Free Republic

Although the city of Oakland had a policy of zero tolerance for sexual harassment, unwanted advances and sexually charged comments to female employees by a powerful aide to Mayor Jerry Brown went unaddressed in 1999 and 2000, the early years of his administration, records and interviews show. Present and past city employees said Brown seemed oblivious to the conduct of longtime confidant and top aide Jacques Barzaghi until the mayor's protocol chief lodged a sexual harassment complaint against him in 2000. The mayor then blamed other aides for not warning him about Barzaghi's behavior, staffers said. The issue resurfaced last...

Judge: Lawsuit Can Proceed Despite Federal Law 'VOTE YOUR SPORT' IMPORTANCE UNDERSCORED . . . An Indiana judge last week ruled the city of Gary's frivolous lawsuit against firearms manufacturers can proceed despite a federal law that prohibits such suits. Lake County Superior Court Judge Robert A. Pete declared the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, enacted a year ago, unconstitutional. The firearms industry will appeal the decision. Threats to the firearms industry and the rights of gun owners continue. Before heading to the polls on Nov. 7, NSSF urges all its members and friends to learn more about...

Here is a light-hearted Saturday story of chivalry with a dash of comedy.Japanese TV reported this story today. Here is the video clip.It seems a young Japanese lady, minding her own business, became the target of a sexual harasser (so-called "chikan") at an underground stairway in a Tokyo subway station.Just as the women was being accosted by the perp, it happened that too rather beefy, young, sumo wrestlers were passing by. Great timing.Needless to say, they made 'chanko nabe' of that little pervert in no time at all, grabbing a hold of him, getting him in a headlock, and...

ALBANY State Senator Ada Smith has been found guilty of harassment stemming from an altercation with a staffer. The Queens Democrat was accused of throwing hot coffee in a staffer's face at her Albany office in March. She was also accused of pulling a hairpiece from the woman's head. Smith was originally charged with misdemeanor assault, but the charged was reduced to harassment, a violation, in July. Smith will have to pay a $250 fine and any medical expenses for the former staffer, Jennifer Jackson. She will also have to enroll in anger management courses. Jackson says she feels justice...

JERUSALEM — Police raided the official residence of Israeli President Moshe Katsav as part of a sexual harassment investigation, seizing computers and documents, officials said Tuesday. ... At least two women have accused Katsav of harassing them. He has denied wrongdoing.

Despite the fact that the majority of courts have struck down speech codes as being unconstitutional for overbreadth and/or vagueness, approximately 351 American universities, both public and private, are still enforcing such codes. This can be seen both in information collected by the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) as well as from the practicing college and university websites. The purpose of speech codes is to protect students from hearing words that may offend them. This protection comes at a high price: our fundamental First Amendment right of freedom of speech. Although the Supreme Court has never decided a...

The occasional football flying over the garden fence is an inconvenience familiar to most people with a young family as neighbours. It is certainly familiar to Ray Markham. He has returned more than 50 balls to policeman neighbour Stewart Bosworth and his two sons over the last two years. But when one leather ball crashed into his greenhouse recently, breaking a pane, the retired taxi firm manager decided to take a stand and refused to hand it back. The incident prompted Sergeant Bosworth to call in four colleagues from Warwickshire police to arrest Mr Markham, 68, for alleged theft of...

DURHAM - A Durham police detective investigating the Duke University lacrosse case arrested an alibi witness Wednesday on a 2 1/2-year-old misdemeanor warrant. Taxi driver Moezeldin Elmostafa said Investigator R.D. Clayton and another officer asked whether he had anything new to tell them about the rape case before driving him to the Durham County jail. He said no and was held for five hours, until a friend posted his bail on a shoplifting charge. Ernest Conner, a Greenville lawyer who represents defendant Reade Seligmann, said the cabbie's arrest amounted to intimidation. "It appears to me they are trying to pressure...

Lawyers will give closing arguments today in the civil trial of a former Fresno alarm systems company saleswoman who is seeking money for her humiliation after she was spanked by her supervisors while her co-workers watched and jeered. Janet Orlando, 53, testified in Fresno County Superior Court that she was spanked three times and was subject to verbal abuse. She quit her job as field supervisor in February 2003. Her lawyer, Nicholas "Butch" Wagner, is alleging sexual harassment, assault and battery and is seeking damages for loss of past and future wages and emotional and mental distress. Alarm One Inc....

You know who you all are. And if you think I'm going to stop blogging/writing/making a living because you've plastered my family's private home address, phone numbers, and photos and maps of my neighborhood all over the Internet to further your manufactured outrage and pathetic coddling of a bunch of lying, anti-troops punks at UC Santa Cruz... ...you better think again.

A New York State Senator is accused of harassing a staffer in her Albany office. According to the Albany Times Union, Queens Democrat Ada Smith allegedly threw coffee in the staffers face, and pulled her hair. New York State Police have confirmed that there is investigation into the allegations. Since it is an on-going investigation he could not comment or release any details. This wouldn't be the first time Smith faced allegations by a staffer. Last year, she was cleared of an accusation by a former chief of staff who said he was terminated because he is homosexual. Also, in...

KAISERSLAUTERN, Germany — Army Reserve Col. Nikki S. McCarty was sentenced to three years confinement and dismissed from the Army after being found guilty of four charges related to sexual harassment at a court-martial Tuesday. McCarty, 59, was also sentenced to a reprimand and forfeiture of all pay and allowances. The seven-member panel, composed of generals and colonels, took about 30 minutes to reach its decision on McCarty’s sentence. He had faced a maximum of 51½ years of confinement. McCarty was found guilty of cruelty and maltreatment to subordinates, assault, conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman, and indecent assault....

Despite a decade of efforts to end harassment and discrimination within the Los Angeles Fire Department, the agency still faces frequent costly lawsuits, according to records obtained by the Daily News. The number has ebbed and flowed over the years, but rose sharply from three in 2002-03 to 13 in 2004-05, City Attorney's Office records show - and interviews with firefighters and attorneys suggest even more litigation is pending against a department facing increased scrutiny after a city audit found persistent "systemic harassment." While many cases are pending, liability payouts have already topped $1 million in the past five fiscal...

Dozens of Central Texas drivers got pulled over Thursday for doing absolutely nothing wrong. Travis County deputies kicked off what has become a controversial reward program. You know that heart stopping feeling you get when seeing the flashing red lights of law enforcement in the rear view mirror. Well, you won't see that if you're a good driver, but you may get pulled over. Getting pulled over for doing nothing wrong may not sound right to a lot of people. Travis County Deputy Derrick Taylor says his job is to not only look for bad drivers, but reward and encourage...

At Penn State University, “Acts of intolerance” are unacceptable and in order to prevent them and punish offenders the school has a “Report Hate” hotline and Web site.

Even as the ACLU frets over the privacy of people chatting with Al Qaeda on their cell phones or googling bomb-making instructions on public library computers, a more serious threat to civil liberties and personal freedom has long been institutionalized in our society. I’m talking of sexual harassment law, which has evolved into an Orwellian form of thought policing that subjects individuals and their relations with each other to the coercive power of the state. Most people assume sexual harassment is about reining in cheesy lotharios who grope their colleagues in the mailroom or traffic in sexual quid pro quos....

WASHINGTON - Sexual assaults and harassment are still significant problems at the nation's military academies, polls of students at the schools show, despite recent scandals that triggered intensive training to prevent the behavior. Up to 6 percent of the women at the Army, Navy and Air Force academies said they experienced sexual assault during the 2004-2005 school year, and about half or more said they were sexually harassed, according to a survey released Friday by the Pentagon. The survey comes more than two years after a sex abuse scandal rocked the Air Force Academy, leading to a purge in its...

Gov. Bill Richardson likes to touch people. He hugs, pokes, jabs and tickles. Looking to start a conversation, he might lean forward and head-butt someone— male or female. Bored on an airplane flight? He'll lick his finger and smudge an aide's glasses. Richardson says he's just joking and teasing to ease tension and boredom. Lt. Gov. Diane Denish [a Democrat] says she finds the practice irritating. She said she tries to avoid sitting or standing next to the governor at public events. She said the governor's personality is "one of charisma, joking, joshing," but also used some other words to...

Which is to say that when you sign on to be a Hooters’ waitress you know full well what to expect. Most people would agree that even in that environment there are limits to what bosses can require. Sexual harassment used to refer solely to being asked or coerced to trade sex for employment or promotion. It has evolved into something quite a bit more ambiguous.

Firm to pay $5.35 million in FTC's largest civil penalty protecting consumers. Updated: 11:46 a.m. ET Dec. 13, 2005 WASHINGTON - DirecTV Inc. will pay $5.35 million to settle charges that its telemarketers called households listed on the national do-not-call registry to pitch satellite TV programming, Federal Trade Commission officials said Tuesday. The proposed settlement, if approved by a federal judge in Los Angeles, would be the FTC’s largest civil penalty in a consumer protection case. The DirecTV complaint, filed by the Department of Justice at the FTC’s request, named the company and five telemarketing firms it hired, as well...

NITED NATIONS - Secretary-General Kofi Annan has decided to fire the highly regarded chief of the U.N. office that promotes free elections around the world for harassing staff and management failures, a U.N. official said. The official, speaking on condition of anonymity because an official announcement is not expected until Monday, said Carina Perelli was being dismissed from the United Nations. Stephane Dujarric, the chief U.N. spokesman, declined comment Saturday. In August, the United Nations formally accused Perelli of harassing her staff after a four-month review into the claims of an abusive and sexually offensive environment in her division. She...

HERNDON, VA –Young America’s Foundation exposed Warren Community College’s radical Professor John Daly, who in an email to student Rebecca Beach, vowed to intimidate those students who host conservative speakers and called for American soldiers in Iraq to murder their superiors. Instead of admonishing the professor’s intemperate attack on a student’s right of free expression, Warren Community College President William Austin said Prof. John Daly has “first amendment rights” to harass Rebecca. Furthermore, the President is trying to bully Rebecca into silence. He said Rebecca, not Prof. John Daly, is ruining the college’s name by going on talk radio and...

A three-judge panel overseeing Independent Counsel David Barrett's investigation into abuses by the Internal Revenue Service under the Clinton administration has ordered Barrett to make "discrete deletions" is the draft he submitted 15 months ago. The deletion order "has stoked speculation that [it] has more to do with the next presidential campaign," reports the Wall Street Journal, noting widespread rumors that "the draft report contains information potentially embarrassing to another Clinton administration figure, former first lady and current New York Sen. Hillary Clinton." "The one Clinton official rumored to be implicated in the report is former IRS Commissioner Margaret Richardson,...

LOVELAND, Ohio - A woman who hasn't paid a $1.16 income tax bill to this Cincinnati suburb faces up to 18 months in jail and $4,000 in fines. City officials say Deborah Combs hasn't filed city income tax returns for five years. Combs says she has been mostly unemployed since 2000 and didn't realize she had to file the returns until the city notified her in February about the violation. By that time, Combs owed $200 in late fees - $50 for each year she didn't file a return. "I don't know how they could charge me the fees if...

SHORELINE - Ken Potts calls himself a patriot. That's what his front yard tells you too. Metal American flags are staked in the ivy beside the driveway. A red, white, and blue pinwheel spins near the front sidewalk. One flagpole flies the American flag. A second flagpole carries the banner of the Army's 101st Airborne. Even his mailbox on North 185th Street in Shoreline sports the image of the Airborne's screaming eagle. But he says that in the last year the mailbox has been blown up twice with fireworks. The house has been egged. Paint has been thrown on the...

(PRWEB) - Beverly Hills, CA. (PRWEB) September 2, 2005 -- A final decision was issued in the complaint of discrimination filed by former Customs and Border Protection Officer Julia Davis against the Department of Homeland Security (EEOC No. 340-04-00317X). The Honorable Administrative Judge Daniel Leach found the Agency liable, awarding to Julia Davis damages, attorney fees and costs in excess of $225,000.00 dollars. Ms. Davis was represented by Beverly Hills attorney David Ross of Ross, Rose and Hammill, LLP. Judge Leach ruled that Ms. Davis "established agency culpability of an egregious sort and has been awarded a significant sum in...

Hello ladies. I am writing to initiate negotiations for a legal settlement that I think will be in the best interests of ASU feminists. When I saw your website, I felt immediately sexually harassed as I read the following quotes: "A woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle." - Gloria Steinem "Whatever women do they must do twice as well as men to be thought half as good. Luckily, this is not difficult." - Charlotte Whitton "Sure God created man before woman. But then you always make a rough draft before the final masterpiece." - Anonymous

The American Center for Voting Rights Legislative Fund (“ACVR Legislative Fund”) is proud to present the following report as the most comprehensive and authoritative review of the facts surrounding allegations of vote fraud, intimidation and suppression made during the 2004 presidential election. Using court records, police reports and news articles, ACVR Legislative Fund presents this “after action report” which documents hundreds of incidents and allegations from around the country, notes whether a factual basis for the charge exists and assesses what actions, if any, were taken by the responsible party, law enforcement or the courts. Most importantly, ACVR Legislative Fund...

Many argue that communism will never be possible because of "human nature". The essence of this false argument is the belief that a communist society would consist of an all-powerful central government that would tell everybody what to do--and would therefore undermine the creative initiative of individuals and the search for happiness. • This argument is based on two false assumptions: (1) It assumes that a communist society will look like the former Soviet Union, or the current China, North Korea, etc (ie: corrupt police states with a feudal-style ruling class) (2) It assumes that people will only work in...

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/cmp/20050715/tc_cmp/165702500 UN Panel: No Single Nation Should Control Internet Addresses Aoife White Thu Jul 14, 9:38 PM ET BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP)--A U.N. panel created to recommend how the Internet should be run in the future has failed to reach consensus but did agree that no single country should dominate. The United States stated two weeks ago that it intended to maintain control over the computers that serve as the Internet's principal traffic cops. In a report released Thursday, the U.N. panel outlined four possible options for the future of Internet governance for world leaders to consider at a November "Information...

Here is the list so far for sponcers to this hate America fest: ANSWER Code Pink UFPJ NION Al Awda World Workers Party Ruckas Revolutionary Communist party Moveon.org ACORN Campus Antiwar Network International Socialist Org Greens Party Muslim Student Association CPUSA

It had all the trappings of a male bastion - racy pinups on the walls, stacks of porno magazines and videos in the lounge, even a female blowup doll. But this was no college frat house. It was the office of a Bergen County government agency, according to a lawsuit filed by a female employee. From the bulletin board to computer desktops, offensive pictures and raunchy conduct by workers at the county's Mosquito Control Division in Paramus created a hostile work environment, entomologist Julee Mark alleged. And that was not the worst of it, according to the suit. Employees and...

Self-inflicted wound District attorney's poor judgment in speaking at a Democratic fund-raiser provides an unintended boost for DeLay's defenders. Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle has spent the past year investigating corporate funds collected by political action committees connected to U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. So far, a grand jury has indicted three of the Sugar Land representative's associates for violating Texas election laws. Republicans have accused the veteran prosecutor, a Democrat, of conducting a partisan witch hunt. Earle's attendance and remarks attacking DeLay at a Democratic fund-raiser last week in Dallas damaged the credibility...

Once again, a pro-life Christian has had to appear in Richmond General District Court to answer bogus charges brought against him. As was expected, once again the charges were dropped. Those who minister outside Richmond abortion clinics have become used to this harassing cycle in recent years. Richmond City Police Officer Howard Noyse has made it his mission to threaten and/or arrest those who offer help to women who are contemplating abortion at Richmond Medical Center for Women (abortion clinic) where he moonlights several days each week. Although repeated pleas have been made to the Mayor, Chief of Police and...

THE head of the UN elections unit has been charged with violating staff rules after an internal review said she made unwanted sexual advances toward a male employee and created a sexually charged work environment, UN officials and diplomats said today. The allegations were more bad news for Secretary-General Kofi Annan as the United Nations faced findings of impropriety and mismanagement in the $67-billion oil-for-food program for Iraq and sexual abuses by UN peacekeepers. UN refugee chief Ruud Lubbers resigned in February amid sexual harassment allegations. Carina Perelli, director of the Electoral Assistance Division, which helped organise elections in Iraq...

AMSTERDAM — UN High Commissioner for Refugees Ruud Lubbers was found guilty last year of sexual harassment in a confidential report. It also accused him of unwanted sexual advances towards four other female employees, it was revealed on Friday. The United Nation's internal investigations department OIOS found Lubbers guilty of sexual intimidation and abusing his authority. Besides one official complaint, the report said allegations from several other women indicated "a pattern of sexual harassment". British newspaper The Independent has obtained a copy of the 15-page confidential report and the paper says that the report's findings will place renewed pressure on...

CRAFTY COLLEGE and university professors have figured out how to intimidate their students and get praised for it. Thankfully, some students are no longer standing for this. By manipulating public respect for the First Amendment, some professors disguise intellectual pressure tactics as mere expressions of opinion offered in the spirit of open debate. What they are really doing is using their positions of authority to bully students into agreement. And for this they often are praised by their peers and bosses. Take, for example, Keene State Professor David Stowell, who has some 15 political statements (left-wing, of course) displayed on...

KEENE, N.H. -- Political bumper stickers and articles posted on a professor's office door are raising questions about free speech and harassment at Keene State College. Shane Calchera, a student and military veteran, accused associate history professor David Stowell of harassment, saying the antiwar and anti-Bush administration statements on his office door created a learning environment that is hostile to veterans.

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. -- A watchdog group has asked the Internal Revenue Service to investigate whether the conservative Christian group Focus on the Family broke the law by trying to sway voters in the November presidential election. Citizens Project, a group that has monitored Focus and other religious organizations since 1992, is taking issue with an article in the Citizen, a magazine printed by Focus. The November article, "The 2004 Election: What's At Stake," compares presidential candidates George W. Bush and John Kerry and their positions on abortion, stem-cell research and same-sex marriage. "You're pro-life, and you want to preserve...

A Washington state family is about to lose their home after the Department of Labor and Industries hit the father with thousands of dollars in fines for having his underage sons work alongside him in the family business – doing things the state believes are dangerous for young boys. In 2003, Jude Doty was fined $34,000 by the agency for "employing" his then 11-year-old and 13-year-old sons even though both boys did not fit what Doty says are the criteria for official employment. Later, he was assessed $20,000 for unpaid workers' compensation insurance for his children and other workers, along...

International media watchdog Reporters Without Borders has protested at what it calls the "persistent harassment" of Arab satellite news channel al-Jazeera. And it has called on the Iraqi government to reverse the August 2004 decision made by the interim leadership to shut down al-Jazeera's Baghdad office. Reporters Without Borders said that since the start of 2004, al-Jazeera has been "harshly criticised" by Saudi Arabia and America and has been censored in Algeria, Iran, Tunisia and Canada. The press freedom organisation said that the channel, launched in Qatar in November 1996, annoyed some countries by giving airtime to their opponents and...

It was an offer she could refuse – but Wellington kebab shop worker Ahlam Riyad was sacked soon after she said she wouldn't marry her boss' friend. Her boss, Ilhan Ramadan, had been harassing her, swearing at her and belittling her in front of other staff and customers for weeks. ...

HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. -- Two men have been arrested for trading lawyer jokes while waiting on line to get into First District Court in Hempstead. The two men, 69-year-old Harvey Kash, of Bethpage, and 65-year-old Carl Lanzisera, of Huntington, were in court Monday as part of their work with Americans for Legal Reform, a group that monitors how the courts serve the public. While waiting on a long line to get through into court, they began telling each other lawyer jokes such as, "How do you tell if a lawyer is lying? Answer: his lips are moving." Well, an attorney within...

Recent News! They discover proof that Atlantis did not submerge complete but only one part...By Salvador Morales. Atlantis News Agency. Madrid, Spain. 01-06-2005. The Spanish investigator and scriptologist, Georgeos Diaz-Montexano, has discovered paleographical proofs that in fact the island or peninsula (Nêsos) denominated like Atlantis or Atlantic, it was divided in two parts below the sea. To date all atlantologists and students of the Timaeus and the Critias de Plato had thought that in texts of the Greek philosophist narrated the collapse of the all island or Atlantis peninsula, nevertheless, Georgeos Diaz-Montexano has reviewed the oldest texts known writings in...

Inspectors from Federal Protective Services — a branch of the Homeland Security Department — arrested a Bettendorf chiropractor Friday accused of making harassing phone calls to the Department of Veterans Affairs office in Des Moines. Kenneth C. Tennant, 45, 3447 Magnolia Court, remained in the Polk County, Iowa, jail late Friday afternoon, charged with third-degree harassment. Although it is a state charge — and a misdemeanor — Federal Protective Service, or FPS, personnel were involved because the VA office is a federal facility, said special agent Wil Calvey. The FPS provides law enforcement and security services to more than 1...

Justifying Effort to Jail Christians, Officials Make Baseless Claims Tupelo, MS - “We have videotape of the entire incident, the city has a videotape of the entire incident, the facts are before the nation, and the unimpeachable facts conclusively establish that this City is out of control.” – Brian Fahling, AFA Center for Law and Policy Senior Trial Attorney. Philadelphia city officials now claim that a videotape of the events leading up to the arrests of 11 Christians does not reflect one of the Philly 11, Michael Marcavage, allegedly interrupting an onstage performance at the “Outfest” where the events took...

Her suit, which also alleges demeaning remarks were made about blacks and constitute racial harassment, names "Friends" producers Warner Bros. Television Productions and Bright Kauffman Crane Productions, as well as writers Adam Chase, Greg Malins and Andrew Reich.

Others may have sympathized on learning that Hamid Dabashi, a professor of Middle East studies at Columbia University, felt threatened by a graduate student at his own university, but not me. The incident began late on Sept. 27, 2004, when Victor Luria, a Ph.D. candidate in genetics and a former soldier in the Israel Defense Forces, wrote Dabashi an e-mail taking strong exception to what Dabashi had written about the IDF in an article, "For a Fistful of Dust: A Passage to Palestine," he published in the Egyptian newspaper, Al-Ahram. In response, Luria wrote to Dabashi: I have rarely seen...

THIS AM...on Fox News, Podesta was being interviewed about the library. When asked about the extend of the displays about shillery, he said that...she was important..."as the vice president." He didn't say, "as was the vice president."

Judy (hmmm?) Woodruff just had a report that Karl Rove had offered Nebraska Sen Ben Nelson the post of Secretary of Agriculture. Nelson is up in 2006...and facing a hard race from popular GOP Gov Mike Johanns. Nelson is among the most conservative of Senate Dems..Does this make sense, because Nelson votes with the GOP on most of the key issues..?