Showing posts with label oversight. Show all posts
Showing posts with label oversight. Show all posts

Sunday, February 16, 2014

Lack of checks-and-balances haunts de Blasio's scandalous jail favor for Bishop Findlayter

Who has oversight over a mayor, whom many question may have abused his authority ?

Facing questions from the media on Friday about Mayor Bill de Blasio's questionable interference with a judge's order in the case against Bishop Orland Findlayter, New York City Public Advocate Tisch James essentially told a reporter from The New York Post that it was not her job to question the mayor's judgment.

Several people followed Ms. James from City Hall to her office on Friday, asking her to comment on the growing scandal that has forced the mayor to cancel one press conference, forced Bishop Orlando Findlayter to cancel a public statement, and forced the Rev. Al Sharpton to contort himself into a politically expedient embrace with his arch-nemesis, the former racist mayor, Rudolph Giuliani. Mayor de Blasio has defended his intervention in Bishop Findlayter's detention as "absolute appropriate."

Outside City Hall, Ms. James was asked to comment about the mayor's actions that sprung Bishop Findlayter, a crucial political supporter, out of jail, a move seen by many as a favor granted by the mayor to a member of his inaugural committee. As public advocate, Ms. James is tasked with challenging the city government if she sees wrong-doing.

"You are the public advocate, do you have anything to say ?" a reporter asked.

"No comment, no comment," was her first response -- before a reporter repeatedly asked the public advocate for her opinion, finally prompting the public advocate to say, "I will defer to the mayor of the City of New York."

Tish James from yoav gonen on Vimeo.

Just last summer, Ms. James demonstrated she was able to speak truth to power, when she challenged Gov. Andrew Cuomo to place a moratorium on hospital closings. She has it in her to stand up to powerful men. Left unexplained is why Ms. Tames is standing beside Mayor de Blasio as his young administration becomes engulfed in serious questions about abuse of authority and, quite possibly, obstruction of justice.

In respect of Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito, during her campaign for the speakership, many raised serious concerns about her ability, or her willingness, to serve as a check on the mayor's power. Because the mayor lobbied on her behalf during the Council speaker race, Speaker Mark-Viverito owes her political allegiance to the mayor. There's no check on the mayor's power.

In respect of the scandal resulting from the mayor's defense of his call to police to help his political supporter, Speaker Mark-Viverito has predictably sided with defending the mayor.

The importance of checks-and-balances in a government plays an important role in being able to reign in the uncontrolled power if one branch exceeds its authority. But checks-and-balances also comes into play to prevent one branch of government from getting into trouble with the law. If the police had told the mayor that they could not let Bishop Findlayter go before his scheduled appearance before a judge, then the de Blasio administration would not be having all these problems. A courageous cop could have stopped all this from snowballing into an uncontrollable scandal. Checks-and-balances exist to both protect the integrity of our three branch government system, as well as to protect political insiders from abusing their authority or obstructing justice. Because the mayor was obsessed with extending his power and influence into every corner of city government, only wanting "Yes men" -- and "Yes women" -- around him, now he has to deal with a mess of his very own creation. For a mayor with major control issues, this is like a form of karmic justice.

To prove that there is no check on the mayor's power, when serious questions were raised about the electioneering activities of one of the mayor's political supporters, the lobbying and campaign consulting firm known as The Advance Group, the matter was referred for investigation to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York, precisely because the mayor appoints officials to the Campaign Finance Board and the Conflicts of Interest Board, two city agencies that would be tasked to investigate allegations of wrong-doing by the mayor's political supporters. The matter was also referred to select members of Gov. Andrew Cuomo's public corruption investigation panel, the Moreland Commission.

More concerns were raised by the publication, City & State, in a the publisher's editorial column, questioning the independence of the mayor's nominee, Mark Peters, another close political ally of Mayor de Blasio, to head the city's Department of Investigations.

The possible political damage to Mayor de Blasio's agenda

Because Mayor de Blasio's administration is now in full crisis mode over the police's early release of Bishop Findlayter, this means that Gov. Cuomo will be able to run roughshod over the de Blasio administration's weakened state of governing. The mayor's team is too distracted now with politically protecting the mayor that the mayor is no longer able to fully press for his tax rate hike for the very wealthy. Mayor de Blasio needs the tax rate increase to fulfill on his campaign promise to fund pre-kinder for all New York City toddlers. The mayor's other plans to raise the minimum wage may also be in jeopardy. Until City Hall releases the e-mails that City Hall officials sent to the NYPD leading up to Bishop Findlayter's release and fully answers questions about what appears to be political favors that the mayor may be granting to his campaign supporters, Mayor de Blasio will be be governing from a diminished position.

Saturday, December 21, 2013

Bill de Blasio and Melissa Mark-Viverito : Checks and balances are for stooges

Bill de Blasio Prods City Council to Elect Puppet as Speaker

Councilwoman Melissa Mark-Viverito said on Wednesday that she had lined up enough support to win the speaker's post, thanks to the intervention of mayor-elect Bill de Blasio. By Saturday, the editorial board of The New York Daily News has now published another denunciation of the conflicts of interest that are giving rise to Ms. Mark-Viverito's speakership : "Keep the bums out." This follows a prior editorial published last month in which the same editorial board expressed their opposition to Ms. Mark-Viverito's speakership campaign : "No to Mark-Viverito."

RRELATED : Melissa Mark-Viverito Lobbyist Firm Never Quit, Continued Lobbying Despite Investigations

Friday, December 20, 2013

Bill de Blasio Prods City Council to Elect Puppet as Speaker

Checks and balances are for stooges.

Councilwoman Melissa Mark-Viverito said on Wednesday that she had lined up enough support to win the speaker's post, thanks to the intervention of mayor-elect Bill de Blasio.

How soon before somebody makes a "puppet show" video about Ms. Mark-Viverito ?

Monday, September 17, 2012

Bloomberg, Quinn, NYPD, Winski Destroy OWS, Democratic Social Movements, Lawful Activism

Updated ! Sign the Change.org petition that calls on Commissioner Raymond Kelly to fire Deputy Inspector Ed Winski.

Systematic suppression of the Constitutional rights of lawful political activities of activists, politicians, and journalists to observe police actions against Occupy Wall Street protesters.

Deputy Inspector Edward J. Winski, on orders from City Hall : Mayor Michael Bloomberg and approval (either tacit or express) by City Council Speaker Christine Quinn engages in use of police force, misuse of authority, no professional, lack of respect and courtesy, not to mention abridgment of the Constitutionally-protected Freedoms of Speech and Assembly, to thwart the lawful political activities of citizens. Note how police officers selectively pick activists from within a crowd and use force to make false arrests. One person also provides testimony that a legal observer is arrested by the NYPD.

In this video, some activists deliver first-hand witness accounts of Deputy Inspector Winski misusing his official authority for the sole purpose of interfering, thwarting, and destroying the rights of these activists. The intent of Deputy Inspector Winski can solely be to destroy any chance activists have to peacefully and lawfully assemble and express themselves.

According to the video's description on YouTube, the above video was filmed on September 15, 2012 from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m., and it shows "some of the major events," which took place during livestreamer Luke Rudkowski's live broadcast at the "Occupy Wall Street #S15 action."

And no amount of independent monitoring, oversight, community regulation, not even the existence of the Civilian Complaint Review Board or Internal Affairs investigations, can correct the abuse of authority when it is ordered by and/or is carried out with the tacit or express approval of the politicians, who give orders to NYPD. Here is past evidence about how Deputy Inspector Winksi and the NYPD have misused their authority against peaceful and lawful #OWS activists, I'm sure this can't be the rest of it.

To change the system, you have to join community organising efforts to challenge the oppressive conditions, which violate citizens' rights, and this includes taking action to vote out of office the politicians, who give these orders to NYPD.