MORE ARTICLES
- UCLA’s Ronald Mellor on Tacitus, Roman Emperors, & DespotismMarch 27, 2024 - 12:12 pm
- Testimony – Special Joint Committee on Initiative PetitionsMarch 26, 2024 - 3:36 pm
- Poor Housing Incentives: Tax Credits Reward Politicians Not Neighbors in NeedMarch 26, 2024 - 11:40 am
- Tufts Prof. Elizabeth Setren on METCO’s Proven ResultsMarch 20, 2024 - 12:12 pm
- Biden’s Budget Breakdown: Pragmatic Progress or Political PosturingMarch 19, 2024 - 2:25 pm
- Sunshine Week 2024March 14, 2024 - 10:15 am
- Pulitzer Winner Joan Hedrick on Harriet Beecher Stowe & Uncle Tom’s CabinMarch 13, 2024 - 12:03 pm
- The Necessity of Transparent Tax Revenue Reporting: MA Provides a Shining ExampleMarch 13, 2024 - 10:47 am
- Genetic Therapy Revolution: Benefits and Barriers for Medicine’s New HorizonMarch 12, 2024 - 1:46 pm
- Dr. Adrian Mims on The Calculus Project & STEMMarch 6, 2024 - 11:53 am
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How Not to Advocate for Transit
/0 Comments/in Blog, Blog: Better Government, News /byYesterday’s Globe covered the expansion of the Green Line into Somerville and Medford. The article talked to newcomers to that community (who generally wanted the subway) and ‘old-timers’ (who generally opposed it). One quote stood out: “It will be that much more connected to civilization,” said Elizabeth Bolton, a real estate agent who moved here in 2005. Eh, I don’t think the negative space around that comment are great for building coalitions. The notion that Medford is somehow disconnected from ‘civilization’ will not endear you to the ‘old-timers’.
Hmmm, Astrid Glynn returns
/0 Comments/in Blog, Blog: Better Government, News /byNew York State Transportation Commissioner Astrid Glynn is resigning to return to the Boston area. I wonder if there is a soft landing awaiting her here in a transportation-related position?
Try to make your point more skillfully. . . err, I mean more subtly
/1 Comment/in Blog, News /by Liam DayAs I have been in the past critical of Michael Graham’s column, I thought I would (as I have also done in the past) give him props when he deserves it. His column on Harvard’s exclusion of the ROTC from its campus appears in the Herald today opposite a similarly themed op-ed in the Globe. Both authors argue (correctly, I believe) it is time to bring ROTC back to Harvard after a 40-year absence. In contrast to the Globe piece, however, Graham’s column is a monument to nuance and careful argumentation. Frank Schaeffer paints Harvard (actually, the entire Ivy League) and its students with the broadest possible brush (a polite way of saying he stereotypes). Here is what he believes […]
The Revolving Door Also Swings Close to Home
/0 Comments/in Better Government, Blog, News /by Liam DayThere’s been some hand-wringing recently over the increasingly oligarchical nature of our federal government. The revolving door between D.C. and Wall Street is and should be of concern. (See Blue Mass Group, Salon.com and The Atlantic.) In all of this, however, it should not be missed that the same door is held open between Beacon Hill and the corporate sector here in Massachusetts. The Governor’s new Transportation Secretary (about which enough has probably already been written) and his Stimulus Czar both came back to state government after very lucrative stints in the private sector, which were set up by previous stints in state government, from which they both cashed out, the former by remaining a legal consultant to the Pike […]
Truth Telling
/0 Comments/in Blog, Blog: Better Government, News /byAn eye-opening quote from the CBO’s analysis of the proposed Truth in Writing act (my emphasis added): S. 574 would amend federal law to require all federal agencies within one year to use plain writing (clear, concise, well-organized, and readily identifiable to the intended reader) in all documents except for regulations. Thus, we are lead to believe that regulations will continue to be written in opaque, lengthy, disjointed, and obscure bureaucratese.