A Gingrich devotee enjoying his Cohiba. (Photo: Jeff Smith/Occupy Wall Street)

Much like Herman Cain, Occupy Wall Street won't let setbacks keep them out of the limelight. About 25 protesters rallied outside Newt Gingrich's $1000-per person fundraiser at the Union League Club on Park Avenue this morning to protest his lobbying activities and strike back after he told them to "get a job, right after you take a bath."

"We want to draw attention to the influence of corrupt corporate money," organizer Ben Campbell, 28, said. "He's the dirty one: he's a shill for corporations, and now after Cain and Perry screwed up he's the frontrunner by default because he's the only one who can string two sentences together."

Mr. Campbell, a neuroscience grad student at Rockerfeller College and member of OWS' Direct Action committee, set up the protest after hearing of the fundraiser and emailing the Union Club under the guise of a Newt-loving banker to confirm details. Originally, he intended to throw light on Mr. Gingrich's corporate connections - which have seen him amass as much as $31 million since he resigned as House Speaker, including $1.6 million from Freddie Mac for work as a "housing historian" - by having Occupiers show up in bath robes and shower caps.

Much to the chagrin of the Post reporter on the lookout for pretty female protesters, however, Mr. Campbell was the only one to do so, and one of only two in total who showed up at the announced time. It was a good half hour before the twelve journalists on hand were outnumbered by the protesters, though that didn't stop the NYPD from unloading a large number of metal barricades. (The officer in charge told us that "it's always better to be safe than sorry.")

"Getting the word out is a lot harder without a central location," protester Mark Adams, 31, who had actually spent the night before taking a bath, explained. "The assumption is that everyone has web access, but a lot of people don't have smartphones, or even MetroCards, because they're broke."

The Occupiers are currently negotiating over a new ground zero space at 6th and Canal, which Mr. Adams explained was crucial to keeping the movement going after being evicted from Zuccotti Park in November. "A lot of people are unaware," he said. "People don't see us and don't think we're around."

Chanting "We're clean, he's dirty!" and holding up signs with inscriptions like "Mr. Bubble says it's time to take a bath" or "Hey Newt, got beat up for your name in school?", the protesters heckled attendees - including Curtis Sliwa - as they filed in to hear their candidate expound on the UN, the economy, and foreign affairs. The notoriously long-winded Mr. Gingrich did not emerge for several hours, so the Occupiers passed the time by crossing the street and avoiding arrest for "assembling" by marching in a circle.

Probably the most interesting part of the protest was the insight it offered into which wealthy New Yorkers are going gaga for Mr. Gingrich, who is expected to pick up support after Herman Cain "suspended" his campaign on Saturday. The Observer chatted with one attendee - a Gingrich donor since 1994 - in a double-breasted suit who had popped out to smoke a Cohiba cigar. He claimed it was a Dominican, though when he first left the Union League Club he told OWS press rep Jeff Smith, unprompted, "I hope I don't get busted for smoking a Cuban out here."

Just weeks after he beat federal corruption charges describing him as a “a paid advocate in Albany, a politician on the take,” Brooklyn assemblyman William F. Boyland Jr. was arrested by the FBI again this morning - for taking bribes to pay the lawyers defending him in the first bribe-taking trial.

The FBI's complaint alleges Mr. Boyland asked two undercover agents - who he thought were real estate developers who'd bribed him a few thousand before - for $250,000 in cash in an Atlantic City hotel suite in April. Mr. Boyland proposed a scheme that would see Boyland help them flip a hospital in his district, using state grants, for nearly double the $8m the undercovers would pay.

Capital New York has the transcript, which is worth quoting in full:

UC1: You tell me and don't be bashful. What do you need now? Most of all because I want to make sure you have the stamina to keep going with all this stuff too, along the way.

BOYLAND: I have legal fees for this legal thing that I have. I have to hire a good attorney.

UC2: Have you not gotten a good one yet?

BOYLAND: I have a good attorney I just can't pay him (laughs) For me to, be talking the kind of you know.. expansive kinda vision that I have for this project and myself, I not only have to be clear of this project I have.. I have to.. get clear of these.. charges but I have to sort of come back in a bigger sense. That, that's what has to happen. You know? I mean in the long term I think you know everybody wins with that.

Mr. Boyland seems to have thought he was erring on the side of caution, going on to tell the agents that “I got a middle guy by the way . . . I gotta stay clean . . . I got a bag man . . .” and that “I stopped talking on the phone awhile ago . . . I’m just saying there is no real conversation that you can have that, you know, especially with what we’re talking about. You can’t do that.”

Nonetheless, hubris eventually got the better of him. When the FBI agents attempted to scale the bribe down to $5,000 for every introduction Mr. Boyland made to powerful officials, Mr. Boyland dismissed the idea offhand. "I'm not talking about $5,000 folks," Mr. Boyland is recorded as saying. "We talking about the man."

The Boylands are one of Brooklyn's most powerful political families. William Jr. inherited a seat previously held by his father and uncle, whose names adorn schools in the district as well as the street where Mr. Boyland's district office is located. This year, however, has seen Mr. Boyland tarnish the family name considerably. In addition to the two corruption indictments, he was busted playing the game CityVille on Facebook when he was supposed to be doing legislative work and claiming Albany expenses while in New York City for his first corruption trial. In total, Mr. Boyland has missed 20 of 60 Assembly sessions this year.

“The charges announced today are all the more astonishing in light of the fact that Boyland allegedly committed much of the criminal conduct after he had already been charged in another bribery case," FBI assistant director Janice K. Fedarcyk said. "Recording phone calls is not the only method the FBI has available to fight public corruption.”

Mr. Boyland faces up to 30 years in prison if convicted.

Released just in time for World AIDS day on Thursday, the report is a comprehensive study of how patterns in AIDS cases and the way the city treats them have changed since the disease first appeared in the early 1980s. It puts particular emphasis on providing care in our post-recession austerity era, handled by the HIV/AIDS Services association. Mayor Bloomberg has funded it generously - its budget has nearly doubled from $117 million in 1999 to $222 million last year - and, the report predicts, will have to continue to do so.

Once the terror of bohemian New York, the AIDS scare has dropped off in the last 15 years after the introduction of new retroviral drugs and therapies allowing patients to live much longer: AIDS patients in the city had an average survival time of 109 months post-diagnosis in 2008, compared to 34 months in 1996. Prevention strategies have seen new cases decrease by two thirds over the same time period, allowing the city's AIDS population to stabilize at around 65,000 in the last few years.

The mayor has attempted to slash AIDS funding in recent years, with some success - spending per case is down 3.3 percent this year. It doesn't, however, look as if he'll be able to do so again. The most recent city financial plan, released two weeks ago, doesn't call for any further cuts to AIDS spending. A small 6.5 increase in the AIDS caseload over the last three years, coupled with fierce opposition from city council members and advocacy groups to most of the cuts Mr. Bloomberg proposed, means total spending has actually increased this year from $222 million to $225 million.

Even with federal and state cuts looming, the IBO doesn't see any way around the issue. "Looking ahead, fiscal difficulties at the state and federal levels could result in reductions in intergovernmental funding," the report concludes. "Additional city funds might be needed to minimize service disruptions." What exactly might face cuts to make up for the AIDS funding shortfall is, as yet, unclear.

This morning's announcement marks the end of one of the most colorful careers on Capitol Hill. The Harvard graduate spent several years as a political aide and state politician before winning election to Massachusetts' 4th district in the Boston suburbs in 1980, and came out as one of America's first openly gay Congressmen in 1987. That year, Mr. Frank was reprimanded by the House after a scandal over his relationship with a male escort. Leading the moral charge, of all people, was Idaho Republican Larry Craig - himself the subject of national ridicule after demonstrating intricate knowledge of airport bathroom pick-up foot-shuffling while a senator in 2007.

Mr. Frank escaped censure and went on to become one of the most prominent Democrats in Washington, earning notice for his staunch advocacy of civil and abortion rights, medical marijuana, rehabilitation-focused crime policies, and skepticism towards Wall Street and the Federal Reserve. He will probably be best remembered for his time atop the House Financial Services Committee, which he chaired from 2007 to 2011 and where he currently serves as the ranking Democrat. Mr. Frank co-authored the Dodd-Frank financial reform bill aimed at curbing trading practices that helped cause the 2008 market crash; his brokerage of the deal for the hugely unpopular TARP bank bailout may have helped the country avoid an even worse meltdown.

All those positions made Mr. Frank one of the GOP's major betes noires, surpassed perhaps only by Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, Barack Obama, and the Clintons. His support of homeowner relief as the sub-prime mortgage crisis worsened saw many Republicans blame him for the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac collapse - in particular Newt Gingrich, who has repeatedly called for Mr. Frank and former Connecticut senator Chris Dodd to be jailed.

Bad blood has simmered between the two ever since a Gingrich aide alleged House speaker Tom Foley was a gay pedophile in 1987. Since then, Mr. Frank has called the current GOP presidential favorite "the thinnest-skinned character assassin I ever met" and "one of the most energetic homophobics in Congress," while responding to Mr. Gingrich's recent attacks by calling him a "lobbyist and a liar" and wondering aloud whether the Gingrich Group meant the former speaker's many wives.

The Dems will certainly miss Mr. Frank's brio in what looks to be an increasingly heated general election next year. A Washingtonian magazine survey of Beltway staffers named him the "brainiest," "funniest," and "most eloquent" Congressman in 2004 and 2006, titles he retained or came in second for in the 2008 and 2010 polls. At the height of the "birther" town hall controversy in 2009, he told a Lyndon LaRouche supporter who compared Obama to Hitler that "trying to have a conversation with you would be like arguing with a dining room table." Take note, Congressional Republicans.

Back in January, Mr. Bloomberg announced plans to issue 30,000 permits to livery drivers at a cost of $1500 each, compensating for the dismal yellow cab service outside of Manhattan – covered by a mere 4% of the fleet. To appease the 13,000 yellow cab drivers frightened of losing their livelihoods, Mr. Bloomberg intends to release a further 1500 new city-licensed medallions, which are notoriously difficult to obtain and can fetch upwards of $1 million a piece.

Those numbers don't add up, the cabbies say.

"With all due respect to the Mayor, his livery street hail bill has become a failed budget gimmick that won’t work,” Robert Familant of the Taxicab Service Association, an association of credit unions providing loans to finance yellow cab medallions, said in a statement. “Who in their right mind would pay $1 million or more for a medallion when under the Mayor’s plan, they could lease a street hail permit for only $1500?"

Though the bill passed the state legislature – Mr. Bloomberg sent it to friendlier politicians there after it stalled in the City Council – in June, Mr. Cuomo has yet to sign it, citing differences of opinion that need to be resolved in the Senate. Lobbyists for the yellow cab industry, meanwhile, have been campaigning furiously against the bill, which they claim could cost drivers up to 25 percent of their income.

“In an attempt to get his flawed outer-borough plan passed, the Mayor is trying to bootstrap his budget on a house of cards that will not only imperil tens of thousands of jobs in the private sector but is hinging the city budget on phantom revenues,” Familant said.

“Medallion values will drop precipitously, jeopardizing the retirement of more than 5,000 mostly immigrant owner / drivers- all of whom took the administration at its word when they purchased medallions for the exclusive right to street hails.”

Micah Lasher, Mayor Bloomberg's director of legislative affairs, told the Observer he thinks Mr. Familant and other opponents of the bill are missing the point.

"Perhaps Mr. Familant and other lobbyists for the large medallion lenders didn't read the bill: street hail permits would not allow pickups in the areas where yellow taxis make more than 95% of their revenue," Mr. Lasher said. "Instead, the bill would legalize service in the many neighborhoods across the City that the yellow taxi industry ignores. That's why medallion prices have continued to skyrocket. Enormous profits for lenders and owners will not be threatened by our legislation."

Matters are further complicated by city plans to replace all yellow cabs with the “Taxi of Tomorrow,” a modified Nissan NV200 that, at present, is not wheelchair accessible. Should an industry-backed bill to mandate cabs install wheelchair ramps become law, that could cost the city a further $15,000 per cab, adding up to a potential $200 million outlay over five years.

Mr. Cuomo has until the end of the year to sign the bill, but every reason to veto it: his father sits on the board of Medallion Financial, a taxi industry financing association so large that it is traded publicly under the ticket "TAXI." Though the governor has expressed confidence that a compromise can be reached, a “taxi summit” with industry leaders, mayoral, and gubernatorial aides earlier this month failed to settle on a deal.

“They are trying to get around the law by claiming they’re not in the business of selling cigarettes when they clearly are,” Mr. Bloomberg said in a statement. “Most businesses abide by the law, play by the rules and pay their taxes. We are not going to allow some businesses to skirt the law and we will ensure the playing field is level. They are cheating other businesses out of customers and attempting to illegally dilute one of our strongest smoking deterrents.”

The suit targets Island Smokes LLC, a Staten Island company with an outlet on the Lower East Side co-run by NYPD captain John Kimball. Island claims it simply "facilitates" buying cigarettes, rather than selling or making them, allowing the store to avoid taxes and statutes that see packaged smokes cost as much as $14.50 in some stores. The store's ruse is to have customers roll their own using pipe tobacco - taxed at a lower rate than cigarette tobacco - and cigarette-stuffing machines that instantaneously provide them with a finished pack.

Himself a non-smoker, Mr. Kimball told the New Yorker he was motivated to open the shop last May after seeing "smokers get turned into lepers" by the Bloomberg administration's crackdown. The ensuing flurry of business and publicity has encouraged Island to look into opening ten more franchises city-wide, which City Hall has been trying to prevent since sending them a cease-and-desist letter last month. Island's owners don't seem too concerned: they're actively soliciting investors on their site, calling Island's model "the best business opportunity in any economy, especially the current one."

If the lawsuit doesn't work, Mr. Bloomberg can fall back on health-and-safety concerns like the ones he used to evict Occupy Wall Street last week, since state law requires all cigarettes be certified as "fire-safe." Island, for its part, thinks its smokes are a healthy alternative to store-bought straights - 70% of which, they say, contain as many as 599 chemical compounds.

Fourteen percent of New Yorkers smoke, the lowest percentage in the city's history and an eight-point drop since Mr. Bloomberg banned lighting up in public places in 2002. That success aside, smoking-related diseases (did you know it's bad for you?) are still the number one cause of premature death in the city, according to the Department of Mental Health and Hygiene.

The mayor's shown no signs of letting up since then, most recently banning smoking in parks and on beaches. Mr. Bloomberg also touted a reason to feel confident going into this latest legal battle -  a U.S. District Court judge upheld the city's ban on smokeless flavored tobacco earlier this week.

Sheldon Silver after his bike accident. (Photo: Stephen Crowley/New York Times)

Assembly speaker Sheldon Silver - last seen sporting a set of bruises, stitches, and scabs all over his face after a bike fall - has checked into hospital for treatment on knee swelling caused by the same accident. The speaker was in Puerto Rico for the annual Somos el Futuro conference, where politicians schmooze with labor leaders and lobbyists ostensibly over Hispanic-related issues, earlier this month when he took a nasty spin after the bike he rented hit a San Juan pothole.

Initially reluctant to discuss the dramatic change in his appearance upon his return, Mr. Silver eventually came clean last week, admitting his embarrassment at being mocked for the fall by his grandchildren. His surgery will be a family affair: the speaker is getting it done in Stamford, CT, so his orthopedic surgen nephew can perform it.

The full statement from Silver press secretary Michael Wyland is below:

Due to an injury sustained during a bicycle accident on November 10, Speaker Silver was admitted to Stamford Hospital in Stamford, Connecticut on Sunday to undergo treatments to address swelling in his knee.  These are minor procedures which are expected to conclude on Tuesday. Speaker Silver is working from the hospital where he is expected to remain through Wednesday and will resume a full schedule after the Thanksgiving holiday. He chose Stamford Hospital so that the procedure could be performed by his nephew, Marc D. Silver, M.D., an orthopedic and sports medicine surgeon at the hospital.

State Senator Jeffrey Klein looks on as Jose Perez shares his foreclosure story. (Photo: Max Seddon)

With the holiday season approaching and the weather taking a turn for the worse, a group of activists and politicians led by Bronx/Westchester state senator Jeffrey Klein rallied today for more foreclosure counseling and legal aid funding in next year’s budget.

“Preventing foreclosures not only keeps hard-working New Yorkers in their homes now, but saves our neighborhoods from devastating ripple effects later,” Mr. Klein said outside the Center Street courthouse. “Property values go down, crime goes up, and our tax base shrinks with every boarded-up home in our community.”

Klein, whose constituency has one of the highest foreclosure rates in New York, is advocating a renewal of the $25 million in funds allocated to the state’s Housing Trust Fund Corporation in 2008. Since then, programs funded by the agency have saved the state $1.9 billion in lost property value and tax revenue while keeping more than 14,000 families in their homes, according to Mr. Klein.

This year’s budget, however, did not renew the $47 million allocated over the previous two years. With further cuts predicted for the 2012-13 budget – and Governor Andrew Cuomo’s intransigence over renewing the “millionaire’s tax” – foreclosure programs will lose 70% of their staff and 76% of their current operating capacity, according to the Empire Justice Center, a public interest law firm.

“Because of the meltdown in the banking industry, much of which is due to their illegal practices and very loose regulations over the housing industry, the cuts have to hit homeowners,” Adriano Espaillat, ranking member on the State Senate’s housing committee, said at the rally. “Twenty-five million dollars is a drop in the bucket to save the American dream of thousands of New Yorkers who worked very hard to own their own home.”

Fallout from the 2008 sub-prime mortgage crisis continues to resonate in New York, though the state has suffered less relative to many other states. Eric Schneiderman is one of only two attornies general to resist a White House-backed settlement with banks over mortgage fraud, and has launched an investigation into alleged illegal behavior by banks handling mortgages and foreclosures before the crisis.

Meanwhile, more and more New Yorkers find themselves facing foreclosure. Over 1,800 city homeowners have received notices from their banks since September, according to Mr. Klein: without an advocate to defend them, these households alone could lose the city over $18 million.

“Because I’m disabled, they tried to tell me I couldn’t stay in my home,” Jose Perez, a father of four whose faced eviction after his Staten Island home was damaged by flooding, said at the rally. “But because of these people that help the poor and the city workers that work so hard to pay taxes, I’m able to keep my home," he continued, close to tears. "Hard-working New Yorkers want to stay in their homes so that they can spend Christmas and the holidays with their families.”

The former city comptroller had remained relatively silent on the OWS issue; yesterday,  he expressed sympathy for the protesters' aims while hoping they respect downtown residents' quality of life.

Today, he repeated those sentiments in a characteristically level-headed statement:

“New York City is a place that values different opinions, and the rights of people from every walk of life to express themselves," Mr. Thompson said. "As I have said previously, we have a responsibility to respect those rights.  We also have an obligation to balance those First Amendment rights with the rights of those who live and work in Lower Manhattan.

I am troubled by reports of excessive force in today’s action at Zuccotti Park, which should be immediately investigated and addressed appropriately. Our city must be one where all voices are respected and not suppressed.”

Ms. Quinn wants protesters let back in the park.

Not one to be outdone by her opponents in the 2013 mayoral race, City Council speaker Christine Quinn shared her take on Mayor Bloomberg’s OWS eviction today.

Ms. Quinn, who has positioned her campaign as a continuation of Mr. Bloomberg’s regime, called the reported police brutality and media blackout “unacceptable” and demanded protesters be let back into the park so long as they respect local residents and businesses. She also demanded the NYPD clarify the status of arrested council member Ydanis Rodriguez, still in custody at the time of writing.

Previously, Ms. Quinn has shared many New York politicians' ambivalent attitude toward the Occupiers: she told businessmen last month that the city needed to strike “the right balance between people’s American right, and New York right, to protest” and “the right for people in a neighborhood to have sleep and space, and people to come to and from work.”

The speaker’s full statement is below:

“As I have said from the very beginning, we must balance the protesters’ First Amendment rights with the rights of the residents, workers, and businesses of Lower Manhattan. We must protect the protestors' right to peaceful assembly and the local community's right to a safe and secure neighborhood.

Today’s actions include reports of excessive force by the NYPD, and reports of infringement of the rights of the press. If these reports are true, these actions are unacceptable. The Council will seek answers to questions surrounding these reports and clarifying information regarding the arrest and treatment of Council Member Ydanis Rodriguez.

In a spirit of cooperation, we must work to ensure that the protesters are allowed back into Zuccotti Park as soon as possible and are allowed to exercise their right to protest while not impeding on the rights of others.”