Opinion

POLITICS AS USUAL (By Jim Baron) We must be careful not to give up our liberties

January 9, 2012

We pay a lot of lip service in this country to the notion of freedom, democracy (note the lower-case d) and self-government. But despite the many and varied lessons history teaches us from the most ancient civilizations to the present day, the idea of a benevolent dictatorship still appears to hold a measure of allure for a lot of folks.

POLITICS AS USUAL (By Jim Baron) What does 2012 hold in store politically?

January 1, 2012

• Given the absolutely lousy year he had in 2011, if Gov. Lincoln Chafee suffers a sophomore slump he just might shrink to a little soap bubble and — pop! — disappear altogether.

• General Treasurer Gina Raimondo has the exact opposite problem. What’s she going to do for an encore? Somehow I don’t see her retreating to the normal obscurity of the general treasurer’s office.

POLITICS AS USUAL (By Jim Baron) 'Uncommon Man' a good read for political junkies

December 11, 2011

I’ll never forget the time, this was in the late 1980s, when an editor came up to me in the old Pawtucket Times newsroom and said, “Senator Pell just came in and asked if we wanted to interview him. You want to talk to him?”
I was still a young reporter then (sigh), and was absolutely flabbergasted that the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee just dropped by The Times, unannounced and virtually alone (he had one aide with him), and wondered if we wanted to chat about anything.

POLITICS AS USUAL (By Jim Baron) Tree is less about religion, more about politics

December 4, 2011

It is Christmastime once again; a time of peace on earth and good cheer, a time for generosity and caring about one’s fellow man, a time of family togetherness and gift giving, and a time to claw each other’s eyes out in a vicious brawl about what to call the decorated tree.

POLITICS AS USUAL (By JIm Baron) Don't worry about casino, our leaders are watching

November 27, 2011

It’s a good thing our public officials have been watching.
Governor Chafee has been watching. House Speaker Gordon Fox has been watching as well. And Senate President Teresa Paiva Weed has been on the lookout, too.
I know they have been watching because every time I or some other reporter has asked them about casinos, they always said they were keeping a close eye on what Massachusetts is doing about its casino proposals.

POLITICS AS USUAL (By Jim Baron) When it comes to depth, long live newspapers

November 20, 2011

I dipped my toe into the Twittersphere, or whatever the hell you call it, for the first time last week.

POLITICS AS USUAL ( By Jim Baron) Some happy, some not, but reform will pass

November 13, 2011

The state’s public employee unions are not happy with the comprehensive pension reform that is now going to slide through the General Assembly on the skids that have been greased by the leadership of that body. The citizen’s groups like RISC and EngageRI, who have supported the reform right along, seem pretty contented.
So much for all that know-it-all talk about how the unions have all this clout on Smith Hill.

POLITICS AS USUAL (By JIm Baron) Pension reform maybe a political done deal

November 1, 2011

When she unveiled the massive pension reform bill a couple of weeks ago, General Treasurer Gina Raimondo went out of her way to make the point that politics was being taken out of the pension process.
“It is going from the political to the actuarial,” she said more than once. It was going to be about the numbers, not the politics.
The public employee unions apparently took her at her word.

POLITICS AS USUAL (By Jim Baron) Pension bill could have been a lot worse

October 24, 2011

Let’s start with the premise, often stated in this space, that the state employees, school teachers, et al., are getting hosed by having their pension rules changed in the middle of the game. I don’t want to keep having to say that over and over, so just incorporate that thought into everything that follows in this essay.

POLITICS AS USUAL (By Jim Baron) Occupiers, Tea Partiers fighting the good fight

October 16, 2011

A year or so ago I wrote a column about a group of people in Tiverton who had been plagued for years by industrial pollution in their neighborhood.
I declared it one of my favorite news stories ever because, instead of rallying at the Statehouse or lobbying the governor or protesting to the General Assembly, those folks went to where they knew the real power was: they protested outside the Pawtucket law office of one of the state’s top lobbyists.