BAGHDAD (AFP) — Insurgents killed eight US soldiers in two separate attacks in 24 hours in Iraq and nine more people died on Tuesday in clashes in the north. In one of the deadliest days for the US military in several months, the insurgents on Monday killed three US soldiers and their translator in the Iraqi province of Diyala where a massive American and Iraqi military sweep has been targeting Al-Qaeda militants. The military, which announced the Diyala incident and casualties on Tuesday, said another soldier was also wounded in the bomb attack. On Monday, five other US soldiers were […]
SHOCKER: NY Gov. Caught In Fed Prostitution Dragnet
NEW YORK TIMES: ALBANY — Gov. Eliot Spitzer has been caught on a federal wiretap arranging to meet with a high-priced prostitute at a Washington hotel last month, according to a person briefed on the federal investigation. Governor Eliot Spitzer delivering the New York State Executive Budget address in The wiretap recording, made during an investigation of a prostitution ring called Emperors Club VIP, captured a man identified as Client 9 on a telephone call confirming plans to have a woman travel from New York to Washington, where he had reserved a room. The person briefed on the case identified […]
MONICA: Johnny Doc Or Johnny Dangerously?
MONICA YANT KINNEY: Just last month, Local 98 — the powerful electricians union run with an iron hand by [State Senate candidate John “Johnny Doc”] Dougherty — sued the city’s Board of Ethics.The union’s political action committee spent $2.4 million last year — including $140,000 on “propaganda” for failed mayoral candidate Tom Knox — but is refusing to open its books as state law requires. The electricians think such snooping violates their constitutional rights. A year earlier, Dougherty — who flirted with a mayoral run — tried to get the city’s pesky new campaign-finance law tossed by the state Supreme Court. […]
BILLARY: Ed Rendell, Clinton Family Consigliere?
NEW YORK TIMES: Two of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s biggest supporters, who are also two of the Democratic Party’s most successful fund-raisers, have offered to help raise millions of dollars to stage new primaries in Florida and Michigan. Gov. Jon S. Corzine of New Jersey and Gov. Edward G. Rendell of Pennsylvania said Sunday that they would be willing to raise half the $30 million it would take to run new contests in those two states. Mr. Corzine and Mr. Rendell submitted their proposal to The Washington Post.The two governors argue that the Democratic National Committee, and not taxpayers in […]
WYOMING: ‘Yes We Can’
CHEYENNE, Wyo. — Senator Barack Obama continued his string of victories in caucus states on Saturday, beating Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton in Wyoming by a wide margin. The victory, while in a state with only 18 delegates, was welcome news for the Obama campaign as it sought to blunt Mrs. Clinton’s momentum coming off her victories in Ohio and Texas on Tuesday. Mrs. Clinton had campaigned here Friday, a day after her husband and daughter, signaling the stakes every contest holds in the fierce battle for the Democratic nomination. Party officials reported extremely high turnout at caucus sites across the […]
PHAWKER EXCLUSIVE: Inside Bill Clinton’s Smokeless Backroom Meeting With Philly Democrat Party Bosses
JOE SUPER DELEGATE: Illustration by ALEX FINE BY AMY Z. QUINN Phawker is receiving reports from some of the city’s Democratic Ward Leaders, who gathered this morning to hear a pitch from former President Bill Clinton on behalf of his wife in anticipation of Pennsylvania’s April 22 primary. According to sources who just left the meeting, attended by Mayor Nutter and U.S. Rep. Allyson Schwartz, both of whom have publicly endorsed Hillary Clinton, the former president gave a passionate pitch for his wife’s candidacy for president, but ward leaders voted to defer making an official endorsement until they have a […]
STAY TUNED: For Our Hilariously Un-Scientific Pennsyltucky Primary Keystoned Cell Phone Poll
A long time ago, in a Clinton campaign far, far away, James Carville famously declared that Pennsylvania is Pittsburgh and Philadelphia and Alabama in between. Aw, yeah: Pennsyltucky. We know thee well. It’s sort of like the Dukes Of Hazzard after smoking kielbasa. Like sweat socks with a Sunday suit. Like the Deer Hunter costumed by Wal-Mart. It’s the long dark Chicken Dance of the national soul. Lord help us all. Anyway, with the national press are already converging on the Keystone state to get some local color on their laptops, we feel an obligation to Sherpa them up to […]
Bubba In Town To Kiss The Ring Of Dem Party Bosses
INQUIRER: Former President Bill Clinton is scheduled to address the city’s Democratic ward leaders tomorrow to pitch his wife’s candidacy while on a campaign swing through Philadelphia, party sources said.The 69 ward leaders were scheduled for a regular meeting and may consider endorsements in the April 22 primary, when in addition to the presidential race, state lawmakers, row offices and members of Congress will be on the ballot. Insiders do not expect the leaders to come to an agreement between Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama in the presidential race; already several African American ward leaders have declared they are […]
CLINTONISTA: Campaign In Civil War
WASHINGTON POST: For the bruised and bitter staff around Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, Tuesday’s death-defying victories in the Democratic presidential primaries in Ohio and Texas proved sweet indeed. They savored their wins yesterday, plotted their next steps and indulged in a moment of optimism. “She won’t be stopped,” one aide crowed. And then Clinton’s advisers turned to their other goal: denying Mark Penn credit. With a flurry of phone calls and e-mail messages that began before polls closed, campaign officials made clear to friends, colleagues and reporters that they did not view the wins as validation for the candidate’s chief […]
‘Those Who Ignore History Are Doomed To Repeat It’
WIKIPEDIA: Since Mussolini, there have been many conflicting definitions of the term fascism. Former Columbia University Professor Robert O. Paxton has written that: Fascism may be defined as a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victim-hood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion.”[11] Paxton further defines fascism’s essence as: …a sense of […]
A VERY SPECIAL CONTEST: How To Win Two Tix To Watch The Wire Finale With Mayor Nutter At City Hall!
Just answer this question: Who wrote (wrote, not performs) the song that plays during The Wire‘s opening credits? Send your answers ASAP to feed@phawker.com and you could be our very lucky winner! Why? Because we love you! UPDATE: We have a winner! The response was overwhelming, thanks to everyone for playing! PREVIOUSLY: Mayor Nutter To Host City Hall Screening Of The Wire Finale FRESH AIR ON WHYY: Novelist and screenwriter Richard Price discusses his latest novel, Lush Life, which follows the repercussions of a shooting on the Lower East side. Price has written extensively about the realities of inner city […]
75 YEARS AGO TODAY: ‘We Have Nothing To Fear…’
THE REFORMER: Seventy-five years ago, our nation was in the midst of one of the most dangerous and troubled periods in its history. In March 1933, about 15 million Americans — 1 in 4 workers — were unemployed. Five million American families — 1 in 7 — were barely surviving on an inadequate patchwork of private charity and public relief. In the little more than three years since the stock market crash of October 1929, more than 4,600 banks had failed. On March 3, 1933, a “bank holiday” was declared across the country and every remaining bank was either closed […]
SNAFTA: Hillary’s ‘NOhio’ Firewall Holds
NEXT STOP, US: The political road show that has crisscrossed the nation is now destined for Pennsylvania.Victories for Hillary Rodham Clinton in Ohio and Rhode Island last night, and a tight race in Texas, seemed certain to give her the momentum she needs to bring the race to the Keystone State. Not since Jimmy Carter in 1976 have residents in the state had a real voice in a presidential primary. As Gov. Rendell said just hours before the polls closed in Ohio, “We’ll know by the end of the night whether Pennsylvania will be irrelevant or the center of the […]