"That's a little contraversonarial there, eh?"
Posted on 10/27/2007 6:30:58 PM PDT by neverdem
In raising concerns that Governor Spitzer's choice to lead the Metropolitan Transportation Authority belonged to a private social club believed to be exclusively white, Albany lawmakers have opened an issue that may be difficult to cap.
Among the Harmonie Club's roughly 1,100 current members is Mr. Spitzer's father, Bernard Spitzer, who joined the secretive Upper East Side institution 30 years ago, five years after the newly installed MTA chairman, Dale Hemmerdinger, was accepted.
Before he was confirmed by the Senate, Mr. Hemmerdinger reluctantly resigned his membership last week after some state lawmakers said it was inappropriate for him to take the reins of the city's public transit system while remaining associated with a club they said was racially exclusive.
While Mr. Hemmerdinger's connection to the club was scrutinized, the elder Spitzer's membership in Harmonie never surfaced during the debate. Lawmakers interviewed said they weren't aware of his association until a reporter brought it to their attention yesterday.
Aides to the governor defended the club but didn't disclose that Mr. Spitzer's father, a prominent luxury real estate developer and philanthropist who helped finance Mr. Spitzer's campaigns for attorney general, was a longtime member.
It's unlikely that Bernard Spitzer's association with Harmonie will trigger the level of controversy that surrounded Mr. Hemmerdinger, who was seeking a high-level public post.
Still, the news isn't sitting well with all in Albany, especially minority lawmakers whose relationship with the governor has been at times distant.
"He's in the private sector but his son is the governor of New York," a Democratic assemblyman of Harlem, Adam Clayton Powell IV, said in an interview. "When someone is that close to you … you have some responsibility yourself. It's high time for the father of the governor of New York to resign from the club as well."
(Excerpt) Read more at nysun.com ...
These liberals are such hypocrites!
Just because someone to belongs to an exclusive all-white club they make a big deal out of it. How many latino politicians belong to La Raza or MEcha, the two most racist organizations in North America? But that seems to be acceptable to the MSM and you never hear about it on television, only on talk radio.
Jews aren’t “white” pal. Gov. Spitzer (and his parents) is Jewish you putz. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eliot_Spitzer
The possibilities are endless here.
None of this is surprising. Spitzer was highly selective in the non-profit organizations he went after. He wasn't after the crooks, just certain kinds of crooks who had certain religious affiliations, or political proclivities. Seems the apple wasn't falling far from the tree.
Time for the Governor to resign. This is all very shameful. I simply can't bear it. The man makes me cry when he appears in public. Oh, the humanity!!!
City Says Prescription Misuse Caused Death of Detective Who Worked at 9/11 Site
FReepmail me if you want on or off my New York ping list.
Goodness gracious. I thought he was a member of EHarmony.
"That's a little contraversonarial there, eh?"
Satin Doll , On this site ?
just kidding.
Owl_Eagle
If what I just wrote made you sad or angry,
it was probably just a joke.
Nah, try asserting that Irish people aren't white ("they're Irish"). THAT'S contraversoniarial.
Owl_Eagle
If what I just wrote made you sad or angry,
it was probably just a joke.
Not controversial at all. I didn’t exactly say Jews were “evil” did I? They surely aren’t White Anglo-Saxon Protestants, eh?
What? No Irish Need Apply? eh?
Harmonie Club was founded as a ethnic Germanic Jewish club. For urban non-religious German/Prussian (mostly north German/Prussian, low German dialect) Jewish businessmen and their families. Non religious non-Protestant Christian Germans of the nouveau rich business class prior to the ‘93 recession were also early members. Coming from a German urban center and speaking low German were pretty important.
When the German immigrants got off the boat they started in Germantown in the lower east side. If you got just a bit of money you moved up to German Harlem. If you made it big you ended up in the midtown neighborhoods around the Harmonie club building.
Mayor Bloomberg was also a member and he resigned before (or at the very beginning of) his Mayoral campaign.
The Spitzer family shouldn’t be pressed to disassociate with their ethnic community club that was founded specifically as a ethnic heritage society in the face of WASP discrimination in the prior two centuries. Neither should Dale Hemmerdinger.
More
http://www.nypress.com/blogx/display_blog.cfm?bid=21515983
Also, Hemmerdinger has contributed a good deal of money to Powell’s district over the years. Harlem Medical Center received a large enough donation Dale Hemmerdinger has his name on a plaque there.
It's been too long since we've checked in with Roger Stone, the GOP operative who is suspected of making a threatening call to Governor Spitzer's father. The Sun reports that Stone, who was asked to resign his $20,000/month gig consulting for NY State Republicans, has apologized to Dale Hemmerdinger, the owner of his apartment building and friend of Spitzer.
Spitzer's father's lawyers say that a call (which included the invective, "You will be compelled by the Senate sergeant at arms, if you resist, you will be arrested and brought to Albany - and there's not a goddamn thing your phony, psycho piece of s--- son can do about it. Bernie, your phony loans are about to catch up with you.") from someone who sounded just like Stone was made from Stone's 40 Central Park South apartment building. Stone contended that the call was spliced together using audiotapes made from his talk show appearances and that Hemmerdinger must have been behind it, pointing out that Hemmerdinger had access to apartment keys. The Sun excerpted Stone's letter:
In his letter, Mr. Stone said, "It was inappropriate for me to suggest that just because you are a major Democratic fund raiser, major Spitzer fund raiser, and the Governor's appointee to the MTA, that you would wrongly enter my apartment or have someone do so on your behalf, even though management has access and keys to every apartment."Stone's alibi in the matter seemed waterlogged after he said he was at the play Frost/Nixon on the night of the alleged call - August 6. It turned out that August 6 is a Monday, when plays are dark and that Stone actually saw the play on Wednesday, August 8. Stone now blames the date mix-up on the first reporter who called him.He wrote: "I regret any inconvenience or distress my initial comments may have caused."
This ridiculousness stems from Spitzer's fight with State Senate Majority Leader Bruno, which has included dirty tricks-ing from Spitzer's staff. Bruno has kept relatively quiet recently, but he did announce improved future Amtrak service between Albany and NYC, perhaps to make his days relying on state aircraft more manageable.
In other Spitzer news, the Governor told an upstate TV journalist to "get a life" after a question about using state troopers to dig up dirt on Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno. Justin Moss of WBNG-TV repeatedly asked Spitzer about "Troopergate". Moss later said, "It caught me off guard for sure. What do you say to that?" from : http://gothamist.com/2007/09/06/accused_meanvoi.php
Thanks for the update.
Thanks for the ping!
btt
Well then the author of the piece should say Jewish club, not white club. And point well made.
To a Democratic assemblyman of Brooklyn who was the first lawmaker to raise concerns about Mr. Hemmerdinger’s ties to Harmonie, Hakeem Jeffries, that the governor’s 83-year-old father is a private citizen is a crucial difference.”
To the Black Muslims of NY, Jews are the only “whites” that matter.
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