By Roy Bercaw. 4/8/2001. Boston
Globe.
Let's see. Cambridge high school students do poorly on the MCAS. Homeless
people solicit spare change on the streets of Cambridge. Thirty percent of
American citizens cannot read. Half of eligible voters abstain. Boston FBI
informants ran drug and gambling rings, threatened debtors, and murdered 24
persons over 20 years with the knowledge of the FBI and US Attorney.
The solution? More books for Cuba's libraries and a seventh sister city for
Cambridge. (''Cuba trip spurs sister city plan,'' City Weekly, April 1) Sending
books to communist countries may encourage reading there. Traveling there for a
winter vacation may do wonders for the public officials.
A Gore campaign manager and his life partner, Representative [Jarrett]
Barrios, assure us that ''no government money was used for the trip.''
Government has no money of its own; government spends taxpayers' money. But
preparations are done each year at city and state offices on the public's dime.
Barrios calls it his ''private time.'' Yet he and city officials use the
rent-free offices and free phones on state (public) property. That is improper
use of taxpayer funds.
The State Ethics Commission fined a [former] Cambridge schools
superintendent (''Ex-official fined $2,000 in college papers case,'' March 30)
for using city employees ''to obtain an unwarranted priviledge of substantial
value.'' How is the yearlong use of public offices and phones for an annual trip
to Cuba any different? When there is no opposition, corruption is considered an
entitlement. These self-deluded elected officials are in denial about their
wrongdoing.
The local Democrats follow the lead of Clinton and Gore, who used the White
House unlawfully for fund-raising. If the two top elected deceivers can get away
with it, perhaps the local liars can do it, too. Where is the Ethics Commission
now? Is the state Attorney General as corrupt as the previous US Attorney
General?
ROY BERCAW. Cambridge
This story ran on page 02 of the Boston Globe's City Weekly on 4/8/2001.
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