Category: Massachusetts

Maskachusetts dumping migrants into a Black neighborhood

by philg

“[Lockdown and forced vaccination mayor of Boston Michelle] Wu acknowledges ‘pain’ of state plan to use Roxbury rec. center as overflow shelter site” (Boston.com):

Boston Mayor Michelle Wu responded to Gov. Maura Healey’s potential plan to use the Melnea A. Cass Recreational Complex in Roxbury as an overflow shelter site for migrants. Wu said she is working closely with the state to find solutions amid the ongoing migrant crisis, but expressed some frustration around the idea of using the Cass complex.

“For the first community where this is being proposed to be Roxbury, a community that over so many decades has faced disinvestment, redlining, disproportionate outcomes, it’s very painful,” Wu said during an appearance on WBUR’s “Radio Boston” Monday morning.

Amid historic levels of migrations, the emergency shelter system in Massachusetts has been under stress for months. Healey declared a state of emergency last year, and instituted a 7,500-family cap on the system. For months she has been pressuring federal officials and lawmakers to give Massachusetts more funding to deal with the crisis and make it easier for migrants to obtain work permits.

But the flow of migrants into the state shows no signs of slowing. More than 600 families were on a waitlist for emergency shelter as of Friday, and dozens of families have been forced to sleep at Logan Airport.

When I arrived at MIT in 1979, Roxbury was a Black neighborhood. This history describes what a hater might call a population replacement:

By the early 1970s, a combination of declining property values in Roxbury and rising values in the South End and discriminatory home lending practices had conspired to push Boston’s black community into Roxbury. As Latinos moved into Boston in greater numbers in the 1970s and ’80s, Roxbury became more heterogeneous. In 1990, the neighborhood was 79 percent African American, 14 percent Latino and 3 percent white.

[in 2019], Roxbury is 53 percent black, 28 percent Latino and 12 percent white.

It seems that there is no room for migrants in Weston, Wellesley, Dover, Concord (a sanctuary city), Lincoln, Newton (a sanctuary city), or other nearly-all-white towns with 1-2-acre zoning minimums. Maybe Newton doesn’t make sense because the teachers are on strike and migrants are entitled to a U.S. taxpayer-funded education (teacher strikes are illegal in Massachusetts, but 98 percent of the Newton teachers voted to break the law; apparently, they can’t be fired from their union job even when they violate the law).

Related:

  • America’s Welcomer-in-Chief is visiting Jupiter, Florida today! “President Biden heads to Jupiter, Miami for high-priced campaign events” (WPTV): “On Monday night, the White House announced he “will participate in a campaign reception in Jupiter” at an undisclosed location at 2 p.m. after arriving at Palm Beach International at 12:15 p.m. … Details on the Palm Beach County visit are being kept tightly quiet, but it is likely to be a pricey event.” (a border open to low-skill migration enriches American elites by about $500 billion per year in pre-Biden dollars: Harvard study using pre-Biden levels of immigration as well as pre-Biden dollars (i.e., it is probably closer to $1 trillion/year for the rich today))
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Somerville, Maskachusetts votes for permanent Hamas rule of Gaza

by philg

“Somerville City Council calls for ceasefire in Gaza” (Boston Herald):

The Somerville City Council is requesting President Biden to call for a ceasefire in Gaza but stopped short of endorsing a measure calling for the dismantling of Hamas and the administration of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Roughly 500 supporters packed Somerville City Hall on Thursday, crowding the Council Chamber and two overflow rooms to make their voices heard that fighting must come to an end in Gaza.

Councilors deliberated for well over two hours before approving in a vote of a 9–2 resolution that received multiple amendments. It explicitly calls for an “enduring ceasefire, provision of life-saving humanitarian aid in Gaza, and the release of all hostages.”

If there is an “enduring ceasefire” doesn’t that also mean enduring rule by the Islamic Resistance Movement (“Hamas”)? Separately, the parallelism here is tough to miss:

Councilor Kristen Strezo proposed an amendment demanding the dismantling of Hamas as well as the dismantling of the Netanyahu administration.

From state-sponsored public radio/TV:

Somerville is the first city in Massachusetts to call for a ceasefire, according to the local advocacy group Somerville For Palestine. Other local governments, including San Francisco and Minneapolis, have also passed resolutions. Cambridge City Council will hear its own ceasefire resolution on Monday, and it’s expected to pass.

I would love to see one of these cities take the next logical step and vote to have Hamas officials come over and govern a city here. If Hamas is an ideal government for Palestinians then why isn’t it an ideal government for Americans, both documented and undocumented?

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Socialists run out of other people’s hospital beds in Massachusetts

by philg

“The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people’s money,” said Margaret Thatcher. She didn’t count on the U.S. Congress and Federal Reserve being willing to print however much was deemed necessary to achieve the ruling party’s goals.

One thing that the technocrats couldn’t print, however, is hospital beds. With just a trickle of undocumented immigrants over the past couple of years (compared to the flood that Texas has received), it seems that Massachusetts is running out of health care system capacity.

“‘Capacity disaster’: Mass. General Hospital says it needs more beds to combat ‘unprecedented crisis’” (Boston News 25):

Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston announced Friday that it has been dealing with an ongoing “capacity disaster” and that it’s in desperate need of more beds to help combat the “unprecedented crisis.”

The hospital has been operating every day for the past 16 months in “Code Help” or “Capacity Disaster” status, despite the worst days of the COVID-19 pandemic being a thing of the past, a spokesperson for the medical center said.

According to the hospital, “Code Help” occurs when inpatient beds and monitored hallway stretchers are full, and “Capacity Disaster” is triggered when the emergency department is full, all hallway stretchers are being used, and there are more than 45 inpatients boarding in the emergency department awaiting a hospital bed.

What do the technocrats have to say about this kind of situation? It can all be fixed with a technocratic solution. “How to keep people out of the emergency room; Help for immigrants in arranging primary care visits leads to substantial drop in ER visits and costs, a new study shows.” (MIT News, 9/23/2023):

“This program is fairly low-touch and minimalist, yet it had a meaningful effect,” says MIT economist Jonathan Gruber, co-author of a new paper detailing the study’s results.

Separately, as the authors note in the paper, extending formal health insurance to undocumented immigrants “remains politically untenable” for the most part. On the other hand, jurisdictions might examine if other approaches increase care while, in this case, lowering emergency room traffic.

“There’s this tendency with health care to think that if you give people health insurance, you’re done,” Gruber says. “This study is saying the right system combines insurance as financial protection with other kinds of [tools].” He adds: “There is just huge potential to use data and science to get people to where they need to be in terms of getting the most efficient care.”

With data and science, all problems can be solved!

From the hospital itself…

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Triggered by Airsoft

by philg

We last encountered Andrew Stephens, superintendent of a high school in a suburb of Boston assuming that all Muslims affiliated with the school supported the October 7 attacks on civilians in Israel. See The recent flare-up in Israel, explained by Massachusetts public school principal for the email in which “Palestine” is recognized as a nation (would that be a positive for the Islamic Resistance Movement (“Hamas”) and their supporters? If Gaza were a standard country, the IDF could simply flatten it as the US/UK did to Germany and Japan, without trying to sort out each person’s individual level of affiliation with the government in power and the war effort.)

Something more upsetting than the deaths of October 7 has now occurred, however, and I have a new email to share:

Dear [Lincoln-Sudbury High School] Students and Families:

I am writing to let you know that, today in the L-S Library, some students were online and observed by other students to be looking at and discussing airsoft guns. This created understandable feelings of fear and anxiety for some students and staff. I am writing to reassure our community that we investigated and followed all appropriate safety measures in conjunction with the Sudbury Police. The students in question were not in possession of airsoft guns or any other device that either is, or resembles, a firearm or weapon. As a result of our investigation and consultation with the Sudbury Police, we do not have any ongoing safety concerns at this time.

Thank you,
Andrew Stephens, LS Superintendent/Principal

The police were called to the scene of some kids looking at a web page with a picture of an Airsoft product that is part of a “game” (Wikipedia).

Question for readers.. the Wikipedia page says that compressed air isn’t used:

The name “soft air” referred to the compressed Freon-silicone oil mixture (later replaced by a propane-silicone oil mixture known as “Green Gas”) that was used as a propellant gas, which was significantly weaker than the cannistered CO2 used in proper airguns (pellet guns and BB guns).

If a low pressure compressed gas is required, why wasn’t simple air used, perhaps with a regulator? What was the advantage of using these exotic gases?

It looks like some of the latest Airsoft guns actually do use compressed air that is compressed on-demand with battery power. Explained by a retailer:

Contemporary electric airsoft guns use a mechanical system inside, the gearbox contains three gears and a motor that allows the transfer of electrical energy into mechanical energy. It’s a simple process that begins with a trigger pull, then the trigger contacts close thus completing the electric circuit from battery to motor. After the motor draws enough energy it will begin spinning and engage the first (bevel) gear. The bevel gear is blocked by an anti-reversal latch, so it doesn’t reverse. This bevel gear then engages with the second (spur) gear, which subsequently engages the third (sector) gear.

Once the sector gear makes contact with the piston, it pulls it back in order to compress the spring. Meanwhile, a tiny nub on the sector gear drags the tappet plate back which consequently also retracts the air nozzle towards the cylinder. With this motion set, it allows the next BB to feed up into the hop-up chamber. The tappet plate will return to its original position which then chambers the BB. With the piston released by the sector gear, a spring shoots back launching the piston through a cylinder to force pressured air out. The BB is launched out, mechanical energy which suddenly becomes pneumatic energy.

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White vs. Black in Maskachusetts

by philg

From a chat group with some of my friends who are still up in the Boston suburbs:

[9th grader] lost points on a grammar test today because she capitalized Black and also White when referring to groups of people. Her teacher said that only Black should be capitalized, as that is an identity – but white is just a color and doesn’t refer to a cohesive group of people.

Also:

My friend wrote a letter to the head of the private school saying they should take down the BLM-logo mural because they endorse the Palestinian attack. After much pressure, she agreed to replace it with a general message of inclusion without the BLM logo. This is what it was replaced with:

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Two-year anniversary of Boston’s order that 5-year-olds be injected with an experimental vaccine in order to appear in public

by philg

It’s the two-year anniversary of the Boston Covidcrats ordering 5-year-olds to be injected with a non-FDA-approved vaccine if they wanted to enter a restaurant, do an after-school sport, see a movie, or visit a museum. The Science-informed order says “vaccinated individuals are less likely to develop serious symptoms or spread COVID19 to those near them” (i.e., claims that the injection prevents transmission despite the fact that the injection was never tested for its ability to reduce transmission).

“Mayor Michelle Wu announces COVID-19 vaccine requirement for certain indoor venues in Boston” (Boston.com) summarized the situation:

The requirement will apply to indoor dining at restaurants, including bars and nightclubs; indoor fitness centers; and indoor recreational spaces, like theaters, concert venues, and sports arenas.

The first phase — requiring employees and patrons ages 12 and up to show they’ve gotten at least one dose of a vaccine — takes effect on Jan. 15. They will subsequently be required to show they’ve received at least two doses on Feb. 15.

Boston will also require children as young as 5 to show they’ve gotten at least one dose to enter those indoor spaces by March 1. And by May 1, children aged 5 to 12 will be required to show proof of full vaccination as well.

The order Monday follows similar policies in other major American cities, including New York, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia. And it was announced in conjunction with other neighboring Massachusetts communities — including Arlington, Brookline, Cambridge, Salem, Somerville — that are advancing mirroring vaccine requirements for their local indoor venues.

Some initial resistance was anticipated:

Businesses will also be required to post a printed notice, available in multiple languages, informing visitors of the policy. And according to Wu, the city’s Inspectional Services Department will run checks to ensure compliance with the order.

“Once it gets to the point that it is part of the culture, part of the standard expectation, there’s much less direct challenge in compliance,” she said.

However, Wu described the proof of vaccination check as “just one more interaction that is already happening” between customers and staff.

“It would be a quick glance at an app or a card or a photo of your card,” she said.

If the following is true, why didn’t Mayor Wu order a real Chinese-style lockdown?

“We need to take every available action to protect our cities, residents, businesses, and institutions,” she said.

Why did the Followers of Science allow the filthy unvaccinated remnants to continue to congregate inside the never-closed (“essential”) marijuana stores, for example?

Separately, here’s a photo of the Scientist who imposed the order wearing a rainbow sash, but the sash lacks the trans-enhanced rainbow triangle that is part of our state religion. From “Boston mayor under fire after sending list of critics and protesters to police” (New York Post, July 16, 2023):

More recently…. “Boston Mayor Michelle Wu shows off photo from ‘electeds of color’ holiday party after defending gathering: ‘A special moment’” (New York Post):

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Abortionomics in Maskachusetts

by philg

In a recent phone call regarding correct Christmas Card mailing addresses, a nurse friend in Boston told me that she’s moonlighting providing anesthesia at an abortion care clinic. Anesthesia is required starting at about 10 weeks of gestation and the clinic provides abortion care to pregnant people who are up to 24 weeks pregnant. She said that they are especially passionate about providing abortion care to pregnant people who’ve come from states where abortion care is illegal or unavailable in practice at the 24-week mark.

Who decides how long the pregnant person has been a pregnant person? “That’s done with a combination of ultrasound looking at bone sizes and also asking the patient about the date of the last period.” In other words, depending on what the ultrasound shows, the clinic might refuse to provide abortion care to a pregnant person who has been pregnant for only 23 weeks or, if the customer gives a later-than-reality last-period date, to a pregnant person who has been pregnant for more than 24 weeks, which is still perfectly legal in Maskachusetts:

(Note the “mental health” judgment item.)

What’s the revenue picture for the clinic? “Prices start at $600,” she replied. What about for abortion care at 23.99 weeks? “I think it is about $3,500.”

What’s her daughter up to? I learned about various biomedical internships for the college undergrad. “She wants to go to medical school and become an ob-gyn.” I told my nurse friend about our neighbor who does IVF and who tells people if their insurance won’t cover the astronomical cost to get a job at Starbucks where they’ll be immediate covered. “Oh, my daughter wants to work on the other side of O.B. She wants to work in an abortion clinic where women [hateful term quoted; her language, not mine] come from out of state if they can’t get abortions in their own state.”

Related:

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Fighting genocide by sitting in a corridor at MIT today

by philg

“take a stand” by “sitting” today (registration form):

The MIT Coalition for Palestine is planning a demonstration in the Infinite corridor (we’ll be sitting in the hallway) and a fast on Thursday, Nov 9 from 8am-8pm in solidarity with our siblings in Palestine facing genocide and a total blockade orchestrated by the US and Israel. Please fill out the form below if you are committed to taking a stand through this action; details will be sent out later this week.

Everyone, regardless of affiliation with MIT, are welcome (can enter from 77 Massachusetts Ave)! From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!

If you misgender a classmate, you can be expelled from MIT. If you think that college admissions should be on the basis of merit rather than skin color, you will be disinvited from speaking at MIT (New York Times story on Dorian Abbot, 2021). But nobody will complain if you accuse the Jews of Israel of committing a “genocide”.

See also, the MIT Coalition Against Apartheid:

Update from Lobby 7… “No Science for Genocide”; “MIT: We Charge YOU with Genocide”. Note the megaphone, perfect for bludgeoning elderly Jews (Los Angeles-style).

The sitting part of “take a stand” (source):

How does sitting with a fully powered laptop computer in a climate-controlled building compare to the sacrifice that ordinary Palestinians are willing to make? One of the world’s most successful humans, from a biological perspective, willing to give all of that success away:

The above video raises a question, however. She is willing to sacrifice her 17 children and 65 grandchildren to the Palestinian cause. Why doesn’t she say that she is willing to sacrifice herself? Maybe she is too old to be a good soldier in a conventional battle, but she could fight as a suicide bomber. The Jews likely wouldn’t suspect a grandmother until she was too close for them to escape the blast.

Related:

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Cambridge City Council and “Israel’s current genocide in Gaza”

by philg

Harvard students were urged via mailing lists to vote (today) for three candidates with a link to a letter that they wrote:

We are heartbroken by the ongoing conflict in Palestine and Israel. We send our deepest condolences to everyone affected by this tragic situation.

We condemn all forms of violence unequivocally. That includes the recent attacks from Hamas and Israel, and the ongoing Israeli occupation and apartheid of Palestinians for the past 75 years. What we are witnessing in Gaza is an evolving humanitarian atrocity, and we remind all that collective punishment is a war crime. We do not support U.S. funding of Israel’s current genocide in Gaza.

We must come together as a community in Cambridge to protect and hold each other as the situation continues to escalate. We denounce all doxxing, intimidation, hate speech and silencing of individuals in our city. We specifically call on Harvard University to protect its students from racist attacks and threats.

We urge everyone in our community to spread love, not hate, to treat each other with empathy and support, to acknowledge all the suffering that is happening overseas and locally and to lean on our shared humanity and desire for peace. We must all do what we can to alter the course of history toward peace, justice and freedom for Palestine.

Quinton Zondervan, Ayah Al-Zubi, Vernon K. Walker and Dan Totten

(Hamas did some bad stuff on one day; Israel has been doing bad stuff for 75 years.)

As I noted in Why won’t the people who say that Israel is committing genocide go to Gaza and fight?, it remains a mystery to me why people who have identified an ongoing “genocide” advocate doing almost nothing about it. Do these progressives propose sending in the lavishly funded U.S. military to stop the genocide? Do they say that they’re going to leave their comfortable Cambridge homes ($1,000/square foot or, if one refrains from working and gets through the waiting list, $0/sf in public housing) and go to Gaza to help the Islamic Resistance Movement (“Hamas”) and Palestinian Islamic Jihad stop the genocide? Do they demand war crime trials at the Hague for Israelis? Do they demand the expulsion of Israelis, the perpetrators of this genocide, from the U.S.? No, no, no, and no. The Righteous of Cambridge (TM) suggest a slight reduction in Israel’s financial resources.

Let’s meet the candidates for election…

Mr. Zondervan is an incumbent who isn’t running for reelection, but is hoping to pass the torch to these three new candidates. Quinton is an MIT graduate (he and his now-wife were on our floor in the old CS lab) and immigrant from Suriname:

Ayah Al-Zubi is a Harvard graduate in sociology and psychology who immigrated from Jordan:

Vernon Walker works on “the inseparable connection between climate justice and racial justice”:

Dan Totten is “a queer renter from Central Square and a democratic socialist”:

They’re all apparently content to be idle bystanders to an ongoing genocide so long as they think they aren’t directly funding it. Let’s see how these milquetoasts do in today’s election, which might be decided by people who can’t read English. Here are the language options from the city :

Update: The people have spoken (in at least 8 languages). None of the above candidates were successful (which means they’re all free to go to Gaza and help Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad stop occupation, apartheid, and genocide). All of the incumbents were reelected, including Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui (“the first Muslim mayor in Massachusetts”). Two insiders were elected, one a former councilor and one a school committee member. One outsider won, a bike lane advocate (of course, Cambridge does it in a mostly unsafe manner compared to Denmark).

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Massachusetts governor: the border should be open, but migrants should not come to Massachusetts

by philg

“As Massachusetts shelters fill to capacity, Maura Healey says there are ‘a lot of places in the country where people can go’” (Boston Herald):

With the state’s shelter system at or approaching maximum capacity, the governor is suggesting new migrants could consider settling somewhere other than Massachusetts after they cross the U.S. border.

According to Gov. Maura Healey, there are 40 to 50 new families arriving in the state every day and seeking state assistance with housing, and the influx of people to Massachusetts — many without lawful presence in the U.S. — has pushed the state’s shelter system close to its 7,500-family limit.

“We expect to reach it soon,” Healey told WCVB. “We’ve just reached capacity here in terms of the physical space where we can house people, the number of service providers who are out there to provide services, and also the funds to pay for this.”

Healey did not directly say what happens to a family seeking Emergency Assistance shelter after the cap is reached, though she said she hoped it didn’t come to unhoused people sleeping at Logan Airport or in emergency rooms. She also suggested that there are other options available to new U.S. arrivals.

“There are a lot of places in the country where people can go once they cross into the United States,” she said.

“Mass. AG Joins Lawsuit Challenging Trump’s Emergency Declaration At Southern Border” (state-sponsored WBUR, 2019):

Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey on Wednesday joined 19 other states in challenging President Trump’s declaration of a national emergency at the U.S.-Mexico border.

The suit claims the Trump administration’s use of the emergency declaration in this instance is unconstitutional and unlawful.

The states are asking a federal court to block the emergency declaration in order to prevent construction of a border wall and stop the diversion of federal funds to pay for Trump’s proposed wall.

“Healey Among AGs Suing Trump Administration Over ‘Public Charge’ Immigration Rule” (AP 2019):

Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey is among those in 13 states that have filed a lawsuit challenging a Trump administration rule that’ll allow immigration officials to deny green cards to migrants who use public assistance, including food stamps or housing vouchers.

Under new rules unveiled this week, Citizenship and Immigration Services will consider whether applicants have received public assistance among other factors such as education to determine whether to grant legal status.

The attorneys general argue the expansion will cause “irreparable harm” and deter noncitizens from seeking “essential” public assistance.

“Massachusetts Becomes the Second State to Sue Trump Over Muslim Ban” (Slate 2017):

Massachusetts will become the second state to sue the federal government over President Trump’s executive order barring immigration from seven predominantly Muslim countries. In a press conference on Boston’s Beacon Hill, Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey declared the order “harmful, discriminatory, and unconstitutional” and announced that her office will join a suit filed Saturday night by the Massachusetts ACLU and immigration lawyers seeking to have the order overturned.

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