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wo years and six months ago, the Manhattan district attorney had an opportunity to charge Harvey Weinstein with a sex crime. On Tuesday, reports by the New Yorker and the Daily Beast detailed the series of events that led to this opportunity—and what happened after Cyrus Vance Jr.’s office decided not to pursue it. That decision is now under scrutiny, as is Vance’s credibility as an elected official. “I’m not impressed by the decision to not go forward here,” said Matthew Galluzzo, who spent several years with the Sex Crimes Unit in the Manhattan DA’s office. “They’d prosecute 9 people...

Cy Vance’s glide path to reelection as Manhattan district attorney has hit a speed bump. Marc Fliedner, a civil-rights lawyer who lost a Democratic primary this fall to become Brooklyn district attorney, has announced a write-in campaign to challenge Vance. “I’m not doing any fundraising, I don’t have any staff, but it is accurate to say that I am a candidate via this grassroots write-in effort,” Fliedner said in a phone interview this morning. “It’s important we give voters an ethical choice in a landscape totally devoid of women’s rights and equal justice." Vance, first elected in 2009, is running...

NEW YORK (AP) — In a historic change, the Boy Scouts are announcing plans to admit girls into the Cub Scouts starting next year and to establish a new program for older girls using the same curriculum as the Boy Scouts.

A student at an Ivy League university in New York City argues in a recent op-ed that ethnics studies courses are better when the students attending them are primarily of the ethnicity with which the class is concerned. “[T]hese fine lines in balancing diversity are puzzling and contentious,” writes Monica Gu, a sophomore at Columbia, in the student newspaper The Columbia Daily Spectator.

Hezbollah is a greater and more longstanding foundational threat to our homeland than ISIS. This was brought to the forefront last week when two Hezbollah operatives were arrested on charges of surveilling targets for the Iranian-backed terror group on our own soil. They were also naturalized citizens who were admitted from Lebanon as immigrants years ago. Sadly, this story received very little media coverage. President Trump would be wise to give a televised address making the case for his immigration moratorium and travel ban by using this case as a perfect case study for the need for smarter vetting and...

<p>Former Erie County Democratic Party chair G. Steven Pigeon has been charged in an eight-count indictment accusing him of bribing a state Supreme Court justice.</p> <p>Pigeon, 56, of Buffalo, was charged with one count of conspiracy to commit bribery and honest services wire fraud, three counts of honest services wire fraud, one count of federal programs bribery and three counts of violation of the Travel Act, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.</p>

One of the repeated themes in NBC reporter Katy Tur's Trump-campaign memoir Unbelievable is her fear of the Trump mob ripping her to pieces. For example, one metaphor was "They turn all at once, a large animal, angry and unchained. I force a laugh." Why would anyone hate me, she asks, when I am merely an embodiment of the "notion of objective truth"? Or she's like a Christian about to be thrown to the lions. (That's a pretty weird choice for a secular liberal.) The crowd loves it. They turn at once to boo at us in unison. Six thousand...

The rain-soaked crowd demanded that the city's statue of Christopher Columbus stay put. MIDTOWN MANHATTAN, NY — It rained on Bill de Blasio's parade Monday — in more ways than one. Crowds along Fifth Avenue showered the mayor with boos during the rain-soaked Columbus Day parade, demanding that the city not touch the landmark statue of the holiday's namesake at Columbus Circle. De Blasio, a Democrat, has offered repeated assurances that the statue isn't going anywhere for now. A commission he appointed is reviewing the monument and others around the city that could be removed because they're symbols of oppression....

Hollywood is full of Weinsteins, men whose erotic imaginations are fueled primarily by humiliation, who glut their sensibilities with the most exquisite refinements of shame. A journalist once told me about visiting another very famous Hollywood producer—you’d know the name—who exhibited for my friend his collection of photographs of famous female actresses—you’d know their names, too—performing sexual acts for his private viewing. As with Weinstein, this man’s chief thrill was humiliation, and the more famous the target the more roundly it was savored: Even her, a big star—these people will do anything to land a role; they’re so awful, they’ll...

Unlike Las Vegas mass murderer Stephen Paddock, three Islamic terrorists made their motives abundantly clear. “A trio of maniacal terrorists targeted women and children — hoping to make ‘an ocean out of their blood’ — in a failed attack they dreamed would be on par with 9/11,” wrote Denis Slattery Victoria Bekiempis and Graham Rayman in the New York Daily News. The October 6 article, headlined “Terrorist plot targeting NYC concerts, subways and landmarks foiled by investigators,” identified the trio as Abdulrahman El Bahnasawy, a 19-year-old Canadian; U.S. citizen Tala Haroon, who lives in Pakistan; and Russell Salic, 37...

Saturday Night Live creator Lorne Michaels has seemingly admitted the show chose not to roast Harvey Weinstein because the embattled film heavyweight is from New York. When Michaels was asked as he was leaving SNL's after-party at 4am why the show avoided the Weinstein controversy, the producer smiled and responded: 'It's a New York thing.' The show had earlier been criticized for not mentioning the sexual harassment allegations leveled against Weinstein this week.

Dozens of firefighters were fighting a blaze on top of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York on Saturday night, officials say. The fire broke out sometime before 8:40 p.m. on the roof of the 14-story building at 33 Liberty St. in Lower Manhattan. Video shows numerous fire trucks and firefighters at the scene around 9 p.m. The FDNY said a generator on the roof of the building caused the fire in a chimney.

[2014 article]Bill and Hillary Clinton have rented a five-bed property in Amangansett.... Neighbors will include movie mogul - and longtime Clintons pal - Harvey Weinstein

Another 9/11, another Brussels, another Paris? According to indictments unsealed yesterday by the Department of Justice, a three-man Islamist terror cell plotted versions of all the above for another attack on New York City. Before they could carry it out, an FBI undercover agent discovered the plot in 2016, then coordinated an international manhunt to capture all three erstwhile terrorists: The alleged scheme was more nefarious than many: The group, which wanted to attack Times Square and the New York City subway system, claimed to have been in touch with an Islamic State affiliate to obtain the official sanction...

TARRYTOWN, N.Y. – With a 1929 Model A Ford Phaeton making the final 3.1-mile (4.99-kilometer) journey across the Hudson River, the Tappan Zee Bridge in New York City's northern suburbs has officially closed. Much of the fanfare that accompanied the opening of an adjacent $3.9 billion twin-span named in honor of former New York Gov. Mario Cuomo in August was missing Friday night when the Tappan Zee saw its final crossing, according to The Journal News . Seth Kestenbaum was the last driver to cross the 61-year-old bridge around 10 p.m. in the vintage Ford. "If you're first across the...

At a candidate forum for Democrats preparing to challenge Congresswoman Elise Stefanik of New York, the youngest woman in Congress, one of the candidates (Steve Krieg, a Plattsburgh City School Board member) proclaimed, “I probably deserve to be called a sexist,” did not back down from calling the congresswoman “a little girl” and went on to call her “a child.” It’s worth noting that none of the other Democratic candidates on the stage objected to that language or characterization. One again we see the consistent principle of, ”it’s only sexism when someone in the other party does it.”

Mayor Bill de Blasio won’t be marching in the Bronx Columbus Day Parade on Sunday because he hasn’t been invited amid the controversy over what to do with statues of Christopher Columbus on city property. “Why would I have a mayor march who acts like Pontius Pilate. He washes his hands and puts up an 18-member committee to look at each statute,” said Tony Signorile, who runs the parade held in Morris Park. “At this point, I think he is a fake Italian.” --SNIP-- Signorile and other Italian-American leaders said the panel is political correctness run amok. He also is...

RARITAN TWP. -- In response to the ongoing controversy surrounding NFL players kneeling during the national anthem, the owner of Flemington Car and Truck Country has pulled the dealership's ads from broadcasts of games for the remainder of the 2017 season. "The National Football League and its owners have shown their fans and marketing partners that they do not have a comprehensive policy to ensure that players stand and show respect for America and our flag during the playing of the national anthem," Steve Kalafer said in a statement. "We have cancelled all of our NFL advertising on the Optimum...

Cops in some crime-ridden South Bronx neighborhoods have all but abandoned aggressive or intuitive policing — to avoid getting sued or otherwise derailing their careers, officers admitted to The Post. It also comes against the backdrop of a nationwide outcry against aggressive policing. Scores of NFL players have being kneeling during the national anthem at games to protest police brutality. Several precinct patrol officers recalled incidents in which they didn’t bust suspected drug dealers who were taunting them while recording with cellphone cameras. In one case, a cop said, neighbors were “leaning out their windows, shouting at us to go...

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