Free Republic

A turf war is brewing between a Jewish food cart vendor and Muslim competitors vying for prime real estate in midtown Manhattan, according to the New York Post. Dubbing it an "intifooda," the Post reports that Yisroel Mordowitz, who serves kosher brisket and pastrami sandwiches, is being blocked from setting up near Rockefeller Center by by the "hallal mafia." “This guy is hungry – hungry for money,” said Mohamed Mossad, one of the Muslim food purveyors fighting to keep Mordowitz and his cart, the Holy Rollers, off the corner of 48th Street and Sixth Avenue. “Why doesn’t he go to...

The Manhattan mistress of married “60 Minutes’’ newsman Steve Kroft sent him sexy lingerie photos during their affair, but he insisted she dress low-key — like “Laura Bush” — with him in public to keep things hush-hush, according to newly revealed texts. A source close to Kroft’s lover told The Post that the TV hotshot was “really paranoid about right-wing zealots” finding out about their affair and using the tawdry details to try to destroy his career and CBS. [Snip] Kroft was proud to boast to Goines about his closeness to the leader of the free world — and let...

The speaker of the New York State Assembly, Sheldon Silver, was arrested on federal corruption charges on Thursday and accused of using the power of his office for more than a decade to secure millions of dollars in bribes and kickbacks and then covering up his schemes, according to court documents. Mr. Silver, a Democrat from the Lower East Side of Manhattan who has served as speaker for more than two decades, is accused of a range of corrupt dealings that capitalized on his official position. They include using his position to obtain corrupt payments misrepresented as referral fees from...

I will apologize in advance to our readers if this looks like coverage of a “local story” but it actually may be a harbinger for the kind of state and local level change which is required for real progress in America. The New York Times is reporting that today an arrest will be made in Albany, the state’s capital. The suspect is question is none other than the Speaker of the state Assembly, Sheldon Silver. Federal authorities are expected to arrest Sheldon Silver, the powerful speaker of the New York State Assembly, on corruption charges on Thursday, people with...

Federal authorities are expected to arrest Sheldon Silver, the powerful speaker of the New York State Assembly, on corruption charges on Thursday, people with knowledge of the matter said, in a case that is likely to throw Albany into disarray. The investigation that led to the expected charges against Mr. Silver, a Democrat from the Lower East Side of Manhattan who has served as speaker for more than two decades, began after Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo in March abruptly shut down an anticorruption commission he had created in 2013. Details of the specific charges to be brought against Mr. Silver...

Feds subpoenaed Manhattan Democrat Silver's records in a probe of undocumented payments he received from a law firm. He is reportedly to be charged via an investigation sparked when Gov. Cuomo abruptly shut down his 2013 anticorruption commission.....Silver's arrest was related to money he received from a small real-estate tax law firm that Silver failed to list on his official financial-disclosure form. The FBI and Manhattan US Atty's office are looking into exactly what Silver did to earn the money. Silver is a personal-injury lawyer associated with the high-profile law firm Weitz and Luxenberg. Goldberg & Iryami, w/ only two...

Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver was taken into custody Thursday in Manhattan on corruption charges, The Daily News has learned. The impending arrest of Silver, who has been one of the most powerful men in Albany for more than two decades, was first reported overnight by The New York Times. While it’s unclear exactly what charges Silver could be facing, The Times reported the rap is linked to payments the powerful Manhattan Democrat received from New York City lawfrim Goldberg & Iryami that he did not disclose publicly, as required by law.

If all you knew about racial violence came from the protestors at a Manhattan Sunday brunch, you would know that black people are victims of relentless white violence. In the real world, black mob violence and black-on-white crime are astronomically out of proportion. Especially in schools. Especially directed at teachers. Especially this week in Monroe, Yonkers, Little Rock, and Buffalo. Let’s start in Monroe, Louisiana. Facebook videographer “Tanglewood Hard Hitta” transports us into the middle of a few dozen black teenage girls fighting and screaming. Teacher’s aide David Payne was trying to break it up when Ryan Marquez Gix took...

A man yelling “I want to kill cops” tried to run down two Port Authority Police officers with his car near the entrance to the ­Holland Tunnel Wednesday night in the latest attack on officers. Matthew Christian Cash, who has an extensive criminal record, was barreling down a restricted fire lane near Varick and Watts streets when he barely missed cops patrolling the tunnel and smashed his silver Audi right into their ­police cruiser at about 8 p.m., authorities said.

Is this Christmas 2014 — or 1974? A stark reminder of New York City’s bad old days appeared on the streets of Manhattan Thursday , as three-card monte dealers turned out in force on Fifth Avenue. An army of the shady gamblers — offering both crooked card and shell games — set up between West 53rd and 56th streets, fleecing Christmas tourists like hapless rubes in an old-time movie.

A union operative generously praised New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman when he announced he was taking a Papa John’s pizza franchisee to court on behalf of workers who claim they were underpaid. The state attorney general, like the unions, called it “wage theft.” The thing is, the union official knew about the government’s lawsuit before the pizza franchise did. “Fast-food workers all across the city and country are organizing for higher pay and union rights,” said Kendall Fells, organizing director for Fast Food Forward, a group dedicated to increasing wages and benefits for fast-food workers. Fells added: "This suit...

McDonald’s and its franchisees illegally retaliated against employees for participating in union-related activities, the National Labor Relations Board’s top lawyer alleged Friday in a case with sweeping industry implications. NLRB general counsel Richard Griffin announced Friday he will issue 13 complaints involving 78 charges against franchises and McDonald’s USA, LLC. Though many of these alleged labor violations were committed by independent franchise owners, Griffin ruled earlier this year that McDonald’s can be held liable for those actions as a so-called joint employer, leaving the corporatrion — and potentially other franchisors — exposed to such claims. McDonald’s said the decision will...

During Saturday´s protests about the lack of indictments in the cases of Michael Brown and Eric Garner, CUNY adjunct professor and creator of erotic poetry Eric Linsker picked up a trashcan and tried to throw it at police officers. Two police lieutenants were attacked by the crowd when the officers tried to arrest Linsker. Newsday described the incident: They were on the roadway of the [Brooklyn] bridge about 8 p.m. when they heard reports of "debris being thrown on the walkway" at police officers who were walking alongside demonstrators involved in Saturday´s New York City rally against police shootings of...

A part-time CUNY professor faces a slate of charges accusing him of sparking a violent run-in with police during Saturday's protest demonstration on the Brooklyn Bridge. Eric Linsker, 29, was allegedly spotted by police carrying a large garbage can on walkway of the bridge above the traffic lanes during the protests against the police killings of unarmed black men. Protesters had been tossing debris at police on the bridge's lower level at the time, police said. Police Lt. Philip Chan ordered Linkser to put down the trash can and attempted to arrest him, according to court records. A small group...

In 2009, Jud Parker got a West Village landlord to give him a ­duplex apartment on tony Minetta Street for $10 a month — for 50 years! Now new landlord Pari Dulac is challenging the sweetheart deal and claiming the old owner, who died in 2010, had dementia when it was allegedly signed. “When I saw the lease, I couldn’t believe it,” said Dulac, a longtime Village resident. “I thought it was a joke.” Wilfred Schuman, a German-born ballet dancer, had owned a pair of three-story town houses at 12 and 14 Minetta St. since 1993. He lived in the...

A new report being released today by the Census Bureau finds that Manhattan has the highest level of income inequality in the United States. That is not entirely surprising, though it would also not have been surprising if it had been San Francisco or another progressive fiefdom. For all the rhetoric about wicked 1 percenters and inequality, progressivism is a luxury good, and progressive-dominated enclaves are generally pretty okay places to live if you have a fair amount of money, but sort of stink if you’re in the middle or at the lower end of the earnings curve. Because most...

'In July 2010, amid the gargantuan rebuilding effort at the site of the World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan, construction workers halted the backhoes when they uncovered something unexpected just south of where the Twin Towers once stood. At 22 feet (6.7 meters) below today's street level, in a pit that would become an underground security and parking complex, excavators found the mangled skeleton of a long-forgotten wooden ship. Now, a new report finds that tree rings in those waterlogged ribs show the vessel was likely built in 1773, or soon after, in a small shipyard near Philadelphia. What's more,...

Roughly 50 people lined up in front of Hobby Lobby’s new Totowa store Saturday to protest the company’s role in a recent Supreme Court decision that says the company can choose not to cover contraception for its employees through the Affordable Care Act.The Oklahoma City-based arts and crafts chain is owned by a Christian family that says it tries to run the business applying its religious beliefs. One of the parties in the decision by the high court, the family had argued that the Obamacare requirement that all contraception be covered violated a 1993 federal law that protects religious...

As the Rev. Justin Wylie took the pulpit at the Church of the Holy Innocents in Manhattan last month, anger and anxiety emanated from the pews. The church is the only one in New York City to offer a daily traditional Latin Mass, but an archdiocesan panel had recommended that it be closed. Father Wylie, a visiting priest, urged parishioners to be obedient but also to speak up, as traditionalist Catholics, for a place in the church, saying they should not be “turned out like squatters.”

Hillary Clinton drew a "Harry Potter" sized line of fans waiting to get an autographed copy of her new memoir "Hard Choices" at a Manhattan bookstore today. Hundreds of Hillary fans have camped out for hours, many overnight, outside the Union Square Barnes and Noble store to get one of the coveted wristbands which would allow them access to her first book tour stop today. By the time people were allowed to inside the store around 8:30 a.m., the line was wrapped around an entire city block -- up Park Avenue, around 18th Street, and all the way to Broadway.