Last Friday night, after news reports that one suspect in the Boston Marathon bombings had been killed and another was captured, the media became fixated on crowds of Bostonians taking to the streets to "celebrate."
Like everyone else in the Boston area, the Open Media Boston staff is still numb with shock at the news that a vicious explosive attack was perpetrated by forces unknown against innocent civilians at the Boston Marathon just last week. Three people are dead as of this writing -- one of them an eight-year-old boy. Well over 100 people have been injured—quite a large number with damage to their lower extremities. A significant percentage of those unlucky people have already suffered through single or double amputations.
You can’t turn on the news today without hearing about the debate on gun control. With our nation divided between regulating the sales of firearms and our second amendment, where we stand in regards to laws in the coming months is still up in the air. One thing that is not being talked about is the state of our mental health system.
Dark and cold we may be, but this
Is no winter now. The frozen misery
Of centuries breaks, cracks, begins to move;
The thunder is the thunder of the floes,
The thaw, the flood, the upstart Spring.
Thank God our time is now when wrong
Comes up to face us everywhere,
Never to leave us till we take
The longest stride of soul we ever took.
Affairs are now soul size.
—Christopher Fry, A Sleep of Prisoners
I’ll be the first to give credit, when and where it is due. We are fortunate to live in a state that considers and integrates equality and diversity in many of our policies and services. It’s a walk through Boston’s Downtown Crossing or one visit to an organization like Bridge Over Troubled Waters, however, that makes apparent at least one particular failure of local government; so many Massachusetts youth are homeless, especially those who identify as LGBTQ. It’s an uncomfortable truth and juxtaposition to a thriving urban landscape of seemingly continuous development.
On January 1, 2013, Congress passed a bipartisan bill called the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012. ATRA eliminates or postpones many aspects of the so-called "fiscal cliff." President Barack Obama signed the bill on January 2.
A day after the Thanksgiving holiday, 17-year-old Jordan Russell Davis was shot by a 45-year-old assailant, Michael David Dunn. Dunn claims that he unloaded his gun into a vehicle full of teens in “self-defense” after stopping the youths to order them to turn their music down. Davis was Black. Dunn is White.
It was worth staying up until 2 a.m. on election night to hear Barack Obama’s victory speech. The brother sure can bring it when he is inspired.
Now it’s time for the climate and progressive movements to do our job as citizens and demand that he do the same on climate. It’s time, long past time, for Barack Obama to break his own self-imposed silence on climate.
It’s the beginning of the year, and resolutions are fresh. Exercise more. Lose weight. Spend less. Reduce stress. Gym memberships jump in January, and so do hopes that weight-loss programs and yoga classes will reshape our bodies and minds.