From the NY Post:Liberal East Harlem Councilwoman Melissa Mark-Viverito, a contender for City Council Speaker, is pals with Bolivia’s socialist, anti-American president, The Post has learned.
The pol even traveled to support Evo Morales — whose buddies included Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez and former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad — during an ultimately unsuccessful recall election in 2008.
Mark-Viverito, a Democrat, flew to the South American nation to “observe” the vote of Morales “at invitation of government of Bolivia,” according to papers she filed with the Conflicts of Interest Board.
That same year, Mark-Viverito, Comptroller John Liu and Councilman Robert Jackson praised Morales after he spoke at the American Indian Community House in Lower Manhattan.
During the speech, Morales denounced an American “conspiracy” to interfere with his socialists agenda, because the US had sought to reduce coca farming because it can be processed into cocaine.
Morales, a coca farmer by trade, was elected president with heavy support from the country’s farming community.
The three Americans responded by presenting him with a framed proclamation “recognizing his work on behalf of indigenous peoples’ rights,” according to local press reports.
The Bolivian trip didn’t break Mark-Viverito’s bank. The city’s powerful healthcare workers’ union, where Mark-Viverito worked before her 2005 election to the Council, shelled out up to $5,000 for her airfare and hotel, records show.
Last week, the union — which also backed Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio — threw her a party in Puerto Rico to kickstart her campaign for speaker.
11 comments:
Hard to see how Evo Morales is pals with Hugo Chavez, since the latter died eight months ago. And I doubt if he's a cocoa farmer, since it is the indigenous coca plant which can be turned into cocaine. Other than that, more great McCarthyism from the Post.
Chavez and Morales were indeed political allies. And yes, he is a coca farmer. Melissa Mark-Viverito is bad news, no matter what you think of the Post.
I like this part, personally:
Like de Blasio, Mark-Viverito often talks about how hard life is for the poor.
“We are the 99 percent. We represent the 99 percent,” she proclaimed during one Occupy Wall Street protest.
She doesn’t know about those difficulties first hand because she’s part of the 1 percent and reportedly worth as much as $1.8 million.
She is a part owner in several condos in her family’s native Puerto Rico with a value of up to $1.4 million. She also owns a three-family home in East Harlem that was built as part of an affordable housing program for low-income New Yorkers. As of May, the property had an estimated market value of $1.2 million. Yet in a City Council debate this year, Mark-Viverito said she felt that she could be “priced out” of her neighborhood.
Her late father was a doctor and founder of San Pablo Hospital in Puerto Rico who, according to public records, owned a private plane. When he died, he left behind an estate worth over $6.7 million and Mark-Viverito was co-heir to her father’s fortune – which include rental properties in Puerto Rico and the sale of hospital during a $186 million buyout of the company in 1997.
@Anonymous: Guess you have the same reading problems the Post editors do. The piece said he is pals--present tense--with Chavez, a neat trick to pull off with a dead guy. And you seem to have missed their spelling of coca as "cocoa," another plant altogether. I checked the comments on the Post's site after commenting, and someone else called them out for it. Get those peepers checked.
Mark-Viverito is head of the Parks Subcommittee. How's that worked out for us?
She opposed the overturning of term limits in 2009, but took advantage of it this year anyway. What a dame.
@kingofnycabbies
I can read just fine and picked up on those mistakes as well. I just clarified the truth for others. Lighten up.
I corrected the typos so they aren't such a distraction anymore.
The city’s powerful healthcare workers’ union, where Mark-Viverito worked before her 2005 election to the Council, shelled out up to $5,000 for her airfare and hotel, records show.
Last week, the union — which also backed Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio — threw her a party in Puerto Rico to kickstart her campaign for speaker.
Healthcare workers’ union members must be absolutely THRILLED with the efficient use of their union dues!
Mark-Viverito, who was in Puerto Rico, didn’t respond to an email and phone calls seeking comment
Of course not, she was too busy drinking French champagne and Petrus, and nibbling on caviar!
She doesn’t know about those difficulties first hand because she’s part of the 1 percent and reportedly worth as much as $1.8 million.
As a Democrat, she should fit right in with John Kerry, Nancy Pelosi, John Edwards, etc. etc.
She is a part owner in several condos in her family’s native Puerto Rico with a value of up to $1.4 million.
Her late father was a doctor and founder of San Pablo Hospital in Puerto Rico who, according to public records, owned a private plane. When he died, he left behind an estate worth over $6.7 million and Mark-Viverito was co-heir to her father’s fortune – which include rental properties in Puerto Rico and the sale of hospital during a $186 million buyout of the company in 1997.
I’ll bet $1000 that she’s in favor of independence for Puerto Rico, and simultaneously wants U.S. taxpayers to bail out Puerto Rico’s financial mess.
Well the voters elected a Mayor ( with 73% of the vote) who is pals with Nicaragua's Daniel Ortega, and chose to spend his honeymoon in the "socialist paradise" of Castro's Cuba, so maybe this represents consistency and exactly what the citizens of NYC want.
and then there's this:
http://www.gwengoodwin.com/MelissaTownHouseLegalPapers.pdf
Her dad did really well for an Army PFC.
If you want to see where Bolivia is headed, here is a good article on the collapse of Venezuela's currency and thus economy.
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2013/11/venezuelas-hyperinflation-anatomy-army.html
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