Stockstradamus AKA Stocky’s Blog

A few days before Christmas we get this heartbreaking Frontpage above the fold story about a young mother who just gave birth to a new baby but is struggling to keep her family warm.

In a sign of the times twist, it’s not some generic evil landlord that is keeping our poor family in the cold but it’s an evil bank/mortgage company who recently foreclosed on the previous generic evil landlord.

It’s a terrible situation. The new evil landlord will not pay for the delivery of heating oil. They won’t clear the sidewalks of snow either.

Tenants in some foreclosed Boston apartment buildings are living without adequate heat because the new landlords - mortgage companies often based in other states - have not repaired broken systems or paid for the delivery of heating oil.

Karla Herrera, who gave birth to a daughter Wednesday, has lived without heat in her Roxbury apartment since November, when the system broke. “Sometimes, I turn on the oven for 20 minutes for heat,” she said in Spanish, speaking through an interpreter.

Now Stocky is not a total bastard. I do have sympathy for those poor kids but there are some things the Globe left out of the story that leads me to ask a few questions.

The woman spoke through an interpreter. What are the odds that she’s here legally?

She just gave birth to another kid. Where is Dad(s)?

Is there a law against her paying for a load of heating oil herself? She could deduct the amount she paid for the oil from the rent she’s paying.

Assuming she’s paying rent, of course. The amount of rent is mysteriously left out of the story. You’d think The Globe would put that in the story. It would certainly add to the outrage. Call me a cynic but I’d bet half her welfare check that she is not paying a dime in rent.

Which leads me to another question. Why did the buidling go into foreclosure in the first place? Is it possible that tennants not paying rent could have contributed to that? How hard would it have been for the Globe to find the previous owner?

And who do you think is paying for her hospital stay? Hint: look in the mirror. Again, where’s Dad(s).

In another building the Mortgage company has offered the tennants $1,000 to vacate the building. Sounds reasonable to me but not to some of them:

All but one of the other tenants, a woman with a new baby, left after receiving $1,000 from New England Group, which represents the new landlord, GMAC Financial Services.

Murdaugh’s reply to the offer: “Are you serious? Where do we have to go?”

Much less is known about Murdaugh’s situation but I think it’s fair to guess that she’s not paying rent either. If that’s true then yes, finding a new place to stay for free would be tough.

So excuse me for lacking “compassion”.

The Globe’s lazy Business reporter Steve Bailey gets the bad timing award of the week with his column today on the new Boston Fed Governor.

He sings the praises of Eric Rosengren for being the lone dissenting vote at the last FOMC meeting. Eric wanted a half percentage point cut in the rate instead of the quarter point cut we got.

The argument for the bigger rate cut is that a slowing economy is the biggest worry. The argument for a smaller rate cut is that Inflation is the biggest worry.

Bailey compares Rosengren to a previous Boston Fed governor Morris who wrongly opposed Chairman Volker for pushing up rates to stem inflation.

Keep in mind that inflation is the single biggest destroyer of wealth there is.

Bailey, sings the praises of Rosengren for standing up against Bernacke while acknowledging a previous Boston Fed Governor who did the same thing which we now know was flat out wrong.

Right on Queue we get new economic data today that the WSJ reports:

Friday’s report, particularly coming on the heels of the import price and producer price data, appears to justify the Fed’s modest rate cut — which disappointed many on Wall Street — and its decision not to cite slow growth as a bigger risk than inflation, as many analysts had thought it would.

Bailey’s new “Boston Leader” so far looks like a dolt. But in Bailey’s world doing something, anything, even if it’s wrong is to be admired:

“What I am encouraging the organization to think about as we gather the data and do the analysis,” Rosengren said, “is that the end point is not doing a working paper, the end point is not doing a speech, but having some tangible impact.”

Here in Boston, we’re forever wringing our hands about the dearth of leaders. We may have been given a good one in Eric Rosengren. Sitting atop the Boston Fed at the age of 50, the man now has a decade or more to make a real difference. What an opportunity.

What an opportunity all right. An opportunity to destroy an economy.

Todays Globe and all of Boston.com for that matter contains not a word about this person. Jeanne Assam.

Who is she? Some might find her newsworthy. She saved scores of lives yesterday. How did she do it?

With her legally owned Gun.

That’s strike 1 if you’re keeping score for the Globe.

And she praised God for giving her the strength to gun down the scumbag who was shooting up her church.

God?? Strike 2 for the Globies.

She’s a single woman, apparently not gay nor a feminist.

Steeeerike 3!!! She’s out of the paper!!!

Fortunately you can read all about Jeanne by doing a quick Google News search which as of  11:00 AM Tuesday pulls up 726 hits.

The Boston Herald does better. At least they took time out from inserting annoying ads on their web site to include a pretty long AP story which identifies Jeanne as the “security guard” who ended the carnage by shooting the gunman.

Of course any story where a Gun is used in self defense is a “non-story” as far as the Boston Globe is concerned. The Globe has a long history of ignoring those stories.

One that comes immediately to mind was a mid-day shooting in Davis Square  Sommerville. The shooting victim ran from the scene and jumped on the Subway. The Police tracked him from his blood trail and stopped the train in Cambridge, pulled him off the train and placed him under arrest.  

That sounds like a wild scene. A bleeding man running through yuppified Davis Square at 1:00 in the afternoon jumping on the T to avoid arrest. That would make a good episode of some police show.

The story was that a homeowner, home for lunch shot the perp after he broke into his house. The Perp had a history of burglaries but in the Peoples Republic of Massachusetts that still meant the homeowner was held for hours of questioning before he was released.

Surprisingly, this only made Page 2 of the Boston Herald. But at least it made it into the paper. Unsurprisingly, not a word was ever written about the incident in the Boston Globe.

Law abiding citizens defending themselves with legally owned Guns does not fit the Globe’s narrative.

Joan Vennochi gives a nice slap to the dumb voters of Massachusetts in her Sunday Column:

BARACK OBAMA is promising to change politics as usual in America. As Massachusetts already knows, that can be one tough promise to keep.

Last year, Deval Patrick promised to do the same, when he ran for governor. Voters bought the message, making him the first Democrat in 16 years to win the corner office, and the first black candidate to do so.

What dummies we all are. Well, not Stocky. I didn’t vote for Deval but the rest of you sure are dopes.

Joan takes a small swipe at Deval later in the column:

Obama has held elective office on the state and national level, so he has much more political experience than a neophyte like Patrick.

Neophyte. Not very endeering. That Joan sure is tough on our Governor and the rubes who fell for his campaign spiel.

But what about Joan? Let’s hit the way back machine and find all those columns she wrote during the campaign warning us not to be fooled by the Great Black Hope’s Hype and accurately describing his lack of experience….

Damn. The friggin machine must be broke again. I can’t find a single Vennochi column like that. In fact, all I can find are column’s where Joan is fawning all over Deval like Bill Clinton on an intern.

Revisionist history at work in your Boston Globe. Be a Woman Joan. Admit you’re a dope too.

More on Deval:

Howie Carr takes time off from his much less listened to radio show to make a point that Stocky has been making for months:

What exactly has the guy accomplished in his first year in office?

Exactly nothing if you ask me.

Gov Do-Nothing is back from a “critical” trade mission to China where he set up an office to do who knows what. Sounds like more good jobs at good wages for Deval suckups and campaign contributers.

What a joke this guy is.

All this is detailed at devalpatrickwatch.com

Peter J. Howe checks in today with a story about Bush 41 installing a windmill at his Maine Home.

Of course no story on the Bushes can be approved for publication in the Globe without some negative slant. In this case, Howe snidely notes:

his choice of watercraft remains a 28-foot Cigarette speedboat powered by two gas-chugging 185-horsepower engines.

And of course a swipe at Bush 43 always is in order:

His son may be known as a big friend to Big Oil

What you will never read in the Globe and what I’m sure will come as a surprise to everyone who reads this is that Bush 43 is the most environmentally friendly politician in history when it comes to his own home.

The 4,000-square-foot house is a model of environmental rectitude.

Geothermal heat pumps located in a central closet circulate water through pipes buried 300 feet deep in the ground where the temperature is a constant 67 degrees; the water heats the house in the winter and cools it in the summer. Systems such as the one in this “eco-friendly” dwelling use about 25% of the electricity that traditional heating and cooling systems utilize.

A 25,000-gallon underground cistern collects rainwater gathered from roof runs; wastewater from sinks, toilets and showers goes into underground purifying tanks and is also funneled into the cistern. The water from the cistern is used to irrigate the landscaping surrounding the four-bedroom home. Plants and flowers native to the high prairie area blend the structure into the surrounding ecosystem.

No, this is not the home of some eccentrically wealthy eco-freak trying to shame his fellow citizens into following the pristineness of his self-righteous example. And no, it is not the wilderness retreat of the Sierra Club or the Natural Resources Defense Council, a haven where tree-huggers plot political strategy.

This is President George W. Bush’s “Texas White House” outside the small town of Crawford.

I’m skipping the link since the rest of the article is just tree-hugging nonsense.

Nope, no mention of this in the mainstream press. Even a story about Bush 41 installing a windmill has to include slaps at his “gas guzzling cigarette boat” and his “friend of big oil son”.

What about the Globe’s favorite son, John Kerry? What is his “choice of watercraft”? He of the enviromentalists wet dream of a book “This Moment on Earth”.

From his web site:

Now, in this passionate and personal book, Teresa and John shine the spotlight on an inspiring cross-section of these new environmental pioneers and offer a guide on how you too can get involved to protect the world that we all know and love.

His choice of watercraft? Do they make Hybrid boats? Surely Kerry must be a fan of sailing on the cool breezes of Nantucket sound, emitting nary an ounce of carbon. Right? RIGHT?????

Wrong. Like algore and other big mouth do as I say not as I do limousine Liberals, Kerry does not walk the talk. That’s for others, not the aristocrats like him.

On Nantucket, Kerry has 4 boats docked/moored within 1/2 mile of each other. 2 small Boston Whalers moored a few hundred feet off the beach in front of his seconds wife’s first husband’s house along with a “cigarrete boat” with gas guzzling twin 225 Yamaha engines. (He used to have American made Mercury’s on board until he lost the presidential election. Now it’s Japanese made Yamaha’s)

He also has a 40 some odd foot Hinkley docked at The White Elephant Hotel inside Nantucket Harbor. 4 boats for 1 family. All spewing carbon and guzzling fuel. And this is just 1 of his houses. There’s the Beacon Hill house. The Idaho house. The Private Jet. A fleet of jeeps/suv’s. You get the picture.

Bush 41 puts up a windmill and gets snide commentary from Peter Howe in the Globe about his 1 boat. John Kerry writes a book on environmental activism while spitting out Carbon faster than Monica Lewinsky spit out Bill Clinton and not a word out of the Globe on the hypocrisy.

Just more of the same from The Globe.

One of the Hazzards of doing this blog is actually reading the Boston Globe editorials. That’s something I never used to do. I come across enough shit during my day to get my blood boiling without reading that crap.

However, in the interest of the greater good, I now read them. Or some of them anyway.

Saturday’s Globe Editorial Gem really needs to be read in full. Here it is: 

THE MOST significant actions by the Legislature in its last week of formal sessions this year included the passage of bills to hold the Massachusetts presidential primary on Feb. 5, a month earlier than usual, and to provide greater protection against predatory mortgage lending. Hardly earth-shattering, to be sure, but many important bills are still in the pipeline. A better test of legislative performance will come in February or March, when lawmakers have a window to act on these bills before turning to next year’s budget.

The most enduring decision by the Legislature came in June. The representatives and senators, acting in constitutional convention, decided not to place a proposal banning gay marriage on the ballot. This 45-151 vote, supported by Governor Deval Patrick, put the full weight of state government behind the Supreme Judicial Court decision legalizing these marriages. This is a lasting victory for liberty and equal rights.

Beyond that, the session that ended this week could at best by called workmanlike. The Legislature approved a sound budget and began tinkering with the laws to provide cities and towns with better tools to address financial problems. But the new laws to bring more local government employees into the state pension and health insurance systems are not enough to reduce the growth in local property taxes. And the Legislature rejected Governor Patrick’s attempts to offer communities new sources of revenue. The lawmakers will need to revisit the issue next year.

The governor and legislative leaders are properly concerned about economic development. The mortgage lending bill would impose a sensible degree of state regulation on an important part of the economy. Other crucial issues failed to get on the legislative fast track, most notably Patrick’s plan to assist the biotech industry. House Speaker Salvatore DiMasi’s package to assist renewable energy production sped through the House, but hasn’t cleared the Senate. Another issue that needs attention is the governor’s anticrime bill, with its provision for mandatory supervision after release from prison.

And then there’s casino gambling, an issue with implications both for revenue and for development. Patrick and Senate President Therese Murray like the concept; DiMasi doesn’t, but what source of revenue does the speaker have in mind to fulfill the obligations of state government? The governor filed his proposal too late for action this year, but a decision shouldn’t be avoided in 2008.

Among its last significant actions of the year, the Legislature approved the governor’s plan for a Commonwealth Corps to encourage volunteer service and provided $15 million more for home-heating aid - good but easy votes. Let’s hope that, in January, lawmakers will come back refreshed from their holidays and ready for harder decisions.

The title of the editorial is “Quiet Times on Beacon Hill”. Another way to phrase that would be:

Not a fucking lot got done this year on Beacon Hill.

And who’s fault is that? Why the Legislature of course. According to the Globe. Hmmm, I seem to recall something significant happening at the beginning of this year…. wait… I’ll think of it… give me a moment … OH YEAH! WE GOT A NEW FUCKING GOVERNOR!!! A Democrat who got elected in a landslide and ended 16 years of Republican control of the Governors office.

Glory Be!!! Let’s review all his accomplishments!!!! Wait. The Globe did that in their editorial. Only they pinned the blame on the Legislature.

According to the editorial, the Governor was just a supporting character in all this. It seems the Globe status quo is to give the Gov a free pass. The soft bigotry of low expectations coming into play again.

This is a change of tactic for the Globies. Let’s look back to February to this Frank Phillips piece detailing the disappointment the moonbats had with their Great Black Hope’s performance.

Some Highlights:

“He has been exceedingly cautious in trying to determine what his first priorities are,” said Jeffrey M. Berry, political science professor at Tufts University. “So much so that he has already lost a little momentum.”

Patrick advisers concede the governor has not followed the usual tradition of strong media management during his first days in office. But they say that he has been active on a host of major issues, including the daunting task of closing a $1 billion deficit in his first budget. That work — along with a series of other initiatives — will be evident in the next few weeks, they say.

“This is not a governor who is focused on quick headlines in the press that provide little benefit for people’s concerns,” said Kyle Sullivan, his press secretary. “He is focused on developing thoughtful public policy for the long term. Stay tuned.”

 We’re still tuned in Kyle. Any Updates?

But to many who are watching him closely, Patrick appears to be struggling to find a pace and theme to launch his administration.

“A honeymoon period is a unique interval, and he will never have another opportunity of such uncritical acceptance,” Berry said.

Patrick’s untraditional approach has some of his backers worried. “It’s odd,” said one old political hand from the Dukakis administration, who is active in the state Democratic Party. “You go days without seeing him in the news.”

Days without seeing him in the news? Try weeks. How long was his vacation at his mansion in the Berkshires? A Month? Was he working on our property tax relief out there?

Furthermore, he said, Patrick doesn’t need to make a bold move because he secured his image during his two-year campaign for governor, which ended in his landslide election.

“Patrick was elected essentially because he developed a thematic image of himself,” said Goldman, host of a national program on Bloomberg Radio. 

Image. That’s all that matters to Moonbats. Listen to the sickly sweet campaign speaches and then feel so good about yourself when you vote for the Black Guy. Aren’t you just wonderful?

“People asked for a change, and they got it,” said Crosby, who worked on Patrick’s transition team. “They don’t have media-conscious, conventional politicians running the administration. But perhaps there is a trade-off. You don’t get the splash, but maybe still water runs deeper.”

Maybe that still water is no deeper than a soap dish.

Will the Globe even acknowledge the 1 year anniversary of Patrick taking office? Talk about putting a shine on a sneaker. How will they spin Gov Do-Nothings first year as anything but a disaster? 

He must have been in a Coma. How else can you explain this piece where he discusses the Left’s comparisons of Bush to Hitler?

I suppose it was inevitable that the liberal intelligentsia would start comparing George Bush to Adolf Hitler.

Here is what Los Angeles Times columnist and Georgetown University law professor Rosa Brooks recently said on my favorite oddball webcast, bloggingheads.tv:

Inevitable??? Recently??? Where have you been Alex? You must have been in a coma. The Left has been doing that since the first year Bush was in office. A quick search of the Globe archives for Bush + Hitler brings back hundreds of hits.

Hint: Use Post 2000 dates. Otherwise you get hundreds of hits of the Left comparing Bush 41 to Hitler.

Christ Alex. You really don’t get out of the house much, do you?

What the Fuck is wrong with the Boston Globe???

Can’t they get anything right?

A story about the renewed interest in the Celtics on TV fails to address the number 1 issue thousands of viewers want an answer to.

Why the Fuck aren’t all the games broadcast in H FUCKING D!!!!????

Comcast OWNS the station!!! They add HD stations to their cable package every other friggin week, why the Fuck can’t they add one they own???

The home games appear to be swapped over to the lame HD Mojo channel. Is that how it will work for the whole year? Why can’t they do that for the away games??

Can’t they update the guide data to show the home games on Mojo HD so DVR users can setup the recordings in advance without monkeying with the shows listed on the guide for Mojo HD???

Christ almighty. Not a fucking word about this in the Globe story. I swear, when I become king I am going to fire scores and scores of people immediately after my coronation.

Starting with Nancy Marrapese-Burrell.

Let’s start with a Stocky “favorite”, Steve Bailey of The Boston Globe. In todays column, Stevie takes time off from committing felonies to write about the fascinating subject of The Massachusetts Business Court.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz …. oh, sorry. I dozed off there for a minute.

In the middle of an excruciatingly boring piece he inserts this non-sequetor:

 Let’s stipulate, as the lawyers might say, that Howie Carr is no van Gestel fan; after losing repeatedly in his court, the Boston Herald columnist is probably headed back to “indentured servitude” at WRKO-AM at more than $1 million a year. But beyond Howie, van Gestel is a judge with many fans, the person most responsible for turning the business session of the state’s Superior Court into the success it has become.

Nice little whack at Howie. What does it have to do with the reorganization of the Mass Business Court?

Not a fucking thing.

And of course Mr. Business Writer extrodinaire gets the salary figure wrong. No way Howie pulls in $1 mil per year anytime soon. His contract is incentive laden with a base salary that’s actually a pay cut. It’s not certain what time slot he’ll return to never mind if he’ll meet the high bars the incentive clauses have set. But that level of analysis of the situation by Bailey is pretty typical of his work. His thinking runs as deep as a soap dish.

For Moron #2 we go to our Hero Cap’n Carr. In this time of crisis it appears that Howie is regressing to his journalistic childhood. He’s writing columns about City Council races.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz … oh, sorry. I dozed off there for a minute.

Howie eloquently describes the level of interest in yesterdays election:

After days of being called “liar” and “sneak” and “coward,” the college boy from Harvard ousted Felix “No-Show” Arroyo from the City Council in an election 85 percent of voters took a pass on.

If 85% of the voters in Boston didn’t care about this election, what percentage of the Herald’s readership gives a Rats Ass about it? Less than 5%? Forget about that talk of Howie trying to get himself fired on purpose when he returns to ‘RKO, it looks like he’s trying to get himself fired from The Herald.

We get a hint of what Howie is doing with all his free time from an indication that he was actually out “pounding the pavement” for quotes last night.

I asked him if he had any final thoughts on Connolly.

“Nothing,” he said, chuckling. “Not tonight.”

Nice work, Paper Boy. I’m sure it was tough fighting off all your fellow scribes to get that exclusive quote.

Speaking of savewrko.com, we get to Moron #3. Brian Maloney. In a ridiculous jealousy laden post today he calls Tom Bradys lifestyle “borderline disgusting” and repeats the days ago refuted claim that Gisele Bundchen refuses to be paid in Dollars.

Do a little work Brian. Here is a quote from her manager:

But just a few minutes ago, CNBC Squawk Box producer Stephanie Landsman spoke by telephone with Anne Nelson, Bundchen’s manager.  Nelson tells us reports that Gisele wants to be paid in euros are “false.”   Nelson’s take: “Some idiot in Brazil reported something just to make news.”

Nelson points out that Gisele lives in New York City, and thus needs U.S. dollars for her big-city lifestyle.

And Tom Brady’s personal life is “disgusting”. He’d already broken up with his over the hill former girlfriend before she announced a couple of months later that she was pregnant. Can you say TRAPPED? She’s the one who is disgusting.

In a comment Maloney states that there are better ways to hedge than to play the currency markets. Do tell, oh investment guru. I suppose thousands of red blooded American currency traders are just disgusting Morons and un-American if they short the Dollar.

I guess Stocky is Un-American too for investing in all those sweet multinational energy services companies who don’t get paid in Dollars but make a killing when they convert the revenue to the sinking Dollar. 

Stick to your day job of wrongheaded commentary on the Boston Radio scene.

Our do-nothing Governor is beginning to hear some faint criticism from his allies. Todays Boston Globe has a story about a group of Black Harvard Students holding a candlelight vigil to protest the do-nothing Governor doing nothing about violence in Boston.

Oh, wait. My Mistake. The Governors not a Republican???? Scratch the candle light vigil/protest. Let’s call it a “visit”.

Holding lit candles while wearing black suits and dresses, members of the Harvard Black Students Association visited Boston last night to add their voices to the chorus of those challenging Governor Deval Patrick to combat black-on-black youth violence

This follows yesterdays story which also laid a velvet glove on Gov Do-Nothing:

Among the 1,500 mourners was Governor Deval Patrick, who had been admonished a few days earlier by Odom’s mother for doing too little to quell gun violence in the city, the kind of complaint regularly directed toward mayors, not governors. Dickerson told the congregation that some had criticized Kim Odom for “calling the governor out” and asked whether Odom should expect more from Patrick because he is black.

Gun Violence in Boston has been on the rise for several years despite what that series of lying though their teeth billboards on the Mass pike behind Fenway have said. What’s interesting is occasionally the Globe gets it right. Just a few days before these stories were printed the Globe had a story about 3 major cities in Massachusetts where shootings have recently decreased by 45%. Drastically improving the lives of everyone who lives there.

But progress has been made in reducing gun violence, according to police statistics. Reports of shots fired have declined 45 percent through August, and the number of people struck by gunfire has dropped to seven, from 25, through August 2006, according to police. The city had five gun slayings last year but went nearly 10 months until recording the first gun killing of the year, on Sept. 30. New Bedford Mayor Scott Lang, a former prosecutor, is a supporter.

…

Hockert-Lotz, who has publicly praised Sutter in opinion pieces published by the Standard-Times newspaper, said Sutter’s approach, and the drop in gun crimes, has given him hope. “New Bedford is the safest it’s been in the 20 years I’ve been doing business,” he said.

The Cities are New Bedford, Fall River and Taunton. 3 of the roughest cities in the State.

Well Holy Shit!!! You might think. Why couldn’t Boston do the same??? Bristol county must have some extra special gun laws to accomplish such a drop in Gun crime. Let’s get busy doing the same thing in Boston. Imagine how many lives could be saved!!!

Sorry, but you would be wrong to think that. It appears that no one in Boston or the State House is interested in reducing gun crimes by 45%. If they were they would be using the Bristol County model. There is nary a peep about what’s going on in Bristol County.

The reason??? 

O’Berg and police in New Bedford and Fall River are pointing to the aggressive move by Sutter as a key reason gun violence and reports of gun violence have seen double-digit drops in the three Bristol County cities since January, when Sutter took office.

While other prosecutors in Eastern Massachusetts seek to hold someone as a danger to society on a case-by-case basis, Sutter requests a hearing whenever anyone is arrested on gun charges.

“We’ve pushed the envelope,” Sutter said. “We haven’t had a 100-percent success rate, but we certainly are pushing it.”

Dangerousness hearings have been held in 58 cases, according to Sutter’s office, and defendants have been ordered held in 45 of them. Fall River has had two gun-related homicides so far this year, and there were two during 2006. But Police Chief John Souza said his city is more peaceful, as the reports of shots fired have dropped by 40 percent through September.

 Go figure. Locking up the scumbags who commit these gun crimes reduces the amount of gun crimes? How shocking is that?

One thing we know for certain is that Gov Do-Nothing will be doing and saying nothing about the success in Bristol County. To advocate locking up inner city thugs would risk a “visit” from the likes of Al Sharpton.

That’s an outrage Gov Do-Nothing will not stand for. And of course, speaking of outrage, there is none from Steve Bailey.

Yes it must be true.

I think yesterdays story in the Boston Globe about Black Men being held to higher standards than whites in the workplace is just pure bullshit.

How does the Globe define “higher standards”? Are they being asked to work longer or harder for less pay? Nope. Are they given impossible to meet deadlines and then disciplined when they don’t meet them? Apparently not.

So what are the big outrages? Let’s see:

A Black guy named Michael James got a few comments when he wore shorts on a Casual Friday. According to him the obvious reason is because he’s a black guy. This is how far we’ve come in America when some guy with bony legs gets a comment about wearing shorts and he thinks he’s Rosa Parks.

Donovan Mcnabb makes an appearance with this complaint:

He said even when he plays well in a game, critics will say of him: “We would have scored more points if he would have done this.”   

I don’t know if Donovan has been paying attention to the media lately but there’s this new thing called Cable. On it they have lots of stations that do nothing but broadcast sports and do analysis of sports 24 hours a day. There’s also this thing called talk radio. There are entire stations who do nothing but criticize athletes 24/7.

If the only commentary allowed for a QB who played well is “He played Well.” There would be lots of dead air time.

And just a suggestion Donovan. The next time you’re in the Super Bowl and are trying to bring your team down the field for a needed score at the end of the 4th quarter try not to puke in the huddle. You choking dog.

Now back to Michael James:

James makes accommodations because of his 6-foot-2 height, which, he says, has made people view him as “threatening and menacing even though I’m the most peaceful person out there.” He shies away from making declarative statements at work, to prevent himself from appearing too aggressive. “I say, ‘What are your thoughts about it?’ rather than demanding they do certain things,” James says. “I put it out there in a fashion that they feel they have a choice.”

Let’s see … according to James his management style is not to act like a dictator. Instead he solicits opinions from others to gain a consensus; thereby getting buy in from those who will be doing the work.

THAT SOUNDS LIKE WHAT THEY TEACH AT FUCKING BUSINESS SCHOOL!!!!!!

But James does it because he’s a victim of Racism??? Give me a fucking break. 

More wisdom from James:

James finds the persistent negative stereotyping that accompanies having brown skin baffling. “It’s like we have our priorities in the wrong place,” he says. “My success shouldn’t be dependent on how I look or how well I can replicate what you’re comfortable with. It should be about what I bring to the table and how I help the organization advance in its goals and objectives.”

His success shouldn’t be dependant on how he looks??? What a noble concept. Too bad it’s illegal to practice that in America. Preferences must be given to women + minorities. If you’re a white guy forget about what you can bring to the table, black guys like James get the advantage.

Just a little more from James:

“I’ve been terminated from [a] job,” says James, who didn’t want to specify which company, “because I’ve taken on the top leaders based on ethical principles.

Now that’s a great career move. “Take on the top leaders”, that will get you far. I bet he lasted in that job a lot longer than some white guy with no affirmative action protection would have.

The whole premise of the article is such bullshit. EVERYONE modifies their behavior to fit in at work. It’s not a fucking elementary school playground. White + Black have to conform or they get canned.

Well, at least the hetero white male will get canned.

If you’re like Stocky, often times while reading a column in the Boston Globe a couple of burning questions come to mind:

        Who are these twits who write for the Globe?

And

         What the fuck do they do all day? It can’t be much.

Alex Beam answers question number 2 in yesterdays column leaving us with one less mystery of the universe to ponder.

It’s true that I hang around the house a lot …

Thanks for clearing that up Alex.

Stevie has another anti-casino column today which starts off with a lame shot across the Bow of Gov. Moonbat. Stevie calls him “Governor Slots”.

That’s Stevie being “hard on the governor for embracing gambling” again. But as he takes a tiny slap he can’t help but fall into swooning mode:

I have been hard on the governor for embracing gambling. But to be fair he is a man with great ambitions for the state - a very good thing - and he has been honest enough to say we are going to need new money to pay for it. 

If Stevie was really interested in being “fair” he would note that it’s only recently that Gov Moombat has “been honest” about needing money to pay for all of his “ambitions” AKA campaign promises.

During the campaign Kerry Healey nearly lost her voice screaming about how ridiculous all of Deval’s promises were. SHE WAS THE ONE who said over and over that there wasn’t enough money to do the things he was promising.

I’m going to go out on a limb and say that our intrepid “business reporter” Mr. Bailey never wrote about this during the campaign. It’s only now after Deval is governor does Bailey become Mr. Authority on the states revenues and budget.

What’s really amazing is that at no time during the campaign was Deval in danger of losing. He had a huge lead yet he was falling all over himself pandering for votes; a puppet of the special interests.

God forbid his next election is close. Who knows what he’ll promise all the special interest groups.

His only response to Healey during the campaign was his mythical $750 million in waste and inneficiency he was going to eliminate from the budget.

Don’t hold your breath waiting for any press releases on that one. In fact, one of the first things Deval did was restore millions of dollars in cuts the Romney administration had made in order to balance the budget.

But back to Stevie. He has a much better idea for generating revenue than casinos:

The math is not complicated: 10 cents a gallon yields $300 million; 20 cents a gallon is $600 million. The Massachusetts’ gas tax, which hasn’t been raised since 1990, is 23.5 cents a gallon; in New York it is nearly 39 cents. And unlike gambling, we won’t have to set aside a dime to treat the victims of raising the gas tax.

Raising the Gas tax. Gee, there’s a new idea. But what about the $750 mil Deval is going to find in waste + inneficiencies??? Oh, wait. He’s going to use that money to give us “property tax relief”. Or is it the 1000 new police officers he promised? It’s hard to keep these broken promises straight.

Could the lead Business reporter for the globe spell all this out or does it take some dope with a blog like Stocky to do this?

Apparently the answer is some dope with a blog.

Todays Sunday Globe front page above the fold screaming headline:

53% in poll back Patrick casinos plan

Very first sentence in the story by Andea Estes:

A majority of Massachusetts residents supports Governor Deval Patrick’s proposal to license resort-style casinos across the state, …

Slight problem with that. They don’t.

To the Globes credit, they include the entire poll details in a PDF. I initially went there to find the margin of error for the poll. The 4.4% margin of error was not metioned in the story but was footnoted in an accompanying graphic. So it’s within the margin of error that the “majority of residents support Patrick’s plan”? That doesn’t sound like it deserves a screaming page 1 headline to me. But that’s not the real problem with this.

I went to the actual poll and looked for the question: Do you support Gov. Patrick’s Casino plan?

That question WAS NEVER ASKED!!!!!!!!!!

You have to go to page 28 of the PDF doc to find the question they used to come to their headline conclusion. Here it is:

“I’d like to turn to the subject of gambling in Massachusetts. Governor Patrick has recently proposed legal casino gambling, including slot machines, at three locations in Massachusetts. Supporters argue that this will bring in hundreds of millions of dollars in revenues to the State of Massachusetts while opponents argue that casinos will increase social problems from compulsive gambling. What about you … do you favor or oppose legalizing casino gambling in Massachusetts?” “Is that strongly or just somewhat?”

After a lengthy preamble that starts with Patricks plan for 3 casinos across the state and ends who knows where since all we get is the dot dot dot treatment we finally get to the question they asked:

Do you favor or oppose legalizing casino gambling in Massachusetts?

That was the friggin question. Not “Do you agree with Patrick’s plan?”

Christ almighty. Is this so fucking hard to understand? If it is, the very next question in the poll tries to clear it up:

“As I mentioned, Governor Patrick has proposed 3 casinos in Massachusetts. How many casinos, if any, would you like to see in Massachusetts?”

Based on the Front Page screaming headline and accompanying story any rational person would have to assume that 53% of the respondants would answer “3 or more casinos.”

Nope.

29% say None, 23% say One and 9% say Two. Only 28% say Three and 5% say Four or more.

Translated to non-globespeak we have 52% of the people who want no more that 1 casino in Massachusets. The Goverenor’s plan calls for 3 casinos and the poll shows that only 33% agree with 3 casinos.

That is way outside the margin of error and a landslide win for people who disagree with the Governors plan.

Is this bias in favor of Governor Moonbat, Bias in favor of anything that might generate more tax revenue, just plain stupidity on the part of the Globe or all 3.

Who the fuck knows.

The issue of casinos is a hot one in Massachusetts. The proposed Indian Tribe Casino in Middleborough seemed to come out of nowhere and has generated heated debate in that town. I checked Dan Kennedy’s blog and sure enough, he has a post up on the Globe story. Dan grew up in Middleborough and is adamantly against the Casino and the proces the town government has used to authorize the plan. I have to sympathise with Dan and the Opponents, it does sound like they are getting a raw deal. If that casino gets built Middleborough will change forever.  

But back to the Globe story. Amazingly even Dan Kennedy misses the glaring misrepresentation of the poll results.

Dan focuses on the questions that highlight NIMBY opposition to casinos in Massachusetts.  Most people don’t want a Casino near their house. Which by itself is also a repudiation of Patricks plan since it’s primary focus is to put a Casino within reach of everyone in Massachusetts.

But that doesn’t fit the Globe’s ”narrative”. 

Yesterdays Boston Globe had a very good article by Brian Ballou on Crime in the notorious Franklin Hill Housing Project in Dorchester.

Lots of Bad stuff going on there. Ballou does some nice reporting detailing some of the problems:

After a 48-year-old man was fatally shot Monday night inside a hallway, some residents expressed frustration yesterday over the violence.

“They should just tear this whole place down,” said McKinley Sykes, 60, a longtime tenant in the complex in Dorchester. “I told the management before that, anything short of that won’t solve the problem.”

The body of the victim, identified by sources close to the investigation as Kelvin Alexander of Providence, was found not far from the spot where two other men, Jeffrey Jones, 41, and Jarrid Campbell, 27, were slain July 13 as they sat in a parked car.

…

Many tenants clamored for more police foot patrols, especially in areas of the development neighbors know as trouble spots.

“I’m very cautious, because this place just draws the worst kind of people,” said Frederick Bridgewater, 65, who lives in the building. He said he recently refused to open his door after someone professing to be a neighbor knocked and told him his car lights were on. “I didn’t come out, because there was another resident who was busted on the head and robbed some days before,” Bridgewater said.

Jerome Gary, 61, said that he has lived in the development for 14 years and that “it’s never been this bad.” Gary said that he and his grandson “go inside when it gets dark, and we don’t come out.”

…

The Rev. William Dickerson, pastor of the nearby Greater Love Tabernacle, said he grew up in the Franklin Hill area. He also said he presided over the funerals of the two men killed in July.

“An increased police presence will calm things down there,” Dickerson said. “We saw a decrease in violence when police began patrolling several hot spots in the city, and that’s commendable, but we also have to change a whole culture that has become violent.”

That place sounds like a disaster. Maybe an article like this will spur the Boston Police and/or the Mayor to do something to help.

In a case like this Stocky parises the Globe for shedding light on a horrible situation without falling into the intellectualy lazy trap of blaming Guns for the problems.

Speaking of intellectualy lazy, that brings me to Steve Bailey. Not a word of outrage from Mr. Bailey on this. You’d think a good liberal like him would be all over this story. Crying out for justice for the poor residents of Franklin Hill.

You would be wrong.

While Mr. Bailey did have a column in yesterdays paper he chose to address the issue of Casinos in Massachusetts. Interestingly enough, the Column was titled “Collateral Damage”. Gambling is bad, economic impact is overstated, blah, blah, blah. You’ve heard it all before.

One wonders if one of these proposed casinos might be near one of Bailey’s vacation homes.

Maybe he should conduct a “sting” operation similar to the one he executed at the NH Gun Show. He could head to one of the Connecticut Casinos and have the Globe buy a bucket of quarters for a chain smoking Senior Citizen living off Social Security.

Said Senior Citizen blows the liberal wad with nothing to show for it and Stevie gets to pontificate about how evil Casinos are.

Stevie could do that if he has time out from defending himself from felony charges, that is.

Ellen Goodman makes an appearance today. She thinks it’s just swell that gay men meet and suck each other off in public restrooms. Who are these homophobe bigoted jerks who would dare think that is unacceptable behavior.

Stocky would like Ellen to send her grandson into a public restroom in a trainstation, bus station or airport and cool her heels waiting for the little tyke to come out. I bet if she did this a few times the little homophobic bigot would have some “interesting” stories to tell granny.

From Granny’s column: 

I don’t want to send my grandson into a public restroom used for assignations.

Assignations?????? Now there’s a euphamism for you. What is the definition of Assignation? Here it is from an online dictionary:

A “secret rendezvous”. How friggin quaint. This is how Granny thinks of 2 gay guys sucking each others dicks in a public place without even exchanging names. I guess she has to elevate the behavior to that level if she’s to present her “narrative” of gays as victims. Back to her column:

Sex stings to catch gays have been around for more than a century. Sodomy itself was illegal in Minnesota until 2001. It was a “crime against nature” in Idaho, punishable by five years to life in prison. Then in 2003, the Supreme Court finally overturned all the laws against sodomy.

…

Yet the stings go on. Craig was only one of 40 arrested since May in Minneapolis. There were 45 arrested in the Atlanta airport this year. How many elsewhere? There must be saner ways to keep a restroom from becoming a meeting ground, better than using a dubious law that shames men into pleading guilty for the same reason Craig did: humiliation and the fear of exposure. “I don’t call media,” said the policeman. But exposure often follows. So too, a lifetime of registering as a sex offender.

Oh boo hoo. If this type of stuff was going on in womens restrooms do you think Ellen would be complaining about the “stings”? These skeevie guys are swapping semen but not names in the stall next to her grandson but Ellen is more concerned with the gays “civil rights”.

And “there must be saner ways to keep a restroom from becoming a meeting ground” is just so precious. Do tell, Granny. Don’t keep us all in suspense. Come up with a “saner” way to handle this. If you can’t then shut the fuck up and stop complaining about the police doing their jobs.

I can picture her outside a mens room waiting for her grandson, cooling her heels while twiddling her ever so tasetfull pearl necklace. Meanwhile, inside the mens room there could be several “assignations” going on within reach of her grandson. Would it take her grandson getting his own “pearl necklace” for granny to climb down from her politically correct high horse? Does she even give a shit about the men (straight + gay) who are subjected to this shit when all they’re trying to do is take care of business and be on their way? To say nothing of her grandson. 

Nice grandmother she is.

I wonder if she lets him go unattended into the mens rooms on Morrisey Boulevard?

If this Boston Globe piece wasn’t so pathetic Stocky could almost laugh. Almost. Well maybe not almost. The piece does feature the terminally unfunny Jimmy Tingle. But I digress.

Note the deferential treatment Scott Ritter gets:

 In his new book, “Waging Peace: The Art of War for the Antiwar Movement,” former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter discusses John Boyd’s theories of aerial warfare, compares the ideas of Prussian military thinker Carl von Clausewitz to those Sun Tzu proposed 2,500 years ago …

Why from that lead and the resulting story you would have no idea that Ritter is a sex offender.  It seems that the esteemed Mr. Ritter likes to have underage girls watch him jerk off. Isn’t that swell. Not that the Globe would mention that. Can we imagine what the treatment would be for a Bush supporter under the same circumstances?

Of course as long as you’re on the right side of the political debate, the Globe will work with you on resurrecting your career. No matter what the offense. Take Paula Pondstone, please. Here the Globe omits the sexual assault aspect of Paula’s “debacle” and simply states that she “Fell out of favor”. 

Poundstone fell out of favor in 2001 when she pleaded guilty to felony endangerment and misdemeanor child abuse after driving while intoxicated with her children in the car. She was sentenced to five years’ probation and six months of drug treatment, which included attending AA meetings. She emerged with a tarnished image, but her sense of humor still intact.

She was initially charged with 3 counts of committing a lewd act on a child under 14 and she lost custody of 2 children who were in her home via Foster Care. The felony lewd act charge was dropped when she plead out on a lesser charge.

Do we have to ask how the globe would play this if she weren’t a moonbat Lesbian?

Any teachers union official reading that headline would be on their way into full cardiac arrest before reading further. For you non-union types, you know there’s more to the story.

 A globe editorial no less on school funding has this:

… with the goal of creating parent-consumers who will demand rich educational choices for their children. These families will also get scholarship money to spend on such programs. Rolnick argues that these choosy mothers with money will stimulate the marketplace to create more high-quality preschool programs.

Ah ha!! There’s the rub. It’s only PRESCHOOL the Globe is interested in. Once we get the little tykes through high quality preschool programs it’s on to the soft bigotry of low expectations in the union controlled Public Schools.

So it’s a great idea for parents to be given money to spend on Preschool programs which will have the effect of improving preschool programs for everyone but any Voucher programs after preschool are considered the work of the anti-christ????!!!!!

How do those fucking bow tied bum kissers on Morrisey Boulevard sleep at night???

Of all the sections of the Boston Globe that Stocky reads none is more painfull than the editorials. You can’t make some of this shit up.

Todays editorial lavishes praise on Deval Patricks choice for the SJC. Judge Margot Botsford. A trust fund beneficiary, soft on crime, limousine liberal judge from New York who’s in the tank for the teachers unions and was originally appointed to the bench by one M. Stanley Dukakis. The only thing missing from her resume is a “husband” named Stephanie instead of Steve. For the Globe, what’s not to love?

Diabetics should be careful to check their insulin levels before reading the sickly sweet gushing praise for Ms. “slap on the wrist” Botsford.

It’s the last paragraph that is particularly galling:

Botsford’s mentor was SJC justice Francis Quirico, for whom she clerked in 1973. Quirico was a towering legal mind known for a philosophy of judicial restraint. At a memorial service for him in 2000, Botsford said: ‘‘I knew after about six weeks on the job, just watching and being with the judge, that what I wanted to do in life was to become a judge myself, and I spent the next 16 years after my clerkship ended trying to figure out work experiences that would give me a chance to apply.’’ That speaks to Quirico’s influence, but also to Botsford’s own diligence.

Luckily, Boston is still a 2 newspaper town so we are able to learn just how far Judge Botsford was willing to go to “apply” for the position. Howie Carr does an excellent job laying out the Judge’s “credentials” here.

Her “credentials” include her husband making illegal campaign contributions to the person who took her “application” for the job, Gov Deval Patrick. Only in Globeland does a $50,000 illegal campaign contribution by the husband of a nominee to the SJC get no mention anywhere.

A search for Steve Rosenfeld on Boston.com turns up not a word about the “inadvertant over contribution”.

Judge Botsford does all but confess that she’d do anything to become a Judge, her Husband gives $50K in illegal campaing contributions to the Governor and the Globe thinks this is just swell. More than swell, it speaks to her “Due Dilligence”.

Pass the barf bag.

You always have to ask yourself what agenda those limousine liberals are trying to advance for each story. I can only guess that in this case it’s in response to the devastating anti-diversity study the Globe wrote about a few weeks ago. The bottom line of that study is that the more diverse a community is the worse off it is. On every meaningful measure, diversity harms communities.

The Globe can’t leave that notion unchallenged.

As luck would have it, there is a magical community where immigrants and natives alike live in perfect harmony. Perfect harmony with a liberal dose of white guilt, that is. Although nothing those plucky immigrants can’t overcome.

That place is Nantucket. A place Stocky is very familiar with. Let’s take a look at the article on Nantucket. There’s plenty of ommisions and mischaracterizations.

It is an unlikely spot to chase the American dream: a rural island 30 miles offshore, famous as a summer retreat for the rich and powerful, where the median house price tops $1 million, gas costs almost $4 a gallon, and a cheeseburger at one bistro sells for $19.

A chasm separates most foreign workers on Nantucket from their moneyed neighbors. Many immigrants work two jobs, ride bicycles to get around, and live two to a room to cut costs.

Immediately, The Globe misses the most important aspect of life on Nantucket. Those “moneyed neigbors” are only around for at most a few months in the summer. Most are there for only a few weeks. The “locals”, the people who live there year round also ride bikes to get around (lots of bike paths on the island) and while they don’t live 2 to a room themselves, they are likely to have at one time or another rented a room to someone in order to make ends meet. And they have a name for somone who works 2 jobs. Lazy. Most locals bust their ass during the “season” to make a buck any way they can.  

Those “immigrants” also tend to disappear at the end of the season. National Politicians take note: When the jobs leave, so do the illegals. No deportation required. Back to the story:

Many of those who employ them inhabit sprawling mansions, travel by private jet and yacht, and do not work.

Well, that describes John Kerry to a T. I’ll give them that.

For well-off families who summer on the island, shopping for clothes might mean a trip to Lilly Pulitzer, where a man’s cotton blazer in a pink-and-green hibiscus pattern costs $595.

Some immigrants find their clothes at the dump.

Images of peasants rummaging through the squalor of a dump on the outskirts of Mexico City or some other third world hell hole come to mind.  Not so on Nantucket.

The Dump. Just off Madaket road. Like a lot of dumps it has an area where people leave things others might want. It is even staffed by a town employee. It’s “Official” name is the Take it or leave it shop. It’s unofficial name is The Madaket Mall. Lots of good stuff there. While you wouldn’t expect to find John Kerry checking out the offerings(unless he was between heiresses), there’s no shame in picking up an item or 2 from the Madaket Mall.

Besides, Amazon.com ships for free to Nantucket just like anywhere else. It’s not like you are forced to pay Island prices.

But enough with the white guilt. Nantucket is a magical place where immigrants and locals live in perfect harmony. Let’s get on with the “narrative”.

In interviews, foreign workers voiced little resentment of the leisure and luxury that surrounds them. If anything, they say, the excess provides inspiration.

“Here, you sit next to a multimillionaire and you’re treated the same,” said a 34-year-old man from Ireland who was drinking beer at The Muse, an island nightclub, and declined to give his name because he is in the United States without proper immigration documents. “There are a lot of success stories of people who came here with nothing.”

“Without proper immigration documents” …. hmmmm Stocky isn’t sure but that could make him ILL fucking EGAL. Maybe not though. If he were I’m sure the Globe would point that out.

True enough about those success stories though. If you’re willing to work and make sacrifices there is money to be made on Nantucket.

Foreign workers’ presence on the island has grown more visible. The Brazil Mini Mart sits at a busy intersection near Brant Point Lighthouse, its wooden sign shaped like a whale.

Gee, a regular Horatio Alger story there. Brazilian immigrant starts own business and lives happily ever after. Well, not exactly. The Globe left out a few details about the Brazil Mini Mart. The landlord wanted to expand the building and rent it out to new businesses no doubt in order to attract higher rents. When word got out that the Landlord did not intend to renew the lease for the Brazil Mini Mart, the plucky immigrant owner showed just how much she’s assimilated into the American culture by screaming Racism. It now appears that this property owner has a tennant for life. Playing the Race Card trumps all. 

Foreign players dominate the island’s adult soccer league

That is certainly true. One small detail about that soccer league the Globe left out. 2 weeks before the Globe ran the story, the league was shut down. Not because of the piles of trash left on the sidelines after every game but because of a fight, a knife and a gun all coming together during a game between 2 Jaimaican teams. Yup, it’s just a swell time at those soccer games.

Where do all these immigrants live? Now we’re getting to the real impact of illegals on the Island. Even the Globe has a difficult time sugar coating this:

On Essex Street, a curving road in a dense neighborhood near the island’s center, many immigrants live in tidy, gray-shingled duplexes built close together.

Some house as many as 18 people in four bedrooms, said Rose Altunsacan, a legal immigrant from Brazil who moved here from Florida five years ago.

“A lot of people, when they first come, they get a shock,” said Altunsacan, who runs a small housecleaning business. She pays $2,800 a month to rent a bright, airy duplex on Essex Street, which she shares with her husband, a tiler.

Tidy??? A quick drive down Essex St will bring many adjectives to mind. Tidy is not one of them.

18 people in 1 house??? That’s the one with only 10-12 vehicles jammed in and around it.

The other houses obviously contain more people.

What can be done about this? Apparently, not much.

Richard Ray, director of Nantucket’s Health Department, tries to enforce housing rules, which limit how many people can use one septic system or inhabit a certain-sized room, but said his job is complicated by the cultural gap between Nantucket and the places workers come from.

“This has been their way of life in their country of origin, so to convince them you can’t have nine or 12 people in a three-bedroom house is difficult,” he said.

Where Stocky comes from, robbing banks is considered a way of life. I bet the Nantucket authorities wouldn’t waste a lot of time trying to “convince” me to stop robbing banks. WTF is Richard Ray smoking?

But lets get back to the narrative. All is wonderful for the immigrants on Nantucket. Or is it?

Among foreign workers, competition for jobs is intense. The going rate for cleaning houses is $25 per hour, but Altunsacan said she has lost jobs to other immigrants who are working illegally and offer to clean for less.

Let Stocky translate that Globespeak for you. Even the immigrants are bitching about the illegal immigrants.

Sorry to digress. Let’s get back to the narrative and finish this story on an upbeat note.

Peña said she feels at home on the island she loves dearly, and she laughs at the “very Spanish” name she gave her daughter, Chelsea. But the simplest things about life on Nantucket can still cause amazement.

In some of the big houses she cleans, there are just two people, and “all those rooms,” she said.

She expressed no envy of the size of the houses. But she marveled at the orderly calm of such a life.

“If they put something down in the house, it stays there, and nobody takes it,” she said.

Nice. Stocky has a warm and fuzzy feeling now. Do you? This story is a Jenna Russell creation. She has made Stocky’s “list”. On her way to her own category maybe.

Kim gets 2 mentions today.

First, she writes what at first glance seems to be a pretty good article about “short sales” What makes it different than most of these “homeowners lose house” story is first the successful short sale aspect and second the lack of the “homeowner as a victim” angle.

The husband lost his job and now they can’t afford to pay the mortage(s) after refinancing. Reasonably standard stuff. No tales of woe about how they got taken advantage of by a mean mortgage broker and no story of “medical bills” being involved.

What makes the article bad and bad it is, is what she left out. That couple that executed a “successfull short sale” and skeedaddled to North Carolina where they bought a new, cheaper house is in for a big tax bill. The difference between what they owed on their old house and what the bank accepted for the sale price is whats called “forgiven debt”. Or as the IRS likes to call it, Income.

In this case, $168,000. 1/3 of that leaves them with a $56,000 tax bill.

And the IRS will get their money. Short of bankruptcy (which is now much more difficult) there is no walking away from that debt.

Writing an article on short sales without a single mention of the tax implications is just poor work. I wonder how many strapped homeowners read that article and now think they have a chance to save themselves from financial ruin when if you factor in the IRS hit, it’s a bad option.

Kim’s second item comes from a story she writes about Countrywide Financial. The same Countrywide financial that Kim said “Depeleted” an 11.5 billion dollar line of credit a few days ago. 

Totally false of course.

Today she “corrects” (sort of) that falsehood here (the very last line of the story).

Countrywide drew down a $11.5 billion line of credit from its banks to replace funds that Wall Street investors no longer can provide by purchasing mortgages

“Drew Down”??? What does that mean. Stocky thinks she’s still insinuating that the line of credit has been “depleted”.

Maybe it’s because of media types like her that we have what she describes in the beginning of the article:

Some real estate agents no longer refer their home buyers to Countrywide, the nation’s largest mortgage lender, because they fear it would be unable to fund the mortgage at the closing table, loan brokers said. And some depositors, particularly retirees, have been concerned about the safety of their savings at Countrywide’s banking unit, even though their balances are federally insured up to $100,000.

Gee, some people are concerned about CountryWide continuing in business???? Where could they be getting that idea??????

From the Boston Globe:

About 1:30 a.m., the couples, who said they were laughing and chatting excitedly, began walking back to the hotel. They were about a block away when they saw three women whom they estimated to be in their late 20s staring at them.

As the couples passed, Lakeesha Johnson said, the women, who were White, screamed “N—-r” at them and swore at her.

Tameeka Johnson said she responded, “Excuse me?”

“They took offense at it,” she said. “Who knows what offends people?”

The couples walked on hurriedly and were about 10 feet away from the hotel door when the attack began, she said.

Lakeesha Johnson, who fell to the ground, looked up to see her sister-in-law surrounded by women. One woman had grabbed her from behind and wrapped her arms around Tameeka Johnson’s face.

…

Elaine Driscoll, spokeswoman for the Boston Police Department said it is too early in the investigation to determine whether the attack was racial. “To suggest a motive at this point would be inappropriate,” she said.

To suggest a motive would be INNAPROPRIATE?!?!?! You gotta be friggin kidiing me.

Oh. Wait. I quoted that story incorrectly. The attackers were BLACK and the racial slur they used was “Honky”. The women who got attacked were white and their names were Sullivan.

My mistake. Hold the 7 part series on racism in Boston.

Nothing to see here. Move along.

Another day, another gang banging thug gets a free pass from a Judge in Massachusetts.

Michelle McPhee does some more excellent work here.

   Last week Boston Municipal Court Associate Justice Annette Forde gave a stay of execution to a convicted gun-toting thug who secreted a loaded weapon - with its serial number filed off - in a “hide” built into a car stereo. The judge’s move is essentially a free pass to stay home while he appeals his jury conviction for gun possession.

    These are the facts of the case:

    Locksley Bailey, 20, was arrested less than two hours after a shooting when the car he was traveling in was approached by Boston cops, who said they who smelled marijuana coming from the windows. He fit the description of the gunman who unloaded a fusillade of bullets on a Dorchester street corner, hitting a man in the buttocks and hand.

A search of the Globe Website finds nary a mention of a “yout” named Locksley Bailey. No surprise there. Stocky bets they will get around to this story in the unlikely event that Locksley actually begins to serve some time. Look for a story on his aspiring rap career with the standard quotes about “turning his life around” along with a heartfelt shoutout or 2 to his kid(s) and his girlfriend suddenly turned fiance.

And of course, not a word of outrage from Steve Bailey.

Business reporter Kim Blanton draws Stocky’s attention with a story yesterday with a blatant mistake about Countrywide financial. More on that shortly. Stocky perused the Blanton archives at boston.com and found this gem from a few months ago.

Remember a few months ago? Stocky does. The cratering of the housing industry was continuing unabated. Unless you read Kim’s article from April 15th.

According to Kim the it looks like the “worst is over” for the Boston market. This graph sounds like it was taken verbatim from NAR press release.

If you’re selling a home, it’s not great, but not awful, either. Expect a still-slowish market for a time, though not as dreadful as 2006, which posted the fewest home sales in a decade, and a nearly 6 percent drop in prices. Don’t expect prices to bounce back much this year, though one silver lining is they probably won’t fall anymore, either.

But if you’re shopping for a house, 2007 looks pretty good — so far. You have many houses to choose from, and the upper hand in negotiations. One risk: other buyers are also more active, so moving too slowly may mean missing out on good opportunities.

Sounds like “It’s a great time to buy”. (more…)

What do you get when you take a clueless Boston Globe (sorry for the redundancy) “business” writer and let him write about Guns?  Typical liberal kneejerkism followed by holier than thou excuse making and attention diverting attacks on the messenger.

The Steve Bailey Straw purchase is detailed here. To summarize, Stevie is bored with writing boring business stories so he grabs the Globe’s favorite loony leftist gun control nut (John Rosenthal) and he heads to a New Hampshire gun show. Hijinks follow when Stevie uses his El-Globo expense account to have someone else buy him a gun. Otherwise known as a “Straw purchase” and/or a felony. (more…)