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Giuliani said Thursday the unusual billing practice was not intended to hide anything but instead to speed payment of American Express credit card bills.Back to you, Rudy. What's your lie to explains this?
But the current New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said today he knew of no problems with the delay of payments before Giuliani was mayor, when Kelly served under Mayor David Dinkins, or since.
"I don't recall anybody, any statements about delay," Kelly told reporters.
He said all bills for the police details for Dinkins and now for Mayor Mike Bloomberg are handled directly "through the police department."
Officials with the campaign confirmed that there were two workers taken hostage in the office on 28 North Main St., and NBC News reported that the man demanded to speak to Clinton.CNN reports that Hillary just canceled her speech she was going to give momentarily at the DNC winter meeting here in Virginia.
Clinton, who is not in New Hampshire, canceled a National Democratic Committee meeting in Virginia....
Witnesses described the man as in his 40s with salt-and-pepper hair. There are several police officers in the area with guns drawn....
"There are sharp shooters on the roof, and police are negotiating with someone in the building," said another witness, who did not want to be identified. "The police are notifying all the business owners on the street to evacuate. There are fire trucks behind the Hillary Clinton office."
Presidential candidate Barack Obama also has an office in Rochester, and it has been evacuated. Staff members in John Edwards' office, which is a few buildings away, were also evacuated.
The incident happened at about 1 p.m. Friday at 28 North Main St. in Rochester. The man had what appeared to be a bomb strapped to himself inside the Democrat's office, according to Bill Shaheen, a top state campaign official.Reuters:
A witness said that she spoke to a woman shortly after she was released from the office by the hostage-taker.
"A young woman with a 6-month or 8-month-old infant came rushing into the store just in tears, and she said, 'You need to call 911. A man has just walked into the Clinton office, opened his coat and showed us a bomb strapped to his chest with duct tape," witness Lettie Tzizik said.
There are several police officers positioned across the street from the office, crouched down behind cruisers with guns drawn, according to a reported at the scene.
"There are sharp shooters on the roof, and police are negotiating with someone in the building," said another witness, who did not want to be identified. "The police are notifying all the business owners on the street to evacuate. There are fire trucks behind the Hillary Clinton office.
"I walked out and I immediately started running, and I saw that the road was blocked off. They told me run and keep going," said Cassandra Hamilton, who works in an office adjacent to the building.
Nearby businesses have been evacuated, and the St. Elizabeth Seaton School has been locked down.
An armed man took people hostage at a New Hampshire campaign office for Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Hillary Clinton on Friday, New Hampshire's WMUR TV reported.Read More......
Clinton, who was scheduled to campaign in Virginia on Friday, was not present at the office in Rochester, New Hampshire, according to TV reports.
The number of hostages was unclear, WMUR said. A separate report on MSNBC said a man claiming to have a bomb strapped to him walked into the campaign office.
I've decided, for now at least, to do a weekly election update on the podcast. Joe really is one of the smartest people I know when it comes to elections - he has a scary knowledge of polls and districts and facts about why a caucus isn't a primary, and more. So, each week, we're going to do a round up of where the elections stand and why. This week, Joe and I invited longtime Internet reporter Jacki Schechner (formerly of CNN) to join us. I think it turned into a really interesting discussion, and hope you agree (I also left the file in stereo mode this time, which I think adds a nice touch). You can listen to the broadcast via this link (just click and it should play the audio file on your computer), you can subscribe to our podcasts via iTunes here, or you can subscribe to our podcast RSS feed here. This show is about 26 minutes long, so perfect for the treadmill :-)
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During the November 28 CNN special Campaign Killers: Why Do Negative Ads Work?, CNN anchor Campbell Brown said: "General David Petraeus made his reputation taking on insurgents in Iraq. But when he came to Capitol Hill in September, he was confronted by American insurgents, a liberal anti-war group called MoveOn.org."Seriously, comparing MoveOn to insurgents is beyond the pale. That is such an obviously loaded term. Campbell Brown showed a clear bias, plain and simple.
About 550 Australian combat troops in Iraq should be withdrawn by about the middle of next year, Prime Minister-elect Kevin Rudd said on Friday, setting a broad timetable for the soldiers to return home.Read More......
Australia has about 1,500 troops in and around Iraq, but Rudd won power at the Australia's national election on November 24 with a promise to bring frontline forces home.
“Earlier this month, Congress approved nearly a half trillion dollars for the Department of Defense. Just two weeks ago, House Democrats passed $50 billion in additional funding for our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. We have provided every penny that is currently necessary to fund Defense Department operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, and around the world. It is President Bush and his Republican allies in the Senate who are preventing extra funds from reaching our troops.Read More......
Late this afternoon Giuliani told ABC News this story was a "hit job."Um, Rudy, this is about your public life intersecting with your "personal life." You were having an extramarital affair. And, you were using taxpayer dollars to facilitate that affair. And, you tried to hide it. So, Rudy, that makes it an issue.
"This was really done to try to focus on my personal life," Giuliani said.
He said the NYPD always reimbursed city agencies for his security details' expenses.
"They were handled openly, honestly, it was the practice that was going on since my first term and the idea was to get the bills paid quickly," Giuliani said.
Comptroller Thompson said this about the Mayor's explanation: "That's not the way that we operate these days and it would not be the preferred way of doing business," Thompson said. "In the end, it's a very convoluted way of getting things done."
"If anyone hoped that no one would notice, they were being foolish," Thompson told ABC News.
"I thought that that was Mayor Giuliani showing his nasty side," said Romney communications director Matt Rhoades. "And it was a personal attack of a personal nature, and the audience booed him."Read More......
Giuliani aide Bill Paxon, a former Republican congressman, said it was Romney who initiated the attack on Giuliani.
"Others have tried to misrepresent his record. And I think they learned that he doesn't take it when he's attacked. He's going to come back, he's going to tell the truth, he's going to lay it out," Paxon said.
And at the heart of Granite's operations is a rather peculiar fact: on paper, at least, it had been set up to benefit charities, and in particular a small organisation for children with Down's Syndrome, and their families, which was being run from a semi-detached house on the outskirts of Newcastle.The "charity trust" set up by the bank raised £71 billion (double that and add some for dollars) though it remains to be seen if any charities were aware of this. Read More......
Even more peculiar, perhaps, is the fact that nobody at Northern Rock bothered to tell the children's charity that it was a beneficiary, and the charity never received a penny from Granite.
For seven years, Down's Syndrome North East (DSNE) raised small sums of money as best it could. There was £125 from a man who cycled across the United States, children at a primary school in Middlesbrough chipped in £100, and the North East Ladies' Luncheon raised £750. And the whole time, the volunteers who kept the charity running were unaware that it was supposed to be the beneficiary of a trust which had raised £71bn on the international financial markets and which enjoyed a turnover of £1.8bn last year.
After the Guardian asked Northern Rock for an explanation, the bank apologised to DSNE for what it described as an "oversight" and promised the charity that it would receive a donation in the future. The bank then told the Guardian that the charity might receive a payment - but only if its trust was wound up.
As New York mayor, Rudy Giuliani billed obscure city agencies for tens of thousands of dollars in security expenses amassed during the time when he was beginning an extramarital relationship with future wife Judith Nathan in the Hamptons, according to previously undisclosed government records.Most Americans have a different definition of "security" than Rudy. Read More......
The documents, obtained by Politico under New York’s Freedom of Information Law, show that the mayoral costs had nothing to do with the functions of the little-known city offices that defrayed his tabs, including agencies responsible for regulating loft apartments, aiding the disabled and providing lawyers for indigent defendants.
At the time, the mayor’s office refused to explain the accounting to city auditors, citing “security.”
The Hamptons visits resulted in hotel, gas and other costs for Giuliani’s New York Police Department security detail.
Giuliani’s relationship with Nathan is old news now, and Giuliani regularly asks voters on the campaign trail to forgive his "mistakes."
Matt Patsky finds taking a fund green has been good not only for the environment but his investors as well.Read More......
The manager of Winslow Management's Winslow Green Growth Fund is up 11.2 percent year to date, and 22.5 percent over the last five years.
This is last week’s “Iraq Weekly Status Report” from the State Department.Read More......
It’s described thusly: “This comprehensive status report on Iraq provides weekly updates in the eight key areas identified as pillars of U.S. Government policy.”
Scroll through and it looks kind of impressive, lots of information -- good job keeping on top of the game State Department! But scroll to the bottom and it lists the sources for the information. Now it woulda been nice if they included some footnotes in the body of the document to indicate they were including outside information, but as it turns out the entire thing is basically plagiarized word for word from those news articles, with the slightest of adjustments so as to maybe give the impression it’s in their own words. Drop this code below in a post to see what I mean, pretty pathetic that the US State Department would send this out as their official “Status Report” on the preeminent foreign policy clusterfuck of our generation, and plays right into Dowd’s point about Condi being lost in the funhouse and learning everything from the news.
1. Washington Post, 11/15/07:Senior military commanders here now portray the intransigence of Iraq's Shiite-dominated government as the key threat facing the U.S. effort in Iraq, rather than al-Qaeda terrorists, Sunni insurgents or Iranian-backed militias. In more than a dozen interviews, U.S. military officials expressed growing concern over the Iraqi government's failure to capitalize on sharp declines in attacks against U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians. A window of opportunity has opened for the government to reach out to its former foes, said Army Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, the commander of day-to-day U.S. military operations in Iraq, but "it's unclear how long that window is going to be open."State Dept Iraq Weekly Status Report, 11/21/07 (page 9):Senior military commanders now portray the intransigence of Iraq's Shiite-dominated government as the key threat facing the U.S. effort in Iraq, rather than al-Qaida terrorists, Sunni insurgents or Iranian-backed militias. Several U.S. military officials have expressed growing concern over the Iraqi government's failure to capitalize on sharp declines in attacks against U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians. A window of opportunity has opened for the government to reach out to its former foes, said Army Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, the commander of day-to-day U.S. military operations in Iraq, but "it's unclear how long that window is going to be open."2. AP, 11/14/07:The Iraqi government seized the west Baghdad headquarters of a powerful Sunni Muslim group today, cordoning off the building and accusing the group of supporting al-Qaida, officials said. The Association of Muslim Scholars, a hardline Sunni clerics group with links to insurgents, has its headquarters in the Um al-Qura mosque in the capital's Sunni-dominated Ghazaliyhah neighborhood.State Dept Iraq Weekly Status Report, 11/21/07 (page 3,9):The Iraqi government seized the west Baghdad headquarters of a powerful Muslim group November 14, cordoning off the building and accusing the supporting al-Qaida, officials said. The Association of Muslim Scholars, Sunni clerics group with links to insurgents, has its headquarters in the mosque in the capital's Sunni-dominated Ghazaliyhah neighborhood.3. UPI, 11/19/07:The United Nations announced it will help the Iraqi government with the increasing number of refugees returning to their homes. In a statement, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Iraq Staffan de Mistura said the assistance is a result of a request by the Iraqi Ministry of Displacement and Migration. As there are indications that both refugees and (internally displaced people) are starting to return back to their homes, we stand behind the Iraqi government in ensuring that this initial positive return is properly assisted and implemented," Mistura said. Aid and relief agencies estimate 2 million people fled the country since the March 2003 U.S.-led invasion and subsequent sectarian fighting, while another 2.3 million left their homes for other parts of Iraq. The assistance will include technical advice, developing monitoring and data-gathering tools and providing capacity-building support to the ministry, a U.N. statement said.State Dept Iraq Weekly Status Report, 11/21/07 (page 4, 26):UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Iraq Staffan de Mistura announced the UN will help the GOI with the increasing number of refugees returning to their homes. The assistance will include technical advice, developing monitoring and data-gathering tools and providing capacity-building support to the ministry, a U.N. statement said.4. Voices of Iraq, 11/18/07:The Iraqi Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) called on the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) to better assist journalists in their work and grant them any permission necessary for the fulfillment of their mission.State Dept Iraq Weekly Status Report, 11/21/07 (page 4, 29):Strengthen Public Understanding Insurgents5.UPI, 11/16/07:
The Iraqi Committee to Protect Journalists called on the Kurdistan Regional Government to better assist journalists in their work and grant them any permission necessary for the fulfillment of their mission.Oil companies are welcome to Iraq, Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani said, except for the "opportunist" firms already in Iraqi Kurd territory. Iraq is moving toward signing a batch of oil deals, with or without a national oil law, as it attempts to pick up production of the world's third-largest oil reserves. "All the major oil companies ... are very interested for obvious reasons to come work in Iraq and with the improved security conditions they've been approaching us and indicating their keen interest," Shahristani told reporters on the sidelines of an OPEC summit in Riyadh. "We have always told them that they are most welcome to come work in Iraq with us and we don't necessarily need a new hydrocarbon law to do that. "We have our prevailing laws that allow the minister of oil in Iraq to sign any kind of contract; of course it has to be presented to the Parliament depending on the kind of contract," Shahristani said. "We have already started talking to a few major oil companies who are interested in the super giant fields in the south which are already producing. We are producing oil from there but there are new technologies, they have been working and studying these fields. We'll find a way to cooperate to enhance production from these fields and make more oil available to the world market." While Baghdad has only recently said it would soon sign oil deals, based on a Saddam Hussein-era oil law, the Kurdistan Regional Government passed its own oil law in August and since then has signed 14 oil deals with smaller international oil companies.State Dept Iraq Weekly Status Report, 11/21/07 (page 13):Speaking about international investment opportunities, Shahristani said all companies, except for the “opportunist” firms already in Iraqi Kurd territory, are welcome to invest in Iraq. Iraq is moving toward signing a batch of oil deals, with or without a national oil law, as it attempts to pick up production of the world’s third-largest oil reserves. While Baghdad has only recently said it would sign oil deals based on a Saddam Hussein-era oil law, the Kurdistan Regional Government passed its own oil law and has signed 14 oil deals with smaller international oil companies.6. New York Times, 11/16/07:Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki of Iraq has approved the trial of two Shiite former officials who are accused of killing and kidnapping hundreds of Sunnis, according to American advisers to the Iraqi judicial system.State Dept Iraq Weekly Status Report, 11/21/07 (page 4, 25):
The case, which could come to trial as early as this month, would be the first that involved bringing to trial such high-ranking Shiites for sectarian crimes.
An Iraqi judge ruled last month that there was sufficient evidence to try the two former officials, who held senior positions in the Health Ministry. But there had been concern that the ministry might try to block the case by invoking a section of the Iraqi criminal law that proscribes the prosecution of officials who are executing their official duties.
The approval to hold a trial was provided in a memo issued earlier this week by the acting health minister. Mr. Maliki has formally endorsed the decision, American officials said.According to American advisers to the Iraqi judicial system, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has approved the trial of two former Shiite officials who are accused of killing and kidnapping hundreds of Sunnis.
o The case, which could come to trial as early as this month, would be the first that involved bringing to trial such high-ranking Shiites for sectarian crimes.
o An Iraqi judge ruled last month that there was sufficient evidence to try the two former officials, who held senior positions in the Ministry of Health (MoH), but there had been concern that the MoH might try to block the case by invoking a section of the Iraqi criminal law that proscribes the prosecution of officials who are executing their official duties.
o The approval to hold a trial was provided in a memo issued earlier this week by the acting minister in the MoH. PM Maliki has formally endorsed the decision.
Without the money, the panel found, a warmer world "could stall and then reverse human development" in the countries where 2.6 billion people live on $2 a day or less.Read More......
Scientists have reported that temperatures rose an average 1.3 degrees Fahrenheit over the past 100 years, bringing the prospect of a century of extreme weather, rising seas, widening drought and disease and harm to fisheries, forests and farmland.
According to development officials, the unfortunate consequences include women and young girls walking further to collect water in the Horn of Africa, people erecting bamboo flood shelters on stilts in the delta of the Ganges River, and others planting mangroves to protect themselves against storm surges in the delta of the Mekong River.
"These impacts ... go unnoticed in financial markets and in the measurement of world gross domestic product (GDP)," the panel's report said. "But increased exposure to drought, to more intense storms, to floods and environmental stress is holding back the efforts of the world's poor to build a better life for themselves and their children."
John, I stay at the Marriott Fairfield Inn, downtown Chicago and the Marriott Courtyard Inn downtown Chicago about once a month. They always have Americablog blocked. I was in Concord N.H. last month at a Hampton Inn, and they had Americablog blocked as well, I believe they are part of the Hilton network of hotels. Just thought you would wan't to know.This is the kind of issue GLAAD and the Human Rights Campaign should be jumping on. It's not just about AMERICAblog, it's about every Web site on the Internet that ever mentions gays and lesbians. The religious right understands these kind of issues, how they are so much more important than just the single incident. Hopefully our side does as well. Read More......
In 2006, when Israel invaded Lebanon and many civilians died, including children, Condi and W. drew Arab and U.N. ire for not forcing Ehud Olmert to broker a cease-fire faster.Wow. Read More......
That same year, in another instance of spectacular willful ignorance, she was blindsided by the Hamas win in the Palestinian elections.
As she described it to Bumiller, she went upstairs at 5 a.m. the morning after the Palestinian elections in 2006 to the gym in her Watergate apartment to exercise on her elliptical machine. She saw the news crawl reporting the Hamas victory.
“I thought, ‘Well, that’s not right,’ ” she said. She kept exercising for awhile but finally got off the elliptical trainer and called the State Department. “I said, ‘What happened in the Palestinian elections?’ and they said, ‘Oh, Hamas won.’ And I thought, ‘Oh, my goodness! Hamas won?’ ”
When she couldn’t reach the State Department official on the ground in the Palestinian territories, she did what any loyal Bushie would do: She got back on the elliptical.
“I thought, might as well finish exercising,” Rice told Bumiller. “It’s going to be a really long day.” It was one of the few times she was prescient on the Middle East.
Wells Fargo & Co (WFC.N), the second-largest U.S. mortgage lender, said on Tuesday it would take a $1.4 billion fourth-quarter charge largely related to losses on home equity loans as the nation's housing market deteriorates.The industry certainly is cyclical though the depth of the losses are something that did not have to happen so what went wrong and why? The obvious first thought is that too many people made too much money from fluff instead of real business. What is more troubling is that people such as Greenspan should have stepped in and raised a few flags but he too was caught up in the excitement. Perhaps he was excited about heading into retirement with a hot economy? I don't know, but this costly debacle will be a drag on the economy and on individuals for a while. We deserve much more from our government than this. Much more. Read More......
The company, which is also the fifth-largest U.S. bank, said it also was significantly scaling back making home equity loans through brokers, citing a need to tighten lending standards and reduced demand from investors to buy the loans.
Prices of existing U.S. single-family homes in the third quarter slumped 4.5 percent from a year earlier, matching a record decline from the previous period as the housing downturn deepened, according to a national home price index on Tuesday.Read More......
The S&P;/Case-Shiller National Home Price Index fell 1.7 percent from June, marking the largest quarterly decline in the index's 21-year history, S&P; said in a statement.
I asked Mr. Romney whether he would consider including qualified Americans of the Islamic faith in his cabinet as advisers on national security matters, given his position that "jihadism" is the principal foreign policy threat facing America today. He answered, "…based on the numbers of American Muslims [as a percentage] in our population, I cannot see that a cabinet position would be justified. But of course, I would imagine that Muslims could serve at lower levels of my administration."Well, as long as they can carry Mitt's bags or perhaps sweep a floor or two. This is all quite interesting coming from a guy who belongs to a faith that barely represents 2% of the population, compared to the 1% in America who are Muslims. Are we really doing that well with our existing Muslim outreach programs that we can afford to exclude Muslims from senior positions in the next administration? Yes, he's the guy who cries "foul" when anyone discusses his Mormon faith (that he can't stop talking about) but he doesn't mind making a bigoted remark about Muslims. During our so-called war on terror, no less. How insulting, careless and downright offensive. Read More......
Romney, whose Mormon faith has become the subject of heated debate in Republican caucuses, wants America to be blind to his religious beliefs and judge him on merit instead. Yet he seems to accept excluding Muslims because of their religion, claiming they're too much of a minority for a post in high-level policymaking. More ironic, that Islamic heritage is what qualifies them to best engage America's Arab and Muslim communities and to help deter Islamist threats.
Political Wire got an advance look at a new Strategic Vision poll in Iowa that shows Sen. Hillary Clinton and Sen. Barack Obama tied in the Democratic presidential race at 29%, with John Edwards trailing at 23%.Read More......
On the Republican side it shows, Mitt Romney barely leading with 26%, followed closely by Mike Huckabee at 24%, Rudy Giuliani at 14%, Fred Thompson at 10% and Sen. John McCain at 7%.
Mr. Bush made no comment when the Nobel was announced, and today, the two stood silently, and a bit awkwardly, during the photo opportunity.(Hat tip to Riki.) Read More......
But the president did personally telephone Mr. Gore to extend the invitation, and the White House changed the date of the event so Mr. Gore could attend. Mr. Bush’s press secretary, Dana Perino, told reporters the president is willing to let bygones be bygones.
“This president does not harbor any resentments,” she said. “He never has.”
In fact, Mr. Bush and his aides still deplore what they view as President Clinton’s disastrously hands-on involvement in the peace process in 2000. And they insist that Mr. Bush does not intend to negotiate personally the two-state peace he has pronounced as his vision . . . For all the pomp of the Annapolis gathering, the White House is not calling it a summit meeting or anything else suggestive of substantive progress. Mr. Bush’s vision is ambitious, but his strategy is cautious — he may be repeating Mr. Clinton’s role, yet he rejects what he sees as the meddlesome quality of it.To call this "repeating" the role that President Clinton played is hyperbole, to say the least -- while people can (and do) argue over particular Clintonian successes and failures, by all accounts he really, really knew his stuff when it came to Israel/Palestine issues. Down to the neighborhoods in Jerusalem, locations of settlements, etc. Somehow I don't think Bush has quite the same command of the details.
Mr. Bush’s aides often point out that in 2002 he was the first American president to declare support for a Palestinian state. That is true, but they fail to mention that he did so while refusing to negotiate with Yasir Arafat, then the Palestinian leader, effectively endorsing a deadly stalemate.Far too often, that kind of ridiculous administration claim is allowed to pass without context of, y'know, the facts. Nice to have them in this instance. Read More......
Senate Minority Whip Trent Lott's resignation announcement on Monday was the latest in a wave of retirements to hit congressional Republicans, making an already difficult 2008 electoral landscape even more complicated for the minority party.Read More......
Party officials insist that the retirements -- 17 members of the House and six senators -- are simply the result of individual decisions and not indicative of a broader negative sentiment within the party. "I don't hear a drumbeat that 'We're not effective and I don't like it here anymore,' " said National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Tom Cole (Okla.).
But with so many lawmakers -- including a large number from competitive states and districts -- heading for the exits, it's hard not to point to the GOP's newfound minority status in Washington, the turnover in party leadership and the perilous political environment heading into 2008 to explain the exodus.
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