News
by Dave Eisenstadter | Jan 7, 2020 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, News
“The moment we all feared is likely upon us. An unstable President in way over his head, panicking, with all his experienced advisers having quit, and only the sycophantic amateurs remaining. Assassinating foreign leaders, announcing plans to bomb civilians. A...
by Luis Fieldman | Jan 7, 2020 | Articles, Featured, News
In the early hours of Friday, January 3, a group of protesters — some from the Pioneer Valley — blocked a train carrying 10,000 tons of coal by erecting a three-tiered scaffold on tracks in the town of Harvard. They blocked the train for over nine hours after...
by Advocate Staff | Jan 2, 2020 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News, Podcast
Valley Advocate editor Dave Eisenstadter and Hits 94.3 host Trumpy talk about the week’s weird news in a podcast version of the Valley Advocate’s Bizarro Briefs section. Hear about being your own farm in a dystopian future, generous burglars, and the danger of...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Jan 2, 2020 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, News
If there’s one good thing the Trump presidency has brought us, it’s the annual Women’s March. Begun as a response to Trump defeating Hillary Clinton, the first woman to earn a major party nomination in the United States, the march attracted nearly half a million...
by Steve Pfarrer | Dec 31, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, News
When he looks back on more than two decades of forging connections with musicians in Senegal, playing with them both there and in the United States, longtime Valley percussionist Tony Vacca laughs, shakes his head in wonder, and summarizes the situation like this:...
by Advocate Staff | Dec 31, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
Become your own chia pet … TO SURVIVE Climate change is a scary concept and is driving people to extreme lifestyles, but it was left to a Californian landscape architect to offer us the self-sustaining vest — essentially a wearable farm that can be watered using...
by Advocate Staff | Dec 26, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News
It’s time again for the annual Advocate tradition of giving halos to the good and horns to the bad. The year 2019 closed out the decade with some highs, with local activists going down to the border and speaking out on climate issues, residents in Longmeadow saying no...
by Advocate Staff | Dec 26, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News
Frances Crowe At 100 years old before she passed away this year, Frances Crowe was already a legend in activism not just in the Pioneer Valley, but the world. She’d been arrested numerous times over the decades, putting her body on the line for causes such as working...
by Advocate Staff | Dec 24, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured
In the Socks of Fox If you ever watch the Fox network and think — are these guys on something? — turns out some of them likely are. A reporter for Fox Business was busted last week at a Manhattan courthouse with a crack pipe in his sock. The man was ticketed and...
by From Our Readers | Dec 20, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Letters from our Readers
Put the Ha back in Hanukah As the holiday season rolls around we have to brace ourselves for the seasonal secular humanist assault on one of our nation’s most sacred holidays. However you spell it, I’m talking about the “war” on Hanukah. Chanukah has turned into yet...
by Chris Goudreau | Dec 18, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News
Starting in 2022, Massachusetts voters might be able to vote for their second favorite, third, fourth, and last-pick choice for political office, if voters across the state approve a proposed ballot question next year to adopt ranked-choice voting. In Amherst, which...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Dec 18, 2019 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, News
This week a disgusting lawsuit — that tried to censor a Palestinian human rights panel that in part dealt with how Palestinian voices are censored — was dropped. Three anonymous students at the University of Massachusetts Amherst tried to stop the May event, titled...
by Advocate Staff | Dec 17, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
Someone on the Naughty List It’s unfortunately a scene that is not completely uncommon. On a train heading from Manhattan to Long Island this past Saturday, two men began arguing until it culminated into a physical altercation. One man, allegedly drunk, shouted...
by From Our Readers | Dec 13, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Letters from our Readers, News
Come together over hunger As a Kansan, I’m proud that Rep. Roger Marshall (R-Great Bend, Kansas) introduced H. Res. 189 alongside Massachusetts Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Worcester) to work towards bettering global nutrition with U.S. aid. It’s been introduced to recognize...
by Samantha Croteau | Dec 12, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, News
David Picchi, who conducts arrangements for jazz quartet FlavaEvolution, labels the group’s sound as “fresh new jazz music for your mind and soul.” “We’re trying to bring something that you haven’t heard or things that you have heard and put them into new contexts to...
by Chris Goudreau | Dec 11, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News
Eric Talbot got his first tattoo at around 19 years old living in Portland, Maine, during the early 1980s. When the veteran tattoo artist who inked Talbot’s first tattoo — a skull and crossbones on his left forearm — saw Talbot’s artwork, he was impressed and told...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Dec 11, 2019 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, News
Every year around this time, I take a look at my pay stubs and look at the accrued total I’ve paid in health insurance premiums. This year, it will be almost exactly $5,000, which doesn’t include the additional copayments as well as the hundreds spent on dental...
by Advocate Staff | Dec 10, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
A man walked into the Art Basel gallery in Miami Beach, Florida, and ate a work of art that had recently sold to an art collector for $120,000. The piece of art consisted of a banana duct-taped to a wall and was created by Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan and titled...
by From Our Readers | Dec 6, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Letters from our Readers
‘We all know how that goes’ In response to “Between the Lines: Automation without oversight has deadly consequences,” published Nov. 28 – Dec. 4, 2019. Self-driving cars is a stupid technology. It assumes computers will always function well. We all know how that...
by Steve Pfarrer | Dec 4, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Featured, News
Time travel has been a perennial theme for fiction writers for over 200 years, as well as a theme from ancient myths, dating back far longer, from countries all over the world. It’s also an idea — or at least the notion of moving into the future is — that’s been...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Dec 4, 2019 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, News
It was as recently as October when I used this space to observe the two-year anniversary of Lucio Perez taking sanctuary in the First Congregational Church in Amherst. A resident of the Valley for nearly 20 years, Perez is married and has three children who are U.S....
by Advocate Staff | Dec 3, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured
Next stop, The Matrix Farmers in Moscow are now experimenting with virtual reality headsets to help improve milk production among cows. The thought is by rigging a VR headset on cows that simulate tranquil experiences, it will create a calmer atmosphere for the cattle...
by Our Readers | Nov 29, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Letters from our Readers
On its way In response to “The Return Trip: Psychedelics may come back from the abyss of illegality,” published November 21-27, 2019. Serene, I bet we beat your state to this. — Billy Tower, Facebook comment Billy Tower, lol you’re probably right! But glad to know...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Nov 27, 2019 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, News
In March 2018, a 49-year-old woman named Elaine Herzberg was struck and killed by an Uber-owned self-driving car in Tempe, Arizona. Last week, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) released a summary of its report on the accident, and the results are quite...
by Advocate Staff | Nov 27, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
Housebroken A would-be burglar encountered something he didn’t expect when he broke down the door of a Rochester, New York, home — the brute strength of the 82-year-old woman who lived there. The woman, who told a local television station she works out almost every...
by From Our Readers | Nov 22, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Letters from our Readers, News
Responses to Greenfield’s Safe City Ordinance In response to “Greenfield is now a Safe City: What’s next for the sanctuary movement?” published November 14-20. Thank you for your good coverage of this issue, and your ongoing good coverage of Greenfield. I think the...
by Advocate Staff | Nov 22, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
In Mossel Bay, South Africa, a gin maker is infusing their alcoholic drinks with something that’s pretty crappy — elephant dung. The creators of Indlovu Gin thought of the idea after learning that elephants eat a well balanced meal of fruits and flowers, of which they...
by Peter Stilla | Nov 20, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News
When over the past several years states began to legalize marijuana for medicinal purposes and then some of them for recreational use, many people from the Baby Boomer generation witnessed something they doubted they would ever see in their lifetimes. People who had...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Nov 20, 2019 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, News
There has rightly been much interest in the Democratic primary, both from voters and from potential candidates. By spring of this year, it became clear we had a record number of people running to be the one to take the dishonest, racist Trump out of the office of...
by Our Readers | Nov 15, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Letters from our Readers, News
What you can do about the climate crisis I just called Congress about the Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act. energyinnovationact.org. I think it is the best hope for getting us to stop putting carbon in the air! You might also night check out Citizens Climate...
by Luis Fieldman | Nov 13, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News
After last week’s election, Greenfield joins Amherst, Easthampton, Holyoke, Northampton, and Springfield as communities in Western Mass that have rules that limit cooperation of city employees with federal immigration enforcement. A ballot question in favor of...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Nov 13, 2019 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, News
One of the first ways I got connected to Western Mass was through the vibrant contra dance community that continues to exist here. When I first stumbled on contra dance in 2002 in southwestern New Hampshire where I grew up, most agreed that some of the best dancing to...
by Advocate Staff | Nov 13, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
Thanksgiving revolt Just as Americans get ready to tuck into their annual Thanksgiving meal, wild turkeys in a New Jersey town are counterattacking. Residents in the aptly named Toms River (a male turkey is called a tom) are reportedly being terrorized by the large...
by From Our Readers | Nov 8, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Letters from our Readers
How do we get to Medicare for All? Medicare for all is certainly the best plan which is why other developed nations have it. There are four sizable expenses that private insurance has to pay that Medicare does not. 1.) Lobbying Congress and making contributions to...
by Steve Pfarrer | Nov 6, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, News
Bassist Avery Sharpe has been playing and composing music for years, touring and recording with jazz greats like McCoy Tyner, Dizzy Gillespie, Wynton Marsalis, Yusef Lateef, and Billy Taylor. As a composer, he’s written music not just for his own ensemble but for a...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Nov 6, 2019 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, News
Usually, we the journalists don’t like being the story. It’s much more comfortable reporting the news of events with which we’re not directly involved, but there are times it has been unavoidable. Over the past couple of years, the Advocate has been the subject of...
by Advocate Staff | Nov 6, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
Fake Cop of the Week An eager North Carolina man was arrested for impersonating a cop during a police chase. In October, police pulled over a car in Wilson, N.C., searching for a possible murder suspect, but as police approached the vehicle it took off. A chase ensued...
by Our Readers | Nov 1, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Letters from our Readers, News
The state isn’t listening on the Route 9 bridge Are you aware the state is starting work on a two lane roundabout to replace the traffic lights at the bridge? While none of us like sitting at traffic lights, they do serve a purpose. Years ago there were public...
by Advocate Staff | Nov 1, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
So You Want to be Scared? Visiting so-called “haunted houses” for Halloween is very popular, but if you want to get chills in two of them in particular, you’ll need to be medically cleared by a doctor and sign a 40-page waiver before you can go in. The McKamey Manor...
by Gena Mangiaratti | Oct 30, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News
Paranormal investigator Liette Casey speaks politely when she thinks she may be in the company of a spiritual presence, as she would if she were meeting a living person for the first time. Standing in the attic of the historical Josiah Day House in West Springfield,...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Oct 30, 2019 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, News
As we come upon Halloween, that night of frights, there’s a bill going through the Statehouse now that addresses real horrors with our prison system. As reported in Tuesday’s Daily Hampshire Gazette by writer Noor Adatia, Nia Reid-Patterson explained through tears...
by Advocate Staff | Oct 30, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, Podcast
The Halloween edition of weird news with Dave and Trumpy. Valley Advocate editor Dave Eisenstadter and Hits 94.3 host Trumpy talk about the week’s weird news in a podcast version of the Valley Advocate’s Bizarro Briefs section. Hear about a scary house you don’t...
by Chris Goudreau | Oct 23, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News
With Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg testifying before the United States Congress in September and teenagers from Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, becoming leaders advocating for more rigid gun control laws following the 2018 shooting in...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Oct 23, 2019 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, News
Two years. That’s how long it’s been that Springfield resident Lucio Perez has been forced to live in sanctuary at the First Congregational Church in Amherst. Before taking the extraordinary step to escape an immoral deportation order — based on a minor charge that...
by Advocate Staff | Oct 23, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
A joke from beyond the grave … or in it An Irish man raised the spirits of those attending his funeral by requesting a recording be played of him pretending to be alive in his coffin as it was lowered into the ground. “Hello? Hello. Hello? Let me out!” the recording...
by Our Readers | Oct 18, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Letters from our Readers, News
Tennessee Gas project puts my neighborhood at risk In response to “Could it happen here?: Gas explosion in Merrimack Valley hangs over new pipeline efforts,” published Oct. 3-9. I live in a neighborhood in Longmeadow. The homes are not large and luxurious as those...
by Advocate Staff | Oct 17, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
A fish out of water The United States is being invaded by a creepy invasive species of fish that can breathe on land. The state of Georgia is taking no chances, and its Department of Natural Resources’ Wildlife Resources Division announced last week that the public...
by Jennifer Levesque | Oct 16, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, News, Valley Show Girl
Editor’s note: Julia Clark is transgender, and asked the Advocate to refer to her using she/her pronouns for the time both before and after her transition from male to female gender identity. Chris Clark was about 8 or 9 years old when she heard the classic song “Wild...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Oct 16, 2019 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, News
We’re now about three weeks into Gov. Charlie Baker’s unilateral four-month vape ban. How did we get here? It’s really not clear. Very little information has come out of the Governor’s office to justify what has appeared to be a knee-jerk reaction to recent reports...
by Advocate Staff | Oct 14, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News, Podcast
Writer Luis Fieldman wrote the Advocate’s cover story on Whately strip club Castaway, and it’s reopening with some new policies, including having male and queer-identified dancers, lesbian nights, and transgender performers. Listen here: You can hear more...
by From Our Readers | Oct 11, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Letters from our Readers
Editor’s Note: Welcome to our letters to the editor page. Here you’ll find reader comments on Advocate articles and other news. We collect readers’ opinions from emails, letters, Facebook comments, and comments to valleyadvocate.com. Want to get in on this? Email...
by Advocate Staff | Oct 11, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
Um, there’s some toilet paper on your … nevermind The long-awaited results are in: Mimoza Haska from Surfside Beach, S.C., is the winner of this year’s Toilet Paper Wedding Dress competition. In this annual contest, competitors design and build elaborate wedding...
by Luis Fieldman | Oct 9, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News
It will soon be a new day for Club Castaway, which will reopen later this month as a rare strip club that showcases a diverse body of male, queer, and transgender entertainers, and with a manager who says she is committed to treating her workers well. Out among the...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Oct 9, 2019 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, News
We’re less than a month out from Election Day 2019 — Tuesday, Nov. 5 — and while there won’t be candidates for state or federal office on the ballots, there will be a number of important local elections decided. But there are few places that will see as many important...
by Advocate Staff | Oct 8, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News, Podcast
Advocate Associate Editor Chris Goudreau wrote about how gas explosions last year in eastern Massachusetts have affected gas pipeline activism locally. He speaks to editor Dave Eisenstadter about the perspectives of the people he spoke with for the article and what...
by Our Readers | Oct 4, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Letters from our Readers, News
Animal cruelty is more than a ‘fluff piece’ In response to “Between the Lines: Animal rights is the elephant in the room for the Big E,” published Sept. 26 – Oct. 2, 2019. I read your editorial on Beulah’s death at the Big E and was so touched by your thoughtful...
by Chris Goudreau | Oct 2, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News
Across Massachusetts people rely on natural gas to heat their homes and businesses, provide their electricity, cook meals every day, and for their hot water supply. Most of the time, natural gas, which is delivered to residents via local distribution lines, is...
by Advocate Staff | Oct 2, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
Here’s to your health A former British Marine became the first person to drink a cocktail using his own mummified toe, after he had lost it to frostbite during a long-distance race in Yukon. Bolton, U.K., resident Nick Griffiths had lost three toes during a 300-mile...
by Luis Fieldman | Sep 30, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News
Jim Robinson is close to opening a retail marijuana shop in Chicopee, but until recently, cannabis actually might have been holding him back from getting work. Robinson had two minor offenses for possession of marijuana on his criminal record. “I had an active...
by Our Readers | Sep 27, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Letters from our Readers, News
‘Joe Biden should not be our president’ In response to “Between the Lines: Biden’s Electability Argument is Crumbling.” I have to say I agree with this. I don’t agree with being “mean” about it all, but objectively, Joe Biden should not be our president … It is...
