Peter Gay: Wouldn’t it be nice? and other pre-Election Day thoughts – The Sun Chronicle
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Please tell me you read The Associated Press story in Friday’s Sun Chronicle about Benjamin Netanyahu’s win in last week’s national election. Netanyahu defeated acting prime minister Yair Lapid in Israel’s fifth election since 2019.
The story ended with a quote from Lapid: “The state of Israel comes before any political consideration. I wish Netanyahu success, for the sake of the people of Israel and the state of Israel.”
Don’t you wish you lived in a country where losing candidates showed that much class?
We were that type of country at once. We’re now the nation where presidential candidates, long before citizens cast ballots, declare: “If I don’t win, it’s rigged.”
It was one of many thoughts I had during the past week. Here are eight more:
— The antisemitic comments by the former Kanye West (now Ye), Kyrie Irving and other national figures is disgusting. The vitriol in this country mushroomed when our former — and soon to be a candidate again — president dragged our country into the gutter.
After all, if a Gold Star family and a former prisoner of war are fair game, isn’t everyone?
— If you read last week’s column, you know how much I was bothered by the woman I spotted flicking a cigarette out of her car. I saw something even more disturbing this week when I was behind a pickup truck with a Confederate flag sticker in the back window of the cab. Another sticker had three letters C, S and A, short for the Confederate States of America.
Some of you may remember when conservatives told young people protesting the country’s involvement in the Vietnam War to “Love it or leave it!”
The statement certainly is appropriate for the man driving that pickup truck. I bet he considers himself a true patriot.
— A special report in this month’s AARP Bulletin detailed the current political climate in our country. Similar to an NBC News poll cited in this space last week, voters overwhelmingly said they disapprove of partisan rifts. Few seem ready to cross party lines, however.
— Another AP story ran on the front page of Friday’s paper. The headline above the story read, “Has Massachusetts turned into a one-party state?”
The answer is yes and the leaders of the GOP are as much to blame for that as anyone. They have attacked a governor of their own party and threw their support behind a Trump loyalist with no chance of winning tomorrow.
— Has a couple ever done more for their hometown than Kevin and Betty Poirier? They are the definition of what it means to serve the public and have always helped people in need regardless of the individual’s political affiliation.
I wasn’t working in the media when Kevin was North Attleboro’s state representative but I do know Betty did everything she could to help people, even those who weren’t in her district. The dedication of the north end zone at Community Field before the Red Rocketeers’ upset of undefeated King Philip was a fitting honor.
— It will be interesting to see what the North Attleboro Town Council decides tonight when setting the tax rate for 2023. City councilors in Attleboro opted to shift more of the burden onto business owners.
Unlike Attleboro, North Attleboro has a chance to show they are business friendly at a time the town is trying to expand economic development? (North TV will have the meeting live on our Government Channel: Comcast 98 and Verizon 23. It will also stream live at government.northtv.net for North TV Insiders.)
— Social media was abuzz Tuesday criticizing North Attleboro school officials for the way they handled threats written on a bathroom wall and discovered just six minutes before the first bus pulled up to the school.
Comments from parents cited the amount of time their sons and daughters had to spend on their buses. None of the parents posted what they would have done differently, however.
— We are one day away from the end of political ads, six days away from the fifth season of “Yellowstone” on the Paramount Network, 11 days away from the third and final season of “Dead to Me” on Netflix and 17 days away from the 102d year of Attleboro vs. North Attleboro football on Thanksgiving Day.
The game will be shown live on North TV’s Community Channel: Comcast 15 and Verizon 24 and Attleboro’s Comcast 15. I am working on making the live stream a pay-per-view event for people who do not subscribe to cable television in the two communities with half of the proceeds going to the schools.
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