BY DAN VALENTI

PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY

ADD 1, NOV. 29, 2018 — Couldn’t let the 8-2 council vote approve the Bea-Con deal, which lets the developer walk away from millions in debt while keeping intact a brilliant Ponzi scheme in which untold, unnamed principles got their huge kiss in the mail, although if truth be told, the kiss probably came in laundered cash in unmarked envelopes — kinda like they do it in The Sopranos and Better Call Saul. Allow then a few random thoughts, which we shall post during the day. To start:

• A Bea-Con insider, familiar with the numbers, said ODC head Deanna Ruffer “lied when she gave the attendance figures” for last year. Ruffer cited 121,000. Our source says she “inflated the number by more than five times.” This would align with another source, who earlier told THE PLANET that paid, “legit attendance” was under 20,000.
• Our source outlined the scheme: He (or she) claims that the principles set up a slush fund of money from the $23 million that went into the project, one that left “more than $10 million to play around with.” The Beacon would then use some of that to “buy” tickets and use the number of seats “bought” in the attendance figures to count as fannies in the seats, even though no actual people showed up. That would explain the many performance in which there were as little as two, three, or four people — or even no one — for shows. If effect, if true, this would mean Richard Stanley was using taxpayer money to buy tickets from himself. No actual money would change hands, only photons on a computer screen. None of this was vetter, of course, by the mayor, by councilors, by OCD, by Downtown Pittsfield Inc., by 1Berkshire, or by anybody.
• Councilor “Big Earl” Persip defended his vote by saying a “no” vote would “risk the making of a dead, dark area” on North Street. Uh, PLANET to Big Earl. Apparently you don’t get out much at night. You ever take a look at North Street this time of year, long after the Lah-De-Dahs from South County have left until next July? Yeah. You see a “dead, dark area.” That nag done left the barn, honey.
• Mayor Linda Tyer had a great euphemism for the highway robbery she allowed to occur. She called the forgiveness of debt and the sale of a $23 million investment for a little more than half a million “leveraging the benefits.” Right. And bombing civilians accidentally is called “collateral damage.
• Some of the street prophets and Wise Guys who piped in with THE PLANET read mayoral tea leaves from the vote. They feel that:
  • The manner in which Tyer pushed this shows she’s serious about another four-year term.
  • Krol’s “yes” vote backing the mayor is a signal that to her people that he won’t run in opposition.
  • Mazzeo’s “no” vote should be considered the first action of her mayoral challenge in 2019.
• Let it be known and not forgotten that only two councilors — Mazzeo and Morandi — had the courage to vote in the true interests of the Kapanskis as opposed to sweetening the sugar for the Ponzi Perpetrators.
• Is and was Deanna Ruffer’s relationship with Richard Stanley strictly professional, or was there more involved?
• Why didn’t Chris Connell recuse himself from the vote, the same as he did when Stanley’s TIF came to the council’s plate?
• The Bea-Con will go down in local history as perhaps the most blatant act of highway robbery ever. Even broad daylight on the seedier aspects did not stop the skunks in power from their spraying.
• Enough of the unpumped septic tank known as the Bea-Con Sinema, which rhymes with enema. Now back to our regularly scheduled column.

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(FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, WEDESDAY NOV. 28, 2018) — We temporarily leave the uncharted wastes of The Beacon Bomb to present another bit of incendiary, this one occurring south and west. More Beacon to come later, of course, as we unravel the Scam of the Century … or should we call it … Retread Ruffer’s Revenge. What? You think her return to Pittsfield and the timing of Richard Stanley’s latest move was a coincidence? Every romance novel we check said no.

Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich said Monday there is a “war” at the southern border being funded by the far left, explaining it was “a psychological war, very often guided by American leftists who are activists and American left-wing organizations who are helping finance it.” He said the left’s goal in mobilizing the Central American caravan was to embarrass the U.S. by making it seem as though the government cannot control its border. “You are either going to have a country and have a border or you are not going to have a country,” Gingrich said, adding, “we have to be prepared to stand up to that, and to do whatever is necessary.”

Gingrich makes a great point. The United States of America has ALWAYS been open to immigrants. THE PLANET shouldn’t have to remind anyone of that, but, sadly, we have to do that given the hysteria caused by the thousands of migrants, Hondurans, mostly, who have marched to the border demanding illegal entry to the country ad the freebies that go with it. America has a process that welcomes newcomers. The process, one of the few aspects of historical, bureaucratic law that actually performs as billed provided it is followed, doesn’t the seemingly impossible. On the one hand, it gladly welcomes qualified newcomers wishing to take part in what’s left of The American Dream. On the other, it helps weed out the undesirables that every first-world country has to deal with as the cost of success.

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THE PLANET‘s progeny left Austria and Italy early in the 19th century to find their way to America. They came having friends and sponsors here to welcome them. They came legally, willing to assimilate and, while retaining the important aspects of their cultural heritage, become “Americans.” They learned the language. They found employment. They didn’t expect a penny from the government. They were willing to begin at the bottom and work their way up. Our grandparents from both sides of the family tree did just that.

We had an opportunity this year to witness the process in action. One of our students, Demid Karpov, became a U.S. citizen. Demid, a native of Russia, came here, applied himself, got a degree, became a bank manager while putting himself through school, perfected his English, studied, and this summer, became a U.S. citizen. THE PLANET had the high honor of assisting him on his long journey and being honored guest at a celebration dinner with Demid, his doctor mother, and his fiancée. Demid is now pursuing more higher education. He will go on to became a great success and, in doing so, help in a small-but-large way to assist his new country, more than he will ever realize.

What’s wrong with that model?

Compare that to the mob of thousands that pressured entry points near Tijuana, Mexico. This horde, led by a group called “People Without Borders,” showed up at the U.S. border, threw rocks and projectiles at uniformed U.S. border agents, chanted that America’s laws do not apply to them, and began cutting through fences, putting personnel in danger. Organizers got what they wanted: Great footage of women with children being gassed. So what if these pawns suffered a little discomfort. The melodrama scored political points.

With TV cameras present and social media burning the wires, they forced agents to use tear gas to repel the attack, a perfectly executed plan of Guerilla Street Theater. All this confirmed what the White House has been saying for weeks now — this is a group of gullible people driven by poverty into the hands of a lawless elite to be used entirely for political purposes.

Of course, they found comfort in the predictable response of some Democrats, including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. The socialist, 29-year-old congresswoman likened the action to “Jews fleeing Hitler’s Germany.” Nothing like fanning the flames in a tinder box. That kind of response, the clueless congresswoman doesn’t realize, will make Donald Trump’s re-election in 2020 a virtual certainty.

People need to study the constitution, learn history, and realize that — as unfortunate as they may be — poverty, ignorance, and bad government can never be used as ground for political asylum. Otherwise, as CBS News pointed out, America’s population would be 1 billion people.

America welcomes immigrants. We have a process. We suggest that would-be immigrants follow it. The rest can go back home and work to improve their lives there.

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“Nothing discloses real character like the use of power” — Robert Green Ingersoll.

“OPEN THE WINDOW, AUNT MILLIE.”

LOVE TO ALL.

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