An article in New York magazine discusses the dozens of stalled or foreclosed residential construction projects in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn… home to some dear friends of Noise Is Information.

Mike Mennonno is, in my opinion, a terrific writer And he’s based in Boston. And he’s gay! And he gardens!!

I’m really enjoying his post about Gay Pride, but I’m even more enamored of this passage from his discussion of how strangers can interact:

As noxious as smoking was, people forget why they started: because when everyone was doing it, it was the perfect opening line. “Got a light?” was the all-purpose come-on. Everything about cigarettes was perfect for bridging that now unbridgeable gap between strangers — even the fact that they were addictive. It gave both parties an out. If she rebuffed you, usually with a “no, sorry, this is my last one,” you still had your pride. You could be all like: yeah,well, I’m only asking because I’m about to have a nick fit, not because I want to get in your pants, sugartits.

If she — or he — said yes, there was always time as she fished in her pocketbook, or he unrolled the sleeve of his tee, looking all rebelly without a cause, to show off your charm. The cigarette was an in, an opening. And despite the fact that it would eventually kill you, it was also supremely civilizing. Nothing has taken its place. Gum-chewing lacks sophistication, asking the time doesn’t invite intimacy, and you can’t just go up to someone you don’t know and start talking about the weather, even in New England, where it is a rich, voluble topic.

I used to think of cell phones as the new smoking, but only because they, too, pollute the environment. But cell phones are actually worse. They’ve allowed the virtual, in the guise of the private, to colonize and completely overrun the already decimated public sphere, the shared space of strangers that once held the promise of a strange intimacy, without which our common life withers. Smoking, as damaging as it was to health, at least had a social function among strangers to partly make up for it.

A worthy addition to your blog-world, I daresay!

This is the opening/trailer for Food, Inc.:

The film opens June 16 at the Kendall Square Cinema in Cambridge, for those of you local to Boston…

(h/t: Boston Locavores blog)

Governor George Wallace (above, left), on the subject of racial segregation:

Integration is a matter to be decided by each state. The states must determine if they feel it is of benefit to both races.

President Obama (above, right), via spokesman Robert Gibbs, on the subject of marriage equality:

The President believes this is an issue that’s best addressed by the states.

Not that I’m surprised, mind you.

The Massachusetts Executive Office of Transportation has published some animated 3D renderings of the proposed stations on the Green Line extension, which is scheduled to begin service in 2015. Pictured above is the Union Square station, which the Commonwealth is proposing be located along the existing Fitchburg Line railroad right-of-way… that means you’d have to walk up the hill by the Dunkin’ Donuts to get to the station, something Union Square transit advocates object to (it’s harder for elderly and disabled folks to reach it). The advocates’ alternative, though, is to run the Green Line as a streetcar directly into Union Square from about where the Target store is located at the end of Somerville Ave. That’s not likely to fly.

There’s a bunch more information on the web from the Commonwealth, from the City of Somerville, as well as from Union Square Main Streets, a great neighborhood advocacy organization.

Register today!!!

Governor Deval Patrick said today that he was interested in placing tolls on vehicles on interstate highways at the state’s borders and that his administration had already contacted the federal government, which would need to give its permission, about the idea.

“What I would love to see is … border tolls at all of the interstate entrances, maybe Route 3 as well. In other words, Vermont, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York. If we did that right, it would be possible to remove all of the tolls inside of the Commonwealth.”

Patrick rediscovers a timeless political solution: Raise the taxes paid by people who can’t vote against you!

Really only of interest to those of you lucky (?) enough to be in & around the Boston area… the Globe highlights a bunch of local blogs, some of which are actually worth reading.

IRAQ WAR ENDS and other great headlines in today’s (fake) New York Times (courtesy of The Yes Men).

The political battles to come – which will have an enormous impact on our lives and the lives of people around the world – will not be easy. Having a president in the White House who is demonstrably intelligent and reasonable could be a good thing.

But let’s not pretend that, because Barack Obama has been elected, our battles are won.

For instance: today, flush with the glow of yesterday’s victory, Obama announced that he’s chosen the execrable Rahm Emanuel to be his Chief of Staff. This is the same man who, as the head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, fought tooth and nail to exclude, marginalize, and demonize anti-war Democrats in the 2006 primary races. He withdrew national Democratic support from a progressive Congressional candidate and recruited opponents to defeat her in the primary. Emanuel has, time and time again, shown himself to be firmly allied with the “centrist” (read: “Republican”) wing of the Democratic party, personified by the Democratic Leadership Council. (See this Truthout special for more on Emanuel’s role in recruiting conservatives in the 2006 campaign.)

Rahm Emanuel is the opposite of someone like Howard Dean. After Dean lost his bid to be the Democratic nominee in 2004, he undertook another, far more unusual campaign – he campaigned to be the chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC). What’s unusual about this is that the DNC chair is usually chosen by party insiders in Washington, who present their choice to the state parties as a fait accompli. Dean fought for the votes of the state party leaders, and when it was clear he had enough support, the other candidates withdrew, and Dean won the chairmanship (much to the chagrin of Rahm Emanuel, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid, incidentally).

What Dean did next is stunning: he set out to devolve the DNC’s power to its state party organizations. He believed that the best decisions are made by people who are close to the issues that matter to voters. He also believed that Democrats need to compete in every county across the country. His emphasis on rebuilding (or, in some cases, building) viable state Democratic party organizations laid the groundwork for Obama’s successful use of Dean’s “fifty-state strategy” in this election.

Here’s what Rahm Emanuel said to Howard Dean about Dean’s strategy:

“You’re nowhere, Howard. Your field plan is not a field plan. That’s fucking bullshit … I know your field plan – it doesn’t exist. I’ve gone around the country with these races. I’ve seen your people. There is no plan, Howard.”

Howard Dean is smart, compassionate, and effective. I haven’t seen his name mentioned as a possible Cabinet appointee in the Obama administration, incidentally.

In Rahm Emanuel’s defense, he and Obama have been friends since their early days in Chicago together. And, since Emanuel served in the Clinton White House, he can be a bridge to the Clinton wing of the party. And, further, many times someone can sublimate his own opinions in the service of his boss. Nonetheless, the selection of this pro-war, anti-grassroots, former-Investment-Banker as Obama’s chief of staff is a clear signal that we’ll have to keep the pressure up throughout Obama’s term of office if we want to see real, progressive change.

Another crystal-clear signal of this sort are the reports that Obama will likely name Lawrence Summers to be Treasury Secretary. Larry Motherfucking Summers is the guy who signed a 1991 memo, when he was Chief Economist of the World Bank, asserting that “the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that.”

Larry Summers was Clinton’s Treasury Secretary from 1999 until the end of his term. He lobbied the Congress to repeal the Glass-Steagall Financial Services Act, which the Congress ultimately did – leading rather directly to the current financial disaster we’re witnessing. Here’s an excerpt from the 1999 New York Times article describing Clinton’s signing of the Gramm-Leach-Billey Act:

“With this bill,” Treasury Secretary Lawrence H. Summers said, “the American financial system takes a major step forward toward the 21st Century — one that will benefit American consumers, business and the national economy.” Opponents said it would have the opposite effect, creating behemoths that will raise fees, violate customers’ privacy by sharing and selling their personal data, and put the stability of the financial system at risk.

This is the same Larry Summers who announced that efforts by faculty at MIT and Harvard to force their institutions to divest from Israel, due to Israel’s ongoing occupation and subjugation of Palestinian territory, were “Anti-semitic in effect, if not in intent.” The same Larry Summers who drove the African American scholar Cornel West out of Harvard by accusing him of being unserious and contributing to grade inflation. The same Larry Summers who, while President of Harvard, asserted that perhaps the lack of women in top science, engineering, and math jobs was due to their innate lack of ability in those fields.

Obama’s choices of advisers and Cabinet members says a lot about how he’ll govern. The early signs are not very hopeful, at least for those of us who aren’t DLC “centrists.”

Any progressive change that comes out of an Obama administration is going to happen because we organize and fight for it every step of the way. The effort to get real change enacted is going to need the same organization, the same energy, and the same stamina as the effort that put Obama in the White House. And this time, we’re going to have to do it without Obama’s national and local organizations, without the support of the Democratic party, and – crucially – without their hundreds of millions of dollars.

We’ve only just begun…