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‘Slap in the face:’ Boston veterans still fuming at City Council over budget cut

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:41:18 GMT

Two city councilors are trying to repair the damage caused by their colleagues’ vote to cut nearly $1 million from the veterans’ services budget, a move that was vetoed by the mayor but still has Boston veterans fuming months later.Council President Ed Flynn and Councilor-at-Large Erin Murphy filed a resolution ahead of the body’s Wednesday meeting, to commemorate Veterans Day. The measure “honoring all those who served our country” is aimed at helping to mend a relationship that remains strained by last June’s budget vote.Flynn said residents, veterans and military families across the city and country were “shocked and extremely disappointed” at the “disrespect” shown by many members of the City Council, who voted to cut $900,000 from a budget that broadly supports low-income veterans and their families.“The sacred oath that we have made to veterans has been negatively impacted by the vote of the City Council to cut $1 million,” Flynn, a U.S. Navy veteran, told the Herald. “But I a...

‘Antisemitism has no place at Harvard’: College creates advisory board to tackle antisemitism in wake of anti-Israel letter

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:41:18 GMT

Harvard’s president has vowed that she’s committed to tackling antisemitism on campus, telling Jewish students that she created an advisory board to combat hate following the student groups’ anti-Israel letter and anti-Jewish incidents on campus.Harvard President Claudine Gay has assembled a group of advisors to help eradicate antisemitism from the campus community, she recently told hundreds of Jewish students, parents, staff, alumni and faculty at Harvard Hillel.This step from Gay comes in the wake of the bombshell student group letter that blamed Israel for Hamas’ terrorist attacks earlier this month. Gay had told the campus community that she wouldn’t discipline students for their views on Israel.The divided campus has been embroiled in controversy for weeks, while Jewish students have reported being threatened and targeted.“I want to acknowledge the profound toll this has taken, especially on our Jewish students, faculty, and staff,” Ga...

Zach Pelzar, Weston repeat as Div. 3 state golf champions

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:41:18 GMT

STERLING – One stroke is all that prevented Weston senior Zach Pelzar from repeating as individual winner in the rain-soaked Div. 3 golf state championships at Sterling National Country Club on Monday, but it’s also the difference his Wildcats used to repeat as team champions.Pelzar gutted out a four-over 75 through brutal weather conditions on an already target golf course, leading Weston to a 322 score that barely edged runner-up St. John Paul II (323) for a second straight state title. That included breaking out of a spiral a few holes into the back nine, rattling off as good of a performance as almost any in the tournament over the final six holes.The only player he couldn’t recover past was the Lions’ Jack Carstensen, whose three-over 74 won the individual state title. But Pelzar was ecstatic about what the team got instead.“The individual title I honestly couldn’t care less about right now, I’m just super happy for the guys,” he said. “Super pumped for everybody … that’s put i...

Robbins: Academia is OK with mass slaughter of Jews

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:41:18 GMT

As of this past weekend, Israel’s Institute of Forensic Medicine reported that, of the 1,400 Israelis slaughtered on Oct. 7 by Hamas gunmen shouting “God is great!,” 400 bodies still could not be identified. That is because all that is left of them are fragments, if that, once part of the bodies of 400 different human beings. And that, in turn, is because the 2,500 Hamas “militants” wielding automatic rifles built to shred flesh, methodically blew as many of those 1,400 souls to pieces as they could, tying families together and then burning them alive, decapitating and dismembering people and then continuing the process after their victims stopped breathing. Recordings recovered after the massacre showed them rejoicing, one calling his parents to brag about how many Jews he had killed. His father blessed him, saying “God protect you.”So, what the Israelis continue to find are body parts, the humans with which those parts were once associated blown up or burned beyond recognition, su...

After Harvard professor reportedly discriminated against Israeli students, school celebrates prof for civil rights work

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:41:18 GMT

A Harvard professor who reportedly discriminated against Israeli students, subjecting them to “anti-Israel and anti-Semitic bias,” has not been publicly reprimanded while he was recently celebrated for his civil rights work.The Brandeis Center on Monday called out Harvard University for failing to address antisemitism on campus, “demanding” that the school publicly denounce what took place in Professor Marshall Ganz’s class and take other steps.This is the latest in a series of Israel-related controversies at Harvard following Hamas’ terrorist attacks on Oct. 7. An explosive student group letter blamed Israel entirely for the attacks, setting off a firestorm on campus.This discrimination complaint involving Ganz goes back to the spring when the Harvard Kennedy School professor faced bias allegations against three Jewish Israeli graduate students. After a third-party investigator found that Ganz subjected the students to anti-Israel and antisemitic...

Biden White House, Healey admin hatch plan to get some migrants out of shelters

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:41:18 GMT

Amid a migrant crisis and while the state’s shelters are near to overrun, the Healey Administration and Biden White House have announced a plan to help some new arrivals secure employment.During the week of Nov. 13, officials from the Department of Homeland Security and the Bay State will host a “work authorization clinic” for migrant families currently living in state-provided housing. The state will arrange appointments and transportation to the clinic, to be held in an as-yet-unnamed location in Middlesex County, while DHS staff help eligible families with paperwork.“We are glad that the Biden-Harris Administration is hosting this clinic with us, which will help process work authorizations as efficiently as possible. Many shelter residents want to work but face significant barriers to getting their work authorizations,” Gov. Maura Healey said in a Monday morning statement.According to the Healey Administration, as of Monday there are 7,319 families temporarily housed in the...

Matthew Perry mourned by ‘Friends’ cast mates: ‘We are all so utterly devastated’

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:41:18 GMT

The stars of “Friends” say they are mourning the “unfathomable” death of Matthew Perry. “We are all so utterly devastated by the loss of Matthew,” Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, and David Schwimmer said in a joint statement to People on Monday. “We were more than just cast mates. We are a family.”From 1994 to 2004, each of the five actors appeared in every episode of all 10 seasons of the NBC sitcom along with Perry, who was found dead at his Los Angeles home on Saturday at age 54. “There is so much to say, but right now we’re going to take a moment to grieve and process this unfathomable loss,” the statement said. “In time we will say more, as and when we are able. For now, our thoughts and our love are with Matty’s family, his friends, and everyone who loved him around the world.”It was the first public statement on Perry’s death from Aniston, Cox, Kudrow, LeBlanc...

‘Uplifting place:’ Vietnam Navy vet speaks on building community at St. Anthony Shrine lunches

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:41:18 GMT

Once a month, veterans flock for lunch at St. Anthony Shrine, gathering around good food and a sense of community.Boston, MA - October 30, 2023: Navy veteran Tom Kelley serves food along with volunteers Joe Ponti USCG (L) and Gerry Hayes Army (R) during the monthly veterans dinner at St. Anthony Shrine. (Chris Christo/Boston Herald)Boston, MA - October 30, 2023: Brother John says grace before the monthly veterans dinner at St. Anthony Shrine. (Chris Christo/Boston Herald)Boston, MA - October 30, 2023: Navy veteran Tom Kelley holds court with volunteers before the monthly veterans dinner is served at St. Anthony Shrine. (Chris Christo/Boston Herald)Boston, MA - October 30, 2023: Veteran Jesus Castillo enjoys the monthly veterans dinner at St. Anthony Shrine. (Chris Christo/Boston Herald)Boston, MA - October 30, 2023: Veteran Warren Griswold enjoys the monthly veterans dinner at St. Anthony Shrine. (Chris Christo/Boston Herald)Boston, MA - October 30, 2023: Navy veteran Tom Kelley af...

Tennessee officials to pay $125K to settle claim they arrested a man for meme about fallen officer

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:41:18 GMT

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Authorities in Tennessee have settled a First Amendment lawsuit for $125,000, the plaintiff’s attorneys said Monday. The suit was filed by a man who said he was arrested over a disparaging social media post about a law enforcement officer killed in the line of duty. Joshua Andrew Garton was arrested in January 2021 after posting a meme depicting two people urinating on a gravestone with a photo of a Dickson County sheriff’s officer who was fatally shot in 2018 pasted into the image. Garton’s attorneys filed a federal lawsuit in Nashville, saying their client’s First Amendment right to free speech was violated.Garton’s post was captioned, “Just showing my respect to deputy Daniel Baker from the #dicksoncountypolicedepartment.”The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation was called in at the request of District Attorney Ray Crouch. Investigators determined the photo was taken from an album cover with a copy of Baker’s official work portrait “cr...

Eby says B.C. deserves heating bill relief too, after federal tax on fuel oil paused

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 18:41:18 GMT

VICTORIA — British Columbia Premier David Eby says it’s unfair that Atlantic Canada is being targeted for federal relief on heating bills that won’t apply to B.C., after Ottawa announced a three-year pause on carbon pricing for home fuel oil.  The pause announced last week applies to the 10 provinces and territories where the federal fuel charge applies, although fuel oil usage is more prevalent in Atlantic Canada.British Columbia, Quebec and the Northwest Territories are excluded because they collect their own fuel tax.Eby, who is facing calls from Opposition politicians to cut the province’s carbon taxes, says people in Atlantic Canada are struggling to make ends meet, but so are residents of B.C.He told an unrelated news conference in Victoria on Monday that a proposed heat-pump rebate that is being piloted in Atlantic Canada should also be made available in B.C.B.C. introduced its own carbon tax in 2008, which now amounts to almost 17 cents per litre on light f...