Friday Musings: Hillary, Casinos and More

I'm off to New Bedford to sample the local cuisine and meet up with friends, but first some quick thoughts for the weekend.

• How the media latched onto Hillary's impertinent response to Obama - and thought it was a plus for Hillary - is beyond me. Did anyone honestly believe that what Obama meant, when he said he'd meet with foreign dictators and regimes within a year's time, was that he wouldn't send advance envoys? Good for Obama, in New Hampshire no less, to criticize Hill, calling her Bush-Lite. She is Bush-Lite and deserves his rebuke; continuing Bush's regime of playing politics with diplomacy, as if it were some play toy, is not the basis of international peace.

• The media, in the above example, continues to show its ineptitude. Pro-Hillary pundits latched on to those few seconds, which during the debate seemed unremarkable, and haven't helped her cause at all (despite their insistence that it did). This will only continue to backfire for her. Imagine my shock, however, when Hardball's usually insane host (Chris Mathews) actually pushed hard on Clinton's spokesman - who was debating the matter with Obama's guy. The Clinton hack actually insinuated that Obama was already planning those meetings, without a shred of evidence, making it all too easy I suppose. My only question: did she hire Shrum's people or what?

• Read my blog on tomorrow's vote in Middleboro: we can't let anyone fudge the numbers and get away with it. It goes to show why we have a system of government where projects are vetted with hearings before they're voted on. Thank god someone was vetting this, because Middleboro was about to get fleeced.

• Then read the BMG diary for a local's take and good comments. The big shocker: another lie became the basis of the casino's support. There's a rumor going around that the casino is inevitable, so people must vote yes. Except, in fact, the reverse is true: no matter how the town votes on Saturday, Beacon Hill controls the casino's fate. The State Legislature and Gov Patrick would still have to okay the deal. Furthermore, pushing the casino against Middleboro's will, as the rumor suggests, certainly wouldn't be persuasive to the powers that be.

• I didn't blog about it earlier, but kudos to NStar for buying up renewable energy to sell to its costumers. For a small premium of $7-15 dollars, people can turn on all the AC they want - without any of the guilt. Today's 90 degree weather has been a killer, but still my AC remains off. I refuse to contribute to Salem's dirty coal-burning plant any more than required; getting my electricity from the beautiful turbines in New York and soon-to-be Maine would be a refreshing relief in today's summer doldrums.