David Ortiz at MGH after being flown to Boston
David Ortiz beloved in Santo Domingo, Boston, and beyond
"Voters open to higher taxes to level education inequality in Mass., poll says" by Matt Stout Globe Staff, June 11, 2019
$uckers!
As the Legislature grapples with how to fund public education, the majority of Massachusetts voters say they are willing to pay more in taxes — or give up some education funding in their own communities — to funnel more money toward low-income or low-performing school districts.
Sixty percent of the registered voters who participated in a Suffolk University/Boston Globe poll released Tuesday said they don’t believe the state is adequately funding its K-12 schools.
The findings indicate that voters are eager to revamp how the state funds an elementary and secondary education system that has ranked among the best in the nation — but that has also struggled to close wide gaps in achievement. The poll of 600 registered voters was conducted by the Suffolk University Political Research Center between Wednesday and Sunday.
Most voters also say Governor Charlie Baker should seek a third consecutive term — something no Massachusetts incumbent has ever done, and more than 60 percent say their commute has only gotten worse in recent years, though voters are split on solutions to address growing traffic congestion.
It’s education, however, where voters put a heavy emphasis on change, but voters are less keen on a proposal to remove the requirement that anyone under 18 have either parental or judicial consent to get an abortion. About 46 percent support that part of the legislation, while 41 percent oppose it.
The wide-ranging poll also shows that many voters haven’t made up their minds for the 2020 elections.
Former vice president Joe Biden leads a crowded field of two dozen Democrats with 22 percent of support among Massachusetts primary voters, followed by the state’s own senator, Elizabeth Warren, at 10 percent, and Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Ind., at 8 percent.
Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont trails that group at 6 percent, while nearly 42 percent of those surveyed say they’re still undecided about which candidate to support ahead of the state’s March presidential primary. Representative Seth Moulton, a Salem Democrat, polled at 1 percent.
Related: Campaign advice from a past presidential hopeful
Then why isn't he running?
He is certainly qualified for the job.
Warren remains well liked among the state’s Democrats, with 71 percent viewing her favorably, but that shifts dramatically when accounting for other voters. About 51 percent of independent voters, the state’s largest bloc, say they have an unfavorable opinion of her. Among all voters, just as many people have a favorable opinion of the Cambridge Democrat — 46 percent — as those who don’t.
Elsewhere on the 2020 ballot, Senator Edward J. Markey holds large leads over his declared and potential primary challengers, drawing 44 percent of support compared to 5 percent apiece for labor lawyer Shannon Liss-Riordan and author and executive Steve Pemberton.
Nearly 45 percent of Democratic voters say they’re undecided in that race, too, but far more have a favorable than unfavorable opinion of Markey, at 54 to 13 percent.
“You have a lot of people who are kind of taking a wait-and-see in both the presidential and Senate primaries,” Paleologos said.
The Suffolk poll had a margin of error of 4 percent. For questions involving only Democratic voters, the margin of error was 5.1 percent.....
--more--"
[flip to below fold]
Raytheon not likely to be poor stepchild in UTC deal
Did Raytheon have to find a partner now? Probably not, but by acting from a position of strength, it was able to negotiate a deal that — in contrast to the takeovers of other local institutions — prevents it from being a colonial outpost for some distant corporate empire. The deal also amounts to another vote of confidence in the state’s business climate — and a diss of Connecticut’s, which is still stinging from the defection of General Electric to Boston.
Yeah, "GE’s recent shrinkage notwithstanding."
I sure hope you union workers read the fine print.
I was told conglomerates have been falling out of favor for years.
{@@##$$%%^^&&}
Justice Department agrees to turn over key Mueller evidence to House
by Nicholas Fandos New York Times
That was my National lead, with this just below it:
Former White House counsel Dean describes parallels between Trump, Nixon
by John Wagner and Rachael Bade Washington Post
Meanwhile, way back in the C-$ection:
Deutsche Bank acknowledges lax money-laundering controls
By Jack Ewing New York Times
The New York Times recently reported that anti-money-laundering specialists at the bank recommended in 2016 and 2017 that multiple transactions involving legal entities controlled by President Trump and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, be reported to a federal financial-crimes watchdog. The damage to the bank’s reputation and meager profits have shaken investors and helped push Deutsche Bank shares to a record low.
The Senate has already passed the buck to the Fed, so I wouldn't expect anything out of this joke of an investigation.
"A Southern California man was convicted Monday of killing a family of four and burying their bodies in the desert, a case that puzzled investigators for years after the family suddenly vanished from their home in 2010. After a trial that spanned more than four months and depended largely on circumstantial evidence, jurors in San Bernardino found 62-year-old Charles ‘‘Chase’’ Merritt guilty in the bludgeoning deaths of his business associate Joseph McStay, McStay’s wife, Summer, and the couple’s 3- and 4-year-old sons. Merritt closed his eyes and looked down when the court clerk said the word ‘‘guilty’’ the first of four times to first-degree murder. Sobs came from the packed courtroom. Someone called out, ‘‘Yes!’’ Prosecutors say Merritt killed the family with a sledgehammer at a time when he owed McStay money and was being cut out of the victim’s business making and selling custom water fountains. The jury also found the special circumstance of multiple murders. Prosecutors have said they would seek the death penalty if Merritt was convicted, and the penalty phase of the trial was scheduled to begin Tuesday. Prosecutors declined to comment after the verdict, and families on both sides left without speaking to reporters. After the McStay family disappeared, authorities found bowls of uneaten popcorn at their San Diego County home, which had no signs of forced entry, and their car parked at a strip mall near the Mexican border. For years, officials couldn’t determine what happened to the McStays. At one point, investigators said they believed the family had gone to Mexico voluntarily, though they couldn’t say why. In 2013, their bodies were found in shallow graves in the desert after an off-road motorcyclist discovered skeletal remains in the area. Authorities also unearthed a rusty sledgehammer that they said was used to kill the family. ‘‘It was blow, after blow, after blow to a child’s skull,’’ the Los Angeles Times reported prosecutor Britt Imes said during closing arguments. Merritt, who worked with McStay in his water features business, was arrested in 2014. Authorities said they traced Merritt’s cellphone to the area of the desert grave sites in the days after the family disappeared and to a call seeking to close McStay’s online bookkeeping account. Merritt referred to McStay in the past tense in an interview with investigators after the family vanished, and while the evidence linking him to the killings is largely circumstantial, it is ‘‘overwhelmingly convincing,’’ Imes said. Merritt’s attorneys said the two men were best friends and investigators overlooked another possible suspect in the killings. Instead, they said, authorities zeroed in on an innocent man, but the evidence didn’t add up, noting there were no signs of an attack inside the family’s home. ‘‘They tried his character and not the facts of this case,’’ defense attorney James McGee told jurors. Many questions still remain about the family’s disappearance. Prosecutors acknowledge details of the killings aren’t entirely clear but say the evidence from the family’s car, cellphone towers, and financial accounts link Merritt to the killings. Authorities said McStay was cutting Merritt out of the business in early February and the two met on Feb. 4 in Rancho Cucamonga, where Merritt lived at the time. Prosecutors say financial records show Merritt tried to loot the business bank accounts just before and after the family disappeared and backdated checks to Feb. 4, knowing it was the last day anyone had contact with McStay. Phone records show McStay called Merritt seven times after the Feb. 4 meeting, with defense lawyers arguing that McStay wouldn’t likely do that if he had just fired Merritt."
Battle flag carried by black Union troops hits auction block
Court rejects challenge to regulation of gun silencers
Just days after a shooting rampage in Virginia, something that has served its purpose and has now been buried, so go back to sleep and mail it in.
{@@##$$%%^^&&}
Vatican disappoints LGBT advocates as it rejects progressive views on gender identity
by Jason Horowitz and Elisabetta Povoledo New York Times
Hong Kong leader says she won’t back down on extradition bill
by Austin Ramzy New York Times
Indian court convicts 6 Hindus in rape and murder of Muslim girl, 8
by Kai Schultz New York Times
At least 95 slain in Mali village amid surge in ethnic, extremist violence
by Danielle Paquette Washington Post
Reporter’s arrest sets off widespread protests in Russia
by Neil MacFarquhar New York Times
Passenger failed to locate plane’s bathroom, but succeeded in opening emergency exit
by Orion Donovan-Smith Washington Post
I didn't see a need to read any of those given the $ources.
(flip)
"Stern words from Iran: US cannot ‘expect to stay safe’" by Amir Vahdat and Jon Gambrell Associated Press, June 10, 2019
TEHRAN — Iran’s foreign minister warned the United States on Monday that it ‘‘cannot expect to stay safe’’ after launching what he described as an economic war against Tehran, taking a hard-line stance amid a visit by Germany’s top diplomat seeking to defuse tensions.
Prepare yourself for a false flag attack to be blamed on Iran.
A stern-faced Mohammad Javad Zarif offered a series of threats over the ongoing tensions gripping the Persian Gulf. Zarif’s ramped up rhetoric marked a sharp departure for the US-educated diplomat and signals that Iran is taking a harder line toward the West. His public threats, which came during a joint news conference with German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas, were striking because Zarif was the one who helped secure the nuclear deal, alongside the relatively moderate President Hassan Rouhani. However, he does not make the decision on whether to go to war. That is left to the supreme leader.
For his part, Maas insisted his country and other European nations want to find a way to salvage the deal, which saw Iran limit its enrichment of uranium in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions, but he acknowledged there were limits.
‘‘We won’t be able to do miracles, but we are trying as best as we can to do prevent its failure,’’ Maas said.
Then the United States is obviously the Lord of this Earth.
However, Europe has yet to be able to offer Iran a way to get around the US sanctions. Meanwhile, a July 7 deadline — imposed by Iran — looms for Europe to find a way to save the unraveling deal.
Otherwise, Iran has warned it will resume enriching uranium closer to weapons-grade levels.
Yeah, up to about 20% so they can have isotopes for medical research, but far from the 90-95% purity they would need for a bomb, and with all the industrial capacity needed to produce such, it would be impossible to go undetected.
Thanks for omitting that, AP!
Zarif’s comments came after Maas spoke about Israel, an archenemy of Iran’s government.
‘‘Israel’s right to exist is part of Germany’s founding principle and is completely nonnegotiable,’’ Maas said. ‘‘It is a result of our history and it’s irrevocable and doesn’t just change because I am currently in Tehran.’’
I don't know why he brought them up, but he shows you how much of a vassal state is Germany.
Zarif then grew visibly angry, offering a list of Mideast problems ranging from Al Qaeda to the bombing of Yemeni civilians he blamed on the United States and its allies, namely Saudi Arabia.
See: German FM in Tehran, pledges no 'miracles' on JCPOA
He didn't seem angry, and they all seem like good questions to me!
Zarif’s sharp tone likely comes from Iran’s growing frustration with Europe, as well as the ever-tightening American sanctions targeting the country. Iran’s national currency, the rial, is currently trading at nearly 130,000 to $1. It had been 32,000 to the dollar at the time of the 2015 deal. That has wiped away people’s earnings, as well as driven up prices on nearly every good in the country.
European nations had pledged to create a mechanism called INSTEX, which would allow Iran to continue to trade for humanitarian goods despite American sanctions. However, that program has yet to really take off, something Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman noted before Zarif and Maas spoke to reporters.
‘‘We haven’t put much hope in INSTEX,’’ spokesman Abbas Mousavi said, according to Iranian state television. ‘‘If INSTEX was going to help us, it would have done so already.’’
Yup.
Maas later met Rouhani as well. ‘‘We expect Europe to stand up to the United States’ economic terrorism against the Iranian nation, living up to its commitments under the deal,’’ Rouhani told him, according to a statement.
He expects too much.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will arrive in Tehran on Wednesday as an interlocutor for Trump. Japan had once purchased Iranian oil, but it has now stopped over American sanctions; however, Mideast oil remains crucial to Japan and recent threats from Iran to close off the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth through which a third of all oil traded by sea passes, has raised concerns.
They are trying to goad him into war while stabbing him in the back.
The semiofficial Tasnim news agency reported that Ali Asghar Zarean, deputy head of Iran’s nuclear department, said Tehran had increased the number of its centrifuges to 1,044 at the Fordo underground facility. That’s the maximum allowed under the deal.
So they are still abiding by the deal.
Meanwhile, the head of the United Nations atomic watchdog said Monday that Iran had already increased its uranium enrichment activities. Iran previously announced it would quadruple its production of low-enrichment uranium.
‘‘I am worried about increasing tensions over the Iranian nuclear issue,’’ Yukiya Amano of the International Atomic Energy Agency said. ‘‘As I have constantly emphasized, the nuclear-related commitments entered into by Iran under the [deal] represent a significant gain for nuclear verification — I therefore hope that ways can be found to reduce current tensions through dialogue.’’
It's a false hope when having to deal USrael.
They are “non-agreement capable” since Trump took over.
--more--"
Maybe they could end one war before starting another, 'eh?
"Islamic State is expanding its reach in Afghanistan, say US and Afghan officials" by Kathy Gannon Associated Press, June 10, 2019
JALALABAD, Afghanistan — The Islamic State group has lost its caliphate in Syria and Iraq, but in the forbidding mountains of northeastern Afghanistan the group is expanding its footprint, recruiting new fighters and plotting attacks on the United States and other Western countries, according to US and Afghan security officials.
Related: America Created Al-Qaeda and the ISIS Terror Group
Yeah, anywhere the U.S. needs to go or stay, ISIS™ shows up!
Of course, pointing it out is a "conspiracy theory" so you have to punch back.
Nearly two decades after the US-led invasion, the extremist group is seen as an even greater threat than the Taliban because of its increasingly sophisticated military capabilities and its strategy of targeting civilians, both in Afghanistan and abroad. Concerns run so deep that many have come to see the Taliban, which have also clashed with the Islamic State, as a potential partner in containing it.
Related:
"The U.S. government was well aware of the Taliban's reactionary program, yet it chose to back their rise to power in the mid-1990s. The creation of the Taliban was "actively encouraged by the ISI and the CIA," according to Selig Harrison, an expert on U.S. relations with Asia. "The United States encouraged Saudi Arabia and Pakistan to support the Taliban, certainly right up to their advance on Kabul," adds respected journalist Ahmed Rashid. When the Taliban took power, State Department spokesperson Glyn Davies said that he saw "nothing objectionable" in the Taliban's plans to impose strict Islamic law, and Senator Hank Brown, chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on the Near East and South Asia, welcomed the new regime: "The good part of what has happened is that one of the factions at last seems capable of developing a new government in Afghanistan." "The Taliban will probably develop like the Saudis. There will be Aramco [the consortium of oil companies that controlled Saudi oil], pipelines, an emir, no parliament and lots of Sharia law. We can live with that," said another U.S. diplomat in 1997."
All the blood, destruction, and death for psychopathic globe-kickers who are switching sides all the time.
You know, fun and games, fun and games!
A US intelligence official based in Afghanistan said that a recent wave of attacks in the capital, Kabul, is ‘‘practice runs’’ for even bigger attacks in Europe and the United States.
Well, at least they have given you a heads up regarding the upcoming false flags or mind-manipulating mass casualty events that may or may not be real.
Bruce Hoffman, director of the Center for Security Studies at Georgetown University, sees Afghanistan as a possible new base for the Islamic State now that it has been driven from Iraq and Syria. ‘‘ISIS has invested a disproportionate amount of attention and resources in Afghanistan,’’ he said, pointing to ‘‘huge arms stockpiling’’ in the east.
He's also a CFR member, and terrorism is his bu$ine$$!
Btw, we are told the Islamic State’s Afghan affiliate refers to itself as the Khorasan Province -- replete with killers who had their coming out party a while ago.
The Islamic State affiliate initially numbered just a few dozen fighters, mainly Pakistani Taliban driven from their bases across the border and disgruntled Afghan Taliban attracted to the more extreme ideology of the Islamic State, but it received a major boost when the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan joined its ranks in 2015. Today it counts thousands of fighters, many from central Asia but also from Arab countries, Chechnya, India, and Bangladesh, as well as ethnic Uighurs from China.
I guess that's why China is locking them up, and why the U.S. is complaining!
The group has long been based in the eastern Nangarhar province, a rugged region along Afghanistan’s border with Pakistan, but has a strong presence in northern Afghanistan and of late has expanded into neighboring Kunar province, where it could prove even harder to dislodge.
US military and intelligence officials have begun to see the Taliban as a potential ally against the Islamic State.
The Taliban and the Islamic State are sharply divided over ideology and tactics, and have fought each other on a number of occasions, and the Taliban are still the larger and more imposing force.
US envoy Zalmay Khalilzad has held several rounds of talks with the Taliban in recent months in a bid to end America’s longest war.
Khalilzad is a member of the Project For a New American Century, and that is about all you need to know.
Sorry to blow the whistle.
‘‘One of the hopes of a negotiated settlement is that it will bring the Taliban into the government and into the fight against IS,’’ the US intelligence official said.
Minor point, but given the U.S. track record on negotiated agreements, what would make the Taliban think any agreement is worth the paper it is printed on?
Besides, the U.S. wouldn't have introduced ISIS™ if they wanted a negotiated settlement because then they would have to leave!
Without an aggressive counterterrorism strategy, Afghanistan’s Islamic State affiliate will be able to carry out a large-scale attack in the United States or Europe within the next year, the US intelligence official said.....
Okay, they have warned you twice now, so get ready for a rollicking summer of false flag events!
--more--"
More garbage:
"Canada joins global movement to ban single-use plastics" by Dan Bilefsky New York Times, June 10, 2019
Canada on Monday joined a growing global movement with a plan to ban single-use plastics blighting the environment.
The World Economic Forum estimates that 90 percent of the plastic ending up in the oceans comes from 10 major rivers and that currently there are 50 million tons of plastic in the world’s oceans. Environmental specialists say plastic bags can take centuries to degrade.
One of them is the Great Pacific Garbage Patch — an island of trash twice the size of Texas.
The stuff can be recycled, you know.
Oh, the Chinese are sticking it to us now?
The move by Canada comes as countries and cities across the world have been seeking to ban or phase out the use of plastic products and plastic bags in particular. In March, New York announced plans for a statewide ban on most types of single-use plastic bags for retail sales after similar bans in California and Hawaii.
The bans were enacted after China said it was no longer willing to take out garbage!
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau noted that Canada threw away 8 billion Canadian dollars’ worth of plastic material each year and that, according to Environment and Climate Change Canada, the national environmental agency, that includes more than 34 million plastic bags each day. By recycling and reusing plastic, Trudeau said, the country could reduce pollution, create 42,000 jobs, and protect the environment.
Then why were you not doing all this earlier?
Trudeau’s announcement comes as he is gearing up for a general election at the end of this year, in which climate change and the environment are expected to figure prominently and are viewed as issues that resonate with voters, in particular the younger generation.
Meaning the Canadians are going to get a BS election like we get down here!
It's going to be a phony fu*king campaign issue to distract from other things!
The government said it would undertake scientific analysis before determining which plastic products to ban as early as 2021, but Trudeau said Canada expected to follow the example of the European Union, which voted in March to ban 10 single-use plastics that most often end up in the ocean, including plastic cutlery, plates, and cotton-swab sticks.
The bloc introduced the legislation after its research showed that plastics made up 80 percent of marine litter on European beaches, threatening the coastal environment.
Some retailers in Canada have become creative to try and discourage consumers from using plastic bags, including by shaming them.
Isn't that BULLYING?
Shoppers at East West Market in central Vancouver, British Columbia, who decide to pay for a plastic bag are given a bag with an embarrassing logo emblazoned on it like “Into the Weird Adult Video Emporium,” “Dr. Toews Wart Ointment Wholesale,” or “The Colon Care Co-Op.”
I would take my bu$ine$$ el$ewhere then!
“It’s hard to always remember a reusable bag,” the store wrote on its Facebook page. “We redesigned our plastic bags to help you never forget again.”
No concerns about “bag rage” by angry shoppers?
--more--"
In announcing the ban next to a lake at the picturesque Gault Nature Reserve in Mont Saint-Hilaire, outside Montreal, Trudeau said he wanted his children to be able to play on the beach or swim in a lake without having their memories interrupted by dead birds or fish killed by pollution.
What the article doesn't mention is that the proposed ban comes on the heels of the Philippines and Malaysia sending the garbage back, no doubt to due to suggestions from China over the Huawei affair.
Oddly enough, after the Philippines decided to send the stuff back the U.N. opened a human rights inquiry.
{@@##$$%%^^&&}
Helicopter pilot dies in ‘hard’ rooftop landing
by James Barron New York Times
A helicopter had crashed onto the roof of a 51-story office building and burst into flames. The crash involving an aircraft and a skyscraper closed off streets, prompted building evacuations, and unnerved New Yorkers who wondered if it had been an accident or something deliberate, but Governor Andrew Cuomo, who was quickly at the scene, said there was no indication of terrorism. Still, the memory of the Sept. 11 attacks flashed through the minds of people in Le Bernardin, the three-star Michelin restaurant at the bottom of the building. “If you’re a New Yorker, you have a level of PTSD, right from 9/11,’’ Cuomo said. “I remember that morning all too well.”
A nice little mind-fu*k and mental trigger for them, and who could ever forget that morning or what happened in Dallas?
No secret immigration deal exists with US, Mexico’s foreign minister says
New York Times
They are taking a hard line on it, and the Street welcomes the deal even though they are no fan of Trump (as you can see, fabrications mean nothing).
"John Kelly, the acting inspector general for the Department of Homeland Security, announced his retirement Monday following revelations that he directed his staff to whitewash audits of the agency’s performance after federal disasters. Kelly, 64, a career auditor who rose to the top job in 2017, announced his retirement in a brief e-mail Monday morning to hundreds of Homeland Security employees and contractors. Kelly, who had planned to retire in May, wrote in an e-mail to The Washington Post that he ‘‘accelerated my retirement because I feel it’s in the best interest of the organization and its employees.’’ Kelly’s announcement follows the Post’s report last week that an internal review found that Kelly overrode auditors who had found problems with the response of the Federal Emergency Management Agency to various disasters......"
See: Watchdog reveals it whitewashed FEMA disaster reports
So that is what John Kelly is doing now.
"The Saga of the Tree has a sad ending, it turns out: A sapling given to President Trump by French President Emmanuel Macron to great fanfare has died, according to French news reports — and the symbolism wasn’t lost on people who noted the strained relationship between the world leaders. The roots of the story go back to April 2018, when the Macron-Trump friendship was being described as a ‘‘bromance,’’ and the French president and his wife, Brigitte, were feted at the only state dinner the Trumps have hosted. The Macrons presented the Trumps with a tree meant to embody the close ties between their respective countries, and the foursome planted it on the White House lawn with gold-toned shovels in a photo op designed to highlight Franco-American unity. Things seemed amiss shortly afterward when reporters noticed that it had been removed from its spot, but then-French Ambassador Gerard Araud assured people there was no message behind the uprooting. He tweeted that the young oak had simply been put in a standard-issue quarantine. It seems that the sapling didn’t survive its exile. Le Monde reported the demise, confirmed to the Agence France-Presse by a ‘‘diplomatic source.’’ (The French embassy didn’t immediately respond to our query.) The White House did not immediately return a request for comment......"
The tree withered away, and as soon as the WH found out it was the Washington ComPost calling, they hung up!
"Justice Brett Kavanaugh has hired the daughter of Yale Law School professor and ‘‘tiger mom’’ Amy Chua, who praised Kavanaugh as a mentor to women after his Supreme Court nomination. The court is confirming that Yale Law graduate Sophia Chua-Rubenfeld will work as a clerk for Kavanaugh for a year, beginning this summer. Shortly after Kavanaugh’s nomination, Chua penned a Wall Street Journal essay extolling Kavanaugh ‘‘as a mentor for young lawyers, particularly women.’’ Chua is known for her memoir ‘‘Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother,’’ which describes her tough Chinese-style parenting. Chua’s essay was published before Kavanaugh was publicly accused of sexual assault, which he denied. Critics accused Chua of pandering for a clerkship for her daughter. Chua-Rubenfeld responded last year by saying she wouldn’t be applying ‘‘anytime soon.’’
It always helps to have connections, and I'm not going to reopen old wounds.
{@@##$$%%^^&&}
Editorial
Boston Police don’t need more pay for body cams
Sal DiMasi pursues his inalienable right to lobby
By Joan Vennochi
And to think I felt sorry for that scum!
{@@##$$%%^^&&}
A state lawmaker says he is being subjected to personal attacks from antivaccine conspiracy theorists over a bill he is sponsoring to eliminate Massachusetts’ religious exemption for vaccinating schoolchildren.
When they start hollering conspiracy theorists, you know you are on the right track. In this case, it is to protect the pharmaceutical indu$try and to keep those campaign checks coming.
Despite the deluge of angry mail and social media postings, state Representative Andy Vargas said he has seen an overwhelmingly positive response to his proposed legislation, galvanized by two confirmed measles cases in Massachusetts this year — and around 1,000 diagnoses nationwide.
They really want to get that damn needle into you!
More than 75 percent of vaccine exemptions in Massachusetts are for religious reasons, according to state data. The rest are medical exemptions, for health issues such as severe allergies or weakened immune systems, which still would be allowed under Vargas’s bill.
He said he was inspired by three separate constituent groups who told Vargas they felt unsafe sending their children to public schools.
“I have a duty to protect the general public and particularly people who are most vulnerable in our society,” the Haverhill Democrat said in a recent interview, adding that no major world religion is against vaccinations. “I felt that it was time to step up to the plate and respect the science.”
This is fu*king $ickening!
Vargas is not alone in facing vitriol over his stance. Last month, the Massachusetts Medical Society’s House of Delegates passed a resolution opposing nonmedical vaccine exemptions for schoolchildren. Dr. Maryanne C. Bombaugh, the society’s president, said it is important to discuss — and later embrace — vaccinations by relying on accurate, transparent information.
“We have so much data, so much facts,” showing that vaccines are safe and effective, Bombaugh said. “It’s really a time to do this, address it, and get rid of fear — and to take care of patients, our children. I think this is very important legislation, and I applaud this coming forward.”
Dr. Ari R. Cohen, chief of pediatric emergency medicine at MassGeneral Hospital for Children, called Vargas’s bill a “brave move” amid a fiery political and religious debate surrounding vaccinations.
“It’s always a battle of the government’s view of what’s safe for its population,” Cohen said. “This is also a battle of your personal liberties. Unfortunately, it’s not just your personal liberty when it affects somebody else.”
Cohen said herd immunity — which can prevent contagious diseases from spreading if enough people in a community are vaccinated — has dwindled as the antivaccination movement gains momentum. That makes some groups more susceptible to contracting measles, a highly contagious viral infection that can linger in contaminated public spaces for hours.
“Vaccines are one of the true wins in medicine,” Cohen said. “The argument being made against vaccines is poor science and impassioned belief, and impassioned belief is hard to overcome.”
See: CDC: You’re Fired. Autism Coverup Exposed
Not all doctors agree, and know we cannot rely on corporate-sponsored news media for the truth.
While C.J. Doyle, the executive director of the Catholic Action League of Massachusetts, believes in the “good of vaccines,” he described Vargas’s legislative push as “morally problematic.” As Doyle sees it, only parents — and not the government — should ultimately decide whether their children are vaccinated. “Our tradition has always been that people should be accommodated for their sincerely held religious beliefs,” Doyle said. “I think it’s unfortunate. I think our foundational liberty — our freedom of religion — is in some way being devalued and ignored.”
Massachusetts’ overall vaccination rate is about 95 percent, although exemption rates among kindergarten students vary widely across the state. In Suffolk County, less than half a percentage point are exempted, but in Dukes County, home to Martha’s Vineyard, the rate is 9.9 percent, according to 2018 state Department of Public Health statistics.
Measles, though considered eliminated nearly two decades ago in the United States, has seen a resurgence this year. Particularly hard hit have been Orthodox Jewish communities throughout New York, with over 550 cases in New York City and more than 250 cases in the suburb of Rockland County. Scientists believe the New York cases have origins in Ukraine and Israel.
Why did you leave that until the end?
So who released the measles to cause this epidemic?
“Given our proximity to New York, I don’t think we should wait for it to be a public health emergency,” Vargas said. “We want to take action.”
So role your sleeve up!
--more--"
So how long until Ebola shows up in San Antonio?
Related:
Insys Therapeutics, opioid maker implicated in major kickback scheme, files for bankruptcy
But we should trust the vaccine makers!
Merck to acquire Boston-area immunotherapy startup for up to $770 million
Yeah, it's BIG BU$INE$$!
Who cares if you are gambling with your life?
"Slots. Poker tables. Fine dining. Luxury hotel. Dead fish?" by Joshua Miller Globe Staff, June 6, 2019
Wynn Resorts is planning every last detail for the opening of the $2.6 billion Encore Boston Harbor later this month — from the luxurious linens in the hotel rooms to lighting that one executive insists will make visitors “look better than you look anywhere else,” but there’s only so much a fastidious team of hoteliers and casino designers can control.
Enter: the humble menhaden.
Late last July, tens of thousands of the very oily fish washed up dead near the casino’s Mystic River entrance in a giant malodorous mass. Now, with the casino resort’s June 23 opening less than two weeks away, the prospect of another mass death at its doorstep raises an unsettling scenario: patrons gazing out at the Encore’s 100,000 plants, shrubs, and flowers only to encounter a fetid fish tableau.
“Menhaden fish kills have not been common in Massachusetts since the last population boom in the 1980s,” the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries said in a newsletter published this year, but “the 2018 event may be a harbinger of things to come.”
Last year, state officials determined that there was no reason to suspect the fish kill was caused by any type of contamination. Instead, they found the likely causes were natural, including very warm water and oxygen depletion from a large school congregating in a shallow area, perhaps after being chased by a predator.
More hot air.
It wouldn't be because of a plastic garbage patch, would it?
I mean, those things are popping up all over the place.
What is plastic made from, anyway?
Responding to Globe questions, Massachusetts Undersecretary of Environmental Affairs Daniel Sieger mused recently about the possibility of another menhaden die-off near the casino resort.
“Could it happen again? I think the answer is definitely yes,” Sieger said.
Patrick Herron, executive director of the Mystic River Watershed Association, said there’s not enough evidence to know why, exactly, the fish died last year or if such a die-off is likely to re-occur near the shores of the casino.
“The next time it could be up in Ipswich,” he said.
Herron also praised Wynn Resorts for its $68 million cleanup effort at the one-time Monsanto site.
I'm sure that has nothing to do with it, as the Globe has you worry about carbon when your food is poison!
Through the removal of contaminants, dredging, and laying down clean fill in the Mystic, the company has “certainly contributed to an improvement in the environmental conditions in their area,” and, he emphasized, last year’s dead fish event came and went pretty quickly.
“It was an unpleasant odor for a few days,” Herron said, but “ultimately the tide came and washed all the fish away.”
Yup, nothing to see there.
--more--"
Related: In the future, Amsterdam’s canals might have robot boats
Because of the garbage and stench?
Also see:
Could this dog from Maine be the ugliest in the world?
New baby monkey arrives at Franklin Park Zoo
‘Mind-blowing’ video shows close encounter with killer whale swimming alongside boat off Cape
The lower half of the page is an adverti$ement for the 2019 Provincetown International Film Festival with the keynote speaker none other than Andrew McCabe, who lied about leaking to the pre$$, was integrally involved in the infiltration and spying on the Trump campaign, and of whom the organizers say “story reveals the importance of truth tellers in an age in which the very concept of truth has been called into question.’’
I would say you can't make this stuff up, except they can.
Back on the ground:
"Former MBTA trolley driver convicted of staging Halloween attack to collect worker’s compensation" by John R. Ellement Globe Staff, June 10, 2019
A former MBTA trolley driver who paid a man $2,000 to attack him with a trick-or-treat plastic pumpkin while the assailant wore a Michael Myers mask is now serving a three year state prison sentence imposed Friday following convictions for perjury and stealing worker’s compensation.
So when is Smollett going to jail?
It really is a fake new$paper, full of agenda-pushing garbage, inane irrelevancies, and outright lies.
Thomas Lucey was convicted by a Suffolk Superior Court jury last week on five counts of worker’s compensation fraud, two counts of insurance fraud, misleading police, and making a false statement under penalties of perjury for the attack that was staged before midnight on Oct. 29, 2016, according to court records. Halloween was two days later.
Following the guilty verdict, Superior Court Judge Michael D. Ricciuti immediately sentenced the 47-year-old Saugus man to three years and one day in state prison, meaning he must serve the full three years and one day before being released, officials said.
In a statement, MBTA general manager Steve Poftak called Lucey’s actions an “egregious breach of the public trust and a disservice to the thousands of MBTA employees who work hard every day to deliver safe and reliable transit services.”
PFFFFFT!
According to court records, Lucey met with a friend at the Hooters restaurant in Saugus on Oct. 26, 2016, where Lucey paid the man $2,000 to stage the assault, which they planned to take place three days later. Bank records showed withdrawals and deposits consistent with the transaction, according to court records.....
What happened to him?
--more--"
Related:
MBTA suspends driver of Green Line trolley, faulting him for derailment that injured 11
It's called scapegoating in light of the corruption and neglect at the agency.
Delays mount after Red Line derailment at JFK/UMass
Yeah, it's even starting to affect the richer lines, and I'm sure the operator was at fault there, too.
{@@##$$%%^^&&}
"Trump renews attacks on Fed, putting central bank in a bind" by Jeanna Smialek New York Times, June 10, 2019
NEW YORK — President Trump renewed his criticism of the Federal Reserve on Monday, saying the central bank erred in raising interest rates last year and put the United States at a disadvantage to China.
Trump, in an interview on CNBC, said the Fed “made a big mistake: They raised interest rates far too fast.”
The president also seemed to lament that the Fed, which is independent of the White House, did not operate like China’s central bank, which is largely subservient to the government.
“The head of the Fed in China is President Xi,” Trump said, asserting that “he can do whatever he wants.”
He better be careful or, you know (now the movie makes sense).
Then again, maybe he has nothing to worry about.
Trump has repeatedly attacked the Fed’s decision last year to raise interest rates, accusing it of undermining his economic policies and slowing growth, and he has urged the Fed to cut rates and take additional steps to stimulate economic growth.
His comments on Monday came after the Fed paused its steady march toward higher rates and began reorienting policy toward potential cuts amid slowing growth, but Trump is putting Fed chairman Jerome H. Powell and his colleagues in a difficult spot. The president’s ongoing trade war with China — including his threat to slap tariffs on virtually all Chinese imports if no agreement is reached — is creating uncertainty, causing businesses to put off investment and hiring.....
How absurd.
--more--"
Related:
"US employers hired the most people on record in April, while the number of open jobs was largely unchanged, evidence that the job market remains solid, the Labor Department said Monday....."
Of course, the "labor force participation rate fell to 62.8 percent in April from 63 percent the prior month, meaning a smaller percentage of the population is working."
Yeah, if you don't count people the numbers sure look good!
Are you $ick of being lied to yet?
Also see:
"There were significant changes at Vice Media on Monday as the company — which was once operated more like a frat party than a business — takes shape under new leadership. First came the news that HBO was canceling the nightly program “Vice News Tonight” and that the executive who oversaw the show, Josh Tyrangiel, would be leaving the company. Vice Media quickly followed that report, which appeared in The Hollywood Reporter, with an announcement that Jesse Angelo, former publisher of The New York Post, would become the company’s president of global news and entertainment. The changes occurred on the watch of Nancy Dubuc, former head of the A&E cable network, who joined Vice Media as CEO in 2018 and has been charged with the task of stanching the flow of red ink at the company."
I've never watched Vice Media (for the obviou$ rea$ons), there really is nothing left to talk about, and even if there were they wouldn't hear you.
NEXT DAY UPDATES:
Second suspect arrested; David Ortiz ‘resting comfortably’ at MGH
On the campaign trail in Iowa, Biden and Trump take aim at each other
One could be forgiven for momentarily believing the 2020 general election had already begun. For Biden, the strategy fits with his attempt to fly above the fray, and “There’s something about Joe Biden that just makes me feel safe.”
[flip to below fold]
The only thing better than a Game 7 is a Game 7 at home
{@@##$$%%^^&&}
"The Democrat-led House voted Tuesday to authorize the Judiciary Committee to go to court to enforce two subpoenas related to Robert Mueller’s investigative findings and to empower other panels to move more quickly to court in future disputes. The resolution grants the Judiciary Committee the power to petition a federal judge to force Attorney General William Barr and former White House counsel Don McGahn to comply with congressional subpoenas that they have either completely or partly defied, but it stops short of holding either witness in contempt of Congress, as lawmakers had initially threatened to do, forgoing for now a formal accusation of a crime. The decision appears to be based, at least in part, on new signs of cooperation from the Justice Department. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi framed the vote as a step to uphold the principle that Congress is “constitutionally obligated and legally entitled to access and review materials from the executive branch.” House Democratic leaders called the vote a vital step in their methodical march to expose President Trump’s behavior and pressure the Trump administration to cooperate with congressional oversight requests. They also clearly saw it as a means of holding off calls within their ranks to quickly move to impeach the president, arguing that it showed there are other ways of using their power to hold him accountable. If they follow through in filing the suits, Democrats will be effectively calling on a third branch of government, the federal judiciary, to settle a dispute between the legislative and executive branches over Congress’s right to conduct investigations and the extent of the president’s authority to shield evidence from lawmakers. The answer could have significant implications not just for Trump, but for oversight of the executive branch for decades to come......"
Too late for some, and Pelosi says Trump’s criticisms strengthen her politically as the President’s son to appear again before a Senate panel.
"The Justice Department has delivered to officials in the United Kingdom a formal extradition request for Julian Assange, making further US charges against the WikiLeaks founder unlikely. A US official who spoke on background to discuss a sensitive matter said the request was sent Thursday. The Justice Department did not pursue Assange for the 2017 exposure of Central Intelligence Agency hacking tools known as ‘‘Vault 7,’’ according to government officials, out of concern that doing so would do more damage to national security. Joshua Adam Schulte, a former CIA employee, is accused in New York federal court of leaking that information to WikiLeaks. A grand jury investigation of Assange has remained active in recent weeks. Former Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning, whose interactions with Assange form the basis of the charges against him, remains in jail for refusing to testify before the grand jury. Sigurdur Thordarson, a former WikiLeaks associate who became an FBI informant, said he voluntarily met with prosecutors in Virginia late last month and was asked detailed questions about Assange’s relationships with hackers. A spokesman with the US attorney’s office in Alexandria declined to comment on Thordarson’s account....."
Did you see whose fingerprints were all over that?
Looks like Wikileaks was a honey trap set up by intelligence agencies all along!
Group seeks permit to float ‘Baby Trump’ on July Fourth
It's the controlled opposition group Code Pink, but organizers hope the screaming-baby balloon will be a sign of what’s to come that day: protests, and more of them.
If your protest makes the agenda-pu$hing pre$$, it's probably controlled opposition meant to frame the debate.
{@@##$$%%^^&&}
Police in Hong Kong turn water cannons on protestors
by Tiffany May New York Times
"A New Zealand court Tuesday blocked a murder suspect’s extradition to China, the latest repudiation of a Chinese legal system under Communist Party control. The move came two days after hundreds of thousands of people in Hong Kong, a semiautonomous Chinese territory, marched in protest of a plan by the local government to allow extraditions to the Chinese mainland. It also followed a decision by Australia two years ago to back away from a proposed extradition treaty with China. In a strongly worded ruling, the New Zealand court ordered the country’s government to consider human rights risks in China before deciding that the suspect, Kyung Yup Kim, should be sent there. The saga has unfolded over nearly a decade. In 2009, Kim was accused by officials in China of killing a Chinese woman, Peiyun Chen, 20, while in Shanghai on vacation. He traveled to South Korea before he could be questioned. The case of Kim — who is Korean-born and became a legal resident of New Zealand after moving there as a teenager — poses a political quandary for the New Zealand government. It is trying to shore up its relationship with China, the country’s biggest trading partner, after hitting rocky patches over the past year......"
Well, being part of the Five Eyes spying network and a vassal for American Empire has its costs.
Iran frees US resident Nizar Zakka from prison, lawyer says
by Erin Cunningham and Carol Morello Washington Post
The move to free Nizar Zakka, 52, a US permanent resident and Lebanese national, was the result of intense negotiations and high-stakes diplomacy between Lebanese and Iranian officials, who said he was released out of respect for the leader of Lebanon’s Hezbollah, a powerful paramilitary group backed by Iran. Hezbollah, which is part of Lebanon’s coalition government, helped facilitate the diplomacy behind Zakka’s release, Iran’s judiciary spokesman said Tuesday. The Trump administration has not said whether it was involved in the efforts to free Zakka, who was detained in Tehran after attending a conference at the invitation of the Iranian government. Some have interpreted Iran’s gesture as an indirect signal to the United States that it is open to further diplomacy.
The Iranians released the spy to appease Ayatollah Mike and as a gift to President Trump, but it's all a trap.
Botswana’s High Court decriminalizes gay sex
New York Times
Amnesty warns war crimes continuing in Sudan’s Darfur
Sure looks like another color coup, and the military's attempt to forestall it has failed.
65 Rohingya Muslims found shipwrecked in southern Thailand
They were trying to make it to Russia:
"Russian investigative journalist freed after days of protests" by Anton Troianovski Washington Post, June 11, 2019
MOSCOW — Russian authorities dropped charges Tuesday against an investigative reporter whose arrest last week sparked protests and an unprecedented wave of media solidarity, with even pro-Kremlin outlets expressing doubt over the actions by police.
The announcement by Russian Interior Minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev represented a stunning reversal by Russia’s powerful security agencies. It marked a rare bow to public outrage that underscored the Kremlin’s sensitivity to shifts in public opinion, and it was an unexpected victory for a journalism community that has seen media freedom recede for two decades in Russia.
No offense, but I'm pretty damn tired of the $elf-centered, $elf-$erving slop when they won't defend Assange or bloggers.
The security services have long appeared dominant, wielding the law to overpower business rivals and silence activists, but in detaining a respected and well-liked journalist, they seemed to have gone too far — suggesting that nearly two decades into Putin’s rule, there are still limits to state power, but the evidence seemed so flimsy that even some staunchly pro-Kremlin television journalists rallied to Golunov’s defense. Celebrities released videos calling for his freedom.
Hundreds of journalists and supporters gathered outside the courthouse Saturday, their chants heard inside the courtroom. Protesters picketed the Moscow police headquarters, and major newspapers ran matching headlines.....
--more--"
Btw, whatever happened to Whelan?
Related:
Russia set to air TV series that reveals US role in Chernobyl nuclear disaster
Looks like it was sabotage as the five-part "Chernobyl" series, produced by American premium cable and satellite television network HBO, has recently triggered worldwide debate as some experts have challenged its credibility, which assumes, of course, that it had any credibility to begin with.
Justice belatedly catches up with Linda Fairstein
It's another HBO miniseries!
Also see: US Catholic bishops convene to confront sex-abuse crisis
So are the Baptists.
{@@##$$%%^^&&}
Opinion | Kenneth Rogoff
As populists rise, Latin America’s economies may fall
I'm told Kenneth Rogoff is a professor of economics and public policy at Harvard University and recipient of the 2011 Deutsche Bank Prize in Financial Economics.
He might want to give back that prize, and why did the Globe leave out the fact that he was once an economist at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and served on the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System?
Opinion | Martin T. Meehan
A tuition freeze would hurt a thriving UMass
I don't mean to undermine his opinion, but he's the president of the University of Massachusetts begging for more money, and he only got the job because of his political connections:
"Amid an unprecedented financial crisis, the university has hired at least seven people with connections to state government and politics as administrators with salaries between $81,000 and $222,000 in the past year and a half, records show. The hires include the former head of the state Democratic Party, a former legislative aide, and a former state commissioner of environmental protection. Together, the seven people earn nearly $1 million. A UMass campus spokesman said in a statement that hiring is based on merit, and the hires underscore UMass’s reputation as a place where the politically connected of Beacon Hill can land a job with a single phone call. It’s an attractive place to work in part because the UMass system is part of the state retirement system, so state employees can continue to earn toward their pensions, which are based on their three highest years of pay and their number of years of service. And the campus’s location is for many more appealing than traveling to the other campuses in Lowell, Dartmouth, Worcester, or Amherst."
I've said it before, and I'll probably say it again: Ma$$achu$etts state government is nothing more than a $y$tem for political patronage and the looting of taxpayers to $ervice well-connected family and friends.
Also see:
"States, including Massachusetts, have been providing fewer resources for scholarships and student aid in recent years. “Obviously, I support the thrust of it,” said Martin T. Meehan, the president of the University of Massachusetts and a former Democratic US representative. “If the federal government is willing to make a commitment to help offset the costs for students, I think that’s a good thing. This would help reverse that trend. The key is whether or not the states will step up” and provide the matching funds needed to unlock the federal support.”
"Tuition and fees for University of Massachusetts students will likely increase 2 to 3 percent for the coming academic year, depending on how the state budget shapes up, UMass President Marty Meehan said at Board of Trustees meeting on Tuesday....."
{@@##$$%%^^&&}
"‘Medicare for All’ gains backers, but bill still faces long odds in Legislature" by Priyanka Dayal McCluskey Globe Staff, June 11, 2019
Supporters of single-payer health care are rallying behind legislation that would transform Massachusetts’ health care system, a sign of lingering frustration with the status quo, even in a state that prides itself on being a leader in access to medical care.
The so-called Medicare for All legislation would raise taxes and eliminate private health insurance while putting the state in charge of all payments to doctors and hospitals.
The controversial measure is unlikely to become law anytime soon, but growing support for it shows the single-payer debate has shifted from the political fringes to the mainstream, in the state and across the country. Many of the Democrats running for president, including US Senator Elizabeth Warren, support a national health care system.
It's more political poop as the middle men come under scrutiny for playing video games.
In the meantime, you can squabble over low-income housing vouchers.
“This movement is growing across Massachusetts,” said state Senator Jamie Eldridge, an Acton Democrat and a lead sponsor of the bill.
The legislation has drawn 73 cosponsors — including the House and Senate chairwomen of the Committee on Health Care Financing. That’s up from 57 cosponsors when the bill was filed, but ultimately wasn’t approved, two years ago.....
--more--"
"Markey will run on his record, but will that be enough?" by Michael Levenson Globe Staff, June 4, 2019
In a typical election year, a 43-year veteran of Congress with $3.5 million in the bank and a proudly liberal record wouldn’t have to worry a wink about winning a contested Democratic primary in Massachusetts, but this is not a typical election season, and Senator Edward J. Markey knows he cannot ignore Shannon Liss-Riordan, a prominent labor lawyer with no political experience who recently announced she would challenge him in the 2020 Democratic primary.
“I take every challenger seriously, and that’s why I’m going to conduct this race running at full speed for the next year and a half, nonstop, every day,” Markey said in an interview.
What about your Senate duties?
Still, Markey refused to discuss or even acknowledge what may be the greatest threat to his reelection: the nationwide surge in Democratic voters eager for more women, people of color, and political outsiders to fight President Trump in Washington.
Liss-Riordan has said she wants to tap into the energy of those voters, pointing out that they helped Ayanna Pressley defeat Markey’s congressional colleague, Michael Capuano, last fall, and also propelled Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to victory over another longtime Democratic House member in New York.
Markey, when asked repeatedly about the desire in his party for fresh faces and more women in Congress, consistently sidestepped the question, saying only that he plans to run on his record.....
Then he has already lost.
--more--"
At least she won't be getting any help from the DCCC.
"Man freed after 32 years in prison, only to face murder charge again, is acquitted" by Gal Tziperman Lotan Globe Staff, June 11, 2019
A man whose murder conviction was overturned after he spent 32 years in prison was acquitted in a swift retrial Tuesday.
After a little more than two hours of deliberation, jurors found Darrell Jones not guilty of the murder of Guillermo Rodriguez, who was shot and killed outside Pete & Mary’s bar in Brockton in 1985.
Jones, who always maintained his innocence and turned down a plea deal that would have guaranteed his freedom, said he felt “great” about the verdict, but that the injustices of his case still weighed on him.
“I’m not really celebratory because they took my life and they knew what they did. And they did it intentionally,” Jones said in a phone interview. “I lost my grandma when I was in there, my only brother, my son. So my family isn’t here to celebrate.”
In a statement, Plymouth District Attorney Timothy J. Cruz said that a video recording of a witness identifying Jones as the shooter was suppressed. Prosecutors were also not allowed to introduce prior testimony from a Brockton police officer, who identified Jones as the shooter in the 1980s and has since died, Cruz said.
“We respect the jury’s decision, but with the passage of three decades, the deaths of necessary witnesses and exclusion of some of the prior evidence that was used at the 1986 trial, this was an incredibly difficult case to retry,” he said.
Lawyers for Jones said the recording had been deemed inadmissable because it had been altered by police, and that a deleted portion was likely exculpatory.
Paul Rudof, one of Jones’s attorneys, said the verdict was a great relief.
“I knew that Darrell was innocent, and it seemed so painfully obvious,” he said. “But until I heard it — you never know.”
Jones, 52, was 19 when he was arrested. During his first trial in 1986, prosecutors presented testimony from Lisa Marie Pina, who was 22 and in a car outside Pete & Mary’s bar when Rodriguez was shot.
She told jurors she heard someone in the car blame “That damned Diamond,” Jones’s nickname.
Last month, Pina said she no longer remembered that comment. She did remember a Brockton detective asking her to identify the shooter from an array of photos.
“ ‘Pick a picture, pick a picture,’ ” Pina said, according to testimony read in court. “So I picked a picture and it happened to be Diamond’s picture.”
In 2017, Superior Court Judge Thomas F. McGuire Jr. ruled that Jones did not receive a fair trial because detectives tampered with the video recording, his lawyer was ineffective, and jurors made comments that he must be guilty because he is black.
Two years later, prosecutors pursued a murder charge against Jones again.
“The evidence you’ll hear at this trial is as simple as this: People who knew the defendant, who were familiar with him, saw what he did,” Assistant District Attorney Jessica Kenny said in opening statements last week. “Even people who did not know him saw what he did.”
Some of the witnesses have died in the years since he was arrested, and others claimed they no longer remembered the details of the night Rodriguez died.
Plymouth Superior Court Judge C.J. Moriarty allowed prosecutors to use transcripts from the 1986 trial — transcripts that employees from the district attorney’s office read to jurors in stilted, stiff voices.
In his opening statement Friday, Rudof focused on whether jurors should rely on the decades-old testimony. Though none of the witnesses said they got a good look at the person who shot Rodriguez, they all said the shooter was noticeably shorter than Rodriguez, who was 6 foot 1 inch. Jones is only one inch shorter.
Witnesses also said they saw Rodriguez’s killer run to another bar, where investigators later found a gun. Police found Jones inside Pete & Mary’s bar, where he had been before Rodriguez was shot.
Jones said he wants to help others who were wrongfully convicted, and make more people aware of the power prosecutors hold in the criminal justice system.
“I am going to do what I’ve been doing – I did it in prison, I’ll do it out here,” Jones said. “I am going to wake Massachusetts up – try to wake them up — to the fact that this is done in their name, that they have a responsibility.”
And yet the wars based on lies grind on.
--more--"
I should have just said no.
Related:
Judge drops one murder charge against Blackstone mother whose infants were found dead in closets
"In 1994, Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman were slashed to death outside her Los Angeles home. (O.J. Simpson was acquitted of the killings in a criminal trial but was eventually held liable in a civil action.)"
I'm not saying O.J. is innocent; however, I do think the glove was planted and some blood was splashed around to make the case seem more ironclad.
I wonder what he is up to now.
Kraft and Florida prosecutors agree: An appeals court must examine spa case
"Former Stanford University sailing coach faces sentencing in college admissions scandal" by John R. Ellement Globe Staff, June 11, 2019
The first person to be sentenced in the “Varsity Blues” college entrance scandal will be the former sailing coach for Stanford University who never directly pocketed any cash and whose efforts to help three students bypass the admissions process ultimately failed.
John Vandemoer, who grew up on Cape Cod and started sailing off the shores of Hyannis as a child, pleaded guilty to racketeering and honest fraud services for steering $610,000 into Stanford sailing bank accounts in return for falsely qualifying three students as sailors for admissions.
According to US Attorney Andrew Lelling’s office and Vandemoer’s defense, the Hobart College graduate who once worked as the sailing coach at the US Naval Academy in Annapolis did not put the cash in personal bank accounts, but, prosecutors assert, he actively conspired with “Varsity Blues” scam organizer William “Rick” Singer to subvert Stanford’s admissions system and would personally benefit with increased success in competitions with better equipment purchased with the bribes. He worked with Singer on behalf of three students, but the students chose to attend other schools, prosecutors said.
Oh, they are "conspiracy theorists," are they?
Singer has pleaded guilty and is cooperating with investigators. When he pleaded guilty earlier this year, Vandemoer also agreed to assist Lelling’s office.
Prosecutors said they will ask US District Court Judge Rya W. Zobel to order Vandemoer, the father of two young children and the wife of US Olympic sailor Molly O’Bryan Vandemoer, to 13 months behind bars. Sentencing is set for Wednesday afternoon.
“The defendant did not take the money for his own personal use, but benefited from the money indirectly: he funneled the criminal proceeds to accounts he controlled for the university sailing program,’’ prosecutors wrote. “He secretly sold recruitment slots in exchange for payments that were used to benefit the sailing program he ran, and so enhanced his own career prospects.”
Vandemoer, under federal sentencing guidelines, could face up to four years in prison, records show, but the defense argues that Vandemoer should be placed on probation and not taken away from his children. Moreover, the former coach has no prior criminal history, pleaded guilty, and is considered by some former Stanford sailors, their parents, and a retired Navy admiral, among others, as an otherwise ethical man who made one massive mistake.
“Mr. Vandemoer is before this Court because in one instance he failed to live up to the high standards he set for himself and instilled in countless young people,” his attorneys wrote. “This is a mistake he regrets dearly and one that he is determined not to let define him or his life.”
In a victim impact statement, Stanford University wrote that it was not taking a stand on whether Vandemoer should spend time behind bars, but the famous California university said he violated its trust and tarnished the school’s reputation.....
The image is all they care about, and the damage has already been done to Huffman and Loughlin.
--more--"
At least he will have access to methadone.
Also see:
"In 1942, Anne Frank, a German-born Jewish girl living in Amsterdam, received a diary for her 13th birthday, less than a month before she and her family went into hiding from the Nazis."
Turns out it was all a fraud.
{@@##$$%%^^&&}
Fast-growing Vericel finds success on two fronts: knee surgery and burn care
Welcome to the interim club, Dr. Klibanski
That huge vacant warehouse overlooking the Mass. Pike isn’t going to stay that way
"State leaders agree to a three-month delay for paid-leave taxes" by Jon Chesto Globe Staff, June 11, 2019
Massachusetts employers won’t face Paid Leave Armageddon in a few weeks after all.
State officials on Tuesday granted anxious business leaders their wish by agreeing to a three-month delay before assessing companies fees for a new paid family and medical leave program. These new taxes were supposed to kick in on July 1. Now, they’ll begin in October.
The news came via a brief joint statement issued Tuesday night from Beacon Hill’s three leaders: Governor Charlie Baker, Senate President Karen Spilka, and House Speaker Robert DeLeo. They did not provide much additional detail, other than to note that the postponement should give businesses adequate time to implement the program, and that some minor changes will be made to its design. (The Legislature still needs to vote to adopt the delay.)
They had almost a whole year to get ready, and did you know the “Grand Bargain” eliminated time-and-a-half pay on Sundays and holidays?
With potential payroll disasters looming, business groups had ramped up their Beacon Hill lobbying on this issue in recent weeks. Employers continue to have many unanswered questions, including whether they are eligible to opt out of the state program because they already offer similar benefits, and whether to pass some of the cost of the fees to employees. Chaos seemed imminent.....
And unlike you, they will be heard!
--more--"
"Two executives at a top Lloyd’s of London insurance company have resigned following allegations of sexual harassment. One was accused of groping colleagues at a booze-fueled party, the other of stalking a junior employee. The first executive was said to have grabbed one colleague’s buttocks, unbuttoned another’s shirt, and made lewd sexual remarks at a party for employees of Tokio Marine Kiln Group Ltd., one of the largest so-called managing agents at the Lloyd’s exchange, according to people familiar with the matter. The second allegedly bombarded a woman who reported directly to him with unsolicited text messages and e-mails asking her out on dates, even after she said she wasn’t interested, the people said."
Looks to me like they were just hungry.
Also see:
Raytheon CEO talks about what merger with UTC means for Mass.
Polartec owner sells company to Milliken
Related:
Polartec plant to be put up for auction
That put seasonal workers, many of them immigrants, out of work, and nobody wanted to buy the company so they had to look for work on Mars. Some found it, others found themselves in a place of no hope.
"House opens tech antitrust inquiry with look at news media" by Cecilia Kang New York Times, June 11, 2019
WASHINGTON — Congress opened its antitrust investigation of big tech Tuesday with a hearing focused on how platforms like Facebook and Google may have harmed publishers by siphoning off profits from news organizations.
It's not big tech that did it to them, it's the endle$$ agenda-pu$hing and war-promoting lies and distortions, topped off with loads of eliti$t in$ult, and once again, it's ALL ABOUT THE BENJAMINS!
Lawmakers will hear testimony from executives at News Corp, the owner of The Wall Street Journal and other publications; The Atlanta Journal-Constitution; and the News Media Alliance, a trade group representing 2,000 news organizations, including The New York Times.
Matthew Schruers, vice president of the tech trade group Computer and Communications Industry Association, will represent the tech industry.
The media executives are expected to tell members of the House Judiciary Committee, which is holding the hearing, that big tech platforms have decimated the news industry, leading to a decline in profit and the shuttering of hundreds of local newspapers around the nation.
“The rise of digital news distribution has introduced new, potentially existential threats to the news industry,” David Chavern, chief executive of the News Media Alliance, wrote in prepared testimony.
Waaaaaaaa! Waaaaaaaaa! Waaaaaaaaa!
Congress’ scrutiny of big tech comes amid a swell of recent events challenging the dominance of big tech. The Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission, the two top antitrust agencies, recently divided oversight over Apple, Amazon, Facebook, and Google, increasing scrutiny of the tech giants and how their businesses may be harming rivals and consumers. European regulators have already taken a tough stance against the titans of Silicon Valley, investigating companies for how they handle user data, police speech, and limit competition.
The House committee plans several hearings, depositions, and interviews with competitors over the next 18 months as part of its investigation into whether the dominance and power of Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google have decreased competition and harmed consumers.
The new$papers may be dead by then.
Representative David Cicilline, a Rhode Island Democrat, is leading the Judiciary Committee’s investigation into big tech. Cicilline has said it would explore a diverse range of issues related to the industry. He said the committee would look into whether the dominant social network, Facebook, had harmed consumers with its handling of data, for example. He said it also planned to look into whether Amazon had harmed smaller retailers.
He says the Internet is broken!
Tuesday’s hearing will give publishers a platform after years of complaining about big tech platforms.
Well, I know one citizen who won't be watching because they don't want to hear the crybabies.
What bunch of whining losers!
The hearing is expected to focus in part on a bill introduced by Cicilline and Representative Doug Collins, Republican of Georgia, that would give publishers the ability to jointly negotiate with Google, Facebook, and other platforms for better terms. The law would exempt the publishers from antitrust rules for four years, protecting publishers from charges of price collusion.
Cicilline said in his opening remarks that 2,900 reporters and other news staff had lost their jobs this year and that news ad revenue had dropped to $15.6 billion in 2017 from $49 billion in 2006......
Am I $uppo$ed to feel $orry for them?
--more--"
Enjoy the party:
"Theprivate jets have begun clogging the jetways in Sun Valley, Idaho, which can only mean one thing: “Billionaire summer camp” has begun. The annual Allen & Company conference, the investment firm’s invite-only gathering of some of the world’s most powerful corporate titans, officially begins on Wednesday. Over the next week, the nation’s moguls will play golf, go white-water rafting, attend breakout sessions, and make decisions about the future of their respective media empires. And naturally, some of Boston’s own coterie of power players will be among them. Both Shari Redstone and CBS Corp. CEO Les Moonves are on the guest list. The two have been locked in a legal battle, as the board of CBS has attempted to strip Redstone’s family investment arm, National Amusements Inc., of its voting control in the media company. Meanwhile, Redstone had sought to create a merger between CBS and Viacom (which the Redstone family also owns). The case goes to trial in Delaware in three months, so one expects things could get testy.
So much for the hypocritical concern regarding global warming and climate change.
Patriots owner Bob Kraft and John Henry and Linda Pizzuti Henry, owners of the Red Sox (and the Boston Globe) are also expected to make their way to Idaho, where Bloomberg reports they’ll rub elbows with other sports bigwigs like Gary Bettman, commissioner of the National Hockey League, and agent Casey Wasserman, who’s helming the organization overseeing the upcoming 2028 Los Angeles Olympics. Cable tycoon John Malone, who holds major stakes in Charter Communications and Discovery Inc., is also rumored to be looking to scoop up regional sports networks while wandering the grounds, according to the Wall Street Journal. Allen and Co.’s guest list rarely changes from year to year, so you can bet longtime attendee Steve Pagliuca will also be on hand. Last year, the Celtics co-owner and co-chairman of the Boston-based private equity firm said in an interview with Bloomberg that the sky-high stock valuations meant private equity firms had to work harder, and that Bain would “stick to [its] knitting,” and focus on making deals that can transform and grow companies.
Wayfair’s CEO Niraj Shah is also attending the conference. Stay tuned to see if he ends up in meetings with his fellow e-commerce scion, Jeff Bezos, who has been ramping up Amazon’s housewares efforts as of late. Other media moguls expected to turn up at the confab include Fox’s Rupert Murdoch, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, and Apple’s Tim Cook. Also on the guest list: Walmart CEO Doug McMillon , General Motors’ Mary Barra and Berkshire Hathaway’s Warren Buffett, who is scheduled to host a Q&A over the weekend.
The conference, which is in its 35th year, often ends up being the staging ground for massive media deals. In 1995, the details of Disney’s acquisition of ABC/Capital Partners were hashed out there, as was the 2000 Time Warner/AOL merger and Comcast’s 2011 takeover of NBCUniversal. The mountainous Idaho landscape was also the site of Bezos’s first steps toward acquiring the Washington Post. As for the Idaho locals, they were looking forward to a lucrative week of baby-sitting, catering, and guiding gigs, many of which offer “boosted wages and, often, a fat tip,” according to Mark Deereporting in the Idaho Mountain Express, but the Sun Valley Resort, which plays host to the spectacle, won’t divulge any details on the guests or the agenda for the week. “That message has been the same for 35 years: Everybody’s here, and nobody’s talking,” Dee writes."
So much for the hypocritical concern regarding global warming and climate change.
Patriots owner Bob Kraft and John Henry and Linda Pizzuti Henry, owners of the Red Sox (and the Boston Globe) are also expected to make their way to Idaho, where Bloomberg reports they’ll rub elbows with other sports bigwigs like Gary Bettman, commissioner of the National Hockey League, and agent Casey Wasserman, who’s helming the organization overseeing the upcoming 2028 Los Angeles Olympics. Cable tycoon John Malone, who holds major stakes in Charter Communications and Discovery Inc., is also rumored to be looking to scoop up regional sports networks while wandering the grounds, according to the Wall Street Journal. Allen and Co.’s guest list rarely changes from year to year, so you can bet longtime attendee Steve Pagliuca will also be on hand. Last year, the Celtics co-owner and co-chairman of the Boston-based private equity firm said in an interview with Bloomberg that the sky-high stock valuations meant private equity firms had to work harder, and that Bain would “stick to [its] knitting,” and focus on making deals that can transform and grow companies.
Wayfair’s CEO Niraj Shah is also attending the conference. Stay tuned to see if he ends up in meetings with his fellow e-commerce scion, Jeff Bezos, who has been ramping up Amazon’s housewares efforts as of late. Other media moguls expected to turn up at the confab include Fox’s Rupert Murdoch, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, and Apple’s Tim Cook. Also on the guest list: Walmart CEO Doug McMillon , General Motors’ Mary Barra and Berkshire Hathaway’s Warren Buffett, who is scheduled to host a Q&A over the weekend.
The conference, which is in its 35th year, often ends up being the staging ground for massive media deals. In 1995, the details of Disney’s acquisition of ABC/Capital Partners were hashed out there, as was the 2000 Time Warner/AOL merger and Comcast’s 2011 takeover of NBCUniversal. The mountainous Idaho landscape was also the site of Bezos’s first steps toward acquiring the Washington Post. As for the Idaho locals, they were looking forward to a lucrative week of baby-sitting, catering, and guiding gigs, many of which offer “boosted wages and, often, a fat tip,” according to Mark Deereporting in the Idaho Mountain Express, but the Sun Valley Resort, which plays host to the spectacle, won’t divulge any details on the guests or the agenda for the week. “That message has been the same for 35 years: Everybody’s here, and nobody’s talking,” Dee writes."
At least they finally $hut up!
