Results tagged “republicannationalconvention”

The city is not only settling lawsuits against the police during the Republican National Convention--the city also settles lawsuits against certain civilians! According to the NY Times, last week the city's legal department paid $55,000 to settle a lawsuit from June Brashares. Brashares, the Code Pink protester who interrupted President Bush's speech (she was charged and found not guilty of charges like disorderly conduct, harassment and assault), sued because she was tackled and dragged by convention volunteers. The city paid up because of "indemnification agreement" where the city agreed to pay for defending any lawsuit naming the RNC. And apparently St. Paul took note and made the RNC take out an insurance policy "covering up to $10 million in damages for civil rights violations by the police, to avoid saddling taxpayers with legal costs."

After noting the St. Paul police's tactics with protesters, the Daily Show analyzed the third night of the Republican National Convention. That night featured Sarah Palin's speech, as well McCain's former rivals on the presidential campaign trail, so it's all rich material for Jon Stewart and the Daily Show writers.

          

John McCain accepted the Republican presidential nomination last night, “Let me offer an advance warning to the old, big spending, do-nothing, me first, country second, Washington crowd: Change is coming... I have that record and the scars to prove it. Senator Obama does not. You know, I’ve been called a maverick, someone who marches to the beat of his own drum... I don’t work for a party. I don’t work for special interests. I don’t work for myself. I work for you."

           

Senator John McCain was officially nominated as the presidential candidate of the Republican party last night, but his running mate Sarah Palin took the convention hall by storm. The Governor of Alaska addressed the crowd and energized them by introducing herself and her family--and aggressively attacking Barack Obama:

Before I became governor of the great state of Alaska, I was mayor of my hometown. And since our opponents in this presidential election seem to look down on that experience, let me explain to them what the job involves. I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a ‘community organizer,’ except that you have actual responsibilities.

Continue reading "McCain Officially Nominated, But Palin Steals the Show"

      

Tonight is arguably the biggest night of the Republican National Convention, as it will be vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin's first national campaign speech. Politico has five things to watch for, including how Palin will have to emphasize why she's experienced. Her aide said, "She will speak as a governor, a former mayor and someone with both hands on the steering wheel of America's energy economy. She will detail her record of shaking up the status quo in Alaska and standing up to entrenched interests to put the government back on the side of the people."

       

Senator Joe Lieberman addressed the Republican National Convention in St. Paul last night, heralding presidential candidate John McCain's record. The former vice presidential candidate in the 2000 election discussed his political affiliations, "What, after all, is a Democrat like me doing at a Republican convention like this? I’m here to support John McCain because country matters more than party... John McCain’s whole life testifies to a great truth: Being a Democrat or a Republican is important. But it is not more important than being an American." (Video below)

Last night, the Republican National Convention got off to a subdued start as most of the focus was on Hurricane (now Tropical Storm) Gustav. First Lady Laura Bush and First Lady aspirant Cindy McCain asked for delegates and the country to extend aid to the affected region. While President Bush had to cancel his Monday night appearance, he will address the convention tonight via satellite at 9:30 p.m. EST. Other speakers will include former presidential candidate Fred Thompson and one of John McCain's VP shortlisters, Senator Joe Lieberman. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is bowing out due to California budget battle and it seems like Rudy Giuliani's keynote speech is getting bumped from today.

John McCain has all but canceled tomorrow's first night of the Republican National Convention due to the expected severity of Hurricane Gustav's arrival along the Gulf Coast. "This is a time when we have to do away with our party politics and we have to act as Americans." Earlier in the day it had been announce that President Bush and Vice President Cheney would not be speaking at the convention as scheduled tomorrow so that people wouldn't remember how atrociously they screwed up Katrina in order to attend to the emergency. The McCain campaign said that the opening program on Monday would be "business only and will refrain from political rhetoric." The status of the rest of the convention will be day-to-day with some speculation that we could see a telethon in order to raise money for those affected by the hurricane.

With activists and citizen journalists pouring into Minneapolis in advance of the Republican National Convention (which starts September 1st), police there are already getting warmed up for what's sure to be another full-frontal assault on the bill of rights – which won't surprise anyone who protested the GOP's last convention in New York City.

The NY Times Styles section looks at how the The Year of the Political Blogger Has Arrived, both the Democratic and Republican National Conventions extended credentials to bloggers. However, not all bloggers are created equal: At the DNC, there's the national credential ",which offers the same access granted to members of traditional news media organizations," while the "coveted" state blogger credential "allows one blogger per state to cover the convention alongside its state delegation, with unlimited floor access" (Room 8 is representing NY). Our Washington DC blog, DCist, was chosen as DC's state blogger and editor Sommer Mathis is already in Denver. She reports on what's in the DNC media swag bag, "an official Denver 2008 reusable water bottle from Visa... a bottle of Walgreen's brand ibuprofen and minipack of Walgreen's brand facial tissue, a bottle of hand sanitizer from the Hogan & Hartson law firm...magnetic poetry from SEIU..."

Former mayor Rudy Giuliani will speak at the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, according to the NY Post. He has night two slot (Sept. 2) and will likely talk 9/11--presumptive nominee John McCain previously told the Post, "I've been with [Giuliani] a lot. I appreciate more than I could tell you his friendship and support. And that was steadfast throughout the primary. He's great American. He united America. I'll never forget that as long as I live." At the 2004 RNC, Giuliani attacked Kerry, praised Bush and 9/11'd a lot. Back then, the Times wrote his speech "fuels speculation" he could be a 2008 frontrunner.

People may be talking the 2008 Presidential election, but when it comes to NYC, the aftermath of the 2004 Republican National Convention is still being felt. It was right before the convention when the NYPD arrested over 200 bicyclists during the August 2004 Critical Mass ride, starting more heated of NYPD vs. Critical Mass clashes.

Critical Mass, which came to New York around 1993, hasn't always been a cause for concern amongst the city's police. After 2004's Republican National Convention coincided with that month's Critical Mass in Manhattan, things changed. The ride has taken a more political tone and there's often an air of protest circling it.

Almost three years after the 2004 Republican National Convention, the tactics the NYPD used are still being debated in court. Per the NY Times, federal judge James C. Francis ruled yesterday that "hundreds of field intelligence reports by undercover investigators who infiltrated and compiled dossiers on protest groups" must be disclosed.

There are new details surrounding Sunday's 208 arrests at the Puerto Rican Day Parade: According to the NY Times, the police still claim that people were arrested for "specific illegal behavior," like blocking traffic, and not because they were wearing colors of the Latin Kings gang. However:

Criminal complaints filed against 10 defendants show that the police were concerned about the risk that those arrested would engage in violent or threatening behavior or cause some public inconvenience.

Continue reading "More Questions About Police Parade Arrests"

The NYPD decided not to appeal a judge's decision that the NYPD should declassify its surveillance documents from the 2004 RNC, so it has set up a special NYPD RNC Documents website with the documents. Of course, you have to scroll down to the very bottom for a zip file of the 600 pages of documents. And what's above the documents is the NYPD's rather thorough explanation/ defense justifying why it did such extensive surveillance of disparate groups and people, listing various terror incidents between 2001 and the convention as well as other incidents of protest. Here is Police Commissioner Ray Kelly's statement:

“I think a close examination of the documents is going to show that the New York City Police Department did an outstanding job in protecting the City during the Republican National Convention. People wanted to come here and shut down the City, to replicate what happened in Seattle, Montreal and Genoa. We simply didn't let that happen, and I think it'll just underscore the outstanding work of the men and women of the Department. In terms of gathering information, the vast majority of information that was gathered was open-source information. It was gathered from the Internet; these groups that were coming here were advertising what they were going to do — bragging about what they were going to do. It wasn't particularly difficult to get the vast majority of this information.”

ACT UP, Sierra Club, City Council members (Charles Barron, David Weprin, Bill Perkins), Sept. 11 Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, Johnny Cash Bloc, MSNBC, A31 Coalition, NYCLU, NOW, Planned Parenthood, New Yorkers Against Gun Violence, Stuyvesant High School Students, Westboro Baptist Church, Indymedia, Democratic National Committee, Coalition of Fire and Police Unions, Grandmothers Against War, Falun Gong, Arab Muslim American Foundation, Time's Up, Billionaires For Bush, United for Peace and Justice, The Surveillance Camera Players, ACLU, Hip Hop Summit Action Network, The Federation of East Village Artists, Poor People's Economic Human Rights Campaign, Restaurant Opportunity Center of New York

The new chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee says the NYPD thinks it's the NPD - the National Police Department. The Daily News reports that Democratic Mississippi representative Bennie Thompson is critical of the NYPD's tactics that stretch into other jurisdictions. He told the News, "While I understand that chasing down leads in other locales might help keep the city safe, I emphasized that the NYPD is not the FBI, that it does not have national jurisdiction."

This morning, WNBC 4 aired Gabe Pressman's News Forum interview with Police Commissioner Ray Kelly. Pressman asked Kelly about topics such as attacks on the police given the city's record low crime, stop-and-frisks, the recent arrest of a man who intimidated a witness in the Sean Bell case, the NYPD's eal Time Crime Center, terrorism, Rudy Giuliani and police conduct during the Republican National Convention. This is a small bit of Pressman and Kelly's exchange:

PRESSMAN: Civil libertarians go--hark back to the Republican Convention in '04 and the many people who were arrested or detained and then released. Thousands in all were involved in these demonstrations. Do you think that they have a legitimate complaint, that too many were detained, considering the results?

Continue reading "Ray Kelly Says RNC Was "The Finest Hour" in NYPD History"

Though not necessarily together. The Mayor believes in zeppole and fair games, telling reporters: "I understand the frustration of the community, who has their streets blocked and a lot of noise at night. On the other hand, it is part of New York."

A judge sided with the city and is allowing police files to remain secret. After the NY Times ran two stories about how the NYPD spied on groups at least a year before the 2004 Republican National Convention - and some of the groups did not seem to be intent on breaking the law - questions were raised about police conduct and whether the police broke the law (police cannot spy on organizations unless there is some indication of wrongdoing).

After its story about how the NYPD spied on organizations for at least a year before the 2004 Republican National Convention, the NY Times reports that the city wants to keep NYPD records sealed, in fear that the media will "fixate upon and sensationalize them." Well, that's probably too late.

There's a big NY Times story about the NYPD's preparation before the 2004 Republican National Convention: The police started spying on protesters a year before the actual convention.

For at least a year before the 2004 Republican National Convention, teams of undercover New York City police officers traveled to cities across the country, Canada and Europe to conduct covert observations of people who planned to protest at the convention, according to police records and interviews.

Continue reading "The NYPD Loved to Spy Before RNC 2004"

In the wake of a federal judge criticizing the NYPD's videotaping procedures last week, I-Witness Video looks at what the NYPD actually uses to record public events and calls it "360 degrees of surveillance," best illustrated by what the police used during the 2004 Republican National Convention.

Federal Judge Charles S. Haight Jr. banned the police's ability to routinely videotape demonstrations yesterday. Haight found the NYPD violated Handschu v. Special Services Division, a 1971 decision that established "consent decree"; Haight wrote in his decision, "Solely politically based investigations are flatly prohibited by the guidelines. In other words, there must always be a legitimate law enforcement purpose - having a purpose of investigating political activity exclusively for its own sake is never allowed." In other words, just because it's a demonstration doesn't mean it has to be videotaped.

As the City Council continues to look at police-supplied data showing blacks are stopped 55% of the time during stop-and-frisk searches, the community has startled to rumble. The Reverend Al Sharpton said that he would start collecting names to file a class action lawsuit against the city. He asid, "It's an outrage. It's enough. No matter how productive you are, to be cast as a suspect rather than a citizen is intolerable in this country... One will have to explain how 55% of the people stopped are black when we're not nearly 50% of the population."

Ha! The NY Times reports that the Bloomberg administration is "fighting to keep secret the vast array of records, testimony, and videotapes" taken during the 2004 Republican National Convention. Why?

The city contends the materials could be embarrassing to people who were arrested, disclose police intelligence, or reveal environmental conditions that may hurt commercial development on the West Side waterfront or be useful to terrorists.

Continue reading "City Doesn't Want to Release 2004 RNC Arrest Records"

When going out to send your bills, postcards, thank you cards, and the like have you found your regular mailbox suddenly gone? It isn't your imagination. While the Post Office doesn't keep track of permanently removed mailboxes (uhm, why not?) they do admit that since the Republican National Convention a sizable number have been removed and taken out of service. For instance the 10003 ZIP code (which covers much of the East Village and Gramercy Park) has lost 18 of its 75 boxes between March 2002 and October 2004!

Commuters may feel safer when they hear that the MTA is installing a million dollar chemical detection system at Penn Station. But it turns out that the MTA has been testing the system for the past two years at Grand Central, where, as the NY Times reports:

Technicians found that a person walking by with a mop and bucket full of floor cleaner could trigger the chemical sensors.

Continue reading "What it Takes to be a Chemical Detection System in NYC"

We're not sure if New Yorkers are breathing a sigh of relief or upset not to have some crazy protests, as the Republican party has decided to hold its 2008 convention in Minneapolis/St. Paul. New York City, which hosted the 2004 Republican National Convention, was trying to land the Republican and Democrat conventions for 2008 because money is money. Since Minnesota is considered a swing state, the Democrats were also considering it as a 2008 convention site. But it seems like the Republicans are striking while the iron is hot: Minneapolis' mayor said the city cannot have two conventions.

- "Tell me more about this 'terrorist threat' to NYC."