Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Clinton's Scandals: Is this corruption the worst ever? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Doughboy who wrote (8040)	10/8/1998 1:51:00 PM
From: DD™	Respond to of 13994

SLICK'S WILLEY WOES AWAIT October 8, 1998 BY ROBERT NOVAK SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST suntimes.com DD

To: Doughboy who wrote (8040)	10/8/1998 5:45:00 PM
From: Zoltan!	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 13994

>>I heard though that that a Court today required a referendum to be voted on regarding whether a stadium should be built by NYC for the Yankees. That decision has been stayed at the Appellate level. I think most agree that it was a blatantly political decision by a Dem judge who was recently censured - totally justly - by the Commission of Judicial Conduct. But the judge, who came up in the Bronx Democratic organization during the reign of Stanley Friedman, is likely to find himself in the spotlight far less often from now on. He has been transferred to a less-prestigious assignment hearing routine civil trials in the wake of a state judicial panel's decision last month to censure him for misconduct. The panel, the Commission on Judicial Conduct, rebuked Justice McKeon for discussing a pending case with a reporter for The New York Times, appearing on television to comment on the civil case against O.J. Simpson and asking the city's Law Department to speed its hiring of a woman who once worked for him. The panel said Justice McKeon also lobbied on behalf of the woman, with whom he had a personal relationship, when the Law Department sought to dismiss her several months later. The rebuke, and the reassignment by Chief Administrative Judge Jonathan Lippman, swiftly put an end to widespread speculation that Justice McKeon, 50, would succeed Burton B. Roberts, 76, the longtime Administrative Judge in the Bronx, who is to retire in December. Now, after years in which he managed the largest caseload of any jurist in the state, at times juggling pretrial motions and trial work in up to 8,000 lawsuits at once, Justice McKeon will hear only trials, one at a time. "From 8,000 cases down to one," he said ruefully, during an interview in his chambers Wednesday. Moments later, Justice McKeon was informed that Mayor Giuliani had denounced his decision in the Yankee Stadium case, calling it the work of "a judge who is the product of the Democratic machine" and saying its legal merit was nonexistent. search.nytimes.com Even today's editorial in the NYT agrees that the measure should be off the ballot: October 8, 1998 Ballot Battle in New York So here we are again, edging toward Election Day with no firm idea of what the ballots in New York City will look like. In particular, the referendum section, often tucked down at the lumbago level of the ballot, is still very much in doubt. The cause for this confusion is a highly vocal and political battle between Council Speaker Peter Vallone and Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. Mr. Vallone, who is running for governor, wants an item on the ballot that asks voters whether public funds can be used to move Yankee Stadium from the Bronx to Manhattan. The Mayor, objecting mightily to such a limitation on his powers, quickly established a contrived Charter Revision Commission to find its own referendum that would automatically bounce Mr. Vallone's off the ballot. So Mr. Vallone and his City Council went to court -- in the Bronx, of course -- and got a hometown judge to rule for the Vallone referendum. Supreme Court Justice Douglas McKeon, who describes Yankee Stadium as "the tabernacle of sport," ruled that the Mayor's commission did not make a comprehensive review of the charter before devising its "slapdash" referendum on campaign reform. The Mayor retorted that "when you present a political question to a judge who is the product of the Democratic machine, you get a Democratic answer, not an honest answer to the question." The city immediately appealed, and was granted a stay. The best outcome would be if a higher legal authority found a way to keep both referendums off the ballot. The Vallone effort could harden the negotiating process on Yankee Stadium and complicate the task of keeping the team in New York City. The Mayor's referendum is, in many ways, even worse. The Mayor used a legitimate process for revising the city's constitution as a crude political tool. His referendum threatens to disrupt one of the best campaign finance systems in the country. These two referendums may be clever political gamesmanship, but they are a disservice to New York City voters. search.nytimes.com