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Disgraced ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo, D-N.Y., wrote in a Monday column for the New York Daily News that New York Lt. Gov. Brian Benjamin's resignation and indictment "raises troubling questions." Cuomo, who resigned as governor in August 2021 following several sexual misconduct allegations, said that his administration "reformed the insidious pork-barrel member-item process" after several scandals. Benjamin was forced to resign last week over federal charges of bribery and other offenses.

RICHMOND -- A San Francisco-based group of financiers called Mortgage Resolution Partners has been calling on Sacramento and other California cities for more than a year, pitching a plan to use government powers of eminent domain to seize underwater mortgages and refinance them for the benefit of homeowners who owe more than their homes are worth. Most communities took a pass, saying the novel plan was too risky. Not Richmond, a largely working-class city in the Bay Area. There, a determined and articulate Green Party mayor has helped steer the plan through the City Council in recent months. Today, the...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States is considering a release from its strategic oil reserves, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said on Friday, acknowledging the harm that supply disruptions from Iran could have on the global economy. Rising tensions between Iran and the West .. have fueled a rise in oil prices, pushing benchmark Brent crude above $125 a barrel on Friday. "There is a case for the use of the reserve in some circumstances and we will continue to look at those and evaluate that carefully," Geithner said on CNBC television. "Obviously Iran can do a lot of damage to...

The governor of Alabama is taking the weekend to decide whether he will sign an Arizona-style bill into law to crack down on illegal immigrants. If Gov. Robert Bentley gives his stamp of approval to the controversial legislation, the American Civil Liberties Union has vowed to challenge it in court. "It's an outrageous throwback to the pre-civil rights era and we call on Governor Bentley to veto this deeply misguided bill," Cecillia Wang, director of the ACLU Immigrants' Rights Project, said Friday. "The Alabama Legislature has invited rank discrimination into people's everyday lives," The bill, passed by the Alabama Legislature...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama is considering giving a speech in January to the Chamber of Commerce, a major business lobby, as part of a new outreach to corporations, a White House official said on Saturday. The White House and the chamber have tussled repeatedly during the first two years of Obama's administration over policies that the group has portrayed as unfriendly to business. After the November 2 congressional elections, which handed Republicans control of the House of Representatives and shrank Democrats' majority in the Senate, Obama said he had to do a better job of making sure the...

San Francisco Weighs Sweeping Boycott of Arizona Over Illegal Immigration Law April 27, 2010 San Francisco officials on Tuesday will consider a sweeping boycott of Arizona in the wake of that state's passage of tough anti-illegal-immigration measures. A resolution before the Board of Supervisors calls on the city to cancel contracts with companies based in Arizona and halt business ties between city government and the state. Meanwhile, San Francisco City Atty. Dennis Herrera said he was already looking into whether contracts with Arizona could be legally severed without penalty. The proposal is backed by Supervisor David Campos.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The White House has been presented intelligence estimating Taliban-led forces battling U.S. troops in Afghanistan have nearly quadrupled since 2006 and are increasingly independent of leaders in Pakistan, officials said on Friday. A U.S. intelligence assessment, showing the number of fighters in the insurgency has reached an estimated 25,000 from 7,000 in 2006, spotlights Taliban gains and the tough choices facing President Barack Obama in trying to reverse the trend. Some of Obama's advisers see a more concerted crackdown by Pakistan on militants on its side of the border as key to turning the tide in Afghanistan,...

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Oil dropped more than 3 percent on Thursday, touching the lowest level since May 2005 as record U.S. job losses intensified concerns of a long and deep global recession and further crushed demand expectations. The U.S. government reported the number of workers making new claims for jobless benefits last week surged to the highest in 16 years, helping to push down global equity markets. U.S. crude fell $1.81 to $51.81 a barrel by 1251 p.m. EST after earlier touching $49.75, marking the lowest level since May 25, 2005, when prices hit $49.58. London Brent crude shed...

WASHINGTON - President Bush is considering new measures to help stimulate the battered economy, the White House said Friday. White House counselor Ed Gillespie said aides to Bush are constantly looking at options for new economic proposals. "There's a short window for the president here when it comes to new policy. We understand that," Gillespie said. "So I guess what I'm saying is, don't rule it out." Gillespie spoke before a Bush speech on the economy, timed around the ceremonial swearing-in of the president's new housing secretary, Steven Preston. In his remarks, Bush stuck to promoting his existing economic policies....

Natascha weighs less than when kidnapped By Kate Connolly in Vienna (Filed: 26/08/2006) The full horror of Natascha Kampusch's eight-year kidnap ordeal became clearer yesterday as her mother said that the 18-year-old girl weighed less now than when she was abducted. Brigitte Sirny said she had been shopping for size 6 clothes for her daughter whose weight had dropped to 6st 6lb despite having grown to 5ft 3in. She said her daughter had "nothing" except for an orange dress she was wearing when she escaped her "master". Natascha has developed a formal, slightly stilted high-German accent similar to that of...

WASHINGTON - House Republicans pushed a resolution Tuesday commending the Capitol police force for professionalism after a confrontation between an officer and Democratic Rep. Cynthia McKinney. "I don't think it's fair to attack the Capitol Police and I think it's time that we show our support for them," said Rep. Patrick McHenry, R-N.C., a sponsor of the measure. Ignoring a police officer's order to stop or hitting one "is never OK," McHenry said of the incident, which has exacerbated partisan tensions in the House. Last week, McKinney had an argument with a uniformed police officer as she sought to enter...

PHOENIX (AP) -- As public frustration grows over the state's porous border with Mexico, the once-rejected notion of using state police to supplement federal patrols is gaining traction. One state lawmaker's plan includes $20 million for the Arizona Department of Public Safety to run a 100-member squad to operate surveillance equipment, construct border barriers, target drug and immigrant smugglers and perhaps patrol the border. "I'm not putting the handcuffs on. Whatever they need to do, they need to be doing," said Republican Rep. Russell Pearce, the plan's sponsor. Another proposal by Gov. Janet Napolitano would have two state police squads...

WASHINGTON - A federal judge is considering ordering the release of two Chinese Muslims held at Guantanamo Bay, which would be an unprecedented step in the legal battles surrounding the Bush administration's treatment of detainees. U.S. District Judge James Robertson raised the possibility, eight months after the U.S. military found the two men were not enemy combatants. A Justice Department lawyer told the judge at a hearing this week that the Bush administration is still trying to find a country that will take the ethnic Uighurs, who say they fear torture or death if they are returned to China. The...

SACRAMENTO — Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and legislative leaders are actively considering another round of government borrowing — this time to pay for massive building projects such as fixing freeway and cargo port bottlenecks as well as shoring up delta levees and hospitals that could fail in an earthquake. A self-described fiscal conservative who has refused to raise taxes, Schwarzenegger believes California needs a long-term plan that includes billions in new spending on infrastructure and changes in how the government allocates such money, administration sources and legislators said. Last year, Schwarzenegger successfully pushed a $15-billion bond to help the state balance...

UNITED NATIONS - Rwanda's foreign minister on Sunday questioned whether world leaders would ever make good on new promise to act in times of genocide like the one that devastated his nation 11 years ago. One of the most lauded elements of a document that came out of a three-day summit that ended Friday was world leaders' recognition of a collective responsibility to protect people from genocide, war crimes and ethnic cleansing. Rwanda's Foreign Minister, Charles Murigande, told the annual U.N. General Assembly debate that his country would wait to declare that responsibility a success until nations again confront such...

WASHINGTON - House Speaker Dennis Hastert is considering replacing the chairman of the ethics committee, which admonished Majority Leader Tom DeLay, who is the focus of a grand jury probe into his campaign finance practices. Hastert has not yet made up his mind about whether to replace Rep. Joel Hefley (news, bio, voting record), R-Colo., when Congress reconvenes on Tuesday, his spokesman said. "The speaker thinks that Chairman Hefley has done a terrific job," Hastert spokesman John Feehery said Thursday. "If he makes that decision, it will be because of the rules, not for any other reason." Hastert believes House...

LOS BANOS, Calif. (AP) - City officials here must decide whether to charge an 87-year-old man for damage caused when he tried to erect a fence in the middle of a street bordering his property. Bernard Gardner said he was trying to reclaim property the city of Los Banos took from him for a street-widening project in the 1940s, when he was off fighting in World War II. The street was damaged when one of Gardner's neighbors used a jackhammer to dig three post holes in the middle of West L Street. He was stopped by city crews in Los...

The Federal Communications Commission’s enforcement bureau has asked NBC for tapes of the opening ceremony of the Summer Olympics, apparently in response to one or more indecency complaints. It is unclear who may have complained or what aspect of the broadcast may have prompted a complaint, said the sources who revealed the request but spoke on condition of anonymity. An FCC spokesperson late Friday would not confirm or deny an investigation, but said the agency has recieved at least one complaint about the telecast. The Olympics opening ceremony on Aug. 14 in Athens included actors and actresses depicting two lovers...

<p>WASHINGTON (AP) - An architect of the government's legal battle against terror defended the USA Patriot Act, telling a federal commission on Monday the law rightly empowers investigators to "wage a coordinated, integrated counterterrorism campaign."</p> <p>Two law professors offered dissenting views, contending the Bush administration has gone too far toward tipping the balance between national security and civil liberties.</p>

<p>Gov. Gray Davis' recall campaign and state Democratic Party leaders are considering two new legal options for defeating the recall.</p> <p>According to sources close to the anti-recall campaign, pro-Davis lawyers are examining legal arguments that the election is unconstitutional if the governor is denied a place on the list of replacement candidates. Under state law, Davis cannot be a candidate to replace himself if he loses the recall.</p>