I don't condone using a handicapped space if you're not disabled. That being said, it seems to me that there is a lot of abuse and fraud by many placard users that goes unquestioned. It seems to me that doctors are giving placards out like candy on Halloween. I've been amazed by the apparent lack of any visible disability of users in most of the vehicles I've seen using placards. I do understand some of the qualifying physical impairments are not readily obvious or visible but it seems that a lot of people are using the placards even when the disabled person isn't in the vehicle. Isn't it illegal for a disabled person to allow someone else to use their placard? It's difficult to determine who the placard owner is because all of them seem to have a cover that slides over the identifying information. Isn't it illegal to alter a placard. It should also be illegal to obscure the identifying information on a placard. Okay, go ahead and flame me for questioning the disabilities of people using placards, but this system quite obviously allows abuse and fraud. It needs to be cleaned up big time! View Comment

Re:"Good luck using your weapons when Black Water or any other Govcorp agency is at your door. " Tell that to the "primitive, simple minded folk" like the Vietnamese, the IRA, the Afghanis, the Somali rebels, etc. etc. etc.! The Syrian govt has also been so successful cleaning up the little insurrection currently occurring in their country too. It ain't pretty but it continues to happen. So my guess is if we were living in the 18th century and we listened to you we'd still be subjects of the Queen, right? View Comment

Oh Come On! How many times are you going to run this old story? View Comment

RE: " Does this behavior rise to the level of being mentally ill? Incapable of rational behavior?" At this point we don't know what the son's motivations were when he became an unwelcome trespasser on his father's property. Have any or us with kids ever done anything "irrational" in response to their behavior? The son " sought medical treatment at an Upton Street address". He didn't go to a doctor or a hospital emergency room? What were his injuries? What's the full story? Sure the father was wrong for going after the son with a bat and a hammer, IF that's what he did. Depending on what actually transpired it may or may not indicate someone has mental problems. We shouldn't jump to conclusions. My understanding is that for a mental issue to show up on a NICS background check there needs to be an adjudication of the problem mental status. But Massachusetts doesn't report these instances so it wouldn't show up in a NICS check. Absent an incident like this it's unlikely a person will be flagged as a mental risk. After an incident like this, it's pretty much certain that any Massachusetts Chief of Police wouldn't issue a gun permit of any kind. Without a permit no one can legally obtain a gun or ammunition in this state. View Comment

"I feel sorry for all the legitimate gun owners, because nuts like Steven Woskie reflect poorly on you." Is this guy a nut, or is he just an undocumented firearms owner? View Comment

As a proponent of our 2nd Amendment rights I'm not going to defend this guy. It appears that he clearly violated the law. But let's also be clear that, as Bubbly has said, in most states his collection would be perfectly legal. In MA , if he is convicted, he is a felon and will spend some considerable time behind bars. A likely scenario is that he was just ignorant of our states stringent gun laws and had no real criminal intent. One thing that's guaranteed is that he will never again get any kind of firearms permit in MA. It will be interesting to see how this plays out in our courts. View Comment

Historically governments have been the antithesis of freedom. If you don't believe that governments inherently tend toward tyranny just look at history. Ask those who were murdered by Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, etc. etc. etc. There have also always been plenty of ordinary people willing to support those tyrants in carrying out their acts. Oh yes, don't forget that it can and has happened here too. Remember, for example, the interment of Japanese citizens during World War II under FD Roosevelt and the Sedition and Espionage Acts shredding the 1st Amendment under Woodrow Wilson during WW I. Yes, read the Constitution and then read history to understand how far our government (regardless of party) has gone to undermine it's basis. I think it's very naive to trust government at any level to protect your God given rights if they conflict with its agenda at any given time in history. Failure to give credence to these facts is simply hiding behind ignorance. The Bill of Rights is masterful in it's simplicity and it means what it says. Philosophically, One really shouldn't care what weapons their neighbor has as long as their neighbor doesn't use those weapons to abridge anyone's right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. However, I must also insist on my God given right to have whatever weapons I deem necessary to protect me and my family in case my neighbor decides to trample on our rights. Period. View Comment

When someone says "we are NOT trying to take away the 2nd amendment. We are proposing common sense regulations and restrictions on weapons " I know instinctively that their primary purpose is to erode the Constitution's fundamental 2nd amendment right. These recent proposals aren't "common sense" at all but are merely another attempt to erode our fundamental rights. Our Constitution has a Bill of Rights not a Bill of Needs! If a policeman needs a 15 or 30 round magazine in their semiautomatic weapon to protect themselves from criminals and crazies then common sense and the 2nd amendment require that the ordinary law abiding citizen trying to protect their home and family should have them too. Don't forget that when seconds count the police are only minutes away. If we are going to start taxing fundamental rights let's start with a tax on speech. How about extracting a 10% tax on campaign contributions. Doing so would probably go a long way toward removing the national debt. It would also begin to put some common sense restrictions on the sociopaths who infest our government and constantly try to rewrite our Constitution. View Comment

WHM - Read My Lips... is exactly right. Maybe you should read McGovern's resolution at http://mcgovern.house.gov/uploads/Campaign%20Finance%20Amendment%20Text.pdf It only deals with corporate entities. Nowhere does it mention anything about curbing unions and their efforts to financially control our elections. It's very naive to think that one of the leading progressive socialists in the Congress would propose anything that could possibly curtail the power of the unions. Mr. McGovern is the real threat to our Constitution and the Republic. Thankfully, his resolutions won't get very far. He should return to his true calling, working in a package store! View Comment

To Speak Up- I find your comments to be disgusting too. Be that as it may, will I call on the government to take away your right to speak them? No , I want the government respect your rights . Why? Because we have a Constitution that requires the government to respect your freedom of speech. That's the 1st Amendment. There's also a 2nd Amendment. It protects the natural right of law abiding citizens to keep and bear arms. The 2nd amendment isn't just for hunting or target practice either. It is for the self protection of people and their families. It was born out of the violent birth of our Republic and is based in large part on the need for free citizens to be able rid themselves of a tyrannical government. That purpose is largely belittled by our media and many of our citizens today but it shouldn't be underestimated. It is not an outmoded feature of our constitution as recentlyconfirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court. American gun owners, like me, aren't in favor of the restrictions being proposed because we realize that they don't work. I fully agree with Wayne Lapierre and the NRA. I appreciate that they are trying to protect the rights of law abiding Americans. I will continue support him and our organization, despite the emotional and uninformed outbursts of you and most of our political class. What I do find truly disgusting is the penchant for these power hungry politicians to immediately jump to use tragedies like Newtown as an opportunity and an excuse to the emotionally charged aftermath to advance their political agenda. This is exactly what Obama and his friends are doing. These hypocrites feign concern over the deaths of children while incredibly ignoring the thousands of children murdered by abortion. They refuse to have any rational discussion about mental health or the effects of violent media but just keep trying to ram through more and more useless gun controls that they then refuse to enforce just like they do most of the current gun laws. You may be willing to wait minutes for the police to respond when seconds can mean the difference between life and death. I'm not! If I decide to use a handgun, shotgun, AK47 "assault rifle to protect myself and my family it is my decision. Not yours or the government's. View Comment

Friends of the Grafton Elders does a lot for the town's senior citizens. Hopefully their fund drive for GERT will be successful. They have a web site at www.fogeinc.org View Comment

This is a really dumb idea! It's full of the feel good green nonsense that permeates our society today. Electric vehicles remain expensive toys for those with prickly consciences and big wallets. They are totally impractical and uneconomical. They have no place in an operation like our town government. As far as a public charging station goes, let's save the taxpayer's some money and forget this waste. I wish that our TA would study the economics of his proposal and pick vehicles with the lowest lifetime cost to own. I'm getting very tired of the wasteful spending that our town government so willingly participates in. View Comment