Howie Carr thread week of Feb. 15, 2009

Howie thread for the week starting with his Sunday Herald column. Howie is in Florida all week and others (Avi Nelson, Jeff Katz) are in to do his radio show but there will be columns

Saint’s story doesn’t smell right
By Howie Carr | Sunday, February 15, 2009 | http://www.bostonherald.com | Columnists

Not for nothing is Anthony “the Saint” St. Laurent called “Public Enema No. 1.”

Not enemy, enema. Hey, the hapless Rhode Island Mafioso once told a judge he had to take “40, 50 enemas a day.”

He has, as a newspaper story once understated, “dysfunctional bowels.”

Which may explain why all of his appearances in court are by “video conferencing.” And the Saint is in prison at Devens, doing a five-year bit for extortion. He’s charged in Providence with trying to hire a hit man to kill Bobby DeLuca, a mobster whom the Saint detests more than somewhat.

Now, Devens to Providence can’t be much more than a two-hour car ride. The Saint isn’t exactly an escape threat - look at that photo of him, and he’s 10 years older now. So why is the Saint appearing before the judge in Providence via satellite?

“Nobody wants to drive him down there,” said Someone Who Knows. “With all them enemas . . . you understand? Nobody wants to have to deal with it.”

Well, can you blame them?

The Saint is already banned from every casino in Nevada because of his “notorious and unsavory reputation.” Now they could add a third adjective: odiferous.

The Saint is 67 going on 367, and the feds gave him a break by sending him to the medical facility in Devens, not that far from his hometown of Johnston, R.I. But the Saint can’t shake this obsession of his - he has to get at Bobby DeLuca. In 2006, the feds said they had evidence that the Saint had offered two mutts $20,000 to kill an unnamed mobster. The unnamed mobster? DeLuca.

DeLuca’s crime? When he was in prison he tried to prove the Saint was a rat for the FBI. Under oath in federal court in 1997, the Saint was asked the question directly, was he an informant? He took the Fifth. Draw your own conclusions.

So the Saint ends up at Devens where, according to sources, he was asking practically everybody in the joint except the warden if they knew anybody on the outside he could hire to clip DeLuca. The inevitable happened. A guy from Boston, whose brother once got shot in the sitting area, decided to shave a few years off his 10-year rap. Soon a “hit man” showed up in the visitors’ room at Devens.

The wired-up cop/hit man reportedly expressed his concern about hitting a made man like DeLuca. No problem, sources said the Saint responded. When he got out, he’d even introduce the shooter to the boss, Baby Shanks. The Saint gave the hit man his instructions.

“Shoot him in the bleeping head,” he said. “Say, ‘This is from the Saint.’ ” Just like a B movie.

The Saint will be back in court via satellite next Tuesday. Meanwhile, he’s still in the can, so to speak, doing time. And enemas.

See Howie Carr’s weekly “Whitey’s World” feature

SAFE DISTANCE: The Saint has been appearing in court via satellite, reportedly due to ‘dysfunctional bowels.’
Article URL: http://www.bostonherald.com/news/columnists/view.bg?articleid=1152234

Wed column ping
Liberals’ voluntary taxes amount to zilch for state
By Howie Carr | Wednesday, February 18, 2009 | http://www.bostonherald.com | Columnists

Moonbats of Massachusetts, what about the children?

It is with deep regret that I must report to you that in this new tax season more than 99.99 percent of the Beautiful People in Massachusetts are again refusing to do the right thing on their income tax returns and voluntarily pay at the old, higher rate.

All year long, the Hope and Change crowd sanctimoniously lectures those of us who work for a living about how mean-spirited we are because we begrudge paying our “fair share” to help the layabouts who have “fallen through the cracks.”

But strangely, every year, when all they need to do is have the accountant check off a single box on their income-tax forms to solve the problems created by the Cheney presidency, the Yes-We-Can types adamantly refuse to part with a few extra bucks.

As you know, a few years back, as a gag, the Legislature passed a bill allowing the state’s pony-tailed, trust-funded liberals to voluntarily pay at the old 5.85 percent income tax rate, rather than at the reduced 5.3 percent rate.

Considering that in 2000, 40 percent of the electorate voted against cutting the state income tax, you might have expected hundreds of thousands of the blow-in drifters now squatting in Cambridge and Brookline and Amherst to voluntarily ante up.

But no. The state, it appears, is teeming with Leona Helmsleys. Taxes are for the little people, not the Beautiful People.

Here are the latest DOR numbers. As of yesterday, 640,783 individual taxpayers had filed their 2008 returns. Of those 640,783, exactly 293 opted to pay at the higher 5.85 percent rate.

Back me up on the math here. If 640,000 is the number, then 6,400 would be 1 percent, and 640 would be one-tenth of 1 percent. And 293 is less than one half of one tenth of 1 percent. So the percentage so far this year is one-twentieth of 1 percent.

Moonbats, I beseech you! Send in some more of the dough from Pater’s trust fund. Otherwise, how can we offer alms to the neediest among us, like Deval Patrick’s unemployed neighbor with the new made-up $120,000-a-year state job, and the Bulger hack who’s been collecting for 15 years and now was just handed a brand new $150,000 made-up state job?

Actually, the state claims the Beautiful People are twice as likely to check the higher-rate box this year, but two times zero is still zero. Even sadder is how much the commonwealth has collected from these 293 individuals - exactly $24,098.

Again, these are rough calculations, but I think that works out to just under $90 per filer. If $90 is .55 percent of your taxable income, you made about $18,000 in 2008.

That’s not a lot of taxable income. That’s why they all invest in municipal bonds - no taxes.

Theories abound as to why Beautiful People are so damn cheap, whether it’s evading taxes (see Geithner, Rangel, Daschle and now maybe Emanuel) or giving next to nothing to charity (see Biden, Kerry, et al.). Perhaps - make that probably - they’re just a bunch of phonies and hypocrites.

See, when you attend a candlelight vigil, everyone in your social circle can see how righteous you are. Ditto, putting a bumper sticker on the back of your Prius that says, “Vote Yes on the Override for the New $200 Million High School.” But no one in your own exalted bow-tied social class ever sees your tax returns, so why bother?

When it comes to their own money, moonbats toss around quarters like manhole covers. They wouldn’t pay a nickel to see an earthquake - that’s why the Globe is losing a million dollars a week. Their former readers are all liberals, which is to say, misers.

But what about the children, moonbats?
Article URL: http://www.bostonherald.com/news/columnists/view.bg?articleid=1152896

Fri column ping

Handout sure to stimulate a lot of scams
By Howie Carr | Friday, February 20, 2009 | http://www.bostonherald.com | Columnists

This so-called economic stimulus act is going to spur more crime than anything Congress has passed since the Volstead Act.

But at least with Prohibition, Americans got needle beer and bathtub gin. This time, it’s just going to be one outrageous ripoff after another. This $827 billion boondoggle is the equivalent of blowing one of those silent whistles, only this time it isn’t dogs that’ll come running, it’s grifters, scammers, double-dealers.

Take the weatherization plan. I’m sure it survived the conference committee; it’s just too ripe a low-hanging fruit not to have been retained in the final version. It’s for the greens, and a lot of green is certainly going to change hands - mostly under the table.

As envivisioned by its gullible moonbat supporters, low-income homeowners will soon be getting grants of up to $5,000 to weatherize their homes and thus reduce our dependence on foreign oil, wink wink, nudge, nudge.

Soon “contractors” will be setting up shop in the inner cities, recruiting marks, doing the paperwork that allows them to apply for a grant. The first $500 will go to the program supervisor, to get him to sign off on a patently fraudulent project. Then the homeowner will get $1,000 cash, to keep his mouth shut when nothing is actually done. And finally, another $500 cash will be duked to the inspector who signs off on the, ahem, work.

Profit per job: $3,000.

You don’t think this will happen? It already does - every time there’s a disaster.

It happened after the Blizzard of ’78. It happened after Katrina. The only difference is, this time the crooks don’t need a hurricane or blizzard and a FEMA declaration to get in on the gravy. Come one, come all.

What’s that, you say? The states will have oversight? Did you see who Deval Patrick appointed to run the stimulus program in Massachusetts? He used to work for Billy Bulger - the guy must be honest, right? This $150,000-a-year hack got his previous three top years in by age 45 - he was at his top pay grade from Dec. 22, 1992, to Dec. 23, 1995. One day after he gets that third year in to top off his pension, he was, ahem, fired, and he’s been collecting ever since. He is now 58.

And he’s back - as the state’s watchdog.

Always remember, whatever government subsidizes, we get more of. This time we’re subsidizing waste, fraud and abuse.

We’re subsidizing a new generation of hacks, and once they’ve had one Bunker Hill Day off, you can never get ’em back into the Dreaded Private Sector.

Once they go hack, they never come back.
Article URL: http://www.bostonherald.com/news/columnists/view.bg?articleid=1153344

Fri show ping; Jeff Katz again. Meanwhile, from the Boston Phoenix:

DON'T QUOTE ME
Strange bedfellows
Carr plays nice with Randy Price.
By ADAM REILLY | February 20, 2009 It's all true. And for the duration of the interview on WRKO-AM, the Scondras Sex Simulator stayed silent! When Price referenced his husband — no sound effects. When Price talked about Channel 7's failure to report on a new, $100 million AIDS-vaccine grant institute in Boston — still nothing. For nearly half an hour, Carr played it straight (pun fully intended), discussing Price's objections to Channel 7's guiding philosophy and even, toward the end of the segment, bonding with his guest over their shared love of . . . pugs. (While on this topic, Price noted that he wouldn't participate in Pug Rescue of New England's annual parade, because it's too campy — but added that he could see Carr joining the festivities. Still no Scondras Sex Simulator!)

So what gives, Howie? "I like Randy Price," Carr tells the Phoenix via e-mail. "I don't care about his sexual orientation — he's a good guy, he's a friend of mine, and I'm sorry he's gone. I offered to put in a good word for him at WTKK [96.9 FM] if he wants to try talk radio."

For his part, Price apparently likes Howie Carr, too — and considers Carr's occasional forays into gay-baiting (which, among other things, have included use of the phrase "sodomy lobby" in his Boston Herald column) as a bit of an act.

"We go way back," Price says of Carr. "I know that part of Howie, and I think he plays that stuff because he finds it entertaining, but he's always been extremely nice and cordial to me. That's the only important thing in my mind, because I try to make it respectable to be who I am — an openly gay person who has a long-term relationship. He treats me with respect, and that goes a long way."

For those who dream of a day when straights and gays everywhere will join hands and sing "I Will Survive," all this mutual goodwill offers reason for hope. But for those of us who favor cheap entertainment, it's too bad Carr steered clear of Price's sexuality this past week, given Price's preferred M.O. for dealing with jibes on that subject.

"One time, Gerry Callahan" — WEEI-AM's Cro-Magnon morning talker (and Herald sports columnist) — "made a comment on air, shortly after the anti-sodomy law was repealed at the national level, along the lines of, 'Wow, there's going to be a big party at Randy Price's house,' " recalls Price. "After I heard about it, I called and left a message on his phone: 'Hey, Gerry, I just want to tell you there's going to be a big party at my house — and I heard you're the perfect person to be invited.' I didn't hear back."

Well, yeah def. a photoshop...similar things have shown up in articles when they do stuff related to talk radio, usually depicting conservative hosts as firebreathing dragon mutants.

Last night I saw Cinematic Titanic at the Somerville Theatre
(got there at 7 pm, wisely, to make sure I had a good
parking space—heck, ANY parking space!) This is a project by the Mystery Science Theater 3000 people where they take crappy movies and make fun of them. “The Dynamite brothers”
combined blaxploitation and kung fu in 70s San Francisco.
Pretty funny, though one or two political jabs, and they’re
libs. Speaking on behalf of Aldo Ray’s character, who was a racist, Mary Jo Pehl said, “Well, what am I gonna do now? Maybe I can blog for Pajamas Media.” Ugh. But otherwise
funny. While there I bought a DVD which them spoofing
“Santa Claus Conquers the Martians”.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.