We have had some interesting discussion here, saw the birth of an “alternative” site which recently has returned from years of dormancy.

You have all known where I have stood over the years, and while controversial, and somewhat opinionated, my strong desire was for my home town to flourish and thrive during these most difficult of times in Massachusetts.

Those who know me, realize that my politics tend to be more Center-Left than most of those that seem to post here.  While that may come as a surprise to some,  after much self examination, and life experiences, I realize that the debate currently going on in Washington should be one that explores all the issues and complexities, and not be reduced to a 30 second cable TV news shouting match.

Recently it has become apparent that blog-Millville has strayed from it’s intended mission.  That is really my fault.  I have not had the time nor the interest in monitoring some of the guest articles.

I will not be a sensor of the positions folks have taken.  That is not my job.  However blog-Millville will no longer be the forum for this sort of discussion.

As of today 11/22/2009 I am going to make blog-Millville “Read only”.   We shall see what the outcome of this hiatus brings.   If you have story ideas, or comments that are targeted at the local issues of the day, by all means drop the blog-master a line.

If you need to weigh in on the debate of the day in Washington, may I suggest Facebook as an alternative, or any of the fine blog hosting sites around the Internet such as blogger, or wordpress.

Now some will say I am getting soft, maybe so!  This decision has been weighing on me for some time, and I think this is the best for all parties.

I won’t be commenting on the other “alternative” site either, as I have major disagreements with that individual, and with each post he solidifies my own opinion of him as being a rock thrower on so many levels.

Thank you for all your time and energies in making blog-Millville the place to find out what is going on in town.  If we have any budding blogging entrepreneurs out there, by all means drop me a line, I have lots of story leads I would love to share with you.

Further decisions on blog-Millville will be made after 1/1/2010.

Enjoy the Holidays!

The blogMaster

In the wake of the aftermath of the tragedy at Ft. Hood Texas, the recent news and revelations that have come to light has forced me to (as GB would say) “connect the dots”. The dots that are scattered about by the many puzzling facts and circumstances of this tragedy involving the Muslim Major Malik Hasan and the victims at Ft. Hood can only make sense if you connect them as follows:

Dot 1:
Hasan was a natural born citizen and was someone who was not a devout Muslim prior to joining the military. I might even argue that he actually had good intentions when first joining the military. But in the aftermath of 9/11, Muslim nationalism begins to erupt and all Muslims were bound to have some level of curiosity, and that curiosity was bound to gnaw at all Muslims, even those like Hasan that were not deeply connected to the religion.

Dot 2:
Hasan begins observing Muslim rituals in his daily life including attending the local Mosque on a regular basis. Mosques are notorious for bringing in radical Imams that lecture the more fundamental and radical aspects of Islam. Hasan is known to be looking for a traditional Muslim wife who would wear the requisite garb, and “be a good Muslim wife”.

Dot 3:
Years of study and indoctrination begin to have an affect and the Dr. begins to feel emboldened to start speaking out about his faith and to challenge his colleagues in the military. He was even photographed in a local Seven Eleven wearing the traditional Muslim clothing for males. His superiors take notice, and more importantly, the clandestine elements of the US Government and military take notice. Hasan even goes so far as to begin corresponding via email with a radical Imam named Anwar Al Awlaki in Yemen who is a known Al-Qaeda recruiter. The existence of such email correspondence was recently reported by Brian Ross of ABC News as a result of overseas wire taps. Given all this, one might ask why Hasan was not challenged by the Military, and why he was allowed to keep his active duty status, to be promoted to the rank of Major in the Army, and most outrageously, to be deployed to the Middle East with his comrades?

Dot 4:
We all know how competitive our Commander in Chief is, and if you doubt that, just ask his jock-sniffing staffers in the White House who participate in the now infamous “pickup hoop games” held in the back yard basketball court installed at the White House. Now recall the elections of 2008 during which Obama accused the Bush administration of taking their eye off the most important mission being the mission in Afghanistan and primarily killing Bin Laden. For months, Obama has come under considerable fire from Dick Cheney regarding Obama’s handling of the war in Afghanistan. Consequently, Obama feels compelled to fight back and “show up” the former administration, namely Dick Cheney, and decides “getting Bin Laden” would go a long way towards making that happen. Now that’s the ultimate game of one-on-one hoops right?

Dot 5:
Is it possible that Military and DOD intelligence officials briefed the President and raised the specter of Hasan and what he’s up to? Rahm Emanuel, the President’s Chief of Staff, who by the way, is never one to let a crisis go to waste, comes up with the brainstorm that we (the US Government) can leverage Hasan to help Obama realize his ultimate “Hoops dream”. All we have to do is simply deploy Hasan to the Middle East, and see who he contacts while in the theatre of war. The hope is that he’ll lead us to Al Awlaki, and maybe even Bin Laden! Bingo. A SLAM DUNK over Cheney for Obama with a Jordanesque kind of finish!

Dot 6:
At this moment, and completely unexpectedly, “the plan” goes awry. Hasan, just before being deployed to the Middle East is either a) distraught about being deployed, b) tipped off about the Government plan to use him as a decoy to snag his Imam buddy and Bin Laden, c) is appraised of the possibility by his Al-Qaeda contacts of being used by the US Government as a stool pigeon, or d) some combination of all the above. Consequently, Hasan becomes distraught and paranoid leading him to plan his assault. He gives away all his worldly possessions and takes the pre-emptive action to do as much damage as he can before being deployed. He knows he’ll be revered by his Muslim brothers and might even be rewarded with all those virgins.

Dot 7:
The President makes a statement suggesting none of us jump to conclusions about the motives of Major Hasan. He, and some in the lame-stream media suggests that this may simply be the act of a crazy man despite a plethora of evidence to the contrary.   In addition, Obama finally makes time to visit the base after almost a week passes by, and suddenly rumors begin to emerge that indicate Obama is prepared to send 32K troops to Afghanistan.

As Glenn would say, is it possible? I don’t know but if it is, we must ask the questions.  If I’m correct, I predict one of the following happens:

1. Hasan is quietly killed off so as not to expose what he knew and his death is attributed to “complications from his injuries”. The investigation is then quietly shut down and “written off” as a simply tradegy.
2. A General in the Military is hung out to dry and the President issues him clemency as a way to sweep it all conveniently under the rug. The General is paid off and becomes a very rich man.
3. This thing blows up in the President’s face as the Republicans try to understand what Obama knew about Major Hasan, and when he knew it.  If, in the process, he’s caught lying to Congress, or  to the citizens, then he can kiss his re-election bid goodbye.

Let the games begin…

]]> http://blog-millville.com/?feed=rss2&p=49 0 http://blog-millville.com/?p=45#utm_source=feed&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=feed http://blog-millville.com/?p=45#comments Tue, 20 Oct 2009 00:33:00 +0000 blog Master http://blog-millville.com/?p=45 Wandering around the blog-o-sphere today and we happened across a couple of interesting tidbits.  We just love to share such stories with our adoring public!

All is not well in Shangri-La: We hear from a very good source that the combined dispatching up there in Mother Mendon has had its’ share of issues.  Seems that for many years the two towns of Hopedale and Mendon worked very well together, however now that the dispatching is shared, we hear the rank and file are none to happy.   Now of course you won’t hear this on the other blog, nor from the Main Stream Media.  See the Chief up there in MenDaleVille oops, Meant to say Mendon, has already co-opted the local media if one can read between the “lines”…I guess it can be said, be careful what you wish for!  Consolidation is not necessarily pretty.

Don’t take our advice: We hear from a different source that neither the Fire nor Police Chiefs are all that happy about moving the dispatch services to Mendon.  In fact we hear that neither of the Chief’s supported the move, but were over ruled by the BOS and the FinCom.   Interesting.  You would hope that the professionals leading our public safety would have more say in how this is handled.   We wonder what happens if it doesn’t work out with Mendon?   Sounds like the FinCom is stepping over their authority on many of these issues.  Remember, advisory in nature!  No authority!  But if the BOS allows this to happen, this is not a good thing.

We hope the dispatch situation works out, but think that maybe, just maybe, a better situation could have been implemented.

Nonsense drives Brothers-Keepsake: Seems that the only real issues the other blog is interested in covering is noise from the nations heartland.   Here is a suggestion – between brown bottles – maybe let the guy live his life, and move on.

To put to bed any false accusations regarding the old site.

Old posts can still be found at blog-millville.com/archive    The site may need some housework, but all the stories are still there.

Maybe the alternative blogmaster would be better served doing some yard work.  What a terrible looking yard!  Certainly not up to the estate’s standards…

I don’t think much planning has been put into this scheme, since it is apparent that the Fire Chief really has not known anything about what is going on.  Having said that, let’s look at this one scenario logically, and see if you think such a situation is beneficial to YOU the taxpaying public.

A week or so ago, there was a fairly serious accident at Central and Providence Street.  This accident occurred in the evening, and the response by the call fire department was quick and professional.    While the full time employees were not on duty, the response by the call folks was quick, and fortunately, there were no serious injuries.  If you want to see some of the pictures of the accident, check out NRIFirePhotos for details.    MVA in Millville

It has been stated that if consolidation occurs, the Main St. Station will not be manned during the day.  Rather, the response will be from Mendon.  Our Ambulance – bought and paid for by revenue generated by the Ambulance fund will be also moved to Mendon.

If that is true, and this accident occurred on a weekday say at 10:00 AM, or God forbid at 7:45 AM, the response from Mendon would be a distance greater than 8 miles away, and according to “Google” would take 24 minutes.

Now Google doesn’t compute Emergency response, so that would be average driving time.  Even if it is off by 50%, this would see a response time of 12 minutes.   That by any standards is really unacceptable.

While the Town faces some difficult decisions going forward, let’s not lose sight of the fact of what these “consolidations” will mean to our community.  As it is, 9-1-1 dispatch is now gone forever.  Once you give up the PSAP’s you don’t get them back.  What happens after the grants and the honeymoon with Mendon is over?  This could be shades of 1916 all over again, but this time there won’t be the political courage to fight for Millville.

We at blogMillville urge all of the townspeople to take some time and research this proposal thoroughly.  Don’t jump into some “money saving scheme” with Mendon.  Mendon is only looking out for Mendon, not Hopedale, and certainly not Millville.

The latest victim in this running feud in Town Hall is the present Assessor’s Chairman – Jennifer Dean-Wing.   Ms. Wing tendered her resignation this week, just prior to being taken to the woodshed – executive session – regarding the actions of the Board of Assessors.

In Wing’s statement it appears that the Board of Selectmen are determined to take over this board.  We wonder why?  Reduced valuations for members?   We have also learned that the Selectmen have appointed Mr. Laura to the Board of Assessors.  Interesting approach, given Mr. Laura’s lack of any training or certification.  We have also learned that the Executive Secretary  never completed her training from the Department of Revenue – Couldn’t pass the test.

Ah!  Millville Town Government (Guvmnt)  at it’s best.

The following is a highlight of actions by the Board of Selectmen in the past six months:

• Re-configured the department hours without consulting any board member or Assistant Assessor about the day to day needs of the office.
• Reducing the hours to 18.5  and a loss of health care benefits of the Assistant Assessor who holds numerous Assessing certifications and 15 years experience to the point where she could no longer work.
• The non re-appointment of the Chairman of the Assessors, Judy Sambor, who has 50 years experience in the field without any cause but the reasoning that they did not like the manner in which she ran the Board of Assessors.
• Directives to the Board of Assessors as to how they should vote and what actions to take.
• The appointment of a non-resident ,who has does not have a  vested interest into the community.
• Questioning actions of the Board of Assessors from three months ago that were made in the best interest of the disabled and senior citizen population of the community, that was carried out by the Treasure-Collector who is under the direction of the Executive Secretary and BOS.
• Informing the Board of Assessors after the first of eight interviews through the liaison that an appointment of clerk is not at the descretion of the Board of Assessors.

Seems as though our Executive Secretary is Memo and directive happy.  Of course what do you expect from someone with little or no training in the area employee interaction, community relations and executive management.

This is a critical issue folks.  Without a trained and certified Assessing staff, the tax rate can’t be set.  If the tax rate is not set, it puts the town in jeopardy regarding the ability to collect the FY10 taxes.

Since when is Mother Mendon the solution to all of the town problems? Maybe we should consolidate the Board of Selectmen and Executive Secretary first, and see how that works out?

http://www.milforddailynews.com/news/x1689405466/Millville-joins-consolidated-dispatch

We hear through our contacts in Town that the Board of Assessors now is down to one member.  Someone from out of town.  We understand that there have been two resignations, including the chairperson Jennifer Dean-Wing.

What is going on down there?  We hear that the Selectmen are doing their big micro-management of this board.  Hmm?  Tough time to be short of Assessors since the Tax Rate we are sure still needs to be set.

This is blog-Millville Version 2!  Standby for launch!

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