Free Republic

A friend sent me an interesting Youtube video a couple of days ago, and I’ve been spending some time watching it and thinking about it. It’s a video from PBS consisting of an interview by Judy Woodruff of Doug Schoen and Elliot Ackerman, two of the principals of this group. As I listened to them, this all sounded very enticing on its surface, but the longer they spoke, the more I began to wonder about who is behind all of this. It seems like an effort to circumvent the ordinary electoral process, and when I think of that notion, the...

Azar Nafisi reveals the decadence of studying literature in Tehran In a house in Tehran in the 1990s eight women were talking about literature. Someone was thinking of Jane Austen and the famous opening of Pride and Prejudice, "It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife." Since the Iranian authorities had decreed that girls could be married off at the age of nine, one of the women in the group proposed a local variation: "It is a truth universally acknowledged that a Muslim man, regardless...

PETER ACKERMAN'S QUEST TO TOPPLE TYRANNY Regime Change, Inc. by Franklin Foer   Post date 04.14.05 | Issue date 04.25.05 When the Rose Revolution began in the fall of 2003, there was little reason to hope for a happy ending. Twelve years earlier, the former Soviet Republic of Georgia had stepped from communism into civil war. The old Communist eminence Eduard Shevardnadze may have brought greater stability when he took over the government in 1992, but his corrupt rule also generated huge new pools of ill will among the populace. Some of this disgust manifested itself in small, peaceful street protests. But...

In the shifting narratives of the Trump-Russia probe, a Maltese academic named Joseph Mifsud has remained a linchpin regarding claims of collusion. He is the professor who allegedly told Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos that the Russians had emails related to the Clinton campaign. The FBI says it opened its investigation in late July 2016 after Papadopoulos relayed that information to Australian diplomat Alexander Downer, and the Australians tipped off U.S. authorities. While some news accounts describe Mifsud as an accomplice to Russian clandestine operations or a “cut-out” (intermediary), others contend he is a full-fledged Russian spy. In an official...

Gerardo Hernandez, a spy for Communist Cuba and the man responsible for the murder of four humanitarian workers (three of whom were American citizens) over international waters, was freed from prison last year by the Obama administration, due in part to the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). This was revealed at a February 6, 2015, celebration of Hernandez’s release, along with two of his fellow Cuban agents (collectively known as the “Cuban 5.. At the beginning of the event, an IPS official thanked all who who took part in the 17-year campaign and singled out a number of organizations that...

The most influential money-mover of the modern labor movement is also affiliated with the secretive Democracy Alliance. Karen Ackerman launched two of the most expensive political operations of the 2004 and 2008 elections as political director of union giant American Federation of Labor-Congress Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO). The union spent $150 million to defeat President George W. Bush in 2004 and pledged $200 million—more than 40 percent of the $450 million spent by labor groups that year—to elect Barack Obama in 2008. Ackerman’s ability to generate massive political capital made her a star of the left, leading to a $143,000 payday...

Wow. On the heels of his possible congressional opponent, Rory Lancman, bowing out of a run for Congress, Queens/Long Island Rep. Gary Ackerman is now bowing out too, according to a press release I just got from Ackerman’s office. I am told the Queens Dems are meeting tomorrow to nominate congressional candidates, but two people I’ve spoken to close to the Queens Dems were unaware of Ackerman’s retirement. I also have heard rumors that Rep. Joe Crowley would be interested in this seat, since this would be a favorable district for him, but I have no idea if that’s actually...

The headlines last week were filled with outrage over the revelation that former Philadelphia School Superintendent Arlene Ackerman has filed for $573 a week in unemployment compensation, the maximum amount in Pennsylvania. Ms. Ackerman, who was contracted to receive a $348,000 salary through 2014, was bought out of it for a $905,000 lump-sum payment plus $83,000 for unused vacation and personal days.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation dropped in on my doorstep. It seems that the piece we did on Monday about Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-Carnation), the boutonniered New York congresscritter, and his smarmy, PETA-friendly critiques of Rep. Jeff Landry’s fundraising tactics ruffled some feathers inside the Beltway.

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – A Philadelphia Common Pleas Court judge today granted a temporary restraining order against the School District of Philadelphia, putting a halt for now on the school district’s plan to lay off 1,500 teachers. (Philadelphia schools superintendent Arlene Ackerman. Photo by Mike DeNardo) Philadelphia schools superintendent Arlene Ackerman confirmed on Monday that the district was sending out layoff notices to 3,024 employees, including the teachers. She said teachers at the district’s worst-performing schools (dubbed “promise academies” by the district) would not be subject to the layoffs because she wanted to minimize disruptions at those failing schools. The Philadelphia...

Rep. Gary Ackerman, D-N.Y., chairman of the Foreign Affairs subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia, called Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak's address "a sadistic tease" and predicted that demonstrations could turn violent. "He just lit the final fuse," Ackerman said in an interview on MSNBC TV. "And now I think the situation is going to verge on the explosive over the next 24 hours."

OBAMA'S POLL NUMBERS DOWN, IMAGINARY RACISM UPJuly 21, 2010 The Democrats are depressed about their collapsing poll numbers, so it's time to start calling conservatives "racist." As we now know from the Journolist list-serv, where hundreds of liberal journalists chat with one another, and which was leaked to Daily Caller this week, journalists cry "racism" whenever they need to distract from bad news for Obama. (Ironically, this story did not make headlines.) When the Rev. Jeremiah Wright scandal broke during the 2008 campaign, the first response of Spencer Ackerman of the Washington Independent was to demand that they start randomly...

Republican Liz Berney, Esq., 2010 candidate for U.S. Congress (NY District 5) has done everything right to run a formidable campaign against Democrat Rep. Gary Ackerman’s sixteen-year incumbency. District 5 encompasses parts of two counties at lower New York State, from the town of Elmhurst at Queens County to the Town of Greenvale at the North Shore of Nassau County. Even before Liz Berney ran for Congress in 2008, she was laying the groundwork for her campaign by working within the Republican and Libertarian parties and other organizations building a team of supporters who advocate fiscally sound principles in government...

Didn't Nancy Pelosi say that this will be the cleanest congress in history? Pelosi may have had noble dreams but when you look at her tenure and the scandals by Chris Dodd, Charlie Rangel, John Murtha and others she has not followed through on their scandals. In fact she has allowed the ethics process to drag out in these cases. There is a new Senior Democratic Party congressman who is drawing attention of the ethics committee, Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-NY) a 27 year year veteran Representative of NY's 5th district may have broken House ethics rules with no-money-down stock deal....

UTICA, N.Y. (WKTV) - A comment in the New York Post from Queens / Long Island Congressman Gary Ackerman regarding the replacement of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton as a U.S. Senator after her appointment as Secretary of State, has left many locally, including officials, angry, and disappointed. The New York Post reads "Ackerman also joked that he had taken himself out of the running for the Senate in a way that appeared to highlight (Caroline) Kennedy's lack of statewide experience. He said he wouldn't want to replace Clinton, 'because I don't do Utica, and that's a qualification for the job."

Protesters blockade Rep. Ackerman's houseboatBY JANIE LORBER | janie.lorber @newsday.com 9:31 AM EDT, July 9, 2008 WASHINGTON - A flotilla of peace protesters in canoes and rafts attempted to blockade the houseboat of Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-Jamaica Estates) early Wednesday morning in reaction to legislation he submitted that would impose sanctions on Iran. The Queens Democrat emerged from his home on the Potomac River smiling and clapping after the demonstrators, known as Code Pink, had been chanting for nearly 30 minutes. They want Ackerman to withdraw the legislation because they believe it symbolizes the first step on a path to...

A closed-door retreat in Newport Beach for Senate Republicans has turned into a leadership battle, with state Sen. Jim Battin challenging Minority Leader Dick Ackerman for the top job - again. Battin has collected seven votes, one shy of the eight votes needed to assume the leadership of the 15-member Senate Republican Caucus, sources told Capitol Weekly. Several senators did not attend the retreat, and another closed-door vote was planned Monday morning in the Capitol--on the same day that new members of the 2006-07 Legislature are scheduled to be formally sworn in. The challenge mounted by the "Battinistas" against Ackerman,...

The "smooth transition" of power over at the San Francisco school district is turning out to be anything but -- especially after a behind-closed-doors blowup between outgoing Superintendent Arlene Ackerman, her attorney and some school board members. Officially, the district is saying only that acting Superintendent Gwen Chan is now in charge -- and that henceforth Ackerman, who announced her departure come June and will get $375,000 if she sticks around till then, will be acting in an "advisory" capacity. Unofficially, however, Ackerman and the district could be on the verge of a very nasty split. It all has to...

<p>September 17, 2002 -- NEW Jersey voters already concerned about Sen. Robert Torricelli's low ethical threshold now learn that he's been a paid shill for a group the government identifies as a terrorist organization. Called on this by his Republican opponent, Douglas Forrester, in a debate Thursday, Torricelli said the group had been pulled from the State Department's global terror list and given a clean bill of health. Not true.</p>

WASHINGTON - The White House worked furiously yesterday to try to convince skeptics it had a grip on unrest in New Orleans and make the case that the federal response to Hurricane Katrina was finally pressing forward with a monumental recovery effort. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff tried to blame the feds' slow response on the disastrous breaches in levees a day after Katrina hit, even though various officials now claim they'd warned about the weaknesses in the levees for years. "The second catastrophe, frankly, added a level of challenge that no one has seen before," Chertoff said. Bush, however,...