Hey Facisthusetts!  Cause prohibition has such a great track record. 

The Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals is looking for a lot of good homes for goats after a Western Massachusetts farmer — surprised at the rate at which the animals were breeding — surrendered 46 animals to the rescue group.

aflanigan wrote:
No way, dude! That could never happen in Massachusetts—it would be illegal.

If an armed society is a polite society (to paraphrase sci fi writer Robert Heinlein), then, as the Bee Gees might have sung, "the courtesy light is always on in Massachusetts"



City Council Member Accuses Fall RIver Mayor of Threatening Him 

Way to go Massachusetts, one small step at a time!

Green Party Candidate Wins Non-Partisan Election in Massachusetts

Published on June 6, 2014, by Richard Winger  in Uncategorized.

On May 13, Damon Jespersen, a registered member of the Green Party, was elected Selectman of Newbury, Massachusetts.  He placed first, and ousted an incumbent.  Even though the Green Party is not now ballot-qualified in Massachusetts, election officials keep track of registrants in certain unqualified parties that have asked for registration rights.  The Massachusetts Green Party expects to regain its qualified status in November 2014, because it is running for three statewide partisan offices, and expects to poll at least 3% for at least one of them, if not all three offices.  The three offices are Secretary of State, Auditor, and Treasurer.  Minor parties always poll 3% for these offices in Massachusetts.

Massachusetts Loves Itself

One thing the struggling Bay State GOP needs to remember: airing your dirty laundry in public doesn't help your image with voters much, particularly if it involves illegal activities.

Fisher asked for $1 million to drop lawsuit, GOP says

 Mugro wrote: 
I'm not saying it shouldn't be addressed, but I am saying that yes they do just happen. The base for the reference can any one of thousands of things that kids are exposed to. I mentioned earlier recalling a round of kids drawing swastikas in my elementary school. My school was a hippie haven in Denver in the 70's. There wasn't a lot of Hitler reverence going on at these kids homes, the just found a button to push and they pushed it. These days it would be considered hate speech, but at the time it was just generally addressed as an inappropriate thing to do, a bit of History was taught and the message behind the symbol was learned and the kids went on to other things.

The article says basically, kids at several schools are doing dumb racist things. They identified that as a serious problem and reached out to local groups for assistance in dealing with it. They have a plan and are implementing it. Where crimes were committed (graffiti vandalism and hate speech) they police have been involved.  This just doesn't sound like the response you would get if Bedford really did have a large subculture that was actively anti-Semetic.

 islander wrote: 
Kids at that age are very impressionable. I know. I have one. He's nine. If my kid EVER engaged in any bigoted or racist behavior, he would have to answer to me. And it would not be pretty. 

I agree with your later comment that sometimes parents are blinded by their love for their kids. Guilty as charged. But I am very sensitive to what my kid says and what he does, and if he makes some sort of offhand comment that needs challenging, I challenge it. I am very aware that my child is going to listen to what I say and what I do and use me as a role model. That is why I am always talking to him about situations and motives. We explore prejudices and try to overcome them. It's not always easy but it is a necessary task not only in raising a child but keeping my own perspective in check.

These anti-semitic occurrences don't just happen. There is a base somewhere in what the child hears or sees. I have seen how the anti-Isreal lobby has grown, and it disturbs me. Because some people (little and big) may interpret this anti-Isreal rhetoric as anti-semitism, and that ain't cool. 

 islander wrote: 
Yep.

 ScottFromWyoming wrote: 
I'm not a parent, so take this with a grain of salt. Parents often have a blind spot around their own offspring. A lot of parents see everything their kids do as cute and harmless. What would immediately raise flags in other kids is tempered in their own household. Also: teenagers are reasonably good at hiding stuff. 

 islander wrote: 
Some kids in Jr. High, a couple years ahead of me, thought KKK robes would be cool at halloween. They'd seen a picture and thought it was a secret society like the Shriners or DeMolay, (which is a different discussion)... they just thought the getup was creepy cool. I was maybe 6th grade and had zero idea what any of it meant. But yeah, kids try shit out sometimes. Those KKK boys were shut down before they got halfway down their own street.

And yes, I do wonder, a little, about how they got the outfits together without any parents saying that's a no-go. But I don't like to think about that too much because I ran around with those guys for years. 

 islander wrote: 

Oh yea, I hear you and like I said that does not neccessarily mean that I think anything should be done about on an institutional level.

 sirdroseph wrote: 
Kids, especially at the elementary age are pretty mean. It's part of finding boundaries. I don't think it should be tolerated, but I bet any reasonable look would find a lot of stuff beyond the anti-semetic things noted.  Probably a good portion of ti racist, classist, sexist and many other things we want to dial out of them. But this is the process - you have to have a point of "okay, that's too far, reign it back in". I recall a lot of kids drawing swastikas for a period in my elementary school - and we were a hippie haven (Montessori, open school). We weren't farming nazis (band name), the kids just didn't have the background for it at the time. 

 islander wrote: 

True and I am no fan of over reacting PC believe me, but this does indicate a trend of possible bigotry in the home of these children.  They do learn it somewhere and it is usually in the home, my dad tried his best to make me a racist, but I never bought it.  Some kids are more impressionable.

 Mugro wrote: 
The article says it was elementary school kids. The examples presented were certainly not behavior I'd want encouraged, but it sounds like pretty standard elementary school stupidity. Kids do/say dumb things. It's part of their process of learning. They should be corrected, but I don't see anything there that indicates a systemic kind of problem.  I bet there is also a lot of ugly insinuations about who has cooties and who they got them from.

 aflanigan wrote: 
Bedford is one of the richest communities in Massachusetts, home of the liberal elites in the north east, a town that voted for Barack Obama 59% against Mitt Romney in 2012. Sounds like liberal intolerance to me. After all, Israel is terribly out of fashion these days with the Obama White House.... 

21st century antisemitism, courtesy of our Bay-State neighbors.

Bedford, MA Seeks Help in Anti-Semitic Incidents

I thought Mugro would enjoy this.  As he loves to point out, the Bay State has enjoyed control by the Democratic politicians for many years.  This leadership has, inevitably, driven the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to the brink of destruction the pinnacle of success:

Don't Mess With Massachusetts

 aflanigan wrote: 


Who me?

Marsha filed these suits in honor of Baaney Fwank's ("Barney Frank") retirement.