Hank Sheinkopf, an advisor to Bill Thompson, predicts that the growing grassroots movement against Christine Quinn, and her political doctrine of corruption and neoliberalism, will fail. What do you think ?
Democratic Party political consultant Hank Sheinkopf said that he thinks most of the protesters’ arguments against Christine Quinn are bogus.
Among the lone few truly real Progressive voices in New York City, one person spoke up to question the outrageous statements by Mr. Sheinkopf. Gerson Borrero took to Twitter to express his dissent to Mr. Sheinkopf's lack of any political ethics.
Despite the ongoing protests, political insiders say the [growing grassroots] movement [against Christine Quinn] probably won’t gain enough traction to affect the November mayoral primary.
“There’s always unusual things that occur in every mayoral election, and this is the first unusual thing that’s occurring here,” said Democratic Party political consultant Hank Sheinkopf, who added that he thinks most of the protesters’ arguments are bogus.
“The speaker makes deals,” he said. “That’s the nature of legislative government. Her job is to make deals.”
Sheinkopf, who is serving as an advisor to mayoral candidate Bill Thompson, also downplayed Quinn’s status as the Democratic front-runner. A recent poll has her far ahead of the pack, with 35 percent of likely voters pulling the lever for her as compared with 11 percent for Public Advocate Bill de Blasio and 10 percent for Thompson.
Have we reached a low point in New York City politics, where campaign consultants cannot attach the most corrupt mayoral candidate for fear of exposing the shared, underlying political corruption that exists amongst all of the mayoral candidates ?
The Community Safety Act is a first step toward ending discriminatory practices like stop-and-frisk. The NYCLU and our partners in Communities United for Police Reform are working to pass the Community Safety Act, a series of civil rights bills currently before the City Council. The legislation will create a real ban on racial profiling, protect
New Yorkers from unlawful searches, and require that police officers identify themselves and explain their actions when they stop people.
The American soft-drink industry, fighting Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's restrictions on sugary drink sizes, is courting a lawmaker who could eventually have the influence to overturn the rules: Christine C. Quinn, the City Council speaker and a leading mayoral candidate.
Executives from the Coca-Cola Company donated nearly $10,000 this month to Ms. Quinn's campaign, public records show, days before industry lawyers argued against the mayor's plan in State Supreme Court.
The industry, fearful that New York City's first-in-the-nation limits will erode profits and spawn copycat policies around the country, is hopeful that Mr. Bloomberg's plan can be undone by legislative or executive action once City Hall changes hands at the end of this year.
No other mayoral candidate appeared to benefit from the beverage industry's largess, although several of Ms. Quinn's rivals, including Comptroller John C. Liu and one of his predecessors, William C. Thompson Jr., have been outspoken in their criticism of the drink restrictions.
The Coke executives' campaign contributions represented a noticeable sum for Ms. Quinn, who has expressed unease with the soda limits, which would restrict sales of sugary drinks in containers larger than 16 ounces.
She has suggested that the measure is punitive and will not necessarily be effective at limiting calorie intake, as Mr. Bloomberg has argued. Still, Ms. Quinn, an ally of his, declined to take up legislation to overturn the restrictions, which were approved by the Board of Health last fall and are set to take effect in March.
A spokesman for Ms. Quinn's campaign declined to comment on Friday on the contribution.
The soft-drink industry, which has given millions of dollars to politicians as it fights taxes and restrictions on its products, has aggressively courted New York lawmakers since Mr. Bloomberg unveiled his proposal last spring.
This month, the political arm of Coca-Cola contributed $1,000 to the campaign of Councilwoman Letitia James, a candidate for city public advocate who emerged as a leading opponent of the mayor's plan, records show. In November, Melissa Mark-Viverito, another councilwoman who criticized the mayor's plan, received $75 from a marketing official at PepsiCo.
The contributions to Ms. Quinn, which totaled $9,750 and ranged from $500 to $1,500 apiece, came from 16 high-ranking Coca-Cola employees, some based at the company's Atlanta headquarters, including Clyde C. Tuggle, the senior chief public affairs and communications officer, and Sonya Soutus, a senior vice president for public affairs.
"We support candidates that promote fair policies that enrich the communities and marketplaces where Coca-Cola employees live and work," Gary McElyea, a spokesman for Coca-Cola, said by e-mail.
Officials at Pepsi also contributed $175 each to the campaigns of Daniel R. Garodnick, a councilman, and Reshma Saujani, who is running for public advocate, in the last four months. A manager for Coca-Cola in the Bronx gave $175 to the Council campaign of Robert H. Waterman, a Brooklyn pastor.
A version of this article appeared in print on January 26, 2013, on page A17 of the New York edition with the headline: Quinn, Cool to Soda Ban, Gets Donations From Coke.
This is a political parody slideshow that was composed with editorial criticism and satire.
Christine Quinn has transformed into the worst about neoliberalism.
Speaker Quinn has embraced a culture that can only be described as "pay to play." She accepted $30,000 in campaign donations from the owners of Rudin Management Company before the City Council approved the zone-busting Rudin luxury condo conversion plan for St. Vincent's Hospital. Speaker Quinn supports hospital closings, so that billionaire real estate developers can capitalise and profit off of the assets of public charities. To that end, Speaker Quinn has curried favour with Brad Hoylman, Kathy Wilde, and the Partnership for New York, of which Rudin Management Company is a member. Speaker Quinn has supported all of Mayor Bloomberg's most controversial initiatives, from mayoral control of the school system, to the outsourcing of top education posts to business CEO's with no education credentials. Speaker Quinn also supports the racist NYPD commish Ray Kelly, which puts Speaker Quinn at odds with various minority communities in New York City.
This is a political parody slideshow that was composed with editorial criticism and satire.
From DNAinfo : Chelsea Market Agreement Leaves Food Concourse at Risk, Opponents Say
Jamestown Properties, the owner of Chelsea Market, is under no obligation to "keep the historic building's food concourse" after its zone-busting expansion deal was approved by New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, reported DNAinfo.
Speaker Quinn had sold the zone-busting deal for Chelsea Market with a sketchy bait-and-switch "promise" that the food business located in the concourse of Chelsea Market would be "protected."
But now comes DNAinfo to report that Speaker Quinn's deal to protect the food businesses was all made up. According to Speaker Quinn's signing statement, "The Council’s action permanently protects 75 percent of the current total interior ground-floor concourse retail space for food-related uses." But DNAinfo now reports that there is no legally-binding protection that exists that matches Speaker Quinn's promise.
The protections for the food businesses in the concourse that Speaker Quinn "brokered" was all fake. What remains surprising is how anybody can claim to be "shocked," when Speaker Quinn has a track record for many years now of never standing up for anything that is important to the community ? When are folks going to "see the light" that Speaker Quinn represents all that is bad about neoliberalism ?
During a peaceful and legal protest against the mayoral campaign of New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, NYPD officers used physical force to attempt to move protesters off of a wide public sidewalk and onto the other side of the street. When we refused and maintained our right to free assembly, they used the bodies to block us from distributing leaflets.
Are the NYPD blocking anti-Quinn protesters again, because she has agreed to retain Ray Kelly as Police Commissioner ?
Speaker Quinn has become emboldened ever since she overturned term limits, got away with using millions of dollars of taxpayer dollars in an illegal slush fund, weakened the campaign finance laws, and used major real estate projects to extract campaign donations from developers in a system that many describe as a "pay-to-play" culture. Now, she is using the NYPD as her own private army. The impression that Mayor Mike Bloomberg has influenced her is an understatement.
Because of her record of corruption, activists are basically waiting for Speaker Quinn to be caught in more scandals, before the mayoral election this year.
The protest last night took place at a "housing debate" in Brooklyn.
New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn thinks that corporations are people, too, and that they deserve to be counted as member organizations in order to allow corporations to use corporate money to influence the outcome of elections.
New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn achieved a life-long dream to weaken campaign finance laws yesterday. A new bill, which was passed with almost unanimous support through the New York City Council, was nominally promised to help unions, but the dark side of the bill is a backdoor loophole that exempts corporations from disclosing election-related communications with their employees, stockholders, directors, and other stakeholders about activities that corporations undertake to endorse and support corrupt candidates.
"City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, facing accusations that legislation she championed opened a 'gaping loophole' in New York City's campaign-finance system, backed off her proposal and oversaw the passage of a watered-down bill Wednesday that reduced the reporting requirements for unions, corporations and advocacy groups." (Council Eases Finance Rules * The Wall Street Journal)
New York's vendors face $1,000 fines for minor infractions. But City Council Speaker Christine Quinn has the power to help make things right - but she does not. Why ?
In 2006, the Bloomberg administration quadrupled penalties on licensed street vendors, from a maximum of $250 to a maxiumum of $1,000 per ticket. After filing two lawsuits which were successful but only temporary, the Street Vendor Project turned to City Council for permanent relief. In November 2010, Council Member Stephen Levin introduced two bills to lessen the fines. Intro 434 lowers the maximum fines from $1,000 to $250. Intro 435 makes sure that fines escalate only on vendors who repeatedly commit the same infraction.
The past two years, SVP has had countless meetings with council members, chambers of commerce, and community board members. We wrote boatloads of letters. We gathered thousands of signatures. We made videos. We got a ton of press. Eventually, in April 2012, the City Council Consumer Affairs Committee held a public hearing on Intros 434, 435, and several other vendor bills. Hundreds of vendors turned out to show their support. Many immigrants’ rights and other organizations testified in favor. The University of Wisconsin even published a study showing that reducing fines would increase revenue to the city’s coffers. Yes, lowering fines would increase revenues, because vendors could actually pay them!
And yet, more then six months later, the bills have not received a vote. Why not? Christine Quinn, the Council Speaker, controls whether a vote is called. She is a supporter of easing burdensome regulations on small businesses. She has indicated that her office is “looking into“ whether to lower the fines. Yet, like with other bills, she seems to be dragging her feet. To help give her a push (and show that vendors are highly visible in the public realm and therefore powerful), SVP is posting hundreds of signs on vending carts all over the city.
Support vendors? PLEASE HELP by visiting the Street Vendor Project page and take action now.
Christine Quinn's BOE Conflict of Interests : Her Campaign Team Wants To Change Elections Midstream, At Any Cost, To Win The Democratic Primary -- Even If The Board of Elections Has To Flush Democracy Down The Toilet (Again)
Each of the commissioners that sit and make policy at the Board of Elections must be approved by the city council after having been nominated by the GOP and Democratic party leaders. Last month, the council reappointed another commissioner Maria R. Guastella after the long election day lines scandal, the slow vote count scandals and the fact that the board has not had an executive director in the last two years, since the last one left in a ballot tampering scandal.
City Council Speaker Christine Quinn's conflict is that her campaign team wants a fast primary, meaning June. They feel that with Quinn way ahead in the polls the faster the election, the better chance she has of winning. That is why many of her appointed commissioner on the Board of Elections have been pushing for a June primary under the excuse that a September primary would not give the BOE time to count the voters for a run-off. Can you imagine that after spending $100 million on new machines the Board of Elections still cannot count the same ballots it used to do with the 1950's built voting machines ?
Christine Quinn has refused to meet with her constituents about the big dig project in her district, which is for the dangerous pipeline carrying fracked gas. Residents have engaged in civil disobedience, lying on the ground in front of the back hoes to prevent the digging. If a catastrophic explosion takes place in NYC as it has in other areas, we don't even have a hospital on the entire lower west side of Manhattan. It's a perfect storm.
Here's an excerpt from the article in today's Village Voice :
"We have 15,000 to 17,000 people living in a square mile. The human damage and the real property damage if this thing were to explode would be almost incalculable. It's not just the crater: the heat radiates out along the surface of the ground, and these explosions are so hot that if you try to bring emergency vehicles out to the area, those vehicles would melt. Running this pipeline under the city would be like putting a small-grade neutron bomb beneath the streets."
Confronting the President of Magical Thinking : A Vocation of Agony
Barack Obama and his family, the vice president and his family, other government officials, and their supporters celebrated the president's second inauguration today, which coïncided with the federal holiday commemorating the life and accomplishments of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
LGBT Americans were jubilant, because the president said some aspirational words in the second half of his inaugural address.
"Our journey is not complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law, for if we are truly created equal, then surely the love we commit to one another must be equal, as well."
Immediately, the president's supporters acted in lock-step to express support for this expression of a longing for equality.
Corey Johnson is an up-and-coming LGBT politician, who is patterning himself after New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn's doctrine of putting politically-expedient identity politics before having to deliver any government reforms. Note how the president failed to say the words lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered in "LGBT," but already the president's supporters were having to say the words that the president found unspeakable.
It appears that Mr. Johnson's excitement could be being based not so much on the president's promise of legal reforms that would result in LGBT equality, but, rather, on political party discipline that calls for a self-motivated unity in messaging to sway Progressive voters into believing that the Democratic Party was on their side.
But for the incomplete messaging that the president's words offer, there is no plan attached to how the president plans to "complete" our "journey."
On Facebook, some LGBT activists picked up on the incomplete messaging in the president's rhetoric, because they had noticed a pattern in his prior speeches.
Some LGBT activists were already picking up how President Obama was unable to utter the words lesbian, bisexual, and transgender.
To the president's army of speech writers, did those words lack any dignity and respect, and, therefore, did not need to be mentioned ?
In his speech during his second inaugural ceremonies, President Obama seemed to be channeling the "great communicator," who, we may all remember, was notable for his failure to uttered the word "AIDS" until after thousands of people had died.
Many of the president's supporters have made a choice to be excited for the president's re-election. But ...
"By the time President Reagan had delivered his first speech on the epidemic, of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, 36,058 Americans had been diagnosed with the disease; 20,849 had died," Randy Shilts once wrote. Along a similar vein, when will President Obama say all the words in LGBT ?
So many people want to believe in the hope, change, and love that the president so skillfully articulates in his scripted speeches. We are supposed to want to believe in the magical thinking that the president really is on our side, because doesn't he, after all, say so many nice things that he knows that we want to hear ?
While President Obama's lack of clear communication during this inaugural address may not lead to the deaths of tens of thousands of our "gay brothers and sisters," he nonetheless sets the tone for that which the American people become familiar : either feelings of shame and embarrassment that prevent a president from mentioning lesbians, bisexuals, and transgendered Americans, or feelings of equality and respect by dignifying and acknowledging the journeys still being made by lesbians, bisexuals, and transgendered Americans.
Some activists on Facebook took a more diplomatic, but forward-looking approach to the editing of the president's words : by using the occasion of the president's rhetoric to build forward momentum on the social movement for LGBT equality in the United States.
The hopes and actions of LGBT Americans and their allies are to fulfill on our shared dream for equality.
But LGBT activists and allies already exchange amongst ourselves the vision and prayers for equality.
For all the president's rhetoric, we already seem to have, at first blush, the president's love and affinity for our community, at least that which could be expressed in his own way. What we need now is action.
The longer LGBT Americans have to wait for full federal recognition of their equal rights, the more that members of our community remain fully exposed to legally-permitted forms of discrimination in broad areas of their life, including in the workplace.
The skepticism within the LGBT community about President Obama's commitment to true LGBT equality stems from some major examples of actions that the president refuses to take, which contradicts his rhetoric.
For example, the president refuses to sign the Federal Contractor's Employment Protections Executive Order. National LGBT civil rights groups, such as GetEQUAL, have been mounting a multi-prong campaign to pressure the president to sign the executive order, but the president refuses.
President Obama embarrassed both his administration and the Democratic Party by once having said that while he was nominally committed to the idea that all Americans shared the same civil rights, he still had to "evolve" on marriage equality. It was as if President Obama was admitting that his thoughts on civil rights resembled that of someone a little bit ignorant and a little bit intolerant, like former commissioner Bull Connor, who once, among other depraved acts of discrimination, ordered the opening up of firehoses on African American civil rights activists.
Surely, President Obama was not seriously putting himself into the same league as Bull Connor, but why was the president torturing hisself by proclaiming in speech his support for LGBT equality that could not be matched by his actions ?
And lest we neglect to mention how so many people conveniently seem to forget to remember how it took a national campaign of civil disobedience, among other actions, for national Democratic Party legislators to repeal the military's discriminatory policy known as Don't Ask, Don't Tell. The president's political operatives love to mention how the president "repealed" DADT, but they overlook what it took to get a bill introduced in and voted by Congress.
And if the constant push and pull amongst LGBT activists and civil rights groups to define a winning national strategy to deliver a full federal equality bill through Congress wasn't enough, activists must contend with the political trappings of trying to challenge a president who says all the right things and knows how to manipulate support for his administration. And then there are the other unknown, but nonetheless predictable, obstacles for LGBT activists as they set out to challenge power holders, who fail to act to end de jure and de fact discrimination.
While community organising and activism has evolved since the 1960's with the advent of online tools and other empowering platforms of the Internet like Facebook, YouTube, and blogging, every now and then activists must overcome the occasional opening up of digital firehoses.
Although public commentary describes the United States as "post-racial", racism continues to exert a very real and pervasive influence on institutional policies and processes, interpersonal interactions, neighborhood infrastructure, socioeconomic opportunities, media imagery, and more. RISE is a project designed to illuminate some of the ways in which racism operates in this country.
No seas grosera : le dio un ataque a Christine Quinn cuando una periodista usó la palabra, "señora." Tienes que llamar a ella la presidenta del consejo municipal. Christine Quinn atacó a una periodista y la hizo llorar el miercoles pasado. La controversia comenzó cuando la periodista, Erin Einhorn, dijo a Quinn : "señora."
Cuando se enojó, Christine Quinn dijo at la periodista : "Es mi conferencia de prensa, y yo te digo cuales palabras a utilizar."
Quinn admitió mas tarde de ser grosera. Quinn se disculpó por tener un ataque sin sentido.
