Free Republic

"If anything should happen to Mayor Bill de Blasio, you're looking at the next mayor of the City of New York," Tish James pointed out as she introduced Representative Charlie Rangel at a Harlem church on Sunday. While it's true that, as Public Advocate, James stands first in the line of succession to New York's mayoralty, we're didn't realize that it was on the forefront of her mind. Be careful over at City Hall, Bill.

The world was a beautiful place as Bill de Blasio folded himself into the front passenger seat of a black SUV. The late-afternoon sun was shining on Park Slope, and a grand political breakthrough was within reach. Sure, it had been a complicated few weeks as Governor Andrew Cuomo and the Working Families Party, bitter codependents, tried to agree on a deal that would give Cuomo the WFP’s ballot line this fall in exchange for the governor’s publicly pledging to get behind a progressive policy agenda. Now, though, thanks in part to de Blasio’s mediation, a compromise was falling into...

Sunday on CBS's "Face the Nation," former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said Hillary Clinton would make a "spectacular candidate" for president in 2016. “I think she would be a spectacular candidate on the Democratic side. Bloomberg also praised former Gov. Jeb Bush (R-FL) and Govs. Chris Christie (R-NJ) and Scott Walker (R-WI) pointing to their "executive experience"on the potential candidates on the Republican side of the ticket.

A New York City cab driver insisted Friday that it is his right, hands down, to wear a Nazi armband – even if the Taxi and Limousine Commission says otherwise. As CBS 2’s Lou Young reported Friday evening, Gabriel Diaz, 26, spoke outside of his family’s home in the Throggs Neck section of the Bronx, after he was suspended for wearing a swastika while driving the cab. “I am. I’m a National Socialist – what you guys call a Nazi. I am. I’m a believer of it,” Diaz said. Diaz was suspended for wearing the armband while driving his cab....

Standing in a federal courthouse in a city he long called his political home, former Senator Joseph L. Bruno, the once powerful State Senate majority leader, was found not guilty on federal fraud charges on Friday. The verdict put an end to a legal battle nearly a decade in the making. “This system, it works, sometimes its slow but it works.,” Mr. Bruno, 85, said on the courthouse steps minutes later, flanked by his legal team and family members. Mr. Bruno, a Republican, was one of the three most powerful politicians in the state until his resignation in 2008 amid...

NEW YORK (MYFOXNY) - A New York City cab driver has been suspended for wearing a Nazi swastika armband while on duty. The Taxi and Limousine Commission confirmed to Fox 5 News on Friday that the driver had been suspended for 30 days. His name was not released.

RYE BROOK - New York Republicans have officially nominated Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino (R) as their candidate in the race for governor. Republicans wrapped up their state party convention Thursday at the Hilton Hotel in Rye Brook after nominating Astorino. Other candidates nominated include Onondaga County Comptroller Bob Antonacci for comptroller and chief of staff to former Gov. George Pataki John Cahill as attorney general. Astorino says his success in Westchester shows he can appeal to all kinds of voters in heavily Democratic New York. In his acceptance speech, Astorino called for hydraulic fracturing for natural gas and the...

Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced Tuesday morning that Etsy is getting $5 million from New York state to stay in Brooklyn, a pretty nice sum for a company whose CEO publicly acknowledged just weeks ago that it “could only exist in Brooklyn.” “A company like Etsy could only exist in Brooklyn,” Etsy CEO Chad Dickerson said during an April 23 appearance at a Brooklyn Tech Triangle symposium. “Almost all of our employees live in Brooklyn and our Manhattan employees are treated with scorn.” Etsy, which was founded in Brooklyn in 2005, plans to add more than 340 jobs by 2019 (a...

The fast-food worker strikes are expanding to more U.S. cities and going global. Workers in up to 150 cities across the country are planning to strike on May 15, according to labor organizers. The movement is also headed overseas, with plans for workers to join protests in 33 countries. On Wednesday, the workers announced the protests outside a McDonald's in New York City, and delivered a letter that called on the fast food giant to raise wages and respect workers' rights worldwide. However, security guards didn't allow the workers to bring the letter inside the restaurant. So, they posted the...

De Blasio Announces Affordable Housing Plan The $41 Billion Program Will Create Units for More Than 500,000 New Yorkers By WSJ Staff Updated May 5, 2014 10:46 a.m. ET Mayor Bill de Blasio detailed a wide-ranging plan to build 200,000 new affordable housing units in New York City in 10 years, calling it a "fundamental plan to reduce income inequality." Those who benefit from the plan "won't be living doubled up with friends…they won't be living in homeless shelters," Mr. de Blasio said at a news conference in Brooklyn's Fort Greene neighborhood. The plan would provide housing to service more...

Just another group of New York lawyers: “Let’s see if we can find a loophole in the Constitution of the United States and amend the Constitution without a Constitutional Amendment.” “Let’s skip any vote required by Congress, let’s skip the required vote of the states and let’s skip a Constitutional Convention --- oh, and let’s not even ask the people of New York.” Looking for a loophole. That is what we just love about lawyers, isn’t it? Governor Cuomo has signed, on behalf of the people of New York, the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. This Compact would result in...

Suffering from a clear lack of intellectual honesty, the morally bankrupt progressive socialist mayor of New York City seems to have a knack for tax avoidance. (And remember: despite what Harry Reid would have you believe, tax avoidance is not a crime.) According to public records, Bill “punish the rich” de Blasio paid a mere 8 percent of his income in federal taxes. Just to put that in context for any liberal that has accidently stumbled across this paragraph: That’s less than that capitalist pig, Mitt Romney paid in prior years. Of course, to be fair, it is possible...

Mayor Bill de Blasio's promise to ban New York City's iconic horse-drawn carriages could backfire, exposing what the newly-elected mayor's critics suggest is a corruption scandal masquerading as an animal-rights crusade. Defenders of the carriage industry point to a real-estate executive who is one of de Blasio's major campaign donors as the driving force behind the effort to abolish the carriages. (snip) The bad guy in this drama, according to the carriage drivers, is Steve Nislick, chief executive officer of a New Jersey-based real-estate development company, Edison Properties. The company "employs legions of lobbyists to influence city decisions on real...

Newly inaugurated New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio told those attending the ceremony that he would “put an end to inequality in this City. For too long we have tolerated a situation where some have had too much while others have had too little.” The first step toward Blasio’s egalitarian utopia will be the elimination of Central Park horse-drawn carriage rides, which the Mayor labeled “frivolous and degrading. First of all, horses represent an inefficient form of transportation. Anything horses can do electric cars can do better. Carriages pulled by electric cars would enable people to tour Central Park...

Claiming his place as the 109th mayor of New York City, Bill de Blasio delivered an inaugural address on Wednesday that focused on the issue of inequality, promising that the attention he gave to the subject when he was running for office was not merely campaign rhetoric. Outside City Hall, in front of an audience that included members of his family, luminaries like Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton and hundreds of ordinary New Yorkers, Mayor de Blasio spoke of the city’s history of embracing liberal causes, and he laid out a mayoralty that emphasized social and economic justice. “We are...

Mayor de Blasio is not interested in children’s getting a better education. If he were, he would endorse the charter schools and allow Cuomo to fund them. But he couldn't care less about quality education – otherwise, why turn against the charter schools that are educating minorities better than any of the other schools? De Blasio’s whole desire is to tax the rich. He has some twisted need to punish them. He has the communist hatred of wealth. He is a man who emotionally identified with the communists when he traveled to Cuba, Russia, and Nicaragua. He is a big...

When New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced recently that he’d make banning the city’s horse-drawn carriages his first priority, a lot of people were left asking, “Really?” Could This be the Reason De Blasio Decided to Go After Horse Carriages in NYC? Indeed, for all the problems de Blasio claims the city struggles with, it would seem horse-drawn carriages would take a back seat. But they haven’t and he’s pursuing the ban. And there may be a reason why: A major de Blasio campaign donor and real-estate executive may be tied up in the drive to banish the...

They used to hang horse thieves — now they elect them mayor. As many know, New York City’s new commandant, Bill de Blasio, has sworn that one of his first acts upon taking office will be to ban Central Park’s iconic horse-drawn carriages. He claims that forcing horses to work in downtown Manhattan is inhumane, but is he really just kowtowing to a big real-estate developer who heavily supported his campaign? Interestingly, there was a time when de Blasio was more blasé about these animal-rights concerns. In fact, when he had the chance as a City Council member to support...

Rush Limbaugh has come out swinging in defence of the heavily Irish horse and carriage industry in New York’s Central Park after new mayor Bill de Blasio promised to put them off the streets. Over half the drivers of the 200 horses are Irish, but they are fighting a rearguard action against de Blasio, who had major support from animal rights groups. De Blasio stated that one of his first acts would be to end the horse and carriage trade and replace it with electric car tours. "We are going to quickly and aggressively move to make horse carriages no...

Mayor Bill de Blasio is pulling back the reins on his plans to quickly get rid of New York City’s horse-drawn carriage industry, stung by a recent outpouring of support for the colorful coaches that have clip-clopped their way through Central Park for more than 150 years. A campaign pledge to take on the horses during his first week as mayor was eclipsed by other issues. […] What changed? For one, a media blitz led by actor Liam Neeson has portrayed the horse-drawn carriage industry as an iconic, romantic part of New York that provides about 400 jobs, many to...