Everyone is up in arms over the SJC’s decision yesterday regarding pat frisks.
Two things stand out about this decision that basically says cops cannot just walk up to people and search them:
1. Dan “Search and Avoid” Conley telling cops to violate the law, he doesn’t care; and
2. The Globe not providing a link to the full court opinion. That is the very least on-line reporting should be doing. Linking to documents and such which are the basis of the story.
———————————————-
Shouldn’t there be video of the woman from Wellesley repeatedly striking the state trooper with her side view mirror and aiming her car at him? This occurred at Logan Airport’s Terminal B. Are you telling me there is no video?
Are the cops hiding it? Was it destroyed? Are they going to say the videos belong to Homeland Security and to protect us against terrorists it can’t be released?
I’m on the woman from Wellesley’s side. Most of those cops are assholes. This is a good opportunity to curtail abusive MA State Troopers harassing people going about their business.
That is why Tom Birmingham when he was Senate Pres. told the staties at the State House to “get the bleep out of here.’ Now we have nice benign rangers. The way it should be.
Power of arrest is one of the most dangerous powers there is. Shame on the people for not controlling those they give the power to.
The policeman is not always right.
———————————————
I was thinking of writing some positive things about Deval because this negativity is turning into a conflagration.
But then a few things happened yesterday that changed my mind:
1. I heard a little of Deval on talk radio yesterday saying more than once, and not rhetorically either, “What would you do?” This is his response to voters?
I said this before. Deval is like the little kid who goes to work with his father and thinks it’s a blast and he could do it. But the kid has no clue how things really work. Ignorance is bliss when that kid is put in charge.
2. Doug Rubin explaining himself to Paul Levy and others on BMG yesterday. Doug should be meeting Paul in a private office somewhere or chatting over the phone.
This little known agency provides a valuable service for non-profits. The governor is trying to make a major policy change by eliminating two agencies competing against each other. He may be right, he may be wrong. I don’t know. There is nothing wrong with him trying. (But I think he is probably wrong0
But to do so requires some political skills in bringing all or a good portion of the major players together. In this case that would include presidents of large institutions that make use of these agencies.
What we get is the sophomoric bull shit from the governor’s office using BMG to govern. Paul Levy kicked Doug Rubin’s butt.
In my opinion the Governor is trying to centralize bond funding for non-profits’ capital improvements. Of course that would eliminate competition among lenders and the non-profits would ultimately pay more to borrow.
It also allows only one government agency to have control over which non-profits get state backed bonds to sell and which don’t.
This is where politics and political and cultural beliefs can rule. When there is only so much money going around with just one place to get it then you better be nice as nice can be to people controlling that board. An independent board that is non-political. An independent non-political board that the Governor wants to control yet was crying on talk radio yesterday that he can’t.
——————————————-
And another thing. Anyone catch the piece in the Globe yesterday about former rep. Doug Peterson leaving his post as Deval’s Secretary of Farming? It seems Doug had problems and wished a meeting with Deval to discuss. Deval wouldn’t meet with him.
The same thing happened to former rep. Mike Festa who was Secretary of Elder Affairs. He was marginalized and forced out.
Then Deval hangs Marion Walsh out to dry.
See a pattern here? State reps who were with Deval from the get go give up their seats to join the team. Deval takes care of his political friends. He learned that from working for Bill Clinton.
Does Deval understand that reps and senators see this? Through Petersen and Festa Deval is saying to state reps, “I’ll use you for what I need and be grateful that I acknowledge your existence..’
Even the Kennedy’s do more for people.
BTW I was tipped off about this guy when he was calling into his house parties. Remember/? I told you so. Ted Kennedy never phoned into his house parties. (except maybe when he ran for pres.)
———————————————-
Perusing the new 2009 Boston Red Sox Media Guide I saw photographs of 73 people who were owners/directors/executives, and club house and medical staff.
Of these there were still only two African Americans. Both were hired years before new ownership arrived. One is an attorney and the other works in the clubhouse (meaning he picks up dirty towels and underwear and shines shoes)
The Red Sox have a storied past of racism. From being the last team to have a black player to the Tommy Harper incident of the 80s. Owner Tom Yawkey gained the reputation as a racist even though former G.M. Dick O’Connell said Yawkey was constantly on his case to get more black players.
Harper sued the team after he was fired by Lou Gorman for not showing up for scouting assignments. Harper claimed he was fired because he complained about the team’s tradition of supplying white ball players passes to the Elks Club in Winter Haven, Fl during spring training. In the old days the Elks had one of the few restaurants around and it was restricted.
The suit resulted in an agreement between the Sox, Harper, and state. The Sox were on a roll for more than a decade and had African Americans in high places and through out the organization. When new ownership took over they were aware of the Sox racist past and vowed to make things better.
But this is what we get. More insulting crap from Larry Lucchino
But, according to the guide the Red Sox are big into Jackie Robinson so that makes it alright.
Frauds.
you move your car! Duh!
<
p>If this woman refused a reasonable police order, and then fled the scene, she should be arrested and charged just for that.
<
p>Regarding video, if it exists they obviously would have to produce it as part of the discovery process, but I see no need for them to put it on the internet for our personal amusement. Of course, this woman’s lawyers would have to be seriously stupid to let this go to trial. Boston juries are not going to look too kindly on a self-entitled, rich woman disobeying police orders.
Here it is: http://weblinks.westlaw.com/Se…
<
p>A bit long as links go. Or go the mass.gov then judiciary then SJC then reporter of decisions. I do monitor these things.
<
p>Good post. I say that because you asked the right questions, really.
<
p>I disagree about Doug Rubin having public discourse here because I view that kind of connectivity as positive.
<
p>There is no way to know what other non-public communication and connectivity are going on.
<
p>- The Globe is not obligated to link to online resources. If you’re reading it online, freaking google. Reporters are supposed to summarize and to some extent filter information, not aggregate it.
But if they seriously want to drive people to their site for news, and not just wave at it and call it an “online strategy”, they should make use of the medium. Having an online newssite and not linking and doing other Net savvy things is the worst of both worlds…the stodginess and inflexibility of paper, and the antisepticism of the computer.
When writing an online article about something like a court case, not linking to the entire opinion is nothing short of idiotic. First, it’s not always easy to locate a court opinion by Googling, as they’re often buried in poorly-organized judicial websites. But more importantly, if newspapers want to keep themselves relevant, they should be trying to make themselves into one-stop shopping centers for all the information you could possibly want. Why wouldn’t they supply useful links like the opinion about which a news article is written, court documents like indictments, etc.?
The newspaper article describes the ruling well enough so that you don’t need to link to the full ruling.
<
p>If Manny Ramirez signs with a team. and both the team and his agent issue press releases, should the sports story link to both releases? I realize the analogy is imperfect, but the reporter should be focused on reporting, not convenience. It’s time-consuming, creating all those links, and time is short.
<
p>
<
p>No, no, please stop it! You’re killing me!
<
p>[catches breath] Oh goodness. [wipes tears of laughter from eyes]
OK, so either:
<
p>a) Newspaper standards (or expectations) have sunk so low that you think this is a laughably unattainable standard, or
<
p>b) You are assuming everyone needs to read the entire court ruling.
<
p>When I read a legal story, I have two questions: Does this affect me? and Is there a larger issue at stake (say, a freedom curtailed) that will affect everyone? So generally, if Nina Totenberg is telling me about a Supreme Court case, I really don’t need to read the rulings. I don’t really want to get into this, because you seem immovable on it, but how often do you actually read court rulings?
<
p>And one more question: Do you think reporting is just information aggregation? Ugh — why would anyone do a job Google does better?
<
p>
How hard is it to put in a link for the small number of people who do want to follow it? Is that really all that much to ask?
But it might be, when you play out the math of doing it on every type of story. To me it’s contrary to the spirit of the journalist’s mission.
<
p>Here’s an idea, which some websites do: automate it. If a story mentions the Supreme Court, link to its site. That would be a worthy investment, and not impair the reporter’s time. It would be less precise, but maybe good enough to satisfy most clickers.
<
p>
your first point. I read court rulings quite often, and it’s remarkable how frequently reporters overlook, or (less frequently) get wrong, important aspects of the opinions.
<
p>But the larger point is that if newspapers are going to keep themselves relevant in the online age, they need to take advantage of the medium. Why on God’s green earth wouldn’t a paper supply a link to the full opinion? It just makes no sense to me. It’s easy, and it makes the paper a more useful resource. “Information aggregation” isn’t the issue, but to answer your question, reporting isn’t “just” info aggregation, but that’s certainly part of the job.