A face only a mother could love.

Vito Fossella is one of those politicians many an activist loves to not so much to hate but smack around. ">If you go to our archives, you're going to find our peeps here at the TDG have been working hard to help Steve Harrison smack Fossella down come November and it looks that the congressman is giving them plenty to work with these days.

Here's a list that'll put you up to date on the face of NYC's GOP :

Roy Moskowitz's Letter to the editor

Michael Bouldin's Baghdad Vito Freaks Out and Harrison, Steinem, and the GOP's Catholic problem

Below is a link to a story positioning Steve Harrison as the candidate of the people and Domenic Recchia as the Brooklyn machine's choice in City Hall News.

The article mentions the Daily Gotham, but the reporter didn't contact Bouldin and Mole as I suggested when he was writing the piece.

http://www.cityhallnews.com/news/128/ARTICLE/1316/2007-11-12.html

Brooklyn Attorney Steve Harrison and Staten Island educator Mark Zink will announce the forming of the non-partisan SIBRO Civic Association in a 7 PM July 18 press conference at the Staten Island South Beach Boardwalk Gazebo overlooking Southwest Brooklyn. For disclosure purposes, I'm SIBRO's acting corresponding sec.

SIBRO (Staten Island/Brooklyn) Civic Association is dedicated to narrowing the Narrows and bridging the gap between people who live on opposite sides of the bridge, focusing issues that impact Staten Island and Southwest Brooklyn residents together.

They brainstormed the idea in January 2006, before Steve ran for congress, in popular Staten Island hangout Schaffer's. Schaffer's is one of my favorite Staten Island bars because of their extensive beer selection (I'm a beer geek) although I'm always puzzled how they can close before midnight on Saturdays.

You won't have to miss 24 to catch Chris Owens’ TV show. At least for now.

Owens, a former Democratic Congressional Candidate and son of former Congressman Major Owens, is the host and executive producer of Inside the Congressional Black Caucus (iCBC, the lower case "i" is intentional and part of the show's logo) which was originally to premiere at 9 PM on Monday April 30 on the Black Family (BFC). That's the same time slot as 24, that addictive TV show that glorifies torture.

However, BFC is now being acquired by the Gospel Music Network and will cease programming next week.

But iCBC won't be homeless long. Owens is close to a deal with a cable property owned by one of the world's largest media companies.

Stay tuned for more info.

mole333 mentioned Chris Owens's TV show, Inside the Congressional Black Caucus (iCBC, the lower case "i" is part of the logo and intentional), in a December blog, but the launch was delayed until now.

iCBC airs Mondays 9 PM and Midnight Eastern Standard Time on the Black Family Channel (152 on Time Warner in NYC, see your local listings elsewhere). iCBC is scheduled to premiere on April 30 with footage of California Congressperson Maxine Waters and Michigan representative John Conyers and an interview with the Rev Jesse Jackson.

Chris Owens, the Harvard and Princeton educated son of former Brooklyn, NY Congressperson Major Owens and a 2006 Congressional Candidate himself in the frequently discussed in the Daily Gotham 11th CD race, is the co-host and executive producer. Chris isn't the only Owens with a TV career, brother Geoffrey played Elvin on the Cosby show.

iCBC is a joint production effort of the Black Educational Network (BEN, Which he co-founded) through iCBC Productions LLC and historically black college University of the District of Columbia, UDC). UDC is also provides production facilities for Washington DC Cable Channel 98.

Chris is also negotiating with ION Television, the new name for the Pax Network, and CoLoursTV to broadcast the show.

Domenic Recchia, go home.

Brooklyn City Councilman Domenic Recchia has been making the rounds on Staten Island in recent weeks. Some speculated that the Daily News Knucklehead award winner( http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2006/12/26/2006-12-26_how_stupid_can...) was visiting the forgotten borough because he was seeking citywide office. Others correctly speculated that he was contemplating running a primary against Steve Harrison for the right to attempt to unseat Vito Fossella, New York City’s only Republican member of Congress, who represents all of Staten Island and a portion of Brooklyn. Crain’s and the Staten Island Advance confirmed his potentially disastrous for those wanting to Veto Vito, ambitions.

Brooklyn attorney Harrison ran a gallant campaign last year, losing by a smaller percentage of the vote than any of Fossella’s opponents since he supplanted the Molinari dynasty in 1997. Harrison accomplished this despite being out spent 12-1 by Fossella, largely because people like Recchia, who represents a tiny portion of the Congressional District in the Council, did squat for Steve.

Harrison has not formally announced his repeat candidacy yet, but it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that he’s likely to run based on his ubiquitous presence on Staten Island since the election. He also couldn’t announce because of party chair John Lavelle’s death and three first quarter 2007 special elections in Staten Island.

The City Board of Elections denied Independence Party candidate to replace the late John Lavelle representing Staten Island’s North Shore in the March 27 Special Election Kelvin Alexander’s bid to place his made up Family First line (Not to be confused with Working Families which supports Democratic opponent Matt Titone ) as an additional line on the ballot. The board ruled that 611 of the petition’s 1616 signatures were invalid, leaving him short of the 1100 he needed for that additional line.

Alexander, a Staten Island Democratic County Committee member, is running on the Independence line and potentially turning a potential easy Democratic win into an opportunity for Republican Rose Margarella because the party chose Titone over him. He is undecided if he’ll fight the ruling with the state Supreme Court.

Alexander has accused any challenge of his fabricated party petition as marginalizing minority voters. I find that a stretch since he’s already on the ballot as a better known party’s candidate.

I also need to clarify that I am supporting Titone in this race. I have donated money to Titone, campaigned with Matt and have a Titone sign on my front lawn. There are some comments on the Link TextStaten Island Advance’s SIlive political forum that take out of context my initial backing of Alexander in the Daily Gotham. Although I would have voted for Alexander in the first round of voting at the County Convention had I been allowed to participate, I would have switched to Titone in subsequent rounds. Also for the SIlivers who read my blog, I was not one of the January Committee additions thought loyal to Olivari. I was told I was added in June 2006 and still haven’t been named to the Committee and thus still can not vote in County matters.

Some of the latest examples of a leftist circular firing squad have been many who complain that Congress is doing nothing to get us out of Iraq and some of the Hillary Bots who claim progressives in general, and Daily Kos in particular, are a bunch of atheist, anti-religion nut jobs.

Both accusations are untrue and here is one item that counters BOTH. This comes from a DAILY KOS diary by someone with the screen name PROGRESSIVE CHRISTIAN who is pushing progressives (and Christians, we can assume) to support HR 455, one of SEVERAL bills in Congress designed to block the McCain/Bush/Lieberman escalation and to bring our soldiers home from the Iraq quagmire. I sure hope those who have been denegrating congress for not acting to end the war and those who accuse progressives of being anti-religion will take note and help Progressive Christian in getting HR 455 passed.

On January 12, my congressman, Jerrold Nadler (NY-8), introduced H.R. 455, the Protect the Troops and Bring Them Home Act of 2007, a simple bill that limits the use of funding in Iraq for force protection, troop withdrawal and Iraq reconstruction. We spoke with Congressman Nadler's office last week and verified that he is still quite actively promoting this legislation.

I've been taking the Times Empire Zone and Ben Smith to task today for being anti-Statenite.

Link Texthttp://empirezone.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/02/20/its-election-day/#comments

Link Texthttp://www.r8ny.com/blog/ben_smith/turning_out_in_the_40th.html#comment-369392

The Staten Island Advance published a letter to the editor I wrote last week today.

I normally would only post the link, but The Advance purges articles from its archives two weeks after they run, with no opportunity for even payed access.

YOUR OPINION
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Craig Donner, my counterpart as communications director in last year's congressional election, based on his Feb. 12 letter to the editor, thinks his boss Rep. Vito Fossella's constituents are amnesiacs.

First, he forgets to mention Fossella favored the deadlines and penalties imposed on seniors as an "incentive" to sign up for the Medicare prescription plan, written by the pharmaceutical industry, which was among his campaign's largest donors. Fossella favored punishing those not signing up by the May 15 deadline with a six month waiting period and increased costs. Why does the congressman wish to punish the elderly not meeting bureaucratic deadlines? Nobody benefits from delaying coverage and increasing costs for those not acting quickly enough. This is another example of Republican heartlessness.

A common Republican political strategy is to repeat a lie often enough until people believe it. Karl Rove has made a career out of it and Fossella continues to employ this strategy concerning Social Security. Donner states that Fossella is not in collusion with the American Enterprise Institute against Social Security and does not endorse privatization. The American Enterprise relationship may or may not exist. However, the right-wing Cato Institute is a different story. Their socialsecurity.org Web site continues to link to Fossella's 2002 appearance on CNN as a Bush administration privatization spokesperson (socialsecurity.org/sstw/sstw08-26-02.pdf). During that appearance, Fossella says Bush is on the right side of history on Social Security.