Tony Award winner Ruthie Ann Blumenstein, who goes by the stage name Ruthie Ann Miles, is out of intensive care and healing after being injured in a car crash that killed her 4-year-old daughter.
The pregnant Broadway star and her daughter, Abigail Blumenstein, were two of five pedestrians hit on a corner in the Park Slope neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York, on Monday when a car ran a red light and plowed into a crowd of people. Miles’ pregnancy appears to be unharmed.
A 46-year-old man and another woman, Lauren Lew, a friend of Miles, were also injured in the crash. Lew’s 1-year-old son, Joshua, was pronounced dead at the scene.
The car’s driver, 44-year-old Dorothy Bruns, reportedly told police she has medical issues. She has not been charged.
Source : huffingtonpost
Friday, 9 March 2018
The Tainted Water Crisis In Upstate New York That Andrew Cuomo Can’t Shake
NEWBURGH, N.Y. ― Lately, Wayne Vradenburgh daydreams about a demotion.
Vradenburgh has spent his entire career working for the water department of Newburgh, an upstate New York city of 28,000 people, most of whom are Hispanic or black. He started as an assistant water maintenance mechanic at 18, repairing fire hydrants. Two decades later, in 2016, he took the top job of superintendent. He made plans to fix leaky pipes, and mostly just aspired to keep things running smoothly for the poverty-stricken city of dilapidated brownstones nestled on the Hudson River.
Then, a mere two weeks after he took over, state health officials pulled up in his driveway. They had grim news. Lake Washington, the 1.3 billion-gallon reservoir that had served the city since the 1880s, had tested positive for a dangerous chemical. Vradenburgh soon found himself frantically studying the names of tongue-twister toxins he’d never heard of, going head-to-head with state and federal agencies, and working 70-hour weeks overseeing $50 million in emergency projects.
Source : huffingtonpost
Vradenburgh has spent his entire career working for the water department of Newburgh, an upstate New York city of 28,000 people, most of whom are Hispanic or black. He started as an assistant water maintenance mechanic at 18, repairing fire hydrants. Two decades later, in 2016, he took the top job of superintendent. He made plans to fix leaky pipes, and mostly just aspired to keep things running smoothly for the poverty-stricken city of dilapidated brownstones nestled on the Hudson River.
Then, a mere two weeks after he took over, state health officials pulled up in his driveway. They had grim news. Lake Washington, the 1.3 billion-gallon reservoir that had served the city since the 1880s, had tested positive for a dangerous chemical. Vradenburgh soon found himself frantically studying the names of tongue-twister toxins he’d never heard of, going head-to-head with state and federal agencies, and working 70-hour weeks overseeing $50 million in emergency projects.
Source : huffingtonpost
Trump Accuser Jessica Drake Named In Stormy Daniels’ Nondisclosure Agreement
A woman named in the nondisclosure agreement signed by Stephanie Clifford, aka Stormy Daniels, turns out to be both a fellow porn performer and a fellow Donald Trump accuser.
Actress Jessica Drake, identified in the agreement as “Angel Ryan,” was mentioned as one of four people aware that Clifford allegedly had a yearlong affair with Trump between 2006 and 2007, according to the New York Daily News.
During the 2016 presidential campaign, Drake accused the future president of grabbing her, kissing her and offering her $10,000 for sex a decade earlier. She said the incident occurred at a July 2006 event in Lake Tahoe, the same one where Clifford said she met Trump.
Drake’s lawyer, Gloria Allred, confirmed that Drake is Angel Ryan to CNN and HuffPost, but declined further comment. Allred also refused to talk to the Daily News about Drake’s relationship with Clifford or how she knew about the affair with Trump.
Source : huffingtonpost
Actress Jessica Drake, identified in the agreement as “Angel Ryan,” was mentioned as one of four people aware that Clifford allegedly had a yearlong affair with Trump between 2006 and 2007, according to the New York Daily News.
During the 2016 presidential campaign, Drake accused the future president of grabbing her, kissing her and offering her $10,000 for sex a decade earlier. She said the incident occurred at a July 2006 event in Lake Tahoe, the same one where Clifford said she met Trump.
Drake’s lawyer, Gloria Allred, confirmed that Drake is Angel Ryan to CNN and HuffPost, but declined further comment. Allred also refused to talk to the Daily News about Drake’s relationship with Clifford or how she knew about the affair with Trump.
Source : huffingtonpost
GOP Senator Reintroduces Bill To Protect Discrimination Against LGBTQ People
Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) reintroduced on Thursday the First Amendment Defense Act, a bill that would provide a range of federal protections for individuals and companies that discriminate against LGBTQ people.
Framed as a religious liberty measure, the legislation aims to prohibit the federal government from taking “discriminatory” action against a person for speaking or acting in accordance with a sincerely held religious or moral belief against same-sex marriage, polygamy or sexual relations outside of marriage.
The government itself would be barred from disfavoring such people in terms of tax status, grants, contracts, loans, licenses, employment, benefits, access to facilities, and a long list of other federal goodies.
And the bill defines the term “person” to include nonpublicly traded for-profit companies.
“What an individual or organization believes about the traditional definition of marriage is not ― and should never be ― a part of the government’s decision-making process when distributing licenses, accreditations, or grants,” Lee said in a statement on Thursday.
Source : huffingtonpost
Framed as a religious liberty measure, the legislation aims to prohibit the federal government from taking “discriminatory” action against a person for speaking or acting in accordance with a sincerely held religious or moral belief against same-sex marriage, polygamy or sexual relations outside of marriage.
The government itself would be barred from disfavoring such people in terms of tax status, grants, contracts, loans, licenses, employment, benefits, access to facilities, and a long list of other federal goodies.
And the bill defines the term “person” to include nonpublicly traded for-profit companies.
“What an individual or organization believes about the traditional definition of marriage is not ― and should never be ― a part of the government’s decision-making process when distributing licenses, accreditations, or grants,” Lee said in a statement on Thursday.
Source : huffingtonpost
Kris Kobach Begins To Show Why He Thinks There’s Widespread Voter Fraud In Kansas
KANSAS CITY, Kan. ― Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach (R) on Thursday offered his first evidence of noncitizens trying to register to vote in a trial challenging a Kansas requirement that people prove their U.S. citizenship to get on the voter rolls.
The evidence was a spreadsheet of 38 instances of alleged illegal voter activity in Sedgwick County that Kobach’s office had compiled over 18 years, from 1999 to 2017. As of 2016, there were more than 293,000 registered voters in Sedgwick County and over 1.8 million in Kansas.
Documents like the spreadsheet will be crucial to Kobach as he makes his case that large numbers of noncitizens are trying to get onto the voting rolls. In order to preserve the Kansas law, he will have to show that noncitizen voter registration is a substantial problem and that nothing short of the state’s proof-of-citizenship law can stop it. Kobach’s office has identified 129 people who have attempted to or successfully registered since 2000, but he says that there could be nearly 18,000 noncitizens on the rolls and that he plans to present more evidence in the trial.
Source : huffingtonpost
The evidence was a spreadsheet of 38 instances of alleged illegal voter activity in Sedgwick County that Kobach’s office had compiled over 18 years, from 1999 to 2017. As of 2016, there were more than 293,000 registered voters in Sedgwick County and over 1.8 million in Kansas.
Documents like the spreadsheet will be crucial to Kobach as he makes his case that large numbers of noncitizens are trying to get onto the voting rolls. In order to preserve the Kansas law, he will have to show that noncitizen voter registration is a substantial problem and that nothing short of the state’s proof-of-citizenship law can stop it. Kobach’s office has identified 129 people who have attempted to or successfully registered since 2000, but he says that there could be nearly 18,000 noncitizens on the rolls and that he plans to present more evidence in the trial.
Source : huffingtonpost
Fox News Settles Gender Discrimination Suit With Journalist Diana Falzone
(Reuters) - Journalist Diana Falzone has settled a gender discrimination lawsuit she filed against Fox News and left the company, her lawyer said on Thursday.
“Confirmed,” her lawyer, Nancy Smith, tweeted to Reuters when asked if Falzone had reached a settlement and no longer worked at the television channel.
Fox News officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Smith’s announcement, which was first reported by CNN. Fox denied Falzone’s allegations after she filed her lawsuit in May, 2017.
In her complaint in New York state court, Falzone said she was abruptly taken off air by Fox News after writing an article in January 2017 about her struggle with endometriosis, a medical condition that would likely leave her infertile.
She said Fox, a unit of Twenty-First Century Fox Inc, discriminated against her on the basis of sex and disability in violation of New York City law.
Fox executives decided she did not conform to their image of on-air women as “physically perfect” once she disclosed her condition, Smith said in a statement at the time.
Source : huffingtonpost
“Confirmed,” her lawyer, Nancy Smith, tweeted to Reuters when asked if Falzone had reached a settlement and no longer worked at the television channel.
Fox News officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Smith’s announcement, which was first reported by CNN. Fox denied Falzone’s allegations after she filed her lawsuit in May, 2017.
In her complaint in New York state court, Falzone said she was abruptly taken off air by Fox News after writing an article in January 2017 about her struggle with endometriosis, a medical condition that would likely leave her infertile.
She said Fox, a unit of Twenty-First Century Fox Inc, discriminated against her on the basis of sex and disability in violation of New York City law.
Fox executives decided she did not conform to their image of on-air women as “physically perfect” once she disclosed her condition, Smith said in a statement at the time.
Source : huffingtonpost
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