Stasi: Bye to last bozo who spearheaded Bill Clinton's impeachment

And then there were none.

Hamburg, Harry
Serial child molester and former House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) pleaded guilty to structuring and failing to report hush money he used to pay off a minor male student he’d sexually abused.

This month, Dennis Hastert completes the unholy trinity of holier-than-thou congressmen all of whom spearheaded Bill Clinton’s impeachment to, er, go down for being involved in sex-and-money scandals more disgracefully sordid than Clinton’s ever was.

And that fourth sleazy guy. You know, prosecutor Ken Starr who’s now joking about rapes that took place on his watch.

With Donald Trump vs. Hillary Clinton debates for sure on the horizon in which Trump who takes no prisoners will probably bring up the sex scandals and impeachment of Clinton’s husband let’s look at the phonies who led the charge way back when and the scandals that later brought each of them down.

Serial child molester and former House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) pleaded guilty to structuring and failing to report hush money he used to pay off a minor male student he’d sexually abused (that’s called pedophilia in my book). The former student is one of five boys Hastert abused when he was a high school teacher, according to prosecutors.

Hastert, the Jerry Sandusky of Congress, now says he feels “despair” and “regret,” which leads him to think he should get off with probation and no jail time the only place the scum bucket belongs for the rest of his lowlife.

Todd Maisel/New York Daily News
Former President Bill Clinton speaks in New York on behalf of his wife.

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.), who quit “in disgrace,” as Mitt Romney said, cheated on his second wife with his future third wife after the second wife was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. And his affair with soon-to-be wife No. 3 was going on while he was trying to get Clinton thrown out for lying about his affair.

Rep. Bob Livingston (R-La.), who was about to replace disgraced Gingrich as speaker, quit in disgrace himself (on the eve of the impeachment debate) because Hustler magazine had nailed the family values guy for his numerous affairs.

Former House Judiciary Committee Chairman Henry Hyde, who spearheaded the impeachment, had a long extramarital affair with Cherie Snodgrass. Worse, while in the Senate, after leaving the House Banking Committee, Hyde joined the board of directors of Clyde Federal Savings and Loan, which then failed. He’s the only congressional member, Salon pointed out, ever sued for “gross negligence” in an S&L failure.

Finally, we come to prosecutor Ken Starr who has his own sex scandal to deal with as president of Baylor University. The smug, self-righteous sex-obsessed prosecutor has been slammed for remaining silent on rapes by football players at Baylor. He finally opened up at a Christian prayer breakfast. He told Star-Telegram columnist Mac Engel that he had remained silent about the rapes on advice of counsel. This from a former prosecutor!

Starr even joked about it: “As Fiorello LaGuardia once colorfully said, ‘When I make a mistake, it’s a beaut.’” A beaut? Love those rape quips, Kenny boy.

Kathie Lee & Hoda: Christmas traditions are great, but making new ones are better

Our Christmas traditions are different than they used to be.

Richard Thomas
One of the best things about Christmas traditions is making new ones.

Our Christmas traditions are different than they used to be. Kathie Lee used to have tons of them, but these days she heads to Florida for a glass of wine, no Christmas tree in sight. And the Kotb’s take a girls’ trip — Hoda and her mom and sister chase the sun and celebrate the season with their toes in the sand. One of the best things about traditions, well, is making new ones!

KLG : We used to have a lot of traditions. But we don’t even put up a tree anymore. I’m so tired of all the commercialization of Christmas, that I sort of gave up on it a few years ago. I try to live with Christ in my heart every day in my life, but I don’t want to spoil it for other people who enjoy the season!

The last couple of years we put up a tree with just white lights. And then this year, nothing. I have a wreath up on our front door, but only because our producer here sent it to me. I’m not bah-humbugging. I’m just old. And tired!

HK : We only had a few Christmas traditions and most of them were by accident. I remember one February when we were kids, the doorbell rang, and my dad screamed, ’Oh my god, the tree!’ It was still up. (Of course it was fake.) So literally we were running downstairs — my sister, brother and me — and shoving it into the storage room where it stayed till the next Christmas! So that became our tradition — we would pull it out of the closet, plug it in and spray some pine scent. I mean the tree really became our thing. It was on accident, obviously. But it was hilarious and an actual Kotb Christmas tradition.

KLG : That’s better than that bush you have this year.

HK : Rude. It’s a cute little mini tree. And it’s real.

Mark Lewis/Getty Images
Hoda will be spending her Christmas soaking up the sun in the Bahamas — and downing lots of wine.

DRINK THE DAY AWAY

We don’t want a lot for Christmas, just a couple of days off. And wine. We always want wine.

HK : My mom, my sister and I are going to the Bahamas because that’s what we do. They always have carolers and tons of holiday spirit. And we only pack two presents each, so on Christmas morning we open them. We’re just going to lie in the sun, drink and soak up the rays.

KLG : They’re going to drink their brains out.

HK : Yeah, our brain — what’s left of the cells anyway. Yes we are.

KLG : We’ll be down in the Florida Keys, we’ve been doing that for almost 20 years. Just give me a thong, a palm tree baby and some Gifft wine and leave me the hell alone. Actually down there, it’s leave me the heaven alone!

Kathie Lee & Hoda: Women chosen for their success get a calendar, and it’s empowering

It’s a game changer to see women like Amy Schumer , Serena Williams and 65-year-old author Fran Lebowitz posing for the 2016 Pirelli calendar .

Rich Polk/Getty Images for MTV
Amy Schumer was one of 12 women chosen for 2016 Pirelli calendar.

. Until now the annual tribute to pinups produced by the Italian tire manufacturer starred half naked supermodels. But this year the calendar went in a different direction, hiring famed shutterbug Annie Leibovitz to shoot fully dressed women who were chosen for their achievements instead of their bodies. Of the 12 women who posed, only Williams and Schumer took their clothes off that latter posing happily with her stomach rolls on display.

HK : When I saw that picture of Amy Schumer I was so overjoyed there was something about it. When any one of us sits on a chair and looks at ourselves in the mirror I feel like we look like that. I was so empowered by these pictures, especially by her caption where she wrote, “beautiful, ugly, fat, skinny, sexy, disgusting woman . . .” I was totally turned on by that. I think we all feel those things.

KLG : Although I doubt Cindy Crawford feels that way. Or Chrissy Teigen or any of the Victoria’s Secret models. Most women do though. I was just glad they didn’t ask me to pose.

HK : Another great moment this week was seeing Rebel Wilson on the cover of Cosmo UK talking about how much she loves her body.

KLG : If that’s her mindset and that helps her stay happy and focused, good for her.

HK : I think with Rebel Wilson she is uniquely herself. No matter what her size is, there’s a uniqueness about her — you never mistake her for anyone else. Whenever I see her pop up on the screen, I know I’m going to have fun watching her. She’s unique in a million ways and her size is just one of them.

Annie Leibovitz for Pirelli Calendar
Amy Schumer poses the Pirelli calendar. Enlarge Annie Leibovitz for Pirelli Calendar
Serena Williams poses for the Pirelli calendar. Enlarge

Amy Schumer and Serena Williams chose to remove their clothes for the calendar.

TIME FOR THE UGLY SWEATS

It’s that time of the year when ugly holiday sweaters become hot commodities! Among the gems we’ve heard about so far is one that features Christmas patterns and Bigfoot! Given the choice we’ve got some outrageous ideas of our own.

KLG : Well, nothing says Christmas like Bigfoot.

HK : I think if I were designing my own, I’d have to have 100 Christmas balls on it. I think that would look especially hideous.

KLG : Hoda’s really fond of balls.

HK : Careful! Just picture a sweater with real Christmas balls hanging off of it. I think that would be cute.

Kathie Lee & Hoda: Stay off your boss’ lap at the office holiday party

The "Today" show holiday party is Thursday afternoon and you know what that means?

Savulich, Andrew
Office parties often bring out the wild side for some people.

The "Today" show holiday party is Thursday afternoon and you know what that means? Office party shenanigans. While we've been drinking all day — hello, it's part of our job! — our colleagues really let loose before their early bedtimes. But if you've got an office party of your own, don't forget you've got to see those people the next morning. And whatever you do, don't sit on your bosses' lap. It never ends well.

HK : Natalie ( Morales ) is always the most fun at our party. You want to be next to NatMo at a holiday party because she lets her freak flag fly and dances the entire time. But it's only funny because our Natalie is always so right-on, super smart, dresses perfectly.

KLG : Our Little Miss Perfect.

HK : Everything's perfect. And then…

KLG : You get one drink in her, just one glass of wine.

HK : And all you want to do is dance with her! It's like her twin sister comes to the party. And we've got to shout out our girl ("Today" PR maven) Megan Kopf Stackhouse, who puts the whole event together. It's amazing, with a theme, special names for the cocktails, cute menus. Girl knows how to throw a party. It's a big thing, the entire staff, camera guys, crew, hundreds of people.

Evan Agostini/Getty Images
Time to get down at your holiday party just like “Today” host Natalie Morales will be doing on Thursday.

And a word of advice for those of you hitting the holiday party circuit with your co-workers:

KLG : Wear underwear so you'll have something to take off.

HK : You're so sick.

KLG : Don't sit on your boss's lap.

HK : That's a no-no. We've done that.

KLG : Unless you want to get on the unemployment line, first thing of the year.

Kathie Lee & Hoda: Pope Francis makes right call by saying families should ditch phone at mealtimes

Even the Pope thinks we all need to take our eyes off those cellphones for a change.

Markus Schreiber/AP
Pope Francis wants families to put away the cellphones at mealtimes.

Even the Pope thinks we all need to take our eyes off those cellphones for a change. His Holiness, Pope Francis , said last week that families should ditch their electronics at mealtimes and focus on each other instead.

KLG : I totally agree. In my house we had a tech-free zone at dinner. But that was a few years ago when the kids were just at the beginning of all this cellphone stuff. I can’t even imagine what it’s like for kids today growing up with their cellphones attached to their ears. I used to get up and take a call if it was important, but then the kids would give me such grief for it.

HK : I think it’s interesting that the Pope is addressing this issue. Isn’t that funny?

KLG : Family is a huge thing with him.

HK : He was already so human and so down-to-earth when he was here in New York and this reemphasizes that he just gets it. He gets what regular families are doing at the dinner table and this is something he feels is important enough to address. I love that he did that. Meanwhile, I don’t make much of an effort to put my phone away when I’m eating with family. I turn it over. It is bad.

KLG : I do because my kids don’t live at home anymore so I want to be with them when they’re home.

Ditch the cellphone and enjoy each other's company at mealtime.

HK : You know what’s funny? I keep mine nearby, but I don’t like when someone else at the table reaches for their own.

WHY NOT PRAY FOR PARIS?

The terror attacks in Paris were horrible, but what’s also sad is the reaction of some who have slammed people who show their empathy on social media by changing their profile picture or tweeting about their solidarity with the French.

KLG : Let people express themselves.

HK : Why would anyone have a problem with someone posting “Prayers for Paris?”

KLG : I guess because doing so doesn’t change anything in the real world. It just makes us feel good for a moment, but it’s not fixing any of the problems.

Kathie Lee & Hoda: John Stamos shows off great buns, but it’s too much

We're always telling everyone to put their clothes back on and stop flashing their junk to the world.

Courtesy of PAPER / Photos by Brian Bowen Smith
John Stamos shows some skin in the new Fandemonium issue of PAPER Magazine.

We're always telling everyone to put their clothes back on and stop flashing their junk to the world. But then John Stamos took his pants off for a magazine shoot. And, well, have mercy!

KLG : I want him to put his clothes on.

HK : She does? She does! First of all, we have to acknowledge, he has freaking great buns. Perfect ones.

KLG : Listen, I lived with the greatest tight end God ever made for 29 years. So I know a great one when I see one. However — and we love John — but I don't want to see this!

HK : No, I'm just zooming in for research. Hold on, I need to get closer. Somebody needs to investigate this situation. Is that airbrushed? That's a perfect, perfect ass.

KLG : And she has a fine Egyptian one, so she should know.

HK : I do. And my boyfriend has a really hot one, too. If you're an athlete it happens. He can't help it. But that's fine. And I'm not complaining.

Ron Galella/WireImage
Frank Sinatra gave Kathie Lee the thumbs up on her singing voice.

KLG : We had James Brolin in our kitchen yesterday. Seventy five, four months and 20 days old. And so sexy. He’s got a nice one, too.

HK : How do you know the number of days?

KLG : Joy ( Philbin ) and I were saying he's so funny. She goes "how old is he?" I go, "I think he's around 75." So I Googled him, which I know how to do now, and got an answer!

HK : He’s funny and hot. He seems unaware of how hot he is. And that's what makes him even sexier. Because he's just sort of like, 'what?'

KLG : Meanwhile, John Stamos is a great looking guy, he doesn't need to pose like that — with, y’know, everything hanging out.

Kathie Lee & Hoda: We love Spanx, but wearing only one pair at a time

Our love for Spanx knows no bounds.

Michael Stewart/Getty Images
When it comes to gym attire, Allison WIlliams prefers Spanx.

Our love for Spanx knows no bounds. There’s nothing like the security of shimmying into those trusty jiggle concealers — we like the kind that look like bicycle shorts and hit just above the knee — knowing once they’re on, it’s smooth sailing ahead. We’ve heard about people wearing two pairs at a time, but we’re one hit wonders when it comes to high powered shape shifters. But we were pretty surprised to hear that ”Girls” star Allison Williams says she wears Spanx to the gym! “This is my gift to you: Spanx makes the most incredible exercise spandex. I wear them almost every day,” she told Harper’s Bazaar. “They have a little control top, so they’re flattering. I’ll often stay in exercise clothes all day.”

HK : Oh, I’ve seen her with no clothes on! We all have. And she does not need Spanx!

KLG : She’s very slender. But maybe they give her a sense of security.

HK : Spanx are a good place to stash things. You can actually slide a cellphone up your thigh — a great place for a phone if you don’t have a pocket!

KLG : Hoda puts her microphone pack in there too.

HK : My pack fits in there nicely.

Howard Simmons/New York Daily News
Sean Connery (r.) is Kathie Lee and Hoda's favorite James Bond.

KLG : Because it gets nice and hot. And you know she likes that.

HK : I find if you have two pairs on, the oozing factor is high. Because your fat is yelling, ’I need to go somewhere!’ Your fat needs a place to go, people. And it’ll find its way, one way or another.

KLG : I don’t even know how you would wear two pairs. To be honest, I got a little nervous when you said the word “oozing,” wasn’t sure where you were going with that.

HK : One pair only!

I KNEW JAMES BOND

Everyone’s got their favorite Bond, but not everyone has had a personal encounter with the man who tops their list!

Kathie Lee & Hoda: Carmelo Anthony is right on flaws of NYC, but there’s much more to love

In a video for VICE Sports, Knicks forward Carmelo Anthony says living in New York City is a complicated love affair, he says it's the great city in the world, but like any great love, it just makes you nuts sometimes .

Noam Galai/Getty Images
Knicks star Carmelo Anthony, seen with La La Anthony, has a love-hate relationship with the Big Apple.

. "You're not a New Yorker if you don't wake up some days and be like, man, f--- this place."

KLG : Listen, when you can't get crosstown because of traffic, you hate the city. When you can't get any sleep cause of the sirens all night long then it's hard to love your city. On a beautiful spring day when Central Park starts blooming and you can have a hot dog — well you can't have a hot dog anymore, sorry. When you can have a bowl of fruit in Central Park, then you love it. You say it's the greatest place on Earth. Everything is relative.

HK : I think because he dropped the "F" bomb, it caused it to sting a little. I hear him, particularly when someone grabs your cab or you get splashed by a huge puddle on a rainy day. But I feel like there are many, many more reasons to love it than to hate it. I think the hate comes sporadically. And it does! You're not human if it doesn't. But I do think when you walk around New York, most of the time you get this smile like, 'Oh my god, I can't believe that just happened.' Or, 'Oh my god, only here.'

KLG : But you're a half full person as opposed to half empty. You always were. You felt the same way about New Orleans.

HK : Yeah that's true. And it's New York, we use the F-word. We don't just say "It's not great."

KLG : I say freaking.

Hiroko Masuike/Getty Images
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's big mouth got him booted from a quiet train.

HK : There's an edge that needs to be there. Okay?

IT'S NO DEBATE: SHUT UP

Leave it to Hoda to quietly be at the center of a news story. She was there when New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie was booted out of an Amtrak train quiet carlast weekend because he was talking too loud on a phone.

HK : I saw him. I wasn't sitting in the quiet car, but I saw him heading into it and then getting on the phone. The funny thing is how people react when you're loud on the quiet car — it's as if you'd slapped someone's mother across the face. Five times.

KLG : People are like, "What the freak are you doing?"

HK : That day there was a woman sitting near me and she was loud. Frankly I don't want to hear half of your conversation. I'd like to hear the whole thing or nothing — so either put it on speaker phone, or not at all.

Gonzalez: Parents, teachers hope to repeat opt-out movement for Common Core standardized school tests

Next week could mark the final nail in the coffin of Common Core standardized school tests.

Mike Groll/AP
The Board of Regents elected long-time educator Betty Rosa (seated) last week to replace Merryl Tisch as their new chancellor.

Parents and teachers opposed to such high-stakes tests are hoping to repeat the amazingly successful opt-out movement they pulled off a year ago.

Last April, an estimated 240,000 students across the state refused to take annual math and English Language Arts exams — one of every five pupils scheduled to do so.

This grass-roots civil disobedience stunned the politicians and data-obsessed bureaucrats who have dictated public education policy for more than a decade.

Ever since then, the bureaucrats have been scrambling to win back the confidence of fed-up parents. Things will be different with the new round of state tests that start Tuesday, they claim. There will be fewer questions. Students will have unlimited time to answer them. Test scores won’t be the only measuring stick of pupil progress, nor the only yardstick for evaluating teacher performance.

But opt-out leaders aren’t buying the sales pitch.

New York State Education Department
Betty Rosa understands her biggest stakeholders are parents and teachers.

They insist standardized testing still consumes too much in time and resources from schools.

And now the parents suddenly have encouragement from a top state official.

The Board of Regents elected long-time educator Betty Rosa last week to replace Merryl Tisch as their new chancellor.

Rosa proceeded to make a startling remark in her first news conference. “If I was a parent and not on the Board of Regents, I would opt out at this time,” she said. Her words were a clear reminder that Albany cannot simply ignore the concerns of teachers and parents.

Rosa was, after all, a successful principal and school superintendent. Unlike all those modern school “reformers” who hail from the corporate world, she understands her biggest stakeholders are parents and teachers.

Parents like Charmaine Dixon, whose child attends Public School 203 in the Mill Basin, Brooklyn, and who is urging a test boycott again this year.

Puerto Rico Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla dares Congress to pass restrictive financial control board

Puerto Rico’s financial crisis escalated early Wednesday morning as Gov.

Ricardo Arduengo/AP
A Republican proposal in Congress would create a panel that would have close to total control of the territory's economy.

Puerto Rico’s financial crisis escalated early Wednesday morning as Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla won an emergency declaration from both houses of the Puerto Rican legislature authorizing him to suspend all payment on $72 billion in public debt.

The sudden move stunned both Washington and Wall Street, where leaders keep ignoring Puerto Rico’s pleas to be allowed to restructure its debts.

The governor’s action came after hedge funds holding Puerto Rico bonds sued Monday in federal district court in San Juan to freeze assets of the island’s government development bank.

With his government almost out of cash and facing huge debt payments of $422 million on May 1 and nearly $2 billion on July 1, Garcia Padilla is now forcing everyone’s hand.

Around 2:30 a.m. Tuesday, he won approval from Puerto Rico’s Senate for a debt moratorium until next January.

The bill authorizes the governor to “protect the health, security and public welfare” of island residents by using government funds first and foremost for public services.

Jefferson Siegel/New York Daily News
Puerto Rico Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla is forcing the hand of Congress and Wall Street debt holders by threatening to miss bond payments.

The proposal then moved to the lower house, where a debate ensued for much of day, with financial industry lobbyists feverishly pressing legislators to oppose it.

Around 1 a.m. Wednesday, members of Garcia Padilla’s ruling Popular Democratic Party passed their own version of the bill by a narrow one-vote majority.

It authorizes the governor to suspend any debt payment on a case-by-case basis and also to appoint a new chief financial officer.

The governor was expected to immediately sign the law.

This sudden act of defiance should come as no surprise.

Late last year, Republicans in Congress refused to include a rescue package for Puerto Rico in a year-end federal spending bill. House Speaker Paul Ryan failed to pass a bill by March 31 to address the problem as he promised.

Congress mulls over $72B Puerto Rico debt rescue through federal oversight

Federal oversight might be in the future for Puerto Rico as lawmakers consider ways to rescue the U.S. territory from financial ruin.

Ricardo Arduengo/AP
Some Puerto Rico residents have blasted the idea of a five-member voting board as colonialism.

Island residents call it colonialism, but congressional discussions around a plan for a five-member voting board would give the panel power to subpoena documents from both governments and restructure Puerto Rico’s $72 billion debt, according to a document obtained by the Daily News.

The plan is the brainchild of Republican members of Congress who shared a draft of a bill with a small group of Democrats Thursday.

The board would be appointed by the President, and “would be an entity within the government of Puerto Rico, but not subject to the control of the governor or the legislature,” the document states.

Related Stories

Puerto Rico Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla dares Congress to pass restrictive financial control board

Puerto Rico’s financial crisis escalated early Wednesday morning as Gov.

Ricardo Arduengo/AP
A Republican proposal in Congress would create a panel that would have close to total control of the territory's economy.

Puerto Rico’s financial crisis escalated early Wednesday morning as Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla won an emergency declaration from both houses of the Puerto Rican legislature authorizing him to suspend all payment on $72 billion in public debt.

The sudden move stunned both Washington and Wall Street, where leaders keep ignoring Puerto Rico’s pleas to be allowed to restructure its debts.

The governor’s action came after hedge funds holding Puerto Rico bonds sued Monday in federal district court in San Juan to freeze assets of the island’s government development bank.

With his government almost out of cash and facing huge debt payments of $422 million on May 1 and nearly $2 billion on July 1, Garcia Padilla is now forcing everyone’s hand.

Around 2:30 a.m. Tuesday, he won approval from Puerto Rico’s Senate for a debt moratorium until next January.

The bill authorizes the governor to “protect the health, security and public welfare” of island residents by using government funds first and foremost for public services.

Jefferson Siegel/New York Daily News
Puerto Rico Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla is forcing the hand of Congress and Wall Street debt holders by threatening to miss bond payments.

The proposal then moved to the lower house, where a debate ensued for much of day, with financial industry lobbyists feverishly pressing legislators to oppose it.

Around 1 a.m. Wednesday, members of Garcia Padilla’s ruling Popular Democratic Party passed their own version of the bill by a narrow one-vote majority.

It authorizes the governor to suspend any debt payment on a case-by-case basis and also to appoint a new chief financial officer.

The governor was expected to immediately sign the law.

This sudden act of defiance should come as no surprise.

Late last year, Republicans in Congress refused to include a rescue package for Puerto Rico in a year-end federal spending bill. House Speaker Paul Ryan failed to pass a bill by March 31 to address the problem as he promised.

GONZALEZ: Puerto Rico’s future lies in the hands of the Supreme Court

The Supreme Court heard arguments Tuesday on whether Puerto Rico can avoid financial collapse by restructuring a portion of its massive $70 billion debt.

Carolyn Kaster/AP
The court will likely be in favor of Puerto Rico, 4-3 — Justice Samuel Alito recused himself, apparently because he or his wife has personal investments in Puerto Rico's bonds.

And while it’s hard to interpret how the high court will rule, the four liberal justices sounded more sympathetic to the position of the island’s government than to that of its bondholders.

Certainly more sympathetic than the Republicans in Congress, who have refused for the past eight months to pass any law to assist the 3.5 million U.S. citizens who reside on the Caribbean island.

And in this particular case, the court’s liberal wing will have more influence than usual. That’s because Justice Antonin Scalia died in February — and has yet to be replaced — while Justice Samuel Alito has recused himself, apparently because he or his wife has personal investments in Puerto Rico’s bonds.

That leaves only seven justices.

The issue before the court was a bankruptcy law Puerto Rico’s legislature passed in 2014 that would permit the island’s public utilities to restructure about $20 billion those entities owe to bondholders.

Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP
Puerto Rico has maintained that Congress never barred the territory from adopting its own bankruptcy provision.

Known as the Recovery Act, that law was struck down last year after several major bondholders sued successfully in federal court to oppose it. A federal appellate court later upheld the lower court.

Both courts concluded that when Congress amended federal bankruptcy law in 1984 it specifically denied Puerto Rico the right to resort to bankruptcy protection for its municipalities and public corporations.

Puerto Rico has maintained that Congress never barred the territory from adopting its own bankruptcy provisions — something Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg seemed to agree with.

“Why would Congress put Puerto Rico in this never-never land?” Ginsburg asked.

So did Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the daughter of Puerto Rican parents, who specialized in the legal issues surrounding the island’s status when she was a student at Princeton and Yale.

Brooklyn Supreme Court faces backlog of nearly 12,000 foreclosure cases in the hands of just three judges

Nearly a decade after the start of America’s historic housing crash, the nightmare continues for forgotten homeowners behind in their mortgage.

Jesse Ward/for New York Daily News
Newly elected Supreme Court Judge Noach Dear is one of three judges dealing with thousands of foreclosure cases clogging the courts.

The list of pending home foreclosures before Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Noach Dear on Tuesday morning was enough to take your breath away.

Around 11:30 a.m., a clerk in Dear’s packed courtroom at 360 Adams St. announced the cases still to be heard.

There was Bank of America vs. Vazquez, Bank of New York vs. Antigone, Citi Mortgage vs. Green, Deutsche Bank vs. Paz, Federal National vs. Castro, HSBC Bank vs. Ambrose, JPMorganChase vs. Roberts, PennyMac vs. Acevedo, Wells Fargo vs. Hamilton —more than 65 in all.

But lawyers and advocates for distressed homeowners say Dear’s courtroom has become a prime example of a new “assembly line” approach to justice by the Brooklyn court system.

At separate tables in the front, two law clerks convened a steady string of meetings with contending parties while the judge looked on.

“You should see how busy this place gets on Thursdays and Fridays,” said Dear, who is overseeing nearly 6,500 foreclosure cases all by himself.

Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
Foreclosures represent more than a third of all civil cases in New York state courts.

Dear rarely holds a hearing with a court stenographer present to make a formal record of the proceedings. He simply oversees the meetings his clerks hold.

In January, Lawrence Knipel, the administrative judge for Kings County’s civil division, suddenly consolidated the borough’s enormous backlog of nearly 12,000 foreclosure cases in the hands of just three judges, with Dear getting more than half of them. Previously, those cases had been spread among more than 25 judges who also heard other kinds of cases.

“The old way wasn’t working,” Knipel told the Daily News.

That’s because foreclosures have mushroomed into more than a third of all civil cases in New York state courts. More than 41,000 new ones were filed statewide last year. That’s not a whole lot less than the 47,000 filed at the height of the housing collapse in 2009.

And more the 60% of the state’s foreclosure cases are concentrated in four downstate counties, including Brooklyn and Queens.

Gonzalez: Melissa Mark-Viverito eyes future and ambitious agenda midway through term

With less than two years left as this city’s second most powerful official, Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito is already looking toward the future.

Kevin C. Downs/for New York Daily News
Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito is eyeing a run for mayor.

Unlike her friend and ally Mayor de Blasio, who is sure to run for re-election next year, Mark-Viverito, 46, is serving her second term in the Council, which means she is term limited.

But in her remaining time, she is determined to finish an agenda that will likely shape how voters remember her when, as many expect, she makes a possible run for mayor in 2021.

Among her top goals, Mark-Viverito told the Daily News this week, are the closing of Rikers Island, passage of a citywide housing plan that provides better “affordability” than so far proposed by City Hall, and reversing a recent decline in the number of women in the City Council.

“For too long, Rikers has not stood for more justice, but for revenge,” she said in a speech last month. “We must explore how we can get the population on Rikers to be so small that the dream of shutting it down becomes a reality.”

She has named a commission, chaired by the state’s former chief judge Jonathan Lippman, to study Rikers.

“I’ve asked Judge Lippman to issue some recommendations within a year,” Mark-Viverito said.

Spencer Platt
Closing the troubled Rikers Island is on Mark-Viverito's to-do list.

As for the Council’s shortage of female representation, “This is a serious problem,” Mark-Viverito said.

“When I was first elected, there were 18 women out of 51,” she said. “Today, we are down to just 14. And of the eight Council members who must leave next year because of term limits, five of us are women.”

She has held a series of meetings over the past few weeks with county Democratic Party chiefs and labor union leaders urging that they choose more women as candidates next year.

When she captured the speaker’s post in January 2014 in the wake of de Blasio’s landslide victory, Mark-Viverito was little-known outside her East Harlem district.

But the large group of progressive Democratic Council candidates who swept into office that year with de Blasio all backed her for speaker, as did the mayor. She thus became the first Hispanic in the city’s history to hold a major citywide seat.

China's actions in South China Sea raising regional tension: Ash Carter

US Defence Secretary Ashton Carter at a press conference.

(Getty Images)

Carter believes it is the reason why many of those countries are reaching out anew to the US to uphold the rules and principles that have allowed the region to thrive.

Countries across the Asia-Pacific region have been voicing concern over massive Chinese militarisation and assertiveness, US Defence Secretary Asht Carter said, noting Beijing's actions in the disputed South China Sea (SCS) are raising regional tensions.

"Recently not all the news out of the Asia-Pacific has been positive: indeed, in the South China Sea, China's actions in particular, are raising regional tensions," Carter said in his remarks before Council on Foreign Relations, a top American think-tank, on the eve of hiand the Philippines. "That's why countries across the Asia-Pacific are voicing concern with militarisation, and especially over the last year with China's actions, which stand out in size and scope... they're voicing those concerns publicly and privately, at the highest levels, in regional meetings and global fora," Carter said.

This is the reason why many of those countries are reaching out anew to the US to uphold the rules and principles that have allowed the region to thrive, he said. "That's why we support intensified regional diplomacy, not increased tensions, the threat of force, or unilateral changes to the status quo," he added. "And that's one reason why we are making enormous investments in our capabilities; why so many are asking us to do more with them; and why we'll continue to fly, sail, and operate wherever international law allows. Because we must continue the progress that has helped so many in the region rise and prosper," Carter insisted.

ALSO READ US not asking India and others to take sides in Asia Pacific region: Ashton Carter

In view of the changing security environment in the Asia- Pacific region, Carter said the US Department of Defence is operationalising the next phase of the rebalance, and cementing it for the long term.

Gonzalez: Now is the time for Latino millennials to vote, get real about a Basta Trump campaign

With hate-spewing Donald Trump closer than ever to the Republican nomination for President, it’s time to get real about a Basta Trump campaign.

Leaders among the more than 50 million U.S. Latinos recently announced an unprecedented voter registration drive geared toward the November election. The giant Univision Spanish-language network unveiled plans to use all of its radio and television stations to register 3 million new voters.

As Jorge Ramos, the popular Univision anchor who was roughly ejected from a Trump press conference in August, said: “The Republican Party has had an incredible opportunity to reach Latino voters, and they failed. You cannot say, ‘Vote for me, but I want to deport your mother or your brother.’”

But television advertising won’t be enough for the Basta Trump campaign. Basta means “enough already” in Spanish.

For such a campaign to succeed, thousands of Latino college and high school students will need to volunteer to register millennial Latinos in something akin to the “Freedom Summer” voter registration drives of the civil rights movement.

And no one is angrier at Trump right now than young Latinos. They are the ones who most feel the damage from his months of anti-immigrant and anti-Mexican rhetoric.

© Ben Brewer / Reuters/REUTERS
Jorge Ramos (l.) was roughly ejected from a Trump press conference in August.

They’ve witnessed bigots like the KKK’s David Duke and Joe Arpaio, the sheriff of Arizona’s Maricopa County, Joe Arpaio, heartily endorse Trump’s candidacy.

In high schools from Iowa to Indiana, groups of white students recently took to taunting fellow Latino students with chants of “Trump, Trump” and “Build a wall.”

“I was in the car with my 15-year-old daughter a few weeks ago when she suddenly blurted out, ‘Dad, if Trump becomes President, I want to move to England,’ ” said Mike Nieves, a longtime Bronx Democratic Party operative.

Trump’s outrageous claim that Mexico is sending its criminals and rapists across the border has deeply injured Mexican Americans, the largest Latino group.

They have not forgotten that 10 years ago this month, massive immigrant rights protests rocked the nation. Back then, more than 3 million people poured into the downtown areas of 150 cities clamoring for an end to immigrant-bashing and for reform of immigration laws.

ELECTION 2016: LIVE SUPER TUESDAY VOTING RESULTS

Gonzalez: Debate on Puerto Rico’s financial crisis resumes, but pols in Congress divided on solution

The debate resumed in Washington this week over how to handle the impending financial collapse of Puerto Rico’s government, one that could reverberate throughout the U.S. municipal bond market.

Given House Speaker Paul Ryan’s March 31 deadline for passing a bill to address Puerto Rico’s huge debt crisis, two congressional committees held Capitol Hill hearings Thursday on possible legislation.

But a sharp divide quickly became evident between Republicans and Democrats.

President Obama’s point man on Puerto Rico, Treasury Department official Antonio Weiss, urged the House Natural Resources Committee to immediately approve a special “super-bankruptcy” provision for the U.S. territory that would allow the island’s government to restructure $72 billion it owes to bondholders.

GONZALEZ: 'IT'S TIME TO GET REAL' AND LET PUERTO RICO DECLARE BANKRUPTCY

There will be “cascading defaults and litigation” if quick action is not taken, Weiss warned, and a “real risk of another lost decade (for Puerto Rico), one more damaging than the last.”

With $400 million due to bondholders on May 1, and a pressing July 1 deadline for another $2 billion, Weiss called the current debt level for the island “not sustainable.”

Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP
Counselor to the Secretary of the U.S. Treasury, Antonio Weiss, urged lawmakers to approve a special "super-bankruptcy" plan for Puerto Rico.

And that’s only part of the problem, he noted, because the island’s public employee retirement system has only 4% on hand of the $46 billion it has promised in pensions to workers and retirees.

“I don’t think we should take any action until we truly know the audited financial picture,” said Rep. Jeff Duncan (R.-S.C.). Duncan noted that Puerto Rico has still not provided independent financial audits from 2014.

Several Republicans on both panels echoed warnings from the financial industry that granting bankruptcy provisions to Puerto Rico will spark a loss of confidence in municipal bonds generally and raise the cost of borrowing for mainland cities and states.

Weiss disagrees.

“Municipal bond investors tell us that an orderly restructuring under federal guidelines . . . is the best outcome for municipal markets,” he said.

The other contentious issue for both panels was what kind of financial oversight to establish for Puerto Rico. Some Republican leaders are urging a strong control board similar to those that managed financial crises in Detroit and Washington, D.C.

Gonzalez: Now is the time for Latino millennials to vote, get real about a Basta Trump campaign

With hate-spewing Donald Trump closer than ever to the Republican nomination for President, it’s time to get real about a Basta Trump campaign.

Leaders among the more than 50 million U.S. Latinos recently announced an unprecedented voter registration drive geared toward the November election. The giant Univision Spanish-language network unveiled plans to use all of its radio and television stations to register 3 million new voters.

As Jorge Ramos, the popular Univision anchor who was roughly ejected from a Trump press conference in August, said: “The Republican Party has had an incredible opportunity to reach Latino voters, and they failed. You cannot say, ‘Vote for me, but I want to deport your mother or your brother.’”

But television advertising won’t be enough for the Basta Trump campaign. Basta means “enough already” in Spanish.

For such a campaign to succeed, thousands of Latino college and high school students will need to volunteer to register millennial Latinos in something akin to the “Freedom Summer” voter registration drives of the civil rights movement.

And no one is angrier at Trump right now than young Latinos. They are the ones who most feel the damage from his months of anti-immigrant and anti-Mexican rhetoric.

© Ben Brewer / Reuters/REUTERS
Jorge Ramos (l.) was roughly ejected from a Trump press conference in August.

They’ve witnessed bigots like the KKK’s David Duke and Joe Arpaio, the sheriff of Arizona’s Maricopa County, Joe Arpaio, heartily endorse Trump’s candidacy.

In high schools from Iowa to Indiana, groups of white students recently took to taunting fellow Latino students with chants of “Trump, Trump” and “Build a wall.”

“I was in the car with my 15-year-old daughter a few weeks ago when she suddenly blurted out, ‘Dad, if Trump becomes President, I want to move to England,’ ” said Mike Nieves, a longtime Bronx Democratic Party operative.

Trump’s outrageous claim that Mexico is sending its criminals and rapists across the border has deeply injured Mexican Americans, the largest Latino group.

They have not forgotten that 10 years ago this month, massive immigrant rights protests rocked the nation. Back then, more than 3 million people poured into the downtown areas of 150 cities clamoring for an end to immigrant-bashing and for reform of immigration laws.

ELECTION 2016: LIVE SUPER TUESDAY VOTING RESULTS

US defence chief Ash Carter visits Philippines amid sea dispute with China

US Secretary of Defense Ash Carter walks down from the plane upon his arrival at the tarmac of Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) in Manila, April 13, 2016.

(Reuters)

China claims almost the entire South China Sea (SCS), believed to have huge deposits of oil and gas.

US Defence Secretary Ash Carter arrived in the Philippines on Wednesday to highlight strong and growing military relations with a crucial Southeast Asian ally as China assertively pursues its claims in the South China Sea (SCS).

Carter's visit comes as the two countries conduct joint military exercises and on the heels of an agreement that allows a, one of which Carter plans to visit on this week's trip. While the initial agreement allows for five bases, Carter told reporters while on the way to the Philippines that there would be more in future. Defence officials from the Philippines and Vietnam will also meet this week to explore possible joint exercises and navy patrols, military sources said, shoring up a new alliance between states locked in maritime rows with China.

China claims almost the entire South China Sea, believed to have huge deposits of oil and gas. Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam also have claims to parts of the waters, through which about $5 trillion in trade is shipped every year. The US defence chief's visit also takes place weeks before a ruling is expected on an arbitration case the Philippines has brought against China in The Hague.

ALSO READ China's actions in South China Sea raising regional tension: Ash Carter

The United States believes that whatever the tribunal's decision, it will be binding on both China and the Philippines, but China has refused to recognize the case and says all disputes should be resolved through bilateral talks.

"The trip carries greater weight because of the impending arbitration ruling," said Patrick Cronin, senior director of the Asia-Pacific Security Program at the Center for a New American Security. "Secretary Carter's task is to reassure the Philippines that it has U.S. security backing for a rules-based approach to settling disputes."

ALSO READ Japan sub makes first call to Philippines in 15 years amid China tensions

CHINESE REBUKES

The United States has conducted what it calls "freedom of navigation" patrols in the area, sailing within 12-nautical mile territorial limits around disputed islands controlled by China to underscore its right to navigate the seas. Those patrols have drawn sharp rebukes from China, but U.S. officials have said the United States will continue to challenge what it considers unfounded maritime claims.

US officials say the Navy is carrying out more aggressive patrols in the region, sailing close to disputed features. "They're sailing within 13, 14, 15 miles, without dipping into the 12-mile limit, and the Chinese have definitely noticed," said one U.S. official who was not authorized to speak publicly.

ALSO READ US plans third patrol near disputed South China Sea islands

The official said Chinese ships were now shadowing every U.S. ship in the region, and routine ship-to-ship communications had become testier and sometimes unprofessional. In 2016, the United States is providing the Philippines with about $40 million as part of the five-year, $425 million Maritime Security Initiative (MSI).

That money will be used to train staff at the Philippines National Coast Watch Center, better enable the sharing of classified information between the US and the Philippines, and buy better sensors for Philippine Navy patrol ships. Swift progress on spending this year's MSI funds would enable the Pentagon to ask Congress for "multiples more" in funding for future years and possibly expand spending to Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, and Thailand, said Ernest Bower, chair of the Southeast Asia Advisory Board at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

In the Philippines, Carter will observe annual US-Filipino military exercises known as Balikatan. Around 4,400 US troops are participating in the exercises, in addition to 3,000 Filipino troops.

Interpol issues arrest notices for 3 Mexican accused of rape

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Gonzalez: Ex-chancellor returns to NYC to fix 80 struggling Brooklyn schools

Chancellors of the New York City school system routinely come and go.

Steve Mack/Getty Images
Rudy Crew was schools chancellor for four years in the 1990s. After successful stints elsewhere, he's back in a new role to help struggling schools in central Brooklyn.

Chancellors of the New York City school system routinely come and go. I’ve reported on 13 different ones during my 28 years at the Daily News, starting with Nate Quinones during the Ed Koch era.

But once they leave, ex-chancellors almost never look back.

So it is noteworthy that one of them, Rudy Crew, has not only returned to a major education post in this city, but is spearheading an ambitious drive to transform 80 low-performing public schools in central Brooklyn.

Crew, some may recall, served as schools chancellor for four years in the late 1990s before he fell out of favor with Mayor Rudy Giuliani and was hounded out of office. He then sought education posts elsewhere, serving for several years as superintendent of Miami-Dade County schools, and most recently as chief education officer for Oregon’s public schools.

Then in 2013, Crew quietly returned to New York as president of Medgar Evers College in Brooklyn. At the time, that City University campus was reeling from a sharp decline in student enrollment.

Since then, Crew has turned the college around, increasing its student population by more than 10% — from 5,900 to 6,600.

Theodore Parisienne/for New York Daily News
Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams has set aside $4 million to help Crew turnaround 80 low-performing schools.

But he’s done something even more surprising. He’s reached beyond the Medgar Evers campus to fashion what he calls a “new seamless connection from the public schools to college.”

His approach to education reform has so impressed a few philanthropic foundations and local politicians that some are already suggesting a future return for him as public schools chancellor.

Soon after his arrival at Medgar Evers, Crew met with Schools Chancellor Carmen Fariña and offered to assist schools near his college. The chancellor welcomed the offer, so he promptly hosted 80 principals from three central Brooklyn school districts where test scores were abysmal, and asked those principals what they needed.

“I learned from them that they felt besieged by the emphasis on more charter schools, by a national movement to blame teachers, parents and principals, and by test mania, an atmosphere that says ‘get those test scores up and all will be right with the world,’ ” Crew said in an interview.

None of this, he said, was helping teachers and principals improve school performance.

Gonzalez: Bernie Sanders transforms 2016 presidential race

No one is dismissing Bernie Sanders now.

MARK KAUZLARICH/REUTERS
The more Sanders railed on the campaign trail against Wall Street and our “billionaire class” and our nation’s obscene wealth inequality, the bigger his rallies grew.

Even Hillary Clinton suddenly wants more debates with the rumpled firebrand senator from Vermont, this 74-year-old underdog who fought her to a virtual tie Monday in Iowa and who is ahead in the polls for New Hampshire’s vote next week.

So much of the media coverage for months was about Donald Trump and the dogfight among all the Republican candidates seeking to grab the spotlight away from Donald and his hateful barbs.

Scant attention went to Bernie, the Senate’s only socialist, who everyone said didn’t have a chance against Hillary and her well-oiled machine.

But something strange happened on the way to the coronation.

The more Sanders railed on the campaign trail against Wall Street and our “billionaire class” and our nation’s obscene wealth inequality, the bigger his rallies grew. Legions of young people flocked to volunteer for him and small donations from ordinary Americans poured in like a river run wild.

FULL COVERAGE: THE 2016 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION

Then this week, the Democratic Party establishment agreed to add four more televised debates between Clinton and Sanders, beginning with the one in New Hampshire on Thursday night.

They did so even though the party’s veteran leaders keep saying that Sanders can’t possibly keep his momentum in the primaries to come.

Iowa and New Hampshire, they remind us, are rural states with largely white and highly educated populations. In big cities in Pennsylvania, Illinois, New York and California, and in the South and Southwest, Democrats are largely black or Hispanic and Clinton has always been popular among those minority groups.

HATERS IN CHIEF: FIND YOUR CANDIDATE BY WHAT THEY HATE

This won’t be a repeat of 2008, the experts say, when another underdog, Barack Obama, wrested many of those minority voters away from Clinton.

Gonzalez: NYC can make naturalization affordable for immigrants looking for citizenship, Controller Scott Stringer says

City officials should move to reduce the soaring cost of naturalization for New York’s 670,000 legal immigrants eligible to become U.S. citizens, city Controller Scott Stringer urges in a new report.

Epoxydude/Getty Images/fStop
It can cost thousands of dollars to become a permanent resident.

Federal fees for citizenship applications have skyrocketed from just $60 in 1989 to a whopping $680 today, Stringer notes in a report to be released Wednesday. Even after accounting for inflation, that’s more than a 500% increase.

On top of that, immigrants face “additional costs that can run into the thousands of dollars, including the cost of English classes and consultations with immigration lawyers,” the report said.

The gamut of expenses now poses an obstacle to citizenship for legal immigrants with low incomes. And while federal law allows for fee waivers, a recent study found the waiver process so confusing and cumbersome that only 3% of citizenship applicants in 2011 managed to qualify for it.

“There is an economic barrier to citizenship for poor immigrants,” Stringer told the Daily News. “They don’t have the dollars to become citizens, and that’s against everything we stand for.”

Instead, Stringer wants the federal government to lower the fees, which now generate 95% of the entire funding for the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service. But that’s highly unlikely, given the current Republican majorities in both the House and the Senate.

So his report also proposes some measures New York City — the nation’s historic gateway to immigration — can take to defray naturalization costs.

Corey Sipkin/New York Daily News
City controller Scott Stringer said high fees to become a legal U.S. citizen are an unfair hurdle for poor immigrants.

The most novel idea is a new tax credit for employers who are willing to subsidize the citizenship application fees of their workers.

In addition, Stringer wants City Hall to restore funding for more than 6,000 seats in adult literacy classes that were cut from last year’s city budget.

He also calls for increased city funding for free immigration counseling by community-based nonprofits.

All three of these proposals would reduce out-of-pocket costs for thousands of citizenship applicants.

Remember, we’re talking here about legal immigrants, people who have abided by the all rules and who have already incurred substantial costs just to become legal permanent residents.

Gonzalez: Cuomo to name former El Diario editor Rossana Rosado as New York’s next secretary of state

Gov. Cuomo on Wednesday will name Rossana Rosado, the former editor and publisher of El Diario-La Prensa, as New York’s next secretary of state, the Daily News has learned.

Scanned print
Rossana Rosado will be New York’s next secretary of state.

Rosado, 54, will replace Cesar Perales, who has held that post for the past five years and is considered the most influential Hispanic official in the governor’s cabinet.

But at age 75, and after a long career as a civil rights attorney, hospital executive, and top official in Washington, City Hall and Albany, Perales has decided to retire.

Cuomo’s choice of Rosado as his successor comes amid persistent claims that Latinos are underrepresented in state government.

A 2014 study, for example, found that only three of the governor’s 59 commissioners or policy-making appointees were Latino — even though Hispanics make up more than 18% of the state’s population.

To make matters worse, two of them, Labor Commissioner Peter Rivera and now Perales, decided during the past few months to step down.

By tapping Rosado to fill one of those posts, the governor is opting for someone he’s worked well with in the past, someone widely known to both Latino opinion makers and to the state’s business leaders.

Related Stories

Rosado left El Diario, the country’s oldest Spanish-language newspaper, in 2013 after rising up the ranks from reporter to editor-in-chief to publisher. She became a lecturer at John Jay College while also chairing a Cuomo-created task force that prepares ex-felons for reentry into society.

“The governor told me that if I wanted to help the largest number of people, I needed to come into his government,” Rosado told The News on Tuesday. “I’m excited by his progressive agenda and that he wants to bring everyone to the table.”

Secretary of state, of course, has historically been a patronage post with limited powers — overseeing consumer complaints, spurring economic development, issuing licenses and keeping corporate records.

But someone like Perales turned that post into a far more influential platform across state government.

After all, Perales had previously served as assistant secretary of health under President Jimmy Carter, social services commissioner under Gov. Mario Cuomo, and a deputy mayor under David Dinkins.

It was Perales, for instance, who prodded Cuomo to terminate the state’s participation in Secure Communities, a controversial federal program in which local agencies assisted the feds in identifying undocumented immigrants for deportation.

Gonzalez: ‘It’s time to get real’ and let Puerto Rico declare bankruptcy

Senate Democrats sent a united message Wednesday to Majority Leader Mitch McConnell: Allow Puerto Rico to declare bankruptcy on its massive $72 billion debt.

Bloomberg/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Puerto Rico faces more than $400 million in debt service due in May and another $1.9 billion due in July, when even bigger defaults are almost certain.

“We urge you to commit to working with us to swiftly enact legislation to give Puerto Rico access to appropriate restructuring tools,” said a letter to McConnell that was signed by all 44 Senate Democrats and two independents -- Maine’s Angus King and presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders.

This is the only way Puerto Rico can avert a “growing financial and social catastrophe,” the group’s letter warned.

House Speaker Paul Ryan promised last month to deliver legislation to aid Puerto Rico by the end of March.

But on the Senate side, McConnell (photo) has been silent, thus ignoring the near total economic collapse of a territory with 3.5 million U.S. citizens.

This month, Puerto Rico’s government defaulted for the second time in five months on a portion of its debt payments.

Another $400 million payment is due in May, and $1.9 billion in July, which means bigger defaults are almost certain.

Evan Vucci/AP
Senate Democrats wrote a letter to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, urging him to work with them on legislation that would give Puerto Rico the means to declare bankruptcy.

“When it comes to Puerto Rico, it’s time get real,” Sen. Chuck Schumer told the Daily News.

Only legislation that will restore the island government’s ability to use bankruptcy laws to negotiate with its creditors will provide a way out of the crisis, the New York Democratic senator said.

The letter to McConnell noted that Puerto Rico did have the right to use federal bankruptcy laws until 1984 “when Congress inexplicably excluded it from the nationwide approach to resolving municipal insolvency.”

Back then, Strom Thurmond, the Republican senator from South Carolina, inserted an amendment into federal law that stripped Puerto Rico of that option.

“The 1984 Amendments deprived Puerto Rico of a fundamental and inherently managerial function over its municipalities,” U.S. Circuit Court Judge Juan Torruella said in a blistering opinion last July in a lawsuit that bondholders filed against Puerto Rico. The bondholders prevailed in that case, but the Supreme Court will soon decide an appeal by the Puerto Rico government.

Island Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla is only asking Congress to restore a legal right it took away in 1984 — and he is now joined by Senate Democrats.

EXCLUSIVE: Success Charter Network schools formally accused of violating rights of disabled students

The city’s largest charter school chain has been violating the civil rights of students with disabilities for years, a group of parents say in a formal complaint lodged Wednesday with the U.S. Department of Education.

Barry Williams/for New York Daily News
Eva Moskowitz is the founder of Success Charter Network, the city’s largest chain of charter schools.

The parents of 13 special needs students claim the Success Charter Network, which is run by former City Councilwoman Eva Moskowitz, “has engaged in ongoing systemic policies that violate” federal laws protecting the disabled. It cites eight Success schools in Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx where the parents’ children were enrolled.

“Charter schools like Success Academy should follow the same rules as traditional public schools and protect — not punish — children with disabilities,” Public Advocate Letitia James said.

James joined the complaint, as did City Councilman Daniel Dromm, chair of the council’s Education Committee, and five private non-profit legal advocacy groups. All are calling for federal action.

The charter network did not immediately address the specific allegations.

Alliance for Quality Education/Alliance for Quality Education
Education activists have raised a variety of concerns about the practices at Success Charter Network’s schools.

“We are not in a position to comment on a complaint that we have not seen,” Ann Powell, a spokeswoman for Success Charter Network, said. “We are proud to serve 1,400 students who have special needs.”

The complainants are identified only by letters of the alphabet.

One parent who agreed to be interviewed, Katie Jackson, has a 9-year-old son who began attending kindergarten at Harlem Success 2 in August 2011 and is still enrolled there.

According to the complaint, Jackson’s son, Josiah Dent-Beckett, was diagnosed with several learning disabilities while in first grade and was placed in a general education class that also had a second special ed co-teacher. At the end of that year, the school required him to repeat the first grade.

“He was in a class with 32 students and it was too much for him,” Jackson said. She asked for a smaller class but was told her son had to go on a waiting list.

Gonzalez: Sugar substitute maker leaving Brooklyn after 70 years out of ‘pure greed’

Over the factory entrance near the Brooklyn Navy Yard is a brand name known all across America.

Mary Altaffer/AP
Cumberland Packing Corp. employees and union representatives protest the company's decision to end its manufacturing operation in Brooklyn.

The words “Sweet’N Low” are emblazoned on a musical scale, marking the spot where businessman Benjamin Eisenstadt manufactured the first artificial sweetener back in the 1940s.

Since then, the Cumberland Packing Corp. — founded by Eisenstadt — has been churning out millions of packets. More recently, it has branched out to natural brands like Sugar in the Raw and Stevia in the Raw.

But the sweet years have suddenly turned bitter for Cumberland’s workers.

Two weeks ago, company CEO Steven Eisenstadt, Benjamin’s grandson, convened a meeting of his 320 unionized employees and made the surprise announcement that he plans to shut down manufacturing in Brooklyn by the end of the year and to shift that work elsewhere — reportedly to an unnamed contractor in Minnesota.

“They admitted to us they’re still making money,” said Mark Carotenuto, president of Local 2013 of the United Food and Commercial Workers. “They just want to make more. This is all pure greed.”

Mary Altaffer/AP
Sweetener has been manufactured in the city since the 1940s.

Maria Mijangos, a packer at the factory for 26 years, was stunned.

“None of us were prepared for this,” Mijangos told the Daily News. “My husband has been at the plant for 24 years. We have three daughters to support. How are we supposed to survive?”

“I’ve got a rent of $1,200 a month and a teenage son, and I’m not sure what to do,” said Delbert Ranger, a machine operator at the plant for the past six years.

The workers are mostly immigrants and their average pay at Cumberland is about $13 an hour, a low amount cushioned only by a decent benefits package.

“Cumberland wants to help every employee who wants a new job find one, and they want to give retraining and job search services to anyone who is interested in them,” said Stu Loeser, the company’s spokesman.

The Eisenstadt family should at least be credited for staying in Brooklyn so long after other manufacturers fled the city, noted Loeser, and the firm will still keep a certain number of office jobs in Brooklyn after production is shifted.

Japan sub makes first call to Philippines in 15 years amid China tensions

(Reuters)
A Japanese submarine made a port call in the Philippines, the first in 15 years, on Sunday in a show of growing military cooperation amid tension triggered by China's growing assertiveness in the South China Sea (SCS).

One of the newest and largest submarines in the Japanese navy, it was escorted into the former US Navy Base at Subic Bay by two Japanese destroyers on a tour of Southeast Asia. "This is just an exercise and the main objective is to train the officers," Captain Hiraoki Yoshino of Japan's Maritime Self-Defence Force told reporters. "We don't have any message to any country," he said, adding the ship visits were aimed at boosting confidence between the Japan and the Philippines.

China claims almost all the SCS, where about $5 trillion of ship-borne trade passes every year. Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam and Taiwan also have claims. Japan and China also have conflicting claims over islets in the East China Sea. Japan is increasing its presence in the South China Sea, sending more ships and planes to allies in Southeast Asia, like Vietnam and the Philippines.

ALSO READ US, Philippines agree on 5 base locations under defence deal

The Philippines and the United States start military drills on Monday, including simulating the retaking an island seized by an imaginary enemy in the SCS, an exercise likely to rile China. Japan has offered to help the Philippines boost its capability in monitoring what is going on in the South China Sea by leasing three TC-90 surveillance planes, a deal that could be sealed late in April.

EXCLUSIVE: Success Charter Network schools formally accused of violating rights of disabled students

The city’s largest charter school chain has been violating the civil rights of students with disabilities for years, a group of parents say in a formal complaint lodged Wednesday with the U.S. Department of Education.

Barry Williams/for New York Daily News
Eva Moskowitz is the founder of Success Charter Network, the city’s largest chain of charter schools.

The parents of 13 special needs students claim the Success Charter Network, which is run by former City Councilwoman Eva Moskowitz, “has engaged in ongoing systemic policies that violate” federal laws protecting the disabled. It cites eight Success schools in Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx where the parents’ children were enrolled.

“Charter schools like Success Academy should follow the same rules as traditional public schools and protect — not punish — children with disabilities,” Public Advocate Letitia James said.

James joined the complaint, as did City Councilman Daniel Dromm, chair of the council’s Education Committee, and five private non-profit legal advocacy groups. All are calling for federal action.

The charter network did not immediately address the specific allegations.

Alliance for Quality Education/Alliance for Quality Education
Education activists have raised a variety of concerns about the practices at Success Charter Network’s schools.

“We are not in a position to comment on a complaint that we have not seen,” Ann Powell, a spokeswoman for Success Charter Network, said. “We are proud to serve 1,400 students who have special needs.”

The complainants are identified only by letters of the alphabet.

One parent who agreed to be interviewed, Katie Jackson, has a 9-year-old son who began attending kindergarten at Harlem Success 2 in August 2011 and is still enrolled there.

According to the complaint, Jackson’s son, Josiah Dent-Beckett, was diagnosed with several learning disabilities while in first grade and was placed in a general education class that also had a second special ed co-teacher. At the end of that year, the school required him to repeat the first grade.

“He was in a class with 32 students and it was too much for him,” Jackson said. She asked for a smaller class but was told her son had to go on a waiting list.