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Finally: An answer to a question posed by the New York Times in 2022
By adamg on Thu, 09/26/2024 - 8:15pm
Eric Adams and Michelle Wu both won election in 2021. About a year later, the New York Times posed the question of which leadership style Democrats wanted. Given events of the past couple days, you think the Times would ever ask that again?
To be sure, Boston has had some questionable mayors. As mayor, James Michael Curley was indicted, convicted and thrown in federal prison for accepting wartime bribes (and then he got out, insulted the acting mayor and ran against him for re-election - and lost).. And Andrew James Peters was accused of far worse, involving a young woman (and distant relative) whose body washed up on a Long Island beach. OK, NYC had Jimmy Walker.
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Comments
Well, well, well
Says The Onion
Worth noting that we exported a couple of mayors to New York from, if not Boston, nearby (Medford and Cambridge) and they managed to suck, but less than this clown.
Eric Adams got the City that Never Sleeps
Boston got the Mayor who Never Sleeps. Or so it would seem.
IDK
The thing about Wu is that she seems so normal, especially for a big city mayor. I don't picture her working all night, I picture her stopping at the supermarket on the way home to buy normal food and cook her family a normal dinner before going to sleep in her house like a normal person.
And
taking a normal break by hopping up on stage with the BSO and playing a Mozart piano concerto, like a normal person. I do that too. A great way to brighten up your normal day.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsNLh3hNsik
I don't know, but...
Given that her partner is the stay at home caregiver, wouldn't be shocked if he's the cook in their house (as I am in ours).
Normal huh?
Maybe that's why she's so boring. Another carpetbagger.
Boring and getting shit done
Whether I agree with the characterization or not, boring is a good and desirable quality in an administrator, tbh. Another way to say that is "no drama."
She's not just an adminstrator
She's the Mayor and that position is much more encompassing than being a mere administrator. What more is she getting done compared to our recent past Mayor's? I wouldn't say that any of her predecessors were drama queens either and I don't believe that drama is the opposite of boring. I also don't think that "normalcy" (whatever that really means) in all things is necessarily a virtue unless your goal is to be a living corporate-sponsored android.
carpetbagger lol
If Boston has a fault, and it has many, it's the townie attitude that everything sucks unless it and all its ancestors for ten generations were born here. Nearly as provincial as Brooklyn.
Every city and person has weaknesses...
The attitude you've described isn't one that I hold. You made an assumption that my use of the term carpetbagger applies to anyone who migrates here from another place. It doesn't. But it certainly applies to some.
Don't assume you know me, especially based on one word. That 's definitely provincial.
Brooklyn NY is provincial huh? Here's a clue: EVERY locality has elements of provincialism to more and lesser degrees. Even where you come from. Then you have the people who blow in on their proverbial high-horses with false pride and pretense who come off as being better and more knowledgeable about the area than the locals. Many of them take more than they contribute and won't hesitate to tell everyone how they are doing it all wrong.
I'm going to guess that your problem lies more with your resentment of places and people who display strong regional identity. That's more your problem than anybody else's.
"Carpetbagger"
Its hard to give anyone who uses that historically loaded term the benefit of the doubt. Especially when you apply it to a member of an ethnic minority.
I don't need your benefit of the doubt...
and it's questionable whether you even know what the term really means. But by all means, carry on with your bombast.
carpetbagger /kär′pĭt-băg″ər/
noun
1. A Northerner who went to the South after the Civil War for political or financial advantage. 2. An outsider, especially a politician, who presumptuously seeks a position or success in a new locality.
I know what it means, "eddie"
It's right there in your first bullet. "Carpetbagger" was a pejorative term coined by racist southerners to stir up resentment of people looking to dismantle the slave state and spread more equitable civil rights. Not a great etymology, and it feels pretty off-putting when you try to apply it to someone like Wu.
Eric Foner https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carpetbagger
P.S. While you have the dictionary there, I'd suggest you look up "bombast".
Sorry Petie
I realize you're one of our resident race-baiters but making everything you dislike about race doesn't validate your "feelings" about whatever you're hallucinating about today. There's nothing in the definition about race for a reason and there's certainly nothing about ethnicity. The notion that all Southerners were racists and all carpetbaggers were "fighting the good fight" against bigotry is a Northern elitist's fantasy . Most carpetbaggers were migrating for selfish reasons not for black people. You're using race here for selfish reasons because you're a fraudulent virtue-signaler . Mayor Wu's ethnicity is something you injected into the discussion, not anybody else. Not surprising given your tendency to stereotype people based on such factors. BTW: I'm also in a minority demographic.
Bombast: To swell or fill out; to pad; to inflate. (sounds like you in a nutshell)
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/carpetbagger
"CARPETBAGGERS. In the face of the dire financial collapse that followed the Union army's decimation of the physical and commercial infrastructure of the South, once-wealthy Southerners frequently found themselves thrust into abject poverty. An economy thus thrown into chaos made an attractive target for Northern speculators hoping to buy properties at a fraction of their pre-war values in exchange for ready cash. Known for their cheap, shoddy luggage indicative of the transient nature of their business travels, these "carpetbaggers" often enlisted local poor whites or Newly freed slaves as their assistants. This invasion of their property by these geographic, economic, and/or racial outsiders insulted the Southern planters' love for tradition and heritage. During Reconstruction, these carpetbaggers formed the foundation of the Republican party in the South."https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/united-states-and-canada/us-history...
Wishful Thinking
Instead of typing a bunch of words about what you think the term "carpetbaggers" REALLY meant, I suggest you simply visit the referenced Eric Foner work. Since you are so versed in the reconstruction era, you'll know that Mr. Foner is one of the pre-eminent historians of the time frame when the racists started calling people "carpetbaggers". That was his quote, not mine.
Again, it's willfully ignorant to declare that the propaganda coming out of the mouths of confederate sympathizers in the 1860's contained nothing about race, and you parroting that archaic word does not reflect well.
The fact that some people who were racist...
also used the term carpetbagger, doesn't make fact that the term carpetbagger was all about racial implications. I've given you multiple definitions in reputable dictionaries and Mr. Foner has one opinion. An opinion I'd rather hear from him, quite frankly, as opposed to how you interpret it. All Northerners were not saints. But I have no doubt that you'll continue to put words in people's mouths (and use other logic fallacies) in your unending quest here to come off as morally superior. smh
Not All White People
in the south were racists either, but most of them complaining about northerners coming down to educate black people were.
Just like not all people calling an Asian-American who's lived in this area for 14+ years and served in Boston's government for 10 years! a carpetbagger are bad people... well most of them probably are. Maybe you're the exception? Since you're also on this thread trying to justify cops shooting up a subway station, probably not.
Musings of the self righteous...
Making judgements about "good or bad" people based on whether they agree with his worldviews and political interpretations. (look up the definition of bigot)
Please explain to us specifically how Mayor Wu's ethnicity relates to this discussion. Please also point to where I definitively justified anything about that shooting. You'd have no posts without concoctions and other logic fallacies.
Confederate Terminology
I'm not the guy trying to slander Ms. Wu with Confederate terminology, you rebel, you.
Why don't you explain why you think that term applies to someone who's lived in this area since she was a teenager, other than a two year stint to take care of her mother.
PeteX's lies
Nothing in the definition about being Confederate terminology and it was not used in any such context. I take it you can't answer the question I posed - I'm shocked.
You're not very good at gaslighting, Eddie
n/t
I'll take that as a compliment
Coming from a privileged understudy of Alinksy who probably fancies himself as a fake "warrior" of some kind. Remember folks, you're not a minority unless you agree with PeteX and Joe B. LMAO
When she was a city councilor
I ran in to her several times doing just the sort of things you describe. She was a frequent takeout customer at the Pleasant Cafe, for example. But I haven't really seen her out and about in the neighborhood since she moved upstairs.
I'll take the mayor who doesn
I'll take the mayor who doesn't say "I commend their restraint" after the police shoot four people because one of them didn't pay his subway fare.
"after" is not "because"
It's too common to see agenda-driven headlines and commenters use "after" to imply cause and effect.
someone can be pulled over in a traffic stop. they pull out a gun, shoot at the cop, and the cop shoots them dead. the headline will be, "cops kill man shot after stopping him for a broken tail light" as if that explains what actually happened.
i’ll bite
how should a headline describing the hypothetical incident read?
The police literally opened
The police literally opened fire in a subway station, hitting four people, and it's sheer luck that nobody was killed, only wounded. One of those people is a passenger who was shot while sitting on a subway train.
Even the cops aren't claiming they were attacked before they started shooting. They were trying to stop a fare-jumper, who claimed that the fare-jumper had a knife, which was conveniently stolen while they weren't looking. The mayor of New York told the press that the cops are trained to open fire, risking their own as well as other people's lives, rather than letting a petty theft suspect escape.
With any luck, Adams will be too busy with his defense attorney to get anyone killed.
You mean the shooting...
that never would have happened if not for the knife-wielding man who (literally) refused commands to drop the knife and continued to close-in on the officer? Those pesky -literal- details.
What knife?
The police have failed to produce a knife... even if they did, though, that's no justification for firing live rounds in a crowded subway station.
Crowd?
https://wjla.com/news/nation-world/bodycam-footage-shows-nypd-shoot-knif...
It's unfortunate that some were injured from friendly fire and a justified review of the shooting is underway. I'll wait for that review to make a judgement call on the shooting, but it would not have happened had it not been for the knife-wielding criminal. The knife was stolen by another criminal and is being sought. You're here defending them. Lovely
When you're out there dealing with this stuff and someone is coming after you with a knife, you're free to stand there and do nothing. But, being the internet hero that you are, something tells me you won't be putting yourself into that position anytime soon.
Police were the aggressors
The fact that you can watch that video and come to any conclusion other than that the police were acting recklessly, is very telling.
He repeatedly retreated and was simply trying to commute to work. They were aggressive in going after him for the crime of *checks notes* evading a fare of less than $3.
It is clear who was the threat to public safety here, and it sure wasn't the guy trying to commute to work.
The yellow brick road
"He repeatedly retreated and was simply trying to commute to work."
Funniest one I've seen this year (lmao). Keep skipping Dorothy. The wizard is real. You'll find him!
I guess even The Economist
I guess even The Economist calls Boston a “big city...” I’d like to say I was really impressed by the big city quality reporting by the personnel of ‘Spectrum News NY1’ today, which CSPAN2 delivered to the nation to witness today’s infuriating and woeful news.
Mayor Wu
Mayor Wu is the perfect mayor for a city like Boston. Still entrenched in old school cronyism and backroom politics, Boston was due for a leader who. does what she believes. Mayor Wu does not seem to care what others think. She knows what she wants and gets it done!
If she's entrenched in something...
she brought it with her from Illinois.
Did she?
Did she bring the invasive Canada geese with her when she came? Is that how they got here?
No
She and they all flew in. Was she entrenched in old school Boston cronyism when she arrived or did she acquire it via telepathy in Chicago? Is she also a native species? Inquiring minds want you to share all this wisdom you've acquired through your consciousness. Were you enlightened by the Buddha or did you learn it in a pipe dream?
BTW - I don't see being "entrenched in old school Boston cronyism" as a compliment but apparently you do. lmao
Ok...
...townie.
Not ashamed
to be from Boston nor ashamed to have lived in a number of other places. Never carpetbagged into a place though thinking I'm better than the locals and pretending I'm an expert. (wink) That's all you.
The statement was that Boston was entrenched, not the Mayor
It's funny how badly you misunderstood the comment.
Probably...
a combination of two things: I read it too quickly (my fault) and the word Boston appears to be edited into the middle of the sentence later where it wasn't before. Sentence should have started with the word Boston. Not to mention the periods and commas where they don't belong. Unintelligible on first brush. Interestingly, none of the earlier commentators noted that either. That said, OP clearly hasn't seen Boston old school cronyism at its best if they think Boston is still entrenched in it.