Free Republic

A handful of video recordings of the alleged racial assault on three black University at Albany students last weekend do not clearly show the women being attacked on a bus by a large group including white men, two community leaders who saw the recordings said Friday. The videos also contain no audible racial slurs — though the audio quality is often "bad" and sometimes nonexistent, said Common Council President Carolyn McLaughlin and Alice Green, a longtime social justice activist in the city. But Green and McLaughlin, both leaders in the city's African- American community, stopped short of questioning the women's...

Clare W. Bronfman, an heiress of the Seagram Company business empire, allegedly implanted a "key logger" virus on the computer of her late father, Edgar M. Bronfman Sr., so officials with the NXIVM corporation could secretly monitor his emails, including his exchanges with world leaders and Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, according to court records. The extraordinary allegations are attributed to Kristen M. Keeffe, who was part of the inner circle that ran NXIVM, a "human development" organization that has been described by one expert as an "extreme cult." The accusations by Keeffe are contained in a transcript of a...

<p>WASHINGTON (AP) — The number of people applying for or receiving security clearances whose fingerprint images were stolen in one of the worst government data breaches is now believed to be 5.6 million, not 1.1 million as first thought, the Office of Personnel Management announced Wednesday.</p>

ALBANY, N.Y. -- It wasn't just Troy police officers showing their support for Officer Chad Klein. As he walked out of Albany Medical Center, he was surrounded by fellow officers and K9s from agencies across the Capital Region. "As dark as Saturday was, today we're on the other end of the spectrum," said Troy Police Chief John Tedesco. Troy Police Chief John Tedesco says there's still shock within his department about what transpired Saturday night, but as dangerous as it may be, his officers have a job to do. "It's concern now for every officer going out the door, is...

The online world has been rocked this week by news that a group of hackers obtained the names of registrants on Ashley Madison, a website where people can find partners for extramarital affairs. Needless to say this probably has users of the site more than a little bit worried. The information reportedly lives on the “dark web,” a hard-to-find corner of the internet. The company has gotten some sites to take the data down, but lookup services, based on third parties rather than the actual hacking, remain. In a statement, the cheating site’s owner, Avid Life Media, said the incursion...

TROY – An indictment unsealed in Rensselaer County Court Tuesday revealed a year-long undercover drug investigation that led to the arrest of 20 people, including including a former Watervliet police officer and numerous members of a Troy street gang. The investigation by the State Police and state Attorney General's office was first revealed last month when a Watervliet police officer, Nicholas Pontore, was questioned about his dealings with a suspected drug dealer, Donald Kodadar, who was affiliated with the "Young Gunnerz" street gang in Troy. Pontore, 29, resigned from his police job on June 18 when law enforcement officials said...

ALBANY — Gov. Cuomo made it clear Wednesday why he has recently bypassed the Legislature on different issues like raising the minimum wage for fast-food workers. "I run the government," Cuomo said. "I am the executive and therefore I use executive power. And that’s why the executive is given the power," Cuomo said during an appearance on upstate public radio’s “The Capitol Pressroom.” Cuomo dismissed criticism that his actions represent a major power grab by going around the Legislature. In addition to creating a board that has recommended raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour for fast food workers,...

Byline (Cuomo Quote): "This is just the beginning. We will not stop until we reach true economic justice." Getta load of Andrew Cuomo, the governor of the once-great state of New York. For the first time ever, reports Business Insider, a U.S. state "may single out one industry for a big wage hike." Under a plan approved by New York's Fast Food Wage Board, a $15-per-hour minimum wage would be phased in over three years in New York City and six years across upstate New York, whose economy has long been the American equivalent of East Germany. The mandate would...

There is much in the Bible about Iran and it even described the nuclear catastrophe that will result from Obama’s nuclear deal with it. You think this is far-fetched? Just read. For years, Bible prophecy analysts had missed the verses and for years, we have been on record stating that Iran will gain its nukes and so far we were the few who were correct, while the rest still contemplate Israel removing the threat before it happens. We were no geniuses to figure all this, we just read the Bible as Muslims and saw in it that we needed salvation,...

Former Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren’s "Ally: My Journey Across the Israeli-American Divide" is out from Random House today. The book is part autobiography, part memoir, part history and part (as they say in the bookstore) current events. I urge interested readers to pick it up now and study it with care. The book makes a valuable contribution to recent history in which he has been a participant and to which he has been an eyewitness. The heart of the book gives us an important angle on the long, strange trip we have been on for the past six-and-a-half years. Oren’s...

Vatican officials appear to have been flummoxed after Pope Francis was presented with a communist crucifix depicting Jesus nailed to a hammer and sickle by Bolivia’s president Evo Morales. The gift from the leftwing leader caused an immediate stir among conservative Catholics who said the pontiff was being manipulated for ideological reasons. The response of the pope was less clear. (...)

The Saratoga Springs Police Officer who pepper sprayed a man that gave him the middle finger has been suspended without pay. The chief of police now says he's seeking to fire the officer. Officer Nathan Baker stopped Adam Rupeka back on May 16. At the time, Rupeka had just passed the officer and flashed the obscene gesture. He also had multiple cameras rolling. When the officer asked for license and registration, Rupeka demanded to know what law had been broken. After a back-and-forth of about 30 seconds, he was pepper-sprayed. Rupeka claims while it may not have been nice to...

The state Inspector General’s Office is finalizing a bombshell investigation into the state Thruway Authority that is said to reach the highest levels of the organization, sources say. While the focus is unclear, two sources confirmed the Cuomo administration has already been approaching possible replacements for Thruway Authority Executive Director Thomas Madison. Reps for the inspector general's office, Cuomo and the Thruway Authority had no comment. Billionaire developer Howard Milstein recently resigned as Thruway Authority chairman. One source said Milstein, a big-time donor to Gov. Cuomo, to avoid getting caught up in the controversy once the IG report is released....

BYLINE: Regarding Al-Baghdadi, who claimed the Islamic Caliphate in Iraq, who is he and is he the Antichrist? Does he fit the bill of the awaited Mahdi and the last Caliph of Islam? I have had inquiries. Ok, here is what we think. Al-Baghdadi was born in Samarra, a largely Sunni city north of Baghdad, in 1971 and is well educated. His nom de guerre is Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi with a $10 million U.S. bounty on his head. His real name is Ibrahim Awwad Ibrahim Ali al-Badri, but now has been changed to “Caliph Abdullah Ibrahim Ibn Awaad Ibn Ibrahim...

Representatives of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) stated that they will ruin the Kaaba after capturing Saudi Arabia. APA reports quoting Turkish media that ISIS wants to take control of Arar city of Saudi Arabia and start operations here. ISIS member Abu Turab Al Mugaddasi said that they would destroy the Kaaba in Mecca: “If Allah wills, we will kill those who worship stones in Mecca and destroy the Kaaba. People go to Mecca to touch the stones, not for Allah.”

BYLINE: In the Hashemite Kingdom, government leniency toward home-grown Islamists is coming home to roost The rapid advance of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant in northern Iraq has set off warning bells in Jerusalem, which fears a Jihadist takeover of Jordan, Israel’s eastern neighbor and a Western ally. Former national security adviser Yaakov Amidror told Army Radio on Sunday that Israel should extend aid to Jordan in its potential fight against ISIL on its eastern border, if such assistance is requested. “We need to help with whatever they may need in order to overcome the problems developing...

Twenty years ago I thought I would do this job forever. I had a dream: work in Providence till I was 60 and they threw me out, and then move somewhere else where they have a volunteer department and I could put my experience to good use. The department offered a 50 percent pension after 20 years, we contribute 9.5 percent of our pay toward the fund, and the city contributes the rest. “That’s nice,” I thought, never considering that I would actually leave after 20. Time marches on, and 20 years passed in the blink of an eye. The...

THE UNITED NATIONS, June 27. /ITAR-TASS/. The US plans to spend $500 million for training and outfitting Syrian rebels is a step in the wrong direction, Russian Permanent Ambassador to the UN Vitaly Churkin said on Thursday. In his words, 500 million dollars is “a very big sum of money.” “I am sure that it is possible to spend it for something more useful,” he told a news conference at the Russian Permanent Mission at the UN. “They (the United States) put the situation on the wrong track,” the diplomat said. He said with regret that the US “adds fuel...

A gang of men attacked an American student while he was drinking in the street - grabbing a glass bottle from his hands and smashing it over his head, a court was told. Francesco Hounye, 23, from Florida, had been in Britain for just three days when he was set upon by the men while he was walking home with a friend in Shadwell, east London. Shaleem Uddin, 20, Shadhat Hussain, 19, Kamrul Hussain, 22, and Massom Rahman, 22, targeted Mr Hounye when they saw him swigging from a bottle of Jagermeister. (VIDEO) They then chased him, beat him, and...

The swiftness of the Sunni insurgency in Iraq has raised fears that it could spill into neighbouring Jordan, which has always struggled to contain its own home-grown jihadists. In the latest developments, militants from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isis) seized the Turaibil crossing with Jordan along with the al-Walid crossing with Syria after government forces pulled out. On the Jordan/Iraq border, a reporter from the German news agency DPA reported sighting a mobilisation of troops, tanks and missiles. In a video released on YouTube, five of the group's Mujahideen pledged to take the holy war to...