YO--IF YOU WANT BALANCED REPORTING, YOU CAME TO THE WRONG PLACE

If it is balance you want, read the Globe and learn the following:  Target is opening a new store near Fenway Park.  The Globe had a more or less positive article about the commitment of Target to an urban neighborhood .  Then they searched high and low and found (wonders of wonders) a naysayer and a BU professor to boot.  He's not sure it will succeed because the store actually opens up on the second floor--not street level.  They could not just leave it alone; had to throw water on it.  That neighborhood and the North Station neighborhood are about to explode in terms of development.  That professor can go screw himself and in 5 years, he will be wishing he could afford to live in the Fenway (and don't even start on me about gentrification which I know is a real issue). There are not two sides to every story in this screed. All the Globe seems to care about in a one sided way are those poor animals and the Catholic Church--I of course think those are two items that definitely need balance.

Speaking of items, here are some more:
-Item:  Put the gloves, winter hats, and winter coats away.  It is way too early though I do understand if you don't want to wear light colors. It is only autumn and I don't care if there are a few flakes here on the weekend.  A flake does not a winter make (!).
-Item:  The Supremes avoided any ugly showdowns on abortion and gay marriage and let lower court decisions stand.  That means a majority of states now allow same sex marriage and allow abortions.  Of course, some states are defying the court and should be kicked to the curb.  The usual suspects.
-Item:Mass General wants to expand and open a hospital in China.  Good for them--maybe they can also open one in Turkmenistan next.  They are getting the shit kicked out of them here because they claim they will save money if they get bigger.  Highly unlikely and not proven anywhere.  The corporation that owns MGH eased out its leader because of this nonsense--he will take a one million dollar pay cut and run Partners in Health. Hope he can handle Haiti better than he handled the doctors in his MGH job.
-Item:  Because of those fanatic Republicans blocking the nomination, we have no Surgeon General.  And they also don't like the idea of an Ebola Czar.  Anybody think one of them or both might have been helpful if not thoughtful about this Ebola thingy.  They need to be kicked to the gutter--forget the curb. Too much hysteria from too many non-health professionals.  Putting politics right into the operating rooms.
Item:  My main man Nate Silver (538 website) is predicting the Republicans will control the Senate which is really dreary news.  On a brighter note, he is also predicting that Scottie will lose in NH.  Don't know if the gutter has much room left but I think I will try to squeeze Scottie in.
-Item:  Will hold my nose and vote for Coakley for Governor but I care more about NH.
-Item:  Netanyahu is pushing more settlements and these will be in East Jerusalem.  He just does not give a shit and seems to get away with it.
-Item:  The Turks have allowed about 250 Kurdish fighters to cross their border on their way to Syria.  Bless their hearts.  Meanwhile their own soldiers literally continue to watch the war through fences.  They should be embarrassed at their inaction while half the world is bombing those ISIS crazies.
-Item: I want all of you to rest easy--my social security will rise 1.7% in January.  Too late for some really big Xmas or Hanukkah gifts; but maybe I can now get a muffin or two.

Just learned that our former Mayor (Menino) has passed away.  Guy retired about a year ago and then this ugly cancer.  Grab the time you have and live it up. Who knows how good he was--but the streets were plowed and the potholes fixed.  Could not understand one word he said.

SPORTS TALK
--Don't you wish you had Seguin and Thornton on your team.  And some defense men who didn't cough up the puck right in front of the net.  They better play close to .500 until the big boys are back.
--Cannot read too much into the Celtics victory last night but they did look good and very athletic.  Still out rebounded.
--Just hope the Pats do not get blown out Sunday.  Manning has looked kind of terrific.

Sayonara

DAMN THE TORPEDOES, FULL SPEED AHEAD

So here we go.  And speaking of speed, let's begin with Boston traffic.  It sucks and speed is not the operational adjective.  I get it that construction has to happen before the wet cold winter arrives.  I get it that the roads and bridges need fixing.  I do not get why these projects occur during rush hour. We are now a one car family and on some days I take Barbara to work in Waltham--maybe, as the crow flies, it is 10 miles.  Why does it take nearly 45 minutes each way? Because the roads are totally messed up, the towns have allowed the construction to begin at 8 in the morning, and the assigned police are just watching and sipping coffee.

Our slow as a turtle Gaming Commission neglected to discover that the winning bid for the Boston casino included land purchased from a known member of the "Mafia".  Missed that but managed to kill horse racing and took three years to do it.  I am feeling a bit better that the override will fail mostly due to the construction jobs it will create and because everyone in Western Mass. will want downtown Springfield to survive.  But the Commission is a joke and now say they want to broker some kind of deal to keep horse racing alive some place--a day late and way more that a dollar short.

The election is less than a month away and I have thrown in the towel--the Dems will not control the Senate. Which probably means the final two years of Obama's presidency will be a total stalemate.  No immigration reform, an attempt to repeal Obamacare, every effort made to limit anything Obama wants, and god forbid if one of the Supremes steps aside.  Yikes.  And if you say, "its about the economy stupid", you are wrong. Because, considering the mess he inherited, Obama has really salvaged the economy.  Unemployment is under 6% and thanks to energy efficiencies and the North Dakota boom, I paid under $3 a gallon for gas. Not enough for those haters out there.

The Turks are NATO members and want to be part of the EU--but they don't want to dip their military toes into the battle to confront ISIS.  So, literally, their soldiers watch the current battle on the other side of a fence separating Turkey from Syria.  There will be retributions somewhere down the line if they continue to sit on the sidelines.  Meanwhile those medieval fanatics are about to behead another person.

I barely understand the Ebola crisis--but I know this--Bill Gates gave $50 million to help in the fight against the spread but a lot of those African countries cannot even use the money since they have no infrastructure that can manage it.  I will say they better stop sending these patients to hospitals ill prepared to deal with them.

Speaking of nurses, though, can someone tell me why nurses at Brigham and Women's in Boston can choose not to get vaccinated against the flu and other contagious illnesses?  It is now a union bargaining issue.  I mean they are fucking nurses and they don believe in inoculation because of some screwed up sense of the unproven negatives. Bargain my health away if I am an inpatient there?

I want to end on a positive note.  We saw Richard Blanco at a reading last week.  He is the Cuban American gay man from Maine who happens also to be a poet.  He was the guy who read his poetry at Obama's inauguration in 2012.  He was wonderful in person and I promptly went to my library list and ordered up all the stuff he has written. Just inspiring--especially when he talks about the town of Bethel where he lives now.  Loved him.

SPORTSTALK
It has finally gotten through my thick skull--those sports talk shows are not really about sports; they are simply entertainment pretending to be about sports.  And if there is no sports news, they make up issues like Brady and Belichik hate each other which they have created out of thin air.  Yikes, it took me long enough.

And Michigan sucks losing to Rutgers and barely beating Penn State.  They will lose to both OSU and MSU and Brady Hoke will be kicked to the curb.

If there really is a monsoon tonight, the Pats will struggle but the Jets are so bad, they still should win.

Sayonara.