Question 2 on the Massachusetts ballot would provide voters the opportunity to rank their preferences in a multi-candidate field. The option would apply in primaries and general elections for state offices, legislative districts, and federal congressional offices but not for president, county or regional school district committee members. It's less complicated than it sounds, and …
Trump COVID behavior even more outrageous
Donald Trump just received the best government-financed medical care in the country. He left the hospital while still infectious, still needs monitoring for abruptly deteriorating and possible side-effects of the medication he's on, has given no indication that he'll modify his longstanding flouting of rules for protecting himself and others, and without his doctors having …
Trump debate behavior an embarrassment to the country
Last night's despicable mud-wrestling, schoolyard bullying, name-calling event was neither Presidential nor a debate. Thank you, Donald. The President who violates all norms of behavior, tramples science and facts, lies about virtually everything, foments divisiveness, incites violence, savages all who differ with him, broke the rules of the event to which his campaign had agreed. …
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Charlie Baker – big mistake with Collins endorsement?
No, Charlie, we do not need more Senators like Maine's Susan Collins. We don't even need Susan Collins. What we do need is to flip the Senate and deal responsibly with Covid-19 impacts, revitalize environmental standards to halt climate change, launch an infrastructure jobs bill, reform voting laws, redress economic inequities, protect the Affordable Care …
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News of RBG death hits hard
News of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's death Friday hit hard, but it did not come as a surprise. She had been diagnosed with cancer five times since 1999 and fought back fiercely. When she succumbed, at the age of 87, she left hundreds of millions of people indebted to her for her lifelong battle for …
Not too late for end-of-summer reading, pt. 2 fiction
Neighborhood barbecues, beach gatherings, blockbuster movies, Fenway Park. Well, that didn't happen. But the few remaining lazy, hazy, crazy days could still pluck summer from COVID and politics with the pleasures of well crafted novels. There's still time to pick up one of the following before the leaves turn color. FICTION News of the World …
Continue reading Not too late for end-of-summer reading, pt. 2 fiction
Not too late for end-of-summer reading, pt. 1 non-fiction
When you're done reading James H. Barron's new sweeping biography and political thriller, "The Greek Connection," (shameless plug!) here are some other non-fiction possibilities for the last weeks of summer. Not everything has to be about Donald Trump! The Yellow House by Sarah Broom is a memoir of a New Orleans writer, the youngest of …
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CO2 not DNA shapes outcome of Markey/ Kennedy race
The most discordant note in Joe Kennedy's elegiac concession speech on Tuesday night was his observation that, even knowing the outcome, if he had to do it all over again, he would do it "in a heartbeat." Giving voice to the frustrations of tens of thousands of working-class voters living in Massachusetts gateway cities is …
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RNC a gaslight convention
In what universe do Trump Republicans reside? The world embraced by their national convention is the kind of horror show I'd never pay to see, and couldn't sit through if it were free. Cue threatening music: the Democrats will bring carnage. They will kill the suburbs. They are the radical left and will create anarchy. …
DNC delivers optimism, hard work ahead
It's all right to exhale. The Democrats delivered four well-produced creative and nearly seamless nights, and Joe Biden did extremely well. The four days were a huge success, from Michelle and Barack Obama to Kamala Harris to unknowns like Kristin Urquiza, whose late father died of COVID-19. He was, she said, a Trump supporter whose …
Marjorie Arons-Barron 