Left In Lowell

It’s a good idea to secure the loose stuff that could fly around in the wind, e.g. political yards signs.
My printer pal is now officially ticked off. ;v)

Use this as an Open Thread, if you like.

Normally I don’t push too hard on Facebook likes, but sometimes I get in the mood. This is one of those moods. So, if you are a Facebook user and wanna catch our feed, it’s here.

I post lots of stuff on Facebook that I don’t get to here, tidbits that I find on subjects political, cultural, and community-based, most often very local. Some days I post more than others, but it’s never more than 3-5 items per day on average. Some of my tweets from @leftinlowell.com make it there as well, when I remember to check off the box to send them (I most often tweet from my phone). But often you’ll find stuff there that you’ll find no where else, like my most recent post on non-chemical agriculture, or sharing an article from Howl about the chicken movement in Lowell. Yes, chickens! If that intrigues you then go hit the LiL FB page.

I also try to remember (with varying success) to post a link when I create a new blog post here, so it can be convenient for knowing when LiL has new content. Jack and Mimi also have admin access to the FB page though they don’t use it very often (though, hint hint, feel free to).

If you find something of particular interest, you can always hit the share button on Facebook to publish something of ours into your own feed. We’re only as good as the community who spreads the word! And if you like our feed, then share our page with others!

Now, back to your regularly scheduled program. Whatever that was.

http://www.rodney-elliott.com/RodneyElliott/Blog/Blog.html

The link goes nowhere, now. Now that C.Elliott is focusing on what councilors write on blogs about? Go to several of Lowell’s blogs and find the blog roll. You’ll find a link to C.Elliott’s (former) blog on most. It used to be there, but now it’s not. Honestly, the blogscape isn’t being cheated much by this development. However, there was a diary that used the work of the Blog of Record to take a swipe at the Mayor.

Does anyone besides me remember this? I distinctly remember the link to a Sun spinning of the Mayoral follies, right in the time of the inauguration of this council and the heading of ‘Insightful’ or something like that. Normally in a time like this, I just go over to the website and take a screen grab. Which is what I just did, and there is no website there. Oh, well!

Which Column Blog did C.Elliott link to? Was it this one?

Murphy flexes Mayoral Muscle
When asked by Elliott at Tuesday’s meeting why he selected Mendonca, a second term councilor, as finance chair, Murphy said he was choosing someone with the most “expertise and experience.”

But Elliott, who is in his 8th term, said Wednesday Murphy’s decision to end his 12-year run as finance chair was “personal” and likely made at City Manager Bernie Lynch’s request.

Or, was it this one?

Leahy speaks out on mayoral sweeps
Leahy told Martin, in his opinion, the mayor (who also chairs the School Committee) needs to be experienced, given the committee will have three freshmen members.

He urged Martin, if he is not going to vote for Councilor Rodney Elliott, to vote for himself. Martin served as mayor in the 2006-2007 term.

I think it was the former, not the latter.

Update: More clues lay over at Gerry Nutter’s Lowell - A Native Lowellians view of Lowell Politics
(more…)

For those of you that avoided the Tsongas Center like the plague, on Monday, you would have seen a large spectacle. I took this pic from the top of the Ayotte Garage at about 4:45, that evening. This was not the peak of the event.

Jen Myer’s sets us straight:

For anyone unfortunate enough to have watched the City Council meeting tonight and cares about the truth, here it is: my blog www.room50.wordpress.com is NOT a city website, as was erroneously stated by a city councilor tonight. It is owned and operated entirely by me. I do use it to promote the city and events that I attend in my capacity as Mayor Murphy’s aide. The post that was brought up at the meeting tonight: Mayor Murphy’s open letter in response to a factually inaccurate news story in the local paper was not posted on city time, on a city website or from city-owned equipment. Mayor Murphy emailed the letter to me, the newspaper and other bloggers at 8:20 p.m. I was at home. I asked him if I could post it on my blog. He said that was up to me . . . it’s my blog. I posted it — from home, on my own computer at my own discretion. Period.

Though, she told us once before.

Any questions?

Update: The related bit begins at the 2:19:17 mark.

Raise your hand, who didn’t see (or at least start watching, perhaps you ran screaming) the Warren-Brown debate? I know you weren’t bothering with the Red Sox, so don’t lie.

I find myself in total agreement with Outraged Liberal, who says, “It was nasty and brutish and when the smoke cleared there was one clear loser in last night’s US Senate debate: moderator David Gregory.” I felt, in a manner of speaking, betrayed. After all, I took some time off in the afternoon and spent the rest of the day down at the Tsgonas as a blogger, doing the blogger thing as best I could with an iPad and a smartphone (laptop is on the fritz). To have spent so much time prepping for this debacle of a debate feels wasted.

What’s more, this was a huge production on the part of UML and the Tsongas Arena. A lot of money was spent last night. The media descended in a mass hoard on the city, the arena was full, and the task of logistics, printing signage, traffic direction, and the police presence, was just enormous. This truly was debate-as-spectacle at its finest. What we got in the final analysis fell so far short of all the prep and hype.

What a missed opportunity, as Dick Howe said last night on Twitter. If I find out Marty Meehan had any clout in picking the DC Villager to moderate this debate I shall be very put out. Being in the crowd, I got a sense that a lot of people there felt the same way. It’s not like an hour debate is long to begin with. And to have nearly half of it being used for the way-overplayed (and, I think, satisfactorily answered ten times over) Cherokee and asbestos-Traveler thing, as well as horse race questions that have no bearing on policy or how each of the candidates would conduct their tenure on the Senate floor, was worse than a wasted opportunity - it was nothing short of a travesty of democracy and a showcase of everything wrong with our media culture today.

The twitterverse that I hang out in pretty much agreed - the showstoppers for the most part were not either candidate. It was how horrid David Gregory was, how precious few minutes he spent on substantive issues like Afghanistan, jobs and the economy, the environment (hint: none) or any other issue of substance. And to leave us with a stupid baseball question (I could see Gregory crowing inside with “see? I know local stuff that’s local!”) when we had already lost so much time on inanities was just the last straw.

One of our local radio guys, or even, hell, Jon Keller! would have done a far superior job. As smug as Keller is in his commentary, he stayed out of the candidate’s way in the first debate, and yet controlled the flow of it pretty well. Meehan made huge mistakes marrying the Herald for their political arm; I am hoping that a divorce is imminent. The polls appear flawed (I don’t say that because they went the opposite way of the rest of the ones which I liked - I say that because there are serious questions about their undersampling of Dems and oversampling of Republicans in a presidential year with Obama topping the ticket), the debate was trash, and I think UML’s reputation has been tarnished by mating with the Herald. The only thing you can say about this event is that, short of being content-free, it was well-run, the staff managed the influx of reporters and radio and news trucks and visitors outstandingly well, and the audience appeared to be quite balanced in terms of its cheers and jeers (Brown got applause and so did Warren). The event ran smoothly and was a credit to the University and the city. Too bad we can’t say the same thing about the debate itself.

I will, however, leave you with this:

Edit: If you want a good post on substance, a good place to start is this analysis by Mass Marrier.

Instead on one major question after another, he played and overplayed his alleged impartial card (a.k.a. the bipartisan ploy). He couldn’t and wouldn’t tell us what we’d get by electing him to a full term. He’d pore over each bill’s contents, he’d listen to all arguments and only then decide what he believed and would do. While he refuses to call himself a Republican in person or in campaign material, that sounded dreadfully like the Romney/Ryan shtick. They say that their economic plan is too complex to explain, so we need to elect them and let Congress work out the details. Walrus wings, I say!

The Blog of Record informs us that Meehan and Pangy had a pow-wow. What did they speak of?:

Political insiders, however, speculated the political titans talked about Panagiotakos’ future: Specifically him becoming city manager.
As City Manager Bernie Lynch continues to be roughed up, Panagiotakos has said privately that he would indeed consider the job, but he doesn’t want to be viewed as pushing Lynch out.
….
Panagiotakos is everyones’ pol, and he relishes that. If he became city manager, however, starting on the first day he would lose some of that charm appeal and it would only get worse as time marches onward. That’s why not everyone is buying into Panagiotakos’ alleged interest.
Speaking of interest, Panagiotakos was vehement: he doesn’t have any.”Maybe five or six years from now, but not now.” He repeated it several times.

Why not now? Give me a sec, to think of a euphemism. … (more…)

For whatever reason, Gerry Nutter has closed comments in his latest diary. I can only venture to guess why. It could be he is afraid he won’t be able to manage the comments that would challenge his shoddy constructs. Or, maybe he wants to squelch those commentors that would seek to affirm his slant. Gerry must cringe when he reads a compatriot invoke Jim Buba as a pillar of civic thought and electoral gold. (You fight with the army you have, eh Tom?) It might just be that Gerry wishes to drive more traffic over to this blog. I’m etching a bald patch onto my noggin, as I scratch away, preplexed why Gerry and crew pour attention on to what is said on the intertubes. Ignore it. Like most Lowellians will ignore Rita Mercier’s endorsement of Scott Brown.

I have to quote Bill Taupier, roughly, ‘Don’t give anyone advice that is not sincerely meant for their own good.’ So when I say, “Ignore it.” That is the best advice I can give. That’s not to say that I can’t predict how the ego-centric, uber-hubris of our #1 vote collector and her posse of sycophants will trounce this advice, to my own amusement. But, I did warn you!

This is a plausible statement: This endorsement is ALL about Rita and her lust to get even with Mayor Murphy for firing Diane Bujnowski. (more…)

Plop, Plop, Fizz, Fizz

About last night:

- C. Kennedy won’t vote for a contract for any Auditor. For a City Manager?
- C. Leahy dodged a bullet because the two most divisive motions were amended, thus softened. His questions were soft, too. His point that we shouldn’t chase after stuff coming out of a trial was his best moment.
- Kudos to C. Mercier for backing up the new Sheriff in town. Finally. If we are going to pursue bad behavior from before Lynch’s arrival, will it dawn on most that Lynch is the solution, not the problem? Sorry, but I’m not so sure Rita gets this. If she is on the Kennedy/Elliott bandwagon, how can she battle for the manager AND appear to attack him. Rita is crafty. Deft? The crew she is running with is hamfisted.
- This “blame game” is going to have a lot of collateral damage. I don’t think C.Elliott gives two hoots about smearing the reputations of City Workers. Will Mercier and Kennedy keep going along, just to damage the CM? As vote totals drop, the Union vote grows more prominent.
- I thought the bar was set low before. Observers have commented that last night was the worst, so far. “I wanted to puke,” said one.

PS. Thanks to Kathleen Marcin for point blank asking C.Elliott, at the public safety meeting held in the Mayor’s reception room prior to the Council meeting, how will we actually hire more cops AND keep a policy of 0% tax increases? What can be cut, when we are at an all time low? I tapped on C.Lorrey’s shoulder and said, “You don’t need no stinkin’ parks. You don’t need no stinkin’ pools.”

There has been a bit of an underbuzz simmering around the Parking Division kerfuffle. Despite the on-the-record remarks of City officials, the Blog of Record, a few Councilors and a brood of Boo Birds have opted to pay attention to whispers and shadows. The whole mess flared up, two weeks ago, when former CM Bill Taupier made some powerful assertions on the City Life program. Copies of the program are floating around. I don’t have one, but I did see it at the time. I had even called in, earlier in the program, to chill things out. Maybe my advising my elders was intolerable. Anyways, it only got worse that morning. The account Gerry Nutter gave in a blog summed it up fairly well.

I knew after that, this would fester. Bill Taupier was ratcheting things up based on what he thought he discerned from the Blog of Record, but he also seemed to suggest that he was hearing some of the whispers, first hand. I followed up with Bill, after that show. Over breakfast, he doubled down on his position. He, in my mind, was convinced that there was more to the story than had been told. He was forceful in his defense that there was either a coverup, or that his ’source’ was lying or his ’source’ was repeating a lie, unwittingly. (more…)