News
by Alan Bisbort | May 7, 2009 | News
While I still possess health insurance, I decided to take advantage of one of the few things for which I'm covered (with a $30 co-pay, of course). That is, I went for my annual physical exam last week. I got up on the scale and the nurse yelled to colleagues,...
by Tom Vannah | May 7, 2009 | News
Driving home from Boston last week, I heard Gov. Deval Patrick on the radio. I wasn't exactly a willing audience. I'd been trying to listen to the epic three-overtime Game Six between the Celtics and the Chicago Bulls. My radio signal crapped out somewhere in...
by Mark Roessler | May 7, 2009 | News
Not having known of Dana Roscoe or the possible eminent success of his lofty rail transit goals, I recently took an overnight journey by train from Amherst to Brattleboro with my four-year-old son. (The heartwarming narrative of our mini-adventure can be found in this...
by Mark Roessler | May 7, 2009 | News
Long before Interstate 91 tore its way through farms, homes and downtowns along the banks of the Connecticut River, providing a multi-lane ribbon of auto traffic between New Haven and northern Vermont, there were thousands of miles of rail, both steam and electric,...
by From Our Readers | May 7, 2009 | News
Art Won't Stop WarI was truly disappointed in "The Emotional Awareness of War" (April 23) because I think it misses a critically important point here. Do we really need more dialogue about the horrors of war from Americans who have participated in them?...
by Eesha Williams | May 7, 2009 | News
On April 29, hundreds of activitsts rallied outside the Vermont statehouse urging the Legislature to vote to close the Yankee Vermont nuclear plant in 2012 rather than allow the company that owns the plant, Entergy Corp. of Louisiana, to extend its life to 2032.This...
by Stephanie Kraft | May 12, 2009 | News
Complaints about high rates of credit card interest, payday loans and other types of predatory lending are usually framed in terms of their effects on the borrower, which are bad enough. But in "Infinite Debt: How unlimited interest rates destroyed the...
by Maureen Turner | May 12, 2009 | News
Experienced sources insist to the Advocate that kidney stones are a terribly painful matter, comparable to the pain of childbirth. The Advocate will respectfully point out that we’ve never heard of anyone passing an eight-pound, 12-ounce kidney stone. Still, it...
by Our Readers | May 14, 2009 | News
Biomass' Double WhammyProposals for numerous large-scale wood-burning electrical plants in western Massachusetts are alarming to those of us who are concerned about climate change. These are what you would build if you wanted to do everything possible to increase...
by Stephanie Kraft | May 14, 2009 | News
In the mid-1950s, the U.S. government taxed the pants off the rich—and no one called it socialism, even though the Red Scare was at its height in those days. The government taxed the rich hard because it knew very well that, with a few exceptions, most people...
by Mark Roessler | May 14, 2009 | News
Making good on a promise mentioned in last week's story, "Train Departing Amherst Station," Sam Bartlett, the manager of the Shelburne Falls Trolley Museum, emailed the Valley Advocate several images his father had taken of trains on the route described...
by Maureen Turner | May 14, 2009 | News
When Victoria Munroe first heard that Northampton's Cooley Dickinson Hospital had eliminated its regular drop-in clinic for breastfeeding moms, her first instinct was to get upset. "Of course I was outraged. How can they cut the breastfeeding clinic?...
by Tom Vannah | May 14, 2009 | News
In an effort to inoculate myself against withering criticism from one of two raging factions, I'd like to make something clear at the outset: I love teachers. My dear old dad was a teacher. Some of my best friends are teachers. As a parent, I rejoice at seeing my...
by Maureen Turner | May 14, 2009 | News
This fall’s Springfield mayor’s race just became a lot less intriguing, with the recent news that City Councilor Bruce Stebbins has decided not to run for the seat.News of Stebbins’ decision was broken by The Springfield Intruder blog...
by Alan Bisbort | May 14, 2009 | News
Gen. David Petraeus, chief of U.S. Central Command, was on CNN Sunday, putting a happy face on events in Afghanistan. The confident and, by all appearances, competent Petraeus is good at this, frighteningly good; even as he spoke, two suicide bombs went off in...
by Maureen Turner | May 19, 2009 | News
The efforts of the folks at Hallmark notwithstanding, Mother's Day has deeply political, even radical, roots. The holiday was established in the U.S. in the aftermath of the Civil War by Julia Ward Howe, the 19th-century social activist who worked for abolition,...
by Maureen Turner | May 19, 2009 | News
Town Meeting season has not been good to marijuana reform advocates, who are watching as the victory of last fall's Question 2 is being chipped away by community after community. Question 2—approved by 65 percent of voters on last November's...
by James Heflin | May 21, 2009 | News
Brian Hale, vice president of Springfield's X Main Street Corporation, the organization engaged in turning Springfield's old Bing Theater into a new entity, the Bing Arts Center, delivers some good news and some bad: "Unfortunately, we haven't made...
by Cathy Young | May 21, 2009 | News
Those who charge that modern-day liberalism has become fundamentally illiberal toward speech and ideas that challenge its own dogma could ask for no better illustration than recent events at UMass-Amherst. On March 11, the Republican Club at UMass hosted Don Feder, a...
by Alan Bisbort | May 21, 2009 | News
A specter is haunting the Democratic Party—the specter called Arlen. All the powers of the grassroots have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this specter: popular blogs like Daily Kos, Talking Points Memo and Liberal Oasis, activists from all points of...
by Mark Roessler | May 21, 2009 | News
Two hours into the May 7 Northampton city council meeting—a meeting at which the council voted to put a $2 million Proposition 2 1/2 tax override on the ballot this June—Councilor At-Large Michael Bardlsey took the floor to voice his disagreement with the...
by Maureen Turner | May 21, 2009 | News
Last summer, on the evening of July 5, an 18-year-old Springfield driver named Louis Jiles was pulled over by two city police officers. Within a few minutes, what had begun as a seemingly routine traffic stop ended with one officer firing three shots, at least one of...
by Our Readers | May 21, 2009 | News
Obama's OpportunityStephanie Kraft's exploration of the American obsession with Iran ("We Forget, Iran Remembers," April 30) begs comment. Our government is responsible for a half-century history of imperial meddling in Iran's affairs and...
by Tom Sturm | May 21, 2009 | News
When I last wrote about West Springfield's Scuderi Group ("Strokes of Genius," March 9, 2006), the family business's patriarch and principal inventor of the Scuderi split-cycle engine, Carmelo Scuderi, had recently passed away. At that time, the...
by Stephanie Kraft | May 26, 2009 | News
A sidelight on hard times not often mentioned is the situation of those still at work.Of course, they (we) are thankful to have jobs at all. But rather than a nation divided between the anxious, broke unemployed (or underemployed) and the comfortable, successful...
by Mark Roessler | May 26, 2009 | News
On Wednesday, May 20, Northampton residents who live near Hospital Hill were offered a preview of the plans for offices and a new manufacturing facility to be built by Kollmorgen Electro-Optical where once the state hospital’s south campus stood. The plans are...
by Mark Roessler | May 26, 2009 | News
As a teenager, whenever I was faced with a long stretch of nothing to do (road trips, insomnia, school), I would spend my time constructing my dream house in my head. The mansion that slowly grew in my imagination was a mish-mash of Victorian-era styles I...
by Alan Bisbort | May 28, 2009 | News
No question about it, India has accomplished great things. This is not like saying Iceland or Ireland has accomplished great things. Small, compact nations with relatively manageable populations can turn things around pretty quickly. India, on the other hand, juts...
by Mary Serreze | May 28, 2009 | News
Solar electricity—it's the coolest thing going. Science! Technology! Freedom from fossil fuels! A peaceful and productive future! Whether your motivation is political, ecological, or gadget-driven, photovoltaics, or "PV," appeals. Historically, the...
by James Heflin | May 28, 2009 | News
A couple of seasons ago, I researched alternatives to gasoline-powered mowers ("A Kinder Cut," August 10, 2006). That effort ended with my becoming the proud owner of a Scotts Classic reel mower, a new version of those gnarly old-fashioned hand mowers that...
by James Heflin | May 28, 2009 | News
When I was a kid in Texas, my grandmother lived for a while in a house equipped with a house fan. The thing was quite a novelty—central air is required for life to continue in that molten state of the Union. That anyone lived there before air conditioning is a...
by Mary Serreze | May 28, 2009 | News
We've all seen it, in our visits to friends and relatives who live in the 'burbs. Astro-turfish lawns consisting of millions of soldier-straight, identical blades. Stern injunctions to the children and teenagers: no frisbee, no football, please. ChemLawn...
by Mary Serreze | May 28, 2009 | News
Federal Residential Renewable Energy Tax CreditTaxpayers may claim a credit of 30 percent of net qualified expenditures, after state rebates, for residential solar, wind, geothermal or fuel-cell-based systems. Systems put on line before January, 2009, are subject to a...
by Maureen Turner | May 28, 2009 | News
Fewer than 13 percent of workers in the U.S. today belong to a labor union, a statistic that anti-union forces will point to as evidence that unions are relics of the past, and no longer appeal to most Americans.But a new report from Cornell University suggests...
by Tom Vannah | May 28, 2009 | News
My wife and I have nearly gone organic. Our gardens have remained largely free of commercial fertilizers and insecticides. Our lawn has never, in the years we've been caring for it, tasted weed killer or turf builder. The water we use for irrigation, drawn from an...
by Tom Sturm | May 28, 2009 | News
One of the main places homeowners can get significant reductions in both their utility bills and their carbon footprint is in the way they heat their water. Tankless electric water heaters save the cost of keeping a large amount of water hot by employing a system that...
by Stephanie Kraft | May 28, 2009 | News
Former FBI chief Louis Freeh now works for Prince Bandar bin Sultan of Saudi Arabia, one of the suavest diplomats in the world. This is the prince known as Bandar Bush because of his close relations with the Bush family—the prince with whom President G.W. Bush...
by Our Readers | May 28, 2009 | News
Moms RespondHaving given birth twice at Cooley Dickinson Hospital in the past two years, I applaud their ongoing responsiveness to community input—in this case, by seeking certification as a Baby-Friendly hospital ("Going Baby-Friendly," May 14). But...
by Maureen Turner | May 28, 2009 | News
Who wants to see Bud Williams elected the next mayor of Springfield? Mike Albano, for one. You remember Mike Albano. He's the four-term Springfield mayor who left the city with a debilitating fiscal deficit when he finally left office in 2003—a deficit that,...
by Mark Roessler | Jun 4, 2009 | News
Originally, a confluence of railroads put the town of Palmer on the map. The town is made up of four villages: the area right by the tracks is known as Depot Village. Palmer calls itself "the Town of Seven Railroads" in honor of the many train services that...
by Our Readers | Jun 4, 2009 | News
Roessler Wrong on BardsleyI read the recent article by Mark Roessler ("Northampton: Spector vs. Bardsley," May 21, 2009) with amazement and dismay. I have rarely encountered such a twisted version of reality in our Valley press. Not only does it border on...
by Stephanie Kraft | Jun 4, 2009 | News
Talk about a "not-in-my-back-yard" issue. It turns out that today, in the land of the free, more than half the approximately 300,000 homeowners' associations that set the rules for condo developments, subdivisions and other residential clusters don't...
by Mary Serreze | Jun 4, 2009 | News
In Greenfield's recent history, there has been great tension between proponents of economic development in the form of big box stores and proponents of protecting the environment against development. That tension, no doubt, will color the June 9 election of a new...
by Mark Roessler | Jun 4, 2009 | News
In response to the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission's (PVPC) "Knowledge Corridor" study, which advocates re-routing Amtrak's Vermonter rail service via the Massachusetts towns along the Connecticut River to increase its speed and number of...
by Maureen Turner | Jun 4, 2009 | News
For 12 years, Springfield's Solid Rock Church of God in Christ has run an AIDS prevention program aimed at young people. The project trains teenagers to serve as peer leaders, who talk to other teens about avoiding risky behavior. Over the years, the program's...
by Stephanie Kraft | Jun 4, 2009 | News
Maybe it was growing up in a windswept coastal town in Florida. Maybe it was being born an Aquarian. Whatever made me this way, I love water. Not just swimming, which I do in a rather lazy, not particularly athletic way, but being in water, feeling it swirl around and...
by Alan Bisbort | Jun 4, 2009 | News
Sonia Sotomayor saved baseball. So we were reminded last week after she was nominated to the Supreme Court. Before the 1995 baseball season began—the year after the players' strike—Judge Sotomayor issued a temporary injunction to get the season...
by Tom Vannah | Jun 4, 2009 | News
I am not a religious person, never have been. My lapsed Catholic mom and my atheist dad agreed to have me baptized a Catholic, but I don't remember going to mass except on Christmas Eve. When I was about seven, mom briefly joined an Episcopalian church, where I...
by Rory O'Connor | Jun 4, 2009 | News
Garrison Keillor claims to be a liberal. He—and we—should know better. Keillor has just joined the already large and ever-growing list of allegedly liberal media figures who either advocate or apologize for torture. In a recent column, the National Public...
by Eesha Williams | Jun 9, 2009 | News
Vermont Governor Jim Douglas on May 22 vetoed a bill that would have required Entergy Corporation of Louisiana to pay for decommissioning the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant.James Moore of the Vermont Public Interest Research Group (VPIRG) told the Rutland Herald...
by Tom Sturm | Jun 9, 2009 | News
Amherst's National Yiddish Book Center is gearing up to celebrate the opening of its new secure, fireproof and climate-controlled "deposit library" in its nearly-completed Kaplen Family Building. Immediately thereafter begins what President Aaron Lansky...
by Mark Roessler | Jun 11, 2009 | News
Consider this for a long-term, sustainable business model: build an all-in-one entertainment complex in a single, centrally located building. Hotel, restaurant, bar, movies, music, theater and shopping all under one roof, each business feeding the other. Don't...
by Stephanie Kraft | Jun 11, 2009 | News
The current cheerleading contest about whether Amherst should hang onto the Amtrak train from Washington to Vermont or whether the train should revert to an older route through Northampton gives everyone a chance to shout for their side, which is always a lot of fun....
by Stephanie Kraft | Jun 11, 2009 | News
Single-payer health care advocates in the Valley are not amused by U.S. Rep. Richard Neal's way of parrying questions about why he has not supported HR 676, the Improved Medicare for All Act—a bill to reform health insurance by instituting a single-payer...
by Maureen Turner | Jun 11, 2009 | News
When members of the Affiliated Chambers of Commerce of Greater Springfield show up for their annual meeting in Springfield this week, they’ll find some surprise visitors waiting for them: local labor activists and their supporters.The activists will be there to...
by Our Readers | Jun 11, 2009 | News
Doing Spector ProudAs an avid reader of the Advocate and a critic of the choices Paul Spector has made as a Northampton city councilor, I was interested to see what other avid readers could offer as support for the councilor. Peter Hirschman and Phoebe Sheldon, in...
by Alan Bisbort | Jun 17, 2009 | News
Don't look now, fellow GM owners, but we may be able to get out of this economic mess more easily than any of the so-called experts predicted. Mine eyes beheld a miracle this past week: General Motors sold its Hummer brand to a Chinese manufacturer, Sichuan...
by Tom Vannah | Jun 18, 2009 | News
Turns out, I have something in common with General Motors' new CEO: neither of us knows much about cars.Funny, I don't think I even made the short list when President Obama was looking for an industry outsider to bring new leadership to the troubled automaker....
by Maureen Turner | Jun 18, 2009 | News
Metal Fatigue: American Bosch and the Demise of Metalworking in the Connecticut River Valley. By Robert Forrant (Baywood Publishing, 2009)Robert Forrant was braced for a rough day on Feb. 4, 1986. That day, he and a group of fellow members of the International Union...
by Mark Roessler | Jun 18, 2009 | News
A recent Valley Advocate story on Palmer's Union Station ("The Town of Seven Railroads," June 4, 2009), prematurely declared the demise of the Connecticut River Railroad Station in Holyoke. A number of readers pointed out that the 1883 passenger depot...
