects Political Censorship ; Call To Action
Please send an e-mail to press@google.com and copy Gary Tilzer, the owner of the censored blog, at Gtprinter@aol.com -- demanding that the True News blog be restored.
True News is a blog dedicated to reporting about government scandals, politics, and transparency. (Here is the cached version of the True News blog.)
This is not the first act of censorship against Mr. Tilzer. Before the 2010 election, a YouTube video that Mr. Tilzer produced was banned by NBC/YouTube and had to be replaced with an edited version. In the last couple of years, others have faced incidences of cyber censorship or retaliatory activity. One and a half months before the 2009 election, the YouTube channel owned by the artist and political commentator Suzannah B. Troy was likewise censored, until bloggers and a lawyer intervened on her behalf. In 2010, this blogger was attacked by computer viruses 3 or 4 times, including on the day this blogger reported to the New York Department of State Committee on Open Government an act of censorship committed by Brad Hoylman.
Flashback : Secretary of State Hillary Clinton hailed Internet freedom as tool to ‘spread truth and expose injustice’
We need your help to keep courageous bloggers, like Mr. Tilzer, doing what they do. If you are reading this, it is because you are turning to the Internet for reliable information. For it to be here, bloggers, like Mr. Tilzer, have to be able to do their work without fear of retribution or censorship.
