Free Republic

Bill Clinton will deliver the commencement address at Hobart and William Smith Colleges next month, the schools announced Wednesday. Clinton, the 42nd president of the United States and founder of the Clinton Foundation, is scheduled to speak at the Geneva colleges on Sunday, May 14. “We are honored to welcome President Clinton back to Hobart and William Smith as the 2017 Commencement speaker,” HWS President Mark Gearan said in a release. “President Clinton’s leadership has transformed millions of lives around the world, from his time as Arkansas attorney general and then governor, to two terms in the White House, and...

ITHACA, N.Y. — Cornell University officials say the college's oldest all-male a capella group has been permanently dismissed from campus for hazing that included requiring new members to put Icy Hot muscle cream on their genitals........

New York is set to make tuition at public colleges and universities free for middle-class students.Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo (KWOH’-moh) proposed the tuition plan, which will cost an estimated $163 million.

City Controller Alan Hevesi took sides yesterday in a City Council primary slugfest, endorsing Pauline Chu in her contest with veteran Flushing incumbent Julia Harrison. Hevesi, of Forest Hills, cited controversial remarks made by Harrison last April, when she was quoted as saying Asian immigrants in Flushing "were more like colonizers" than other groups that had settled in her district. Chu, an Asian-American who lost a primary to Harrison in 1991, is president of Community School Board 25.

City Controller Alan Hevesi yesterday endorsed Assemblywoman Deborah Glick for Manhattan borough president taking sides in a primary that has split the Democratic Party's gay and black constituencies. Hevesi chose Glick, a lesbian, over her leading opponent in the coming Democratic primary, City Councilwoman Virginia Fields of Harlem, who is black. The move came just two days after Hevesi endorsed Brooklyn Assemblyman Roger Green, who is black, in Green's longshot bid to oust Public Advocate Mark Green in the Democratic primary. Critics accused Hevesi, a likely mayoral contender in 2001, of endorsing Roger Green to avoid political problems with black...

Democratic assemblywoman Deborah Glick of the New York State Assembly has introduced legislation that would fine people who do not vote, and has been promptly criticized on the constitutionality of the measure. Glick's legislation proposes a $10 fine for those who fail to vote without providing a "valid excuse," but she does not specify what a valid excuse would be, the New York Daily News reports.

Which are the worst three states for exercising your right to keep and bear arms? There are several contenders for that dubious distinction. The worst states can be found with the answers to a couple of questions. First: Do you have to ask government permission to purchase a firearm? Some states require that you obtain permission before purchasing handguns. A smaller subset require that you obtain permission before purchasing any gun. That infringement is a must have for the worst states.  There are twelve states that have the requirement for all guns.  They are California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii,...

A disturbing online video shows a straphanger wedged between subway doors from the neck up as passersby casually walk past her on the platform. The woman found herself caught in between the doors of a No. 4 train at around 12:45 p.m. Tuesday as the train reached the end of the line at the Woodlawn station in the Bronx, transit sources said. Apparently realizing too late that the train was at its last stop and had already emptied out, the woman rushed for the doors and became trapped, sources said. The woman, who was standing inside the train car, can...

ALBANY — New York edged closer to its first-ever government shutdown Sunday as lawmakers struggled — once again — to reach agreement on a new spending plan. With the state entering its second day without a budget in place, legislative leaders said negotiations with Gov. Cuomo made progress but final agreements were elusive. As it has been all week, a proposal to raise the age of criminal responsibility in New York from 16 to 18 remained the critical stumbling block.

New York City – Mayor Bill de Blasio claimed that New York is at risk of terror if AG Sessions cuts federal funding for sanctuary cities. Let me get this right–it’s safer to harbor illegal aliens in your city and if you don’t, the nice illegals will get angry and blow up your city. Makes perfect sense.

The New York Teamsters Road Carriers Local 707 Pension Fund has won the unfortunate award for "First Pension to Officially Run Out of Money." According to the New York Daily News, and a host of angry former truck drivers who've had their pension benefits slashed, the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. (PBGC) has officially been forced to step in and take over payments to retirees of the Local 707, albeit at a much lower rate. Teamsters Local 707’s pension fund is the first to officially bottom out financially — which happened this month. “I had a union job for 30 years,”...

<p>Millions of people have been watching and waiting with anticipation to witness the birth of a baby giraffe at Animal Adventure Park in Harpursville, NY.</p> <p>The park set up a webcam in order to share the precious and educational moment with the world. Park officials in a little more than 12 hours they've seen between 20-30 million views.</p>

More than most, Eric Schneiderman understands the risks of taking on Donald Trump. New York's attorney general was a target of Trump's Twitter feed years before the president's assaults on "Little Marco" Rubio or "Lyin' Ted" Cruz. He was once depicted as a deranged Clockwork Orange character on the cover of a newspaper owned by Trump's son-in-law. And he faced intense anti-Semitic attacks from Trump loyalists on social media that continue even today.

Reuters reports: Russia’s combative ambassador to the United Nations, Vitaly Churkin, died suddenly in New York on Monday after being taken ill at work, the Russian Foreign Ministry said. The ministry gave no details on the circumstances of his death but offered condolences to his relatives and said the diplomat had died one day before his 65th birthday. It declined to comment on reports that Churkin had been taken to hospital shortly before his death. President Vladimir Putin was “deeply upset” by the news and had greatly valued Churkin’s professionalism and diplomatic talent, Russian news agencies quoted the Kremlin as...

The bomb that injured 29 people in central New York on Saturday and another device found nearby were both shrapnel-filled pressure cookers, US media report, as law enforcement probe for potential terrorist links. Twenty-nine people were injured when a bomb exploded in New York's upmarket Chelsea neighbourhood on Saturday night, damaging buildings, shattering glass and sending shrapnel flying across the street. A second bomb was uncovered by police four blocks away and defused safely, before being sent to the FBI in Virginia for forensic examination. Both bombs were filled with shrapnel and made with pressure cookers, flip phones, Christmas lights...

The principal at a progressive Manhattan private school told parents in an email last week that the Trump presidency was more troubling than Vietnam, the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., the September 11 attacks and Watergate, The Post has learned. Steve Nelson’s scorching missive managed to roil several parents at the $46,000 per year Calhoun School – no small feat considering the Upper West Side bastion’s blaring liberal bent.

The New York Assembly moved Monday to establish New York as a sanctuary state, but the measure faces an uncertain future in the state Senate. Assembly Democrats are backing measures that would give the entire state sanctuary status for immigrants.

Gov. Cuomo kept his new budget hush-hush all Tuesday, and one reason is obvious: His call to extend the millionaires tax (again) shows his rank hypocrisy. Again. “No new taxes. Period,” Cuomo declared in 2011, nixing any extension of the “millionaires tax.”: “You are kidding yourself if you think you can be one of the highest-taxed states in the nation, have a reputation for being anti-business and have a rosy economic future.”

“The lowest-common-denominator approach proposed by this bill would undermine the core principles of federalism, the traditional police powers of state governments, and the safety of law enforcement officers across the country. It’s absolutely unacceptable for the federal government to dictate that someone can carry a concealed, loaded gun within a state’s border, in violation of that state’s laws.” – New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman in New Bill Would Force States to Allow Visiting Gun Owners to Pack Heat Without a Permit

A man was shot in the shoulder Tuesday during a dispute on the Lower East Side, possibly involving people in several vehicles. The 31-year-old was struck in the left shoulder at the intersection of Hester and Essex streets just after 5 a.m.http://abc7ny.com/news/man-injured-in-lower-east-side-shooting-/1683625/