Terry Cowgill

‘Squeezed’ Out of First Place

Want to see a really cool Red Sox blog? Click on the image at right.

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What a night it was last night for Red Sox fans. First they beat the Twins 5-2 at about 9:40 p.m. but they don’t know whether they’ll have the AL East title until the conclusion of the Yanks-Orioles game in Baltimore.

So the Bosox players head to the locker room unsure of their fate. Thousands of fans stay at Fenway to watch the conclusion of the Yankees’ game on the video screen high over the center field bleachers.

The table was set with the great closer Mariano Rivera trying to hold a 9-6 lead. He blew it, allowing Jay Payton to hit a bases-clearing triple to tie the game and send it into extra innings.

Then the Birds loaded the bases with only one out. Melvin Mora steps to the plate in what seemed to me to be an obvious bunting situation. He lays one down to his left and the winning run scores.

My question is why wasn’t Yanks third baseman Wilson Betemit (and most of the rest of the infield, for that matter) playing in so that they might have a prayer of getting the lead runner? Come to think of it, why wasn’t A-Rod playing at third? Would he have played that ball better?

Too Much $$$$ ?

A friend (and an activist Republican) recently asked me the following:

Why when the Republicans were out raising Democrats was there an overwhelming media meme that there is “too much money in politics.” But now that the Dems are out raising the Republicans, there is little or no concern on the part of the “watchdogs of the public?” Just asking …

A fair question, albeit a rhetorical one. Most members of the MSM are either Democrats or independents sympathetic to Dems. Polls over the years have borne this out.

There are exceptions, to be sure. Locally, there are a couple of scribes I know who worked for big media and who come immediately to mind: One guy who wrote for Newsweek and another for the NYT. Both are somewhat conservative- or libertarian-leaning. And our LJ newsroom has a nice mix of writers and editors with diverse worldviews. But for every righty I’ve met in journalism, there have been at least two lefties.

Moreover, reporters love a good story and nothing fills the bill better than the haves vs the have-nots. You know, it’s the old maxim that the job of a newspaper should be to “comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.”

Recently, I suspect it’s one of the reasons the Boston Globe picked up so swiftly on the story of those two disappointed inner-city football recruits who were turned away from Salisbury School at the last minute. It fits the template: hardscrabble kids get screwed by elite private school.

And note the language of the Globe reporter, describing Salisbury as “an elite boarding academy” with “a leafy campus”; the two recruits, on the other hand, were yearning to be “free from the soundtrack of gunfire and police sirens in their gang-ridden neighborhoods.” For a reporter inclined to this sort of thing, it’s a narrative that almost writes itself.

So to answer your question, old buddy, there’s no great hue and cry in the media about money in politics now for the same reason the booming Reagan years were “the decade of greed” while the equally booming Clinton years were … what? “Good for America?”

Hillary: ‘Send Babies to College’

Update noon Tuesday: According to First Read, “[HIllary’s] $5,000 “baby bonds” proposal may have given fodder to Republicans. “The baby bonds proposal is one of the few mistakes Hillary Clinton has made in her campaign,” said University of Virginia Professor Larry Sabato in  the New York Times. ‘Should Clinton become the Democratic nominee, she may have handed a powerful issue to the Republican candidate.” 

Update 7 a.m. Saturday: As usual, the NY Post has a hilarious take on this matter, including its estimated cost of $20 billion annually based on $5,000 times 4 million (the number of births per year).

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Well, not really … but did she actually say this? Give every baby born in America a $5,000 account that will grow and can be used later to pay for college?

As is often the case with such big-spending proposals, it appears she did not say how she would pay for it. Raise taxes on “the rich?” Restore tax rates to pre-Bush levels? I guess that would mean I will see an increase.

After all, I’m probably regarded by the IRS as rich since I live in Lakeville and own a home that’s increased substantially in value since I bought it five years ago. Heck, I can afford it. I don’t need to make that $100 annual gift to the Salisbury Ambulance Service. My son doesn’t need new soccer cleats. My daughter doesn’t really need dance lessons.

And I don’t need to squirrel money away for their higher education. I can fork more of my income over to the federal government so that someone else can save for college. It’s so simple. Why didn’t Hillary think of it before?

I have been watching with great interest Hillary’s remarkable transformation from arch lib to moderate. My central question has always been whether she is striking a pose or whether her evolution is genuine and would be reflected in the way she would govern as president.

Hillary has a tendency to hyperventilate before African American audiences. This latest pander bear proposal does not inspire great confidence that she’s truly evolved.

LJ 09.27.07

Hi. Sorry this has been so late but it’s been a crazy day. I had lots of other work to do and then had to go to the Region 1 BOE meeting on the NEASC report at 4 p.m. (more on that later) …

On this week’s LJ front page, we have my lead story on the real estate scene in the Northwest Corner and how it has or has not been affected by the crisis gripping the credit industry. There is a compelling update on the sad case of Michael Bradway. And HVRHS football has started off its season with two victories in a row for the first time in recent memory. And a guest Nature’s Notebook column by the legendary Carl Williams.

Inside, Doug Richardson is resigning his chairmanship of the Salisbury Republican Town Committee, Christopher Buckley (himself the son of a famous Republican and author of the hilarious Thank You For Smoking) is coming home to Sharon soon, a profile on Kent’s new rep to the Region 1 BOE and a finely penned column by Tony Piel which I would nonetheless love to deconstruct if I had the time.

In the B section, we have a crazy meeting of the North Canaan P&Z, Ed Herrman will headline Words & Music this weekend in Falls Village and a substantial update by yours truly on the area’s private schools (see also the accompanying editorial). And in Compass, Marsden Epworth reviews the Goshen Players’ “treacly” Enchanted April.

Enjoy and thanks for reading!

P.S. Click here for the podcast of my appearance on Marshall & Mike.

Warm Colors

The high today was close to 90, but fall colors are still making their way down here from the north country. This view is through my neighbor’s front yard and into their back yard. I believe that’s Selleck Hill that you can see through the summer-like haze.

Go Back Behind The Wall

Update: This Denis Horgan post and its comments are precisely the kind of northern elitism I am talking about.

In a fit of idiocy after waking up this morning, I took advantage of the New York Times’ decision to remove its columnists from the failed pay wall that was Times Select.

I had the misfortune of reading Bob Herbert’s column urging those who marched in Jena to instead descend on the headquarters of the Republican National Committee to protest “how anti-black their party really is.” Bob, you should stay behind the wall. Such bitter diatribes do nothing to further the cause of racial justice in this country.

In his rant against Republicans and those vote for them, Herbert says the GOP “has spent the last 40 years insulting, disenfranchising and otherwise stomping on the interests of black Americans.”

Continue reading Go Back Behind The Wall…

Region One BOE Will Address NEASC

Region One BOE Chairman Judge Manning called me on Friday to say the board will hold a special meeting this Thursday, Sept. 27, at 4 p.m. in the high school library to discuss the recommendations of the New England Association of Colleges & Schools on HVRHS.

We’ll have a story appearing Thursday, but since many of you don’t get a chance to read us until later in the day, you might very well miss a meeting you are perhaps interested in. I will be there, as will Michael Flint of CATV6. Below is the text of the article as it will appear in Thursday’s print edition:

[P.S. To download a copy of the report, click here.]

By TERRY COWGILL

FALLS VILLAGE — The Region One Board of Education will hold a special meeting this afternoon at 4 p.m. to discuss the recent re-accreditation report of Housatonic Valley Regional High School by the New England Association of Schools & Colleges.

In an interview, Board Chairman and Sharon representative Judge Manning said the board agreed Sept. 19 to hold the meeting to address the recommendations in the 61-page NEASC report released last month. At its regular Sept. 10 meeting, the board did not comment on a five-minute presentation by Principal Gretchen Foster on the recommendations.

“To be honest, we weren’t prepared to [comment],” said Manning, adding that board members had already sat through a meeting of the Long Range Plan Feasibility Committee that began that day at 3:30 p.m. “It was a long evening.”

Continue reading Region One BOE Will Address NEASC…

To Be Blount About It …

Colin McEnroe’s lifetime friendship with a celeb humorist begins with a dare and a drunken phone call from a Lakeville apartment.

P.S. I wonder whose place it was. There aren’t that many rental units in Lakeville. Maybe a faculty apartment at Hotchkiss …

Pennies For Martha

In the you-can’t-make-this-stuff-up department: a crazy man has sued Martha Stewart alleging his civil rights were violated in a failed real estate deal. When I first came across this, I assumed it was a hoax.

But it was so funny that I quickly determined no one could make it up. Not even Rob Petrie, Sally Rogers and Buddy Sorrel could have concocted a more thigh-slapping story line.

The other thing that occurred to me was that if the man wanted to buy Stewart’s Westport estate with $3.5 million in pennies, then there must be something seriously wrong with our currency system in the U.S. (click here for an informative popular history of the penny).

I have long argued that we should abolish the penny. If people like Mr. Riches (yes, that’s his name) are hording literally truckloads of pennies, then they’re clearly more trouble than they’re worth. Do you know anyone who stops to pick up a penny, other than a good Samaritan treating it as litter?

Would someone tell Congress and the Mint that, with inflation, pennies have become all but worthless since they were introduced in 1793? Vending machines don’t take them anymore and don’t even try to hand pennies to the toll collector on the Mass Pike or the NY Thruway. Most people don’t even spend them anyway. Pennies wind up gathering dust on a shelf or being turned in at banks for a higher denomination. What a waste!

I would even be willing to have merchants round up their prices to the nearest five cents to rid myself of ever having to see another penny. Then in 2020, we can consider doing the same with nickels. I don’t hate many things but I hate pennies with a passion. End of rant …

LJ 09.20.07

The lead story this week was penned by yours truly on the situation at Lee Kellogg School in Falls Village, where a long-range planning committee will be formed to look into issues related to staffing, programs and the physical plant at the tiny 100-student school. At almost $17,000, Kellogg has the highest per pupil cost in the state.

Elsewhere, there are more apples this season than you can shake a stick at and North Canaan’s Union Station project has been stalled. There was a bank robbery in Amenia on Tuesday and catch Karen Bartomioli’s profiles on the candidates for Board of Selectmen in North Canaan. Note in the print edition that on both lenses of Henry Carley’s sunglasses you can see the reflection of Karen taking his photo.

On my appearance this morning on Marshall & Mike (click here for the podcast), we talked about Christopher Jordano’s reprieve from complying with North Canaan’s zoning laws because of a loophole. I feel bad for the people who live near that mess (to say nothing of people like me who have to look at it as we drive by).

There is an editorial taking the Region One Board of Ed to task for remaining silent on Housatonic Valley Regional High School’s 10-year reaccreditation report. All this, and in Compass Alex Taylor’s review of “In The Valley of Elah.” (no link available yet).

Enjoy and thanks for reading.