I give props to VP Mike Pence

faced with the exceedingly simple task of finding a Rabbi to deliver a few bland prayers at a campaign event the damn fool somehow found a "Jew for Jesus" (basically a sneaking evangelical xian cult) and there achieved Something Remarkable if entirely by accident.
The VP managed in one swell foop to UNITE the Jewish Community in the US if only in revulsion for such a crude provocative act.
Tasteless as well in the wake of the anti-semitic "Tree of Life" massacre, to indulge what amounts to evangelical christians with a taste for Jewish Cosplay.
But then this is Mike Pence we are talking about, dumb and boring make up the whole of his political brand.
Someday though, I'd like to address this obsessive need to pray over our politicians at public events, it sure betrays an unconscious lack of trust in my books.  I'd prefer politicians that are honest, not necessarily saved, because any damn fool can claim to have a reservation on God's Footstool as far as I'm concerned.

Okay this one is a riot...

The Boston Globe has formally endorsed Daniel Fishman, a libertarian for State Auditor.  The Value Structure, on Morrissey Boulevard is utterly inexplicable.  The reasoning offered in the above cited link is that the democratic incumbent Suzanne Bump has (among other things) bungled the investigation into the State Police Payroll Scandal.  This would be The Exact Same State Police Payroll Scandal over which the Incumbent republican Governor  presides and yes that is the same Charlie "Lumpy"Baker that the Globe Endorsed for reelection yesterday!!!
This is the same Charlie Baker who has yet to fire anyone at the State Police despite a steady stream of indictments for chiseling, obstruction of justice & Ghod knows what else!
This is the same Charlie Baker who seems content to keep abreast of said scandal by reading the Boston Globe every morning...
Never has neglect and mediocrity been so ringingly validated, The Globe has hit rock goddamn bottom what they excoriate in Suzanne they endorse in Lumpy.  What more can anyone say???

Lumpy Gets Endorsed by the Boston Globe...

Governor Baker's reelection was endorsed by the Boston Globe via an unsigned editorial today.  Its worth reading if you are a fan of half hearted commendations and vague yearnings for the vanished moderate republicanism of yesteryear.  Sheer Mediocrity Has Never Been So Celebrated. The Globe also earnestly wishes that Baker would be more of an Anti-Trump leader in the GOP once reelected.
I'm advising Morrissey Boulevard as a subscriber mind you, not to hold their collective breath.
The time to have done something about Trump was over two years ago in the Presidential Primary, Baker might have been able to bring in a delegation that instructed to oppose Trump but Baker declined to do that, he "Waved Through" the candidate.  Since that time, Baker's "opposition" to Trump has been muted, terse and rhetorical, The Boston Globe cannot expect anything more from Lumpy.
But then again this is an ongoing institutional bias on the part of The Boston Globe, they are seemingly desperate to foster moderate republicanism in the face of the GOP's headlong lurch into dark web rightical chic lunacy.  What Morrissey Boulevard doesn't realize is that they are giving CPR to what amounts to a skeleton...
I have to say I am disappointed in the Boston Globe but not surprised,  despite a spirited effort from democrat Jay Gonzalez they've largely relegated the entire campaign to the second and third pages of the Metro Section, which is pretty much a huge media win for Baker right there.  Gonzalez at least has at last got some adverts on TV at least he thinks the fight ought to be made come what may....

Shabbat Shalom

and peace to the ashes of all who perished yesterday at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh.

So it falls to me to ask is antisemitic violence our "new normal" in the USA?  If so, then we've degraded ourselves past the hope or recovery and may sadly  board up shop and decamp for the caves.

Meanwhile the President's response seems to have something to do with arming the Rabbis....

So we'd best make sure that this is not, the new normal.  Some very stupid and violent people out there have felt themselves, authorized and energized to commit heinous crimes lately...which leads to my other question which is: "If they don't get their fantasized result on election day, on whom and where will they lash out?"


I think thats a question that carries an urgent impetus....

BTW...

according to a new study we could well be underestimating the number of opioid addicts out there. Meanwhile Charlie Baker still has TV commercials out there running on a quarter hourly basis touting progress in the "opioid crisis".  Oh yet again its late October in a gubernatorial race in Massachusetts and the incumbent drifts thru the heavens like a untethered blimp, murmuring the occasional sleepy cliche' and pretending all is well.
Oh and National Grid/Columbia Gas have already punted the deadline to get the heat back on in Andover/Lawrence.  That one made the Metro Section of the Globe today...I only remark on this in passing because outside my window a nice cold wet Nor'easter is raging on.  But the Baker/Polito campaign blimp wallows along, untroubled.
And lets not forget that collection of democratic mayors who have eagerly endorsed Lumpy's reelection bid right there on camera for all to see...blimp-tenders every one of them.  I like Rivera up in Lawrence but I won't weep any salt tears if someone primaries him and all of his fellow-travelers at the next election...assuming we still have elections.

Lumpy is a die hard republican in the sense that he'll never ever regret his complacent performance in office, the rest of us though, the ones that can afford to live in the Commonwealth, will rue the day believe me.

No Pipe Bomb Sent to Me as Yet...

which is a poor result for some fifteen years of "sarcastic rant driven chatter" (per Boston Magazine)...

But as usual, I digress, I don't think this is any longer about "the decline of civility", its officially now about the Survival of Constitutional Governance, I'll take a great deal of incivility if I can guarantee the survival of the latter.
That being the case we have to consider the possibility of escalation, from below or above if
mid term election results are not favorable to our opponents. We must also be prepared for escalation even if said results are in their favor.
I am not saying the country is falling apart, or civil war looms, I am saying right now, the other guys are a lot further down the road to division and ruin than we are, shouting at Ted Cruz in a restaurant is hardly Maquis Tactics in the face of pipe bombs.

"A house divided against itself, cannot stand...I do not expect the Union to be dissolved — I do not expect the house to fall — but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all the other. "

Abraham Lincoln, 1858

If Martin O'Malley really wants to run for President in 2020

assuming we still have elections or a country by then, He could do no worse than by promising to Stand By The U.S. Constitution and also End the Malign Practice of Phishing Phone Calls aka "Voice Phishing" or "Vishing".  No Joke Mah Frenz, My Ninety Five Year Old Mother still gets at least two of these vicious shakedown calls a day from ViOP Boiler Rooms the world over.  Thank Ghod almighty she has all her marbles and knows enough to hang up...but the calls are intrusive, abusive and seemingly aimed to defraud the Elderly of the USA en masse.
Lets Protect Our Elections from Foreign Interference certainly, but lets put a stop to "Vishing" as well...the two notions seem to dovetail together in my mind.
Dropping the Qualification Age for Medicare is ... Great don't get me wrong, but ending for good these maddeningly phone calls from Far Off Lands will yield a tremendous electoral windfall for the Democrats.

Elizabeth, Martin, Joe, Seth....ya listening?