BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, THE WEEKEND EDITION JUNE 19-21, 2020) — You’ve heard the old joke about the definition of mixed emotions: Seeing your mother-in-law drive over a cliff in your new Cadillac (THE PLANET can relate!). Well, we have mixed emotions right now. Lordy, we have actually […]
PLANET VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, WEDNESDAY JUNE 17, 2020) — THE PLANET has stumbled on quite the James Bond story, this involving Ward 1 councilor Helen Moon. The supporting cast remains a bit of a mystery, but the casting office mentions district attorney Andrea Harrington, school superintendent Jake “JIV” McCandless, other […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, MONDAY JUNE 15, 2020) — “Without a data source I have to reject your statement ‘in light of the crime problem in Pittsfield.’ You’ve offered a single qualitative assessment of the city without supporting evidence. The PPD fields a range of calls and without the longitudinal […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, THE WEEKEND EDITION JUNE 12-4, 2020) — Soon after the death of George Floyd, the cry went up in Minneapolis like smoke from a burned-out storefront: “Defund the Police.” Lawmakers took it literally. Nine of the 12 city councilors, a veto-proof majority (the mayor […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, WEDNESDAY JUNE 10, 2020) — You already know about the late George Floyd, the drugged up convicted felon and ex-con arrested by Minnesota police on suspicion of passing counterfeit dough . You don’t know about the equally late David Dorn. After Floyd met an […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, MONDAY JUNE 8, 2020) — Mary Jane and Joe Kapanski received the best gift for which they could reasonably hope when the pandemic hit. The resulting economic turmoil — in Pittsfield, more like devastation, with the tourist economy all but destroyed — provided the […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, THE WEEKEND EDITION JUNE 5-7, 2020) — He had good and bad in him, like all of us. THE PLANET won’t presume to “know” George Floyd or what kind of person he was. We only know some facts about his life plus what those […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, WEDNESDAY JUNE 3, 2020) — One overlooked fact in George Floyd’s death is the composition of the quartet of complicit Minneapolis police officers. Central Casting provided the four, a group consisting of a white, a black, a Latino, and an Asian. Can you get […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, MONDAY JUNE 1, 2020) — It wasn’t enough that the coronavirus put the World’s No. 1 economy into the shredder. Now we have what’s left — Left — being further pulverized by the “protests” following the death of George Floyd at the hands of […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, THE WEEKEND EDITION MAY 29-31, 2020) — THE PLANET can express no sufficient amount of outrace regarding the horrible death of George Floyd at the hands and knee of Minneapolis, MN police officer Derek Chauvin, the arresting officer among the quartet responding to a report […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, WEDNESDAY MAY 27, 2020) — On THE PLANET today, a little of thissa and a lot of thatta. BLACK LIKE ME — First, you have the presumptive nominee of the Democrats appearing via Snapchat on a show hosted by a cat called Charlemagne the […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY ADD 1 5/25/20 — THE PLANET heard reports of shootings, plural, in Pittsfield, and at least one of our correspondents here mentioned something to that effect. It wasn’t rumor. Here’s the information from the Pittsfield Police Department: The Pittsfield Police Department is currently investigating two shooting incidents […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, THE WEEKEND EDITION MAY 22-4, 2020) — THE PLANET has lived through three previous pandemics. We’re now on our fourth. The pandemics: In 1957-8, the Asian flu, left 1.1 million people dead worldwide (116,000 in the U.S.). In 1968, the Hong Kong flu struck. […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, WEDNESDAY MAY 20, 2020) — Scott Graves and Paul Morin yesterday evening sent THE PLANET their rebuttal to Mayor Linda Tyer’s defense of the city of its treatment of the Rusty Anchor owners with respect to the Anchor and the proposal to develop the […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, MONDAY MAY 18, 2020) — Over the weekend, mayor Linda Tyer answered THE PLANET‘s request for comments of the charges put forth by Scott Graves and Paula Morin with respect to their proposal for the former Morningside fire station on Tyler Street. As we […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, THE WEEKEND EDITION MAY 15-7, 2020) — Hess Forest has long been a source of laughing-to-keep-from crying among readers of THE PLANET. One of the most popular sketches we did on PLANET VALENTI TV came the day we took the law and a weed wacker […]
