Results tagged “wesleyclark”

Senator John McCain won the Republican primary in New Hampshire, with the race being called for him early on. Senator Hillary Clinton beat Senator Barack Obama by a few thousand votes in a very close race. Comebacks all around!

• Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: A perp search at Roma Road and St. George in Staten Island, an overturned car at 2nd Avenue and 36th Street in Manhattan and a shark DOA in the Rockaways.
• The FDNY responded to an apartment fire and found a 4-year-old child who apparently witnessed her mother's boyfriend kill her mother then himself this morning.
• Why won't the city fix a sinkhole in a Staten Island street? Because the leak causing the sinkhole started under a private residence.
• Ready the presentation copies of PlaNYC! Mayor Bloomberg will attend the U.S. Conference of Mayors' summit on climate change in November.
• Shorpy's has a photograph of the Red Hook Houses wading pool from circa 1942.
• We guess this means he's not running: Retired general and Metrotard Wesley Clark has endorsed Hillary Clinton for president, saying, "She's the right person."
• Former NJ governor James McGreevey claims he can't afford his ex-wife's child support demands. Keep in mind, the man lives in a 17-room mansion.
• If you love Bjork's music and large jazz ensembles, then you may be interested in Bjorkestra - "The Music of Bjork Gudmundsdottir for large jazz ensemble" - which has some shows coming up.

After yesterday's "shocking" revelation that his ancestors were slaves owned by ancestors of Senator Strom Thurmond, the Reverend Al Sharpton held a press conference to discuss the news. It turns out that a Daily News reporter asked Sharpton if he'd like research his family history with genealogy website Ancestry.com - the NY Times reports that Ancestry.com "approached the Daily News seeking to publicize its African-American ancestry database" and the ball got rolling from there. At the Daily News offices, Sharpton told reporters:

"It's important for America, because in the story of the Thurmonds and the Sharptons, there's the story of the shame and the glory of America. The shame is that people were owned as property, and the shame is that every time I write my name now, I will think about how I got that name. The shame is that I am the heir of those who were property to the Thurmond family.

Continue reading "Sharpton Discusses Ancestral Ties to Thurmond"

The problem with companies selling your cellphone records to anyone is becoming a bigger issue, as it got the Today Show sign of approval to be something Americans should be freaked out about - there was a segment this morning and of course no one wants people knowing who they are calling or who is calling them, especially those cheating spouses or corporate espionage types! Basically, if you give a company like Locate Cell a phone number or name plus an address or Social Security number, plus $65-110 dollars, they'll turn over various information - who you called, who calls you, where you live, all that good stuff. The ball got rolling when Americablog obtained General Wesley Clark's information in order to make the point that this information is out there. It seems that some information gathering companies will pose as the customers to get the records! Cingular has obtained a temporary restraining order against LocateCell to stop their practices. Senator Schumer, who we like to call Senator Cellphone because he tackles lots of cellphone users' rights issues, wants to strengthen/enact federal penalties against people distributing this information. Hmm, prepaid cellphones are looking pretty good right now.

Gothamist on those who are able to fool turnstiles by bending their Metrocards and on Wesley Clark's problem with using a Metrocard.

Apparently, General Wesley Clark did not do enough jumping jacks for votes in New Hampshire. John Kerry's double digit win over Howard Dean in Dean's neck of the woods spells some doom for Dean. John Edwards is excited, but at this point, Gothamist will just wait to see what happens after the convention, weigh our options, and probably vote third party again.

Wesley Clark has been blowing off the Iowa caucuses to concentrate on New Hampshire and to visit in New York. Gothamist saw him at Grand Central yesterday, where he spoke to commuters amid the media scrum. As people jockeyed to tell Clark various things ("I was in the service" or "I'm the CEO of a financial services company"), we could hear his staffers telling others who couldn't get to Clark, "His motorcade is out that door; you'll have a great chance of speaking to him outside, why don't you go wait?" Gothamist contemplated asking Clark if he was going to do any shopping in the city, you know, to support the economy and continue to soften up his image (the Fab Five just made over a military man the other night - imagine what they could do with the General!), but we got hungry and went to buy a bagel.

Lloyd Grove gets political and examines Wesley Clark's recent subway journey. And it's official: The Democratic presidential hopeful is a Metrotard (TM The Morning News). After claiming he was riding the subway "Simply because it's the best way to get around the city," Clark tried to swipe his Metrocard at the turnstile, only to get "PLEASE SWIPE AGAIN." Then his aide tried a few times to work the Metrocard. Grove asked if the general had ever taken the subway before, and Clark replied, "I've taken it lots of times. My wife [Gertrude] is from Brooklyn. She's from Park Slope. Then, her family lived in Flatbush for a while. And so we used to ride the IRT all the time. But I haven't been on since they got the new ticket machines. I'm used to the old tokens." Okay, but still, if he gets elected, Gothamist wants a check on his motor skills.

Brilliant move by Wesley Clark's campaign manager: Have the Democratic presidential hopeful ride the New York subways (to Queens, no less) to understand what goes on in New Yorkers minds before pressing the flesh.

Slate has an excellent drinking game to partake in during tonight's Democratic debate. Drink prompts include mentions of Bill Clinton or Enron, looks into the wrong camera during introductions, or speaks Spanish and mentioning campaign website/URL. (Mmm, we'll venture to say a Schwarzenegger-California reference will make its way into the debate as well.) The Kamikaze version is "Take a drink every time a candidate mentions President Bush by name. " Then there are the specific candidates: