Free Republic

A man whose original flight was delayed seven hours is facing disorderly conduct charges today because he allegedly sprayed fellow passengers with foot powder after landing in Boston. "This is what your airline gets for treating me bad," Arthur Nicolson allegedly yelled, according to a State Police report, as he shook a 7-ounce bottle of Dr. Scholl's Foot Powder on other travelers as he ran off the plane. The 42-year-old Framingham resident was arrested in Terminal A at Logan International Airport shortly after US Airways Flight 67 landed at 3:30 p.m. Nicolson had originally been booked the day before on...

The family of a Jamaica Plain woman crushed to death in the 2006 Big Dig ceiling collapse will collect more than $28 million ... A spokesman for the Turnpike, Mac Daniel, said, "The tunnel collapse in 2006 was the result of a colossal failure of oversight by past administrations..." Investigations of the collapse showed that a string of failures - and, in some instances what authorities said was negligence - caused the collapse ... Concrete panels weighing 26 tons fell from the ceiling after the failure of bolts that had been secured with epoxy. The National Transportation Safety Board faulted,...

The editors of the Boston Globe opined that “Republicans can be counted on to take the low road in their campaign against Obama.” “Despite the fact that Senator Obama meets every Constitutional requirement to be president, the GOP smear machine is already on record with the claim that he is too inexperienced for the job,” the paper wrote. “Well, if Senator Obama were as old as McCain we’re sure he’d have some worthy achievements to cite. We call ‘low blow’ on the McCain campaign.” “We confidently predict that the Republicans will take issue with Senator Obama’s program of hope and...

Illinois freeper plannning on visiting the Boston, MA area this month and seeking advice on avoidance of tourist traps. Interest is primarily history, (without the usual PC spin seen today in most large cities). Any advice from MA freepers is appreciated. Tips and photos of Boston tourist attractions and tourist traps, posted by real travelers and Boston locals. http://www.virtualtourist.com/travel/North_America/United_States_of_America/Massachusetts/Boston-794476/Tourist_Traps-Boston-TG-C-1.html

"I have yet to let Jesus enter my life, but I admire Warren," writes Alan Wolfe in a New Republic essay.  Well you didn't expect a New Republic writer to be a born-again Christian, did you? Just one thing: Wolfe is the director of the Boisi Center for Religion and American Public Life at Jesuit-run Boston College.Now why would an allegedly Catholic school choose an agnostic to direct a center on religion and public life? But wait, you say. Is it fair to conclude, from that one sentence, that Wolfe is a non-believer? Maybe he was making some subtle point. Let's fast-forward to the end...

On August 6, the Boston Herald reported the good news that Boston's Retirement Board finally turned down the disability retirement claim of a fireman that was filmed participating in a bodybuilding contest even as he claimed that permanent back injuries suffered on the job had ended his firefighting career. The Herald hoped this decision heralded the end of the constant corruption of the Retirement Board that had become "a virtual adjunct of the firefighters union." Perhaps there might be hope that the corrupt Retirement Board is reforming what with the retirement of executive officer Robert E. Tierney who is leaving...

We were standing on a dusty road in Mosul, Dr. Larry Ronan and I, and he had just left us. It was January 2006 and this boy named Rakan had driven away in an Opel sedan identical to the one he was riding in when his life changed forever a year before, and so we stood there, with this odd mix of hope and apprehension, and waved goodbye. Rakan Hassan had been shot and paralyzed, his parents killed, when American soldiers panicked and opened fire on the family car as it sped toward them in the fading light of dusk....

Slugger Manny Ramirez's stormy relationship with the Boston Red Sox is over. Ramirez has been traded to the Los Angeles Dodgers, ESPN.com's Amy K. Nelson first reported. The Red Sox will pay the remaining $7 million of Ramirez's contract, ESPN.com's Peter Gammons reported. Jason Bay is going to Boston and the Pittsburgh Pirates get four minor leaguers as part of the three-way deal.

The trade of the week is not a multimillion-dollar transfer of Ronaldinho or Cristiano Ronaldo, but the move from the New England Revs to the Roman Catholic Church by Chase Hilgenbrinck. He has just given up his place on the New England roster to enter a six-year apprenticeship to become a priest. His soccer salary, a reported $36,000 a season, would not interest the gifted Brazilians who expect to earn that in a day. However, once Hilgenbrinck's story was out on The Associated Press wire on Monday, it was rapidly headlined from Latin America to Asia, Europe to the South...

Mayor Menino, tear down this wall. The firewall of low-level graft and back-scratching hackery for which Boston has become famous. It is the only thing protecting a chump like faux-firefighter Albert Arroyo. Everybody knows the story of Albert Arroyo. One day he claims to be “totally and permanently disabled.” Fifteen days later, he’s a top contender in a body building competition - caught on videotape. And yesterday, Mr. Mayor, the “Hardest Non-Working Man In City Government” ignored the commissioner’s order to show up for work. Arroyo may be known for his bulging biceps and six-pack abs, but right now he’s...

Arch Diocese Says Women Are 'Excommunicating Themselves' BOSTON -- Three Catholic women were ordained as priests in a Back Bay neighborhood church this weekend, despite the Vatican's admonition that the trio would be excommunicated if they did so.VIDEO: Women Priests Ordained In Boston“The women being ordained today have been called and they are following God’s guidance and direction for their lives,” said Dana Reynolds, a woman from California who became a Catholic bishop in a ceremony in Germany three months ago. “They have said ‘yes’ to God.”NewsCenter 5's Rondella Richardson reported that a congregation of Catholic worshippers, both male and...

LOS ANGELES -- American Airlines Flight 725, scheduled to fly nonstop from Boston to Los Angeles on Friday, was diverted to Oklahoma City after a disruptive passenger took his clothes off and had to be subdued.

Roman Catholic Womynpriests are up to their play-acting again. This time in Boston. Roman Catholic Womenpriests, who are neither Roman Catholic or Womanpriests, claim to be "ordaining" three additional women. In fact, it is actually an excommunication ceremony. [Boston] Three aspiring Catholic priests will be anointed and prayed over this weekend in an ordination liturgy that will resemble the traditional in most ways but one: The three being ordained are women. The ordination ceremony Sunday, at a historic Protestant church in the Back Bay, is the first such event to take place in Boston, one of the most Catholic cities...

The Red Sox beat the Yankees on Friday in the Bronx, but that didn't seem to satisfy a group of rowdy young people in Falmouth who attacked a family driving home from a Fourth of July fireworks display. Their reason, police said: The car had New York plates, and their attackers presumed they were Yankee fans. As the annual beachside fireworks show was letting up about 10 p.m., traffic congestion turned side streets into parking lots as thousands tried to leave. The New York family was stuck on Worcester Court when police say a group started yelling at them, accusing...

An Iranian Embassy in Boston 25 Jun 2008 Hassan Dai While McCain and Obama are dueling whether they should engage or contain Iran, the world is waking up to the Iranian regime’s proxies infiltrating Iraq, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Yemen, and Gaza. We are out there putting out the forest fire with our tea cups, and mullahs’ men and women are digging trenches in our back yards. Iran has established an embassy in Boston! Three former Iranian deputy ministers, Abbas Maleki, M. Jaffar Mahallati and Farhad Atai, have made Boston the base for their mission to assist Iran's strategic goals. These Mullahs'...

Boston’s two major daily newspapers are going through another round of painful cost-cutting measures. Boston Globe unions have been asked by management to take an across-the-board 10 percent pay cut to help trim costs, while the newspaper also looks at consolidating its printing plants, according to several union members. The Globe has just completed a round of buyouts that led to the departure of several high-profile staffers, and a top union official vowed yesterday to fight the proposed pay cut. “The Boston Newspaper Guild has given enough in the name of company equity,” said Dan Totten, president of the Guild,...

Before heading to work yesterday, I waslistening to the news on WRKO 680 AM out of Boston. They get news feeds from a couple of sources including Fox News. I heard a disturbing story that Jenna & Laura were at a book signing when an Obama supporter started screaming obscenities at them.A couple was there with their crippled daughter in a wheelchair. When the parents told him to shut up, the brazen boob set about punching the poor girl in the wheel chair.I have not heard any more on this. I know I wasn't imagining it. Has anyone heard more??Thanks...

The US Attorney's office in Boston yesterday brought a raft of criminal charges against the Big Dig's largest contractor, saying it knew that bolts were coming loose in the ceiling of the Interstate 90 tunnel but glossed over the problem until panels came crashing down in 2006, killing motorist Milena Del Valle. The government also accused the company, Modern Continental Corp., of systematically cheating on the bills for labor and materials it submitted. And it said a water-gushing wall breach in 2004 was a result of shoddy concrete workmanship, which it said Modern Continental knew about but ignored. Prosecutors said...

LOS ANGELES – After 72 hours of having the game’s showcase event consumed by talk of conspiracy, the Lakers brought another ugly word to the NBA Finals. Collapse. As Kobe Bryant and his LA teammates watched helplessly, the Celtics came from 20 points down in the third quarter to take an improbable, amazing 97-91 win in Game 4 of the NBA Finals on Thursday night at the Staples Center. Boston leads 3-1 in the best-of-seven series. Game 5 is Sunday night as the Celtics will have a chance to win the 17th championship in franchise history. For the Lakers, the...

One month after Pope Benedict XVI made his historic visit to the United States, Sean Cardinal O’Malley ordered the closure of Boston’s oldest German parish, Holy Trinity, and declared all its assets — including $ 242,000 in its bank account — be transferred to Holy Cross Cathedral. The priests and parishioners of Holy Trinity Church, established by German immigrants in 1844, opened the first parochial school in New England and introduced the Christmas tree and Christmas cards to Puritan Boston, among many other traditions. Since 1990, the parish has been home for the Traditional Latin Mass community from 1990 to...

POST-GAZETTE Res Publica Flag Day by David Trumbull June 13, 2008 Saturday, June 14th, is Flag Day, which commemorates the adoption of the flag of the United States by resolution of the Second Continental Congress, June 14, 1777. Since 1966 the week that includes June 14th has been designated National Flag Week. In issuing this year’s Flag Day and National Flag Week proclamation President George W. Bush said: The American flag has been our national symbol for 231 years, and it remains a beacon of freedom wherever it is flown. Since the Second Continental Congress adopted the Stars and Stripes...

“Whaddaya gotta do to get fired in this town?” It’s a great question, asked by a co-worker of mine (emphasis on “worker”) shaking his head over the latest Department of Public Works story in the Herald. This time it was five city workers hanging out at the Northern Avenue Bridge, watching satellite TV and throwing steaks on the hibachi. After opening the swing bridge once a day, they’ve got nothing to do, all day to do it and the taxpayer’s dime to do it on. My buddy, like every taxpayer reading that Herald story, knows that despite the obvious waste...

Having been occupied since 2005 by protesting parishioners, a closed suburban Boston parish is going bi-ritual, with a Syro-Malybar priest to offer one Sunday liturgy in the India-born rite (which celebrates its Eucharist ad orientem), and another in the Roman rite: The archdiocese is hailing the plan as a testament to improved relations between church officials and the protesters; the protesters are denouncing what they say was a lack of consultation with them about the plan, but say they are happy to share space with a group of Catholics in need and optimistic after an initial conversation with Vadana...

BOSTON - More than 80 years ago, the Hook brothers started trucking their catch of lobsters from Maine and Canada to Boston's fish piers, selling them directly to the city's top restaurants. Ever since, four generations of Hooks have kept their seafood wholesale business in a squat wooden building with a corrugated steel roof, resisting multiple offers from developers as luxury hotels, gleaming office towers and the Big Dig highway project dwarfed and surrounded them. On Friday, a seven-alarm fire gutted their landmark waterfront location, causing $5 million in damage that included the loss of 60,000 pounds of lobster, but...

The following letter was read at the meeting of the Parish Council of Holy Trinity Church, Boston, on 21 May 2008. The letter announced Sean Cardinal O'Malley's intent to close Holy Trinity Church effective 30 June 2008. His Eminence repeatedly speaks of "Holy Trinity German National Parish" and the German heritage but makes NO MENTION of the hundred or so souls who attend the extraordinary form every Sunday at 0900. (Note: On 22 April 2007, what was then the Indult Mass for the Archdiocese of Boston was moved from Holy Trinity to a suburban territorial parish 10 miles west of...

Roberto "Kiko'' Pulido, the rogue Boston police officer who enlisted two fellow patrolman in a brazen scheme to escort trucks bringing cocaine into the city, was sentenced today to 26 years in federal prison by a judge who said the defendant had disgraced his badge. "The people who wear that badge have a sense of honor,'' US District Judge William G. Young said, staring at Pulido, the ringleader of one of the most notorious police corruption scandals in recent Boston history. "You are ... dead to that sense of honor.''

“Legal Dramedy”, is how Wikipedia defines the format of the TV series Boston Legal. Living TV describes the show as a “… critically acclaimed and Emmy Award-winning quirky legal drama …” That is a good summary of why I first became enamored with this brilliantly entertaining program. Unfortunately, it has become increasingly common to hear the production characterized as “shamelessly liberal”. With that, Boston Legal’s brilliance and entertainment value has continued to decline and its charm is rapidly fading for me. Ironically, in a recent episode, entitled “Tabloid Nation”, Boston Legal, itself, addresses my very concern. In that episode, during...

Artist's flair makes names of victims hard to forget Email|Print|Single Page| Text size – + Globe Staff / The book has no title, no author, no explanatory words - just a few quotes from The Bible, and page after page of first names. Keith Robert Jeffrey Michael Michael Kim Curtis Richard Scott John Steven Peter Michael Jackie Robert Wayne Stephen Paul Linda Much ink has been spilled over the clergy sexual abuse crisis in the last six years, but this work is different: a hand-painted list of 1,476 men and women who have reported being sexually abused by a Catholic...

BOSTON (WBZ) ― WHDH Channel 7 announced Thursday that general manager Randi Goldklank is now undergoing medical treatment after an allegedly drunken tirade Sunday night that ended with her arrest at Logan Airport. "The unfortunate events of last Sunday night were unanticipated and Ms. Goldklank is deeply regretful," said Ed Ansin, president of Sunbeam Television Corp. in a prepared statement. Mike Carson, the station's previous general manager will take over on a temporary basis while Goldklank remains on administrative leave. According to a State Police report, Goldklank, 40, of Boston, threatened to put a trooper on TV and ruin his...

Anybody watching Boston Legal right now? First time i have seen this show. This lawyer is at the Supreme Court and is bashing the Conservatives. Not once doe's he point out a lib. This show always like this?

A doctor at the renowned Children's Hospital Boston has launched a new program to drug children to delay puberty so they can decide whether they want a male or a female body, according to a report today in the Boston Globe. Pediatric endocrinologist Norman Spack, 64, says he started the Gender Management Service Clinic because he found himself encountering 20-somethings who were "transgendered" and in good shape socially, "but they were having trouble getting their physique to conform to their identity. "I knew the 20-somethings could have better chances of passing if they were treated earlier," he said. "We don't...

Secular progressives, especially those in the Boston media, are having a field day dredging up the whole pedophile priest controversy here at its epicenter. While the mainstream media’s been giving us wall-to-wall all-Pope, all-the-time coverage, many here in the Boston area are well into their sixteenth minute of fame, and bashing the Pope for avoiding our city on his America tour. While he has publicly acknowledged the scandal, and now met with some of the victims, enough is not enough for these professional victims. "I acknowledge the pain of the Church in America is experiencing as a result of sexual...

WASHINGTON -- Pope Benedict XVI, in a dramatic move likely to alter forever the image of his pontificate, met this afternoon with five victims of clergy sexual abuse from Boston. The private meeting, which was first reported by the Globe this afternoon and has since been confirmed by the Vatican, was brokered by Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley of Boston.

Federal authorities issued a flurry of subpoenas across the city yesterday as they launched a grand jury investigation of disability abuse in the Boston Fire Department, including whether dozens of firefighters faked on-the-job injuries to significantly enhance their pensions, according to several officials briefed on the probe.

Growing up as an evangelical in rural South Carolina, I’ve heard plenty of rabid denunciations of the Catholic church and the corrupt scheming of its untrustworthy pope. But to hear these angry rantings from Catholics, I had to come to Boston. My good friend and colleague, Margery Eagan, is in a righteous rage over the positive media coverage Pope Benedict XVI is receiving on his first - and likely only - trip to America. Watching his warm reception in Washington, many local Catholics are surly and sulking. Much to Margery’s chagrin, Americans - particularly Catholics - seem to like the...

The new Yankee Stadium may be cursed! A devilish Boston fan working on a concrete crew at the $1.3 billion stadium covertly buried a Red Sox T-shirt under what will become the visiting team's locker room to jinx the Yanks, two construction workers told The New York Post yesterday.

A caller to Rush Limbaugh said his daughter brought home an assignment that described the Boston Tea Party. In it, the throwing of the tea overboard was changed to "some of the tea accidentally fell overboard" Can this be right? Anyone else's kid being fed this watered down version of historical facts?

Owning a home in Boston is about 70 percent more expensive than renting an essentially identical home. Therefore the government should stop trying to keep owners in homes and instead let more people return to renting. So says a new study from the National Low Income Housing Coalition. The study joins a growing chorus making the point that home ownership is a misnomer in many cases. The point is particularly directed against government efforts and proposals to help owners stay in homes by rewriting the terms of unaffordable mortgages. The housing coalition views this as misguided in markets where renting...

PRESERVING Boston Common should mean much more than keeping the grass green ("Large events may become uncommon at city's beloved park," Page B1, March 20). The Common was America 's very first public grounds and the city should not regulate away the right of the people to assemble peaceably there for the sake of a greener lawn. If greener grass is what the city wants, they can achieve that by not allowing dogs to urinate on the grounds. Boston Parks Department maintenance people have told anyone who asks that dog urine, not peaceable assemblies, is what damages the grass most.

Boston police officials, surprised by intense opposition from residents, have significantly scaled back and delayed the start of a program that would allow officers to go into people's homes and search for guns without a warrant. The program, dubbed Safe Homes, was supposed to start in December, but has been delayed at least three times because of misgivings in the community. March 1 was the latest missed start date. One community group has been circulating a petition against the plan. Police officials trying to assuage residents' fears have been drowned out by criticism at some meetings with residents and elected...

A recent study conducted by the University of New Hampshire confirms what curmudgeons in these parts have been complaining about for a long time: The Granite State may be turning into a suburb of Boston. more stories like thisThe report, "The Changing Faces of New Hampshire: Recent Demographic Trends in the Granite State," released last month by the Carsey Institute at the University of New Hampshire, indicates that nearly 25 percent of New Hampshire residents were born in Massachusetts, and Internal Revenue Service data indicate that the largest source of new migrants to New Hampshire is Greater Boston. According to...

Does anyone know who this thinner, older imposter is doing on the Guy from Boston website? It is not Joe Ligotti, the conservative ranter. I know he was banned from YouTube for a ridiculous reason, but now someone else is masquerading as the Guy from Boston. What is going on here?

FORT MYERS - The Red Sox’ trip to Japan has already hit a major snag. During a players-only team meeting at City of Palms Park this morning at 8:30, the players decided unanimously, according to more than one player, that the Sox would not take the field for their scheduled 12:07 p.m. exhibition game against the Blue Jays today unless there was a resolution to MLB’s decision not to extend an appearance fee of $40,000 to all team coaches making the trip to Japan. All players are receiving the $40,000 appearance fee for the Tokyo trip. According to one player,...

One day after Boston fire union officials stormed out of talks with the city over drug testing, a uniformed jake was arrested in Dorchester when cops spotted him allegedly smoking a joint inside a department car, police said. Anthony Gaston, 47, a 25-year veteran of the Boston Fire Department, was arrested for possession of marijuana, and illegal possession of prescription drugs, police said. Gaston is a fire prevention officer and is assigned a Fire Department car for his job inspecting gas stations and oil tanks to ensure code compliance, said Boston Fire Department spokesman Steve MacDonald. MacDonald said Gaston was...

WASHINGTON - Internet users should be free to surf where they want and download what they please. But shouldn't the owners of the networks that make the Internet possible also have rights? That, in a nutshell, is the topic of debate at a special public meeting of the Federal Communications Commission at Harvard Law School on Monday. Recent events involving Comcast Corp. and Verizon Wireless have raised questions about network owners interfering with customer traffic flow. The meeting also is expected to attract a rally on minority media ownership. The session is the agency's most serious public discussion to date...

http://media.wrko.podzinger.com/archive/Reese_Hopkins/2008-02-21_Barack_Obama_Rap.mp3

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) - The chief songwriter and founder of the band Boston has more than a feeling that he's being ripped off by Mike Huckabee. In a letter to the Republican presidential hopeful, Tom Scholz complains that Huckabee is using his 1970s smash hit song "More Than a Feeling" without his permission. A former member of the band, Barry Goudreau, has appeared with Huckabee at campaign events, and they have played the song with Huckabee's band, Capitol Offense. Scholz, who said Goudreau left the band more than 25 years ago after a three-year stint, objects to the implication that...

Bad news for fans of Boston fans of Bill Bennett, Dennis Praeger, Mike Gallagher, Sean Hannity, Michael Medved, and Hugh Hewitt: WTTT AM 1150 has apparently changed its format from conservative talk to Spanish language religion. Salem Communications also owns WEZE AM 590 and WROL AM 950 in town but I don't believe any of the shows will wind up there (we'll see). Boston still has WRKO AM 680 (mostly conservative), WTKK FM 96.9 (mostly conservative), and WBZ 1030 at night (middle of the road)

Phil Lawler, editor of Catholic World News and former editor of Catholic World Report, has posted the opening chapter of his book, The Faithful Departed: The Collapse of Boston's Catholic Culture, which will be published next month by Encounter Books. Click here to read it. Encounter Books has this description of the book: The Faithful Departed: The Collapse of Boston’s Catholic Culture, traces the rise and fall of the Catholic Church as a cultural dynamo in Boston, showing how the Massachusetts experience set a pattern that has echoed throughout the United States as religious institutions have lost social influence in...

BOSTON (Reuters) - Two men broke into Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney's Boston campaign headquarters early on Thursday, the second break-in of the offices in five months, a spokesman for the local prosecutor said. Boston police arrested Daniel Bradley, 28, and Michael Sauer, 30, as they tried to leave the office complex's parking lot. A security guard spotted them trying to steal computers on a surveillance tape and called police, said Jake Wark, a spokesman for the Suffolk County District Attorney. "There was some computer equipment that was recovered. There is no indication this was politically motivated," Romney spokesman Eric...