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Massachusetts' Liberals are celebrating the 4th of July weekend by planning to pass legislation to ban public access to firearms training. Since no one in MA can go to their chief of police to beg for a MA LTC without completing training, this is another way to ban firearms ownership in MA without violating Heller. They are undoubtedly laughing it up over this one on Beacon Hill. Pay attention. This is part of Obama's test plan to end private firearms ownership in the U.S. (Patrick was reportedly on the team that helped train ACORN to "win" the 2008 election).

When President Obama announced on June 9 that some financial institutions would be allowed to repay Troubled Asset Relief Program dollars, he said the massively expensive TARP bailout had made money for the federal government. "It is worth noting that in the first round of repayments from these [TARP recipients], the government has actually turned a profit," the president said. Indeed, TARP supporters have long held out the hope that the program might be profitable. But now Rep. Barney Frank, the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, has come up with a proposal to spend any TARP profits before...

Former advertising executive Jack Connors and private equity investor Stephen Pagliuca have joined forces to prepare for a potential bid to buy The Boston Globe, according to people briefed on the sales process. This week the two got approval from the Globe’s owner, The New York Times Co., to team up for a potential bid, the sources said. Connors and Pagliuca had been weighing separate bids for New England’s largest daily. Nondisclosure agreements had stipulated bidders could not work together, but the two sought permission to collaborate. As that team and at least one rival local group craft preliminary bids,...

There will be a tea party on the Common in Boston starting at noon. There will be speakers. Many of us will be staying for the fireworks afterward.http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2283755/posts

AUGUSTA, Maine — The Maine Human Rights Commission ruled Monday that the Orono School Department discriminated against a transgender child by denying her access to the girls bathroom. While the school department’s lawyer warned that schools around the state may not be ready to manage the practical fallout from the decision, civil liberties advocates hailed the ruling as an advancement of human rights.

Maybe Mitt Romney should look warily over his shoulder, lest a political calamity befall him, too. Continuing President Obama's political good fortune, a growing list of possible Republican opponents in 2012 is falling by the wayside, often due to self-inflicted wounds.

(snip) On health care, Romney pointed to the successes of his own plan but criticized Obama's for its emphasis on a public option. "The president's plan makes an enormous error by saying we're going to put government into the insurance business. We got everyone in Massachusetts insured and we did it without putting government into the insurance business," he said. "We said instead we're going to help people get private free enterprise kind of insurance they can buy from a number of different companies." He said the system led to plunging premiums while offering a healthy choice of options for...

Gov. Deval Patrick has only himself to blame for an embarrassing poll showing a narrow win for Republican rival Christy Mihos, opposing strategists and potential challengers charged yesterday. “Patrick right now is running against himself - and losing,” said political strategist and author Dick Morris, a former top adviser to President Clinton who is working for Mihos. “It shows there’s tremendous vulnerability.”

Gov. Deval Patrick has only himself to blame for an embarrassing poll showing a narrow win for Republican rival Christy Mihos, opposing strategists and potential challengers charged yesterday. “Patrick right now is running against himself - and losing,” said political strategist and author Dick Morris, a former top adviser to President Clinton who is working for Mihos. “It shows there’s tremendous vulnerability.” The Rasmussen/FOX 25 poll released Monday, which surveyed 500 voters, found 41 percent would vote for Mihos and 40 percent for Patrick.

The word is out that the Obamas will be spending part of their summer vacation in Martha's Vineyard. "Many blacks from Oak Bluffs are elated that the Only One-in-Chief may be joining them. "People are going to lose their minds!" Tonya Lewis Lee says. At the same time, there's also a bit of wariness among the wealthiest ones, an uncertainty whether Obama will affirm them. "Obama is more a man of the people," says a Vineyarder who's part of black high society. "He doesn't seem to identify with affluent black people. His wife definitely doesn't; she is basically a ghetto...

The Obama-Kennedy health plan is modeled after the Massachusetts plan, which, when adopted, many applauded as innovative and destined for success. In fact, the Massachusetts plan has been a massive failure and is a model for what not to do. It has increased costs. It has wasted taxpayer dollars. It has limited patients' choice. It has hurt small business. It has failed to achieve its goal of universal coverage. Most objectionable, it has created shortages and waiting lists. Promoters predicted that the Massachusetts plan would lower health-care costs, but -- so far -- costs are moving in the opposite direction....

Twenty-six percent (26%) of Massachusetts voters say their state’s health care reform effort has been a success. A new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey in the state finds that 37% say the reform effort has been a failure, while another 37% are not sure. Only 10% of Bay State voters say the quality of health care has gotten better as a result of the reform plan while 29% say it has gotten worse. Most (53%) say the quality of care has not changed. As for cost, 21% say the reform has made health care more affordable in Massachusetts. Twenty-seven percent (27%)...

Only 26 percent of likely voters in Massachusetts believe health care reform has been a success and just 21 percent believe reform has made health care more affordable, according to newly released poll results. The Rasmussen Reports poll of 500 likely Massachusetts voters, taken in April, also found only 10 percent said the quality of health care is getting better under the reform law rules here. Most of those polled on April 16, 2009 said they weren’t sure whether reform was a success or failure (37 percent), that there’s been no change in health care affordability under reform (44 percent)...

Future perfect Can a clothing-optional policy teach her young girls to be comfortable as women? By Jennifer Mattern June 28, 2009 I ain’t what I used to be. But my daughters don’t know that. They can’t imagine me any other way -- this soft, paunchy creature they have come to refer to as “Mom.” I tell them to take a good look, that someday they are likely to look much like I do now. They laugh. Preposterous! I grew up in a household where everyone’s jiggly bits were kept under wraps. Only once, when I was very young, do I...

HANOVER, Mass. — A Massachusetts prosecutor says a 6-year-old girl was kidnapped by a would-be rapist but managed to escape from his apartment despite being in leg shackles. Plymouth District Attorney Timothy Cruz says the girl was found Saturday afternoon as police searched the apartment complex in Hanover, about 20 miles southeast of Boston, where she and the suspect live. Her mother reported her missing at about 1:30 p.m. Cruz says the girl pointed officers to an apartment where she was taken. They arrested 26-year-old Justin Shine after a struggle.

Massachusetts' Commonwealth Connector health reforms have reduced the state's uninsured population to less than 3% of residents, the lowest among all states. But a recent survey found an uptick last fall in adults reporting difficulty accessing certain types of care. The outcome of the Massachusetts health system reforms has national implications. Democrats in Congress have offered or are drafting health reform bills based on many of the state-adopted principles, including a health insurance exchange, subsidized private health insurance for low-and moderate-income residents, a requirement for individuals to have health insurance, and a mandate for employers to offer health insurance to...

WAPO reports: Kerry's spokeswoman now tells The Sleuth the senator really didn't mean what he said, though his clarification would hardly qualify as an apology. "We stand corrected, the truth is every Democrat hopes Governor Palin is in the public eye for a long, long time, especially on the 2012 presidential ballot," Kerry spokeswoman Jodi Seth says. "Lately it's been Vice President Cheney that everyone hopes would lose the cameras and go for a long leisurely hike on the Appalachian Trail. And good grief, if anyone thinks John Kerry is afraid of strong, smart women, they sure haven't met his...

"The prevailing narrative today is that Romney has risen to the top of the 2012 Invisible Primary because he's the last man standing. True, Romney hasn't made any obvious mistakes. But his rising standing is a consequence of decisions he's made, and not just a result of the luck." "It's a credit to his communications team that he can appear on television once every two or three weeks and seem to be part of the dialog. When Romney has something to say, he'll find a venue to say it. On auto restructuring, on the Republican stimulus plan, on a free...

Massachusetts Sen. Kerry has joined the fraternity of jokesters using Sarah Palin as a punch line. Kerry was meeting a group of business and civic leaders in the nation's capital when he decided to play comedian, according to The Boston Herald. He was talking about the disappearance of South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford, the Alaska governor's Republican peer. "Too bad," he said, "if a governor had to go missing it couldn't have been the governor of Alaska. You know, Sarah Palin." Kerry's joke came 24 hours before Sanford turned up to admit an affair with a woman living in Argentina,...

“Who is this guy?” That was my recurring thought watching Gov. Mark Sanford’s slo-mo train wreck of a press conference on Wednesday. I know Mark Sanford from my days as a GOP political consultant in South Carolina. I introduced him at a speech to the libertarian Cato Institute before he became governor. Mark Sanford was smooth. He was smart. Above all, Mark Sanford was cool. In many ways, he was the Republican Barack Obama. Sanford is a true small-government conservative, an ideology that, like Obama’s MoveOn.org liberalism, isn’t very popular. But like Obama, Mark Sanford had the political skills to...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Supreme Court said Thursday that criminal defendants have a constitutional right to cross-examine the forensic analysts who prepare laboratory reports on illegal drugs and other evidence used at trial. The court on Thursday ruled 5-4 for a defendant who was convicted of cocaine trafficking, partly because of crime lab analysis. Luis Melendez-Diaz challenged lab analysis that confirmed cocaine was in plastic bags found in the car he was riding in. Rather than accept the report, Melendez-Diaz said he should be allowed to question the lab analyst about testing methods, how the evidence was preserved and other...

GARDNER, MA — A Park Street resident is being held on bail on charges that he assaulted his wife and threw her out of a second-story window on Father's Day. Derek R. Putnam, 36, of 86 Park St. was arraigned Monday before Gardner District Court Judge Patrick A. Fox on charges of aggravated assault and battery, assault and battery and assault and battery with a dangerous weapon (concrete stairs). He was held on $10,000 cash bail or $100,000 with surety, and a pretrial hearing was scheduled for July 17. In setting bail, Judge Fox indicated that the reason for the...

A former Romney administration public safety czar and Bay State police chief is scrambling to save his reputation after he was caught in an embarrassing scandal over an affair with a reporter covering him in his new post as Milwaukee’s top cop. Edward A. Flynn, who was Springfield police commissioner before becoming Milwaukee’s police chief in January 2008, was forced to publicly acknowledge the “painful truth” of the illicit tryst after intimate e-mail exchanges with the journalist surfaced and were published in a Brew City newspaper. The married reporter, Jessica McBride, 39, a college journalism lecturer and freelancer, and Flynn,...

Don’t be too hard on Waffles. His humor’s always been laced with nastiness, which is why he periodically finds himself in clusterfarks over “botched jokes.” It’s not that he hates Palin. He’s just a jerk.

WASHINGTON – U.S. Sen. John Kerry must have been channeling his inner Letterman yesterday. The Bay State senator was telling a group of business and civic leaders in town at his invitation about the “bizarre’’ tale of how South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford had “disappeared for four days’’ and claimed to be hiking along the Appalachian Trail, but no one was really certain of his whereabouts. “Too bad,’’ Kerry said, “if a governor had to go missing it couldn’t have been the governor of Alaska. You know, Sarah Palin.’’ The Democratic-centric crowd laughed. Of course, Kerry couldn’t know that 24-hours...

WASHINGTON – U.S. Sen. John Kerry must have been channeling his inner Letterman yesterday. The Bay State senator was telling a group of business and civic leaders in town at his invitation about the “bizarre’’ tale of how South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford had “disappeared for four days’’ and claimed to be hiking along the Appalachian Trail, but no one was really certain of his whereabouts.

In Part I, I set the groundwork for this discussion by providing the details that the so-called mainstream media won’t. I finished by asking some basic questions: Why would the SJC take up this case on appeal? How would the SJC be viewed by the citizens of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts if they indeed were to rule against Runyan? What if they rule in favor of Runyan? What, if any would be the short or long term ramifications? Before I answer those hypothetical questions let’s review some more historical context to help you understand where we are today. The Second...

The Boston Globe and its largest union reached a tentative agreement last night on $10 million in wage and benefit cuts, following three months of bitter labor talks that threatened to close the 137-year-old paper.

The debate over achieving universal health care can seem hopelessly confusing. But the issues are actually pretty simple when you consider the lessons of Massachusetts. In 2006, state lawmakers seeking to broaden health coverage made it illegal to be uninsured. It works like this: Employers have to offer you a health plan. If you are jobless or don't like your employer's plan, you must buy your own. If you don't get one, you pay a stiff fine. This strategy—known as an employer and individual "mandate"—forms the backbone of the national health reform bills now making their way through Congress. On...

The F-22 Raptor, the most advanced fighter jet in the world, is in a dogfight with a tough adversary: Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.). Frank, the chairman of the Financial Services Committee, said Tuesday he is “vigorously” opposed to Lockheed Martin’s F-22 fighter jet. Frank has called recent congressional efforts to add more money for the production of the F-22 a “major assault” on President Obama’s efforts to control military spending. Frank is intent on striking $369 million authorized for the procurement of advance materials and items necessary to build 12 additional F-22s. House defense authorizers, in a surprising move, last...

B A controversial law in Massachusetts could go national if Congressman Barney Frank gets his way. Frank has filed a bill that would eliminate federal penalties for personal possession of less than 100 grams of marijuana. It would also make the penalty for using marijuana in public just $100. "I think John Stuart Mill had it right in the 1850s," said Congressman Frank, "when he argued that individuals should have the right to do what they want in private, so long as they don't hurt anyone else. It's a matter of personal liberty. Moreover, our courts are already stressed and...

Harvard University announced this morning that it plans to lay off 275 staff members as the college grapples with budget pressures caused by a precipitous endowment decline.

Funding for homosexual programs in the schools in next year's state Massachusetts budget has been hugely derailed by a flood of pro-family pressure -- including hundreds of faxes, emails, and phone calls -- over the last several weeks directed at the committee deciding on final budget allocations. All required funding for the "GLBT commission" -- earmarked or un-earmarked -- has been severely scaled back from last year. This represents a victory for pro-family forces over the powerful homosexual lobby, which put considerable pressure on the committee to require funding for the GLBT commission.

FOR SALE: 142-year-old, once-thriving Central Massachusetts business. Future potential and revenue stream uncertain, but general agreement that product produced is valuable, even necessary. Business last sold for $296 million; current asking price TBD. While there is no for sale sign in front of the Telegram & Gazette building at 20 Franklin St. in Worcester or its printing operation in Millbury, newspaper industry analysts say it is abundantly clear that the New York Times Co., the T&G’s parent company, wants to divest itself of the region’s largest daily newspaper. The Times Co. bought the T&G in 2000, putting it under the...

Middlesex District Attorney Gerry LeoneThere are a few social issues in this country that, if judged by the output of so called mainstream media outlets, seem to be driven by pure emotion rather than logic and the laws of our republic. One could, I believe, argue that the top two issues falling into that category are those of abortion and gun control. I believe that despite the constant flow of emotional rhetoric and lack of facts from these sources Americans can and will ultimately insist that logic and the law prevail, but not unlike the dreadful Dred Scott decision these...

The human ear is an amazing device. In a recent press release, an MIT engineer said that the ear is “like a super radio with 3,500 parallel channels.”[1] In fact, its design inspired the development of a new space and energy-saving radio receiver chip...

We will be standing out with signs at WGGB channel 40 in Springfield MA at 5:00PM to protest the coverage Obama and the healthcare plan will be receiving on ABC news that day and evening. Looking for suggestions for signs (I am not creative).

The state’s highest court plans to review the constitutionality of a recently challenged state law that requires gun owners to lock their weapons, making it the first test in Massachusetts of a landmark US Supreme Court ruling that Americans have the constitutional right to own guns and stow them as they see fit. The SJC decided to review the law less than a year after a Lowell District Court judge dismissed firearms charges against a Billerica man whose handicapped son was accused of shooting a BB gun at a neighbor and who then showed police officers where his father kept...

The Cape Cod Commission has submitted an appeal to the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, claiming the state Energy Facilities Siting Board overstepped its authority when it overruled the commission and gave Cape Wind all the local and regional permits it needs to move forward; Gov. Deval Patrick sent some folks to the Massachusetts Maritime Academy to hear people's thoughts on placing wind turbines on public lands; the first floating wind turbine has been installed; and a new survey finds that a goodly portion of Massachusetts residents are concerned that NIMBYism has impeded the Cape Wind project. We'll get to all...

Last September Sen. Barack Obama promised that under his health-care proposal "you'll be able to get the same kind of coverage that members of Congress give themselves." On Monday, President Obama repeated that promise in a speech to the American Medical Association. It's not true. The president is barnstorming the nation, urging swift approval of legislation that is taking shape in Congress. This legislation -- the Affordable Health Choices Act that's being drafted by Sen. Edward Kennedy's staff and the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee -- will push Americans into stingy insurance plans with tight, HMO-style controls. It specifically...

Charter school teacher suspended for "disturbing" note By L.E. Crowley A physics teacher at the South Shore Charter School has been suspended after police were informed of a “disturbing” and “violent” note he scrawled at his desk during class. The teacher, Max Yarmolinsky, will face misdemeanor charges in the incident.

Let’s say you’re one of millions of Americans with a Verizon contract. Let’s say you really want an iPhone. And let’s say you don’t have hundreds of dollars necessary to break your contract, ditch your BlackBerry, and hop on board with AT&T. Right now, the whole furor over the 3G S is probably pretty frustrating, right? Well, now you’ve got someone on your side. Yesterday, Sen. John Kerry and three others on the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation fired off a note to Michael J. Copps, the acting chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, asking Copps to look...

Abortionist George Tiller's death brought an outpouring of national media headlines and Congressional condolences to his family by a resolution approved by the US House. Laura Hope Smith's death at the hands of an abortionist was and continues to be ignored and her mother's effort to bring it to the attention of her senator was stonewalled. "Where was the press when my daughter Laura died at the hands of an abortionist?" asks Eileen Smith, Laura's mother. A media search shows mostly news reports from nonprofit organizations, religious news and other alternative media. Laura's death was mentioned 10 months later in...

Talks between the Boston Globe's largest union and management wrapped up around 4 a.m. today, after two marathon sessions in two days failed to resolve disagreement over how to achieve $10 million in cuts. Globe spokesman Robert Powers said that talks are tentatively scheduled to resume next Monday. Boston Newspaper Guild president Dan Totten released a statement early Wednesday saying, "We are optimistic about the prospects for reaching an agreement after our most recent talks with the Company. The discussions will continue today." The two sides are scheduled to talk informally by phone today, with formal negotiations resuming next week....

So now The New York Times is quoting “experts” saying the Boston Globe may only be worth one dollar - a buck! Eight bits! OK, here goes. I’ve got a hunch, I’m gonna bet a bunch. Pinch Sulzberger, if you’re listening, I am going to offer you a premium for your dreadful sheet - two bucks. I will take the entire rag off your hands - even the weekly editorial about how wonderful Barney Frank is. Terms: cash. I just counted out eight quarters from the change cup in my car. That’s my last best offer. I still have three...

Massachusetts wants even more tax revenue—from New Hampshire.___ Should New Hampshire businesses have to collect Massachusetts sales taxes from border-crossing shoppers? That’s the issue in Town Fair Tire v. Massachusetts, a case before the Bay State’s Supreme Judicial Court with ramifications for commerce and constitutional law well beyond New England. In 2003, a Massachusetts Department of Revenue audit uncovered invoices from three New Hampshire outlets of the Town Fair Tire company (TFT) to customers with Massachusetts addresses. Because Connecticut-based TFT also has locations in Massachusetts—and therefore benefits from various public services there, from police protection to road maintenance—the Massachusetts Appellate...

Massachusetts lawmakers are considering what is commonly referred to now as a "bathroom bill." Activists want to add transgender to the Bay State's existing "hate crimes" bill. Evelyn Reilly, director of public policy for the Massachusetts Family Institute, tells OneNewsNow that lawmakers who support the measure are bowing to a fraction of the population -- and in that process, are endangering women and children. "[For example] if...a man believes or pretends to believe that he is actually a woman, then you could not question, challenge, or stop him from entering a woman's bathroom, shower, locker room, fitness facility, or whatever,"...

Family advocates are outraged by a prom held at Boston City Hall that was open to children apparently as young as 12 featuring crossdressers, homosexual heavy petting, suspected drug use and a leather-clad doorman who teaches sexual bondage classes. Children from middle schools and high schools across Massachusetts on May 9 attended a Youth Pride Day event ending with a prom inside of Boston City Hall sponsored by the Boston Alliance of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Youth, or BAGLY, a group seated on the Massachusetts Commission for GLBT Youth. Boston Mayor Thomas Menino issued a proclamation welcoming homosexual and...

A small furniture manufacturer based in Arizona recently received a nexus survey — a questionnaire about the company's business activity — from the state of Washington. With just two retail customers in the Evergreen State and a lone sales rep making an annual visit there, the Arizona company returned the form and thought that was the end of the matter. No such luck. Washington assessed the Arizona furniture anufacturer "a substantial income tax," according to Marvin Kirsner, a tax attorney with Greenberg Traurig who represents the company. "One salesperson was there for a total of three days over four years....

Family advocates are outraged by a prom held at Boston City Hall that was open to children apparently as young as 12 featuring crossdressers, homosexual heavy petting, suspected drug use and a leather-clad doorman who teaches sexual bondage classes. Children from middle schools and high schools across Massachusetts on May 9 attended a Youth Pride Day event ending with a prom inside of Boston City Hall sponsored by the Boston Alliance of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Youth, or BAGLY, a group seated on the Massachusetts Commission for GLBT Youth. Boston Mayor Thomas Menino issued a proclamation welcoming homosexual and transgender...