EXTRA...

2 Cape men added to MMA board; Bourne wants the RR too; Spingtime for Hilter; Fishing called a disaster; Interracial marriages surge

Rail line promise raises hope
"What about us?" asks Wareham and Boune

Governor Deval Patrick last week promised to extend commuter rail to Fall River and New Bedford by 2016 and declared it a top priority of his administration. Now, Wareham and some of its neighbors want to know: What about us? What about extending the Middleborough-Lakeville line of the Old Colony Railroad to Bourne and Wareham?

"A Wareham extension is economically feasible," said state Representative Susan Williams Gifford (on right), a Wareham Republican. "We have a good line with tracks that are currently functioning. There will be very little environmental impact."

A recent study by the staff of the Boston-based Metropolitan Planning Organization provided new arguments for the idea. It found that more than 2,000 new riders would take the trains to Boston, removing more than 1,200 cars daily from the Southeast Expressway. That alone gives the idea a strong constituency among traffic-weary commuters.  Although a Wareham-Bourne extension would carry just half as many passengers as the Fall River-New Bedford line, it would cost far less -- an estimated $81.8 million to $103.5 million, compared with $1.4 billion for the Fall River-New Bedford line...  Read the rest of this Globe story here.  Leave a comment
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Meanwhile; A Green Springtime for Hitler
By Alex Beam

BOSTON: In anticipation of Earth Day, everyone wants to do his bit. Leonardo DiCaprio is vamping on an Icelandic glacier for the cover of Vanity Fair (on right), alongside a Photoshopped polar bear. In the same issue, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. rants and raves about the un-green-ness of George Bush's EPA, while he and his family work overtime to scuttle a renewable energy wind-farm project located a bit too close to the family manse on Cape Cod.

Elsewhere, Levi's is selling "ecojeans," the perfumer Lancome is supporting reforestation projects, and the private air carrier Cerulean Jets is eliminating its carbon emissions by going out of business. No - sorry. That would be too practical. Instead, the jet-setters are buying carbon "offsets" from a power company in Vermont.

Everyone is doing their bit. Me, I am reading the important book, "How Green Were the Nazis? Nature, Environment and Nation in the Third Reich."   Read the rest of this Alex Beam column in the IHT here.  Leave a comment
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Senators, congressmen urge fleet be declared economic disaster
State's fishing fleet dropped by 30% since 2000

The U.S. Secretary of Commerce should quickly declare Massachusetts' groundfish fleet an economic disaster, caused by federal Commerce Department regulations, and open the way for federal aid, the state's congressional delegation said yesterday.  Massachusetts' two senators and 10 congressmen wrote a letter to Secretary Carlos Gutierrez urging him to approve Gov. Deval Patrick's request to declare the state's fleet an economic disaster, caused by recent strict rules that have reduced the amount of time fishermen may fish inshore.

"The changes have been devastating to the groundfishing fleets of Gloucester, New Bedford and the Cape and islands of Massachusetts, since more than a quarter of these vessels fish exclusively inside areas where the new regulation orders each day at sea to be counted twice," the delegation wrote. "As a result, many of these fishermen now have just 24 days to fish during a season."  The congressmen said the state's fleet has been in contraction, falling from 572 vessels in 2000 to 400 in 2005... Read the rest of this Gloucester Times story here.  Leave a comment  
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Interracial Marriages Surge Across U.S.
 7% of America's 59 million married couples in 2005, 2% in 1970

NEW YORK— The charisma king of the 2008 presidential field. The world's best golfer. The captain of the New York Yankees. Besides superstardom, Barack Obama, Tiger Woods and Derek Jeter have another common bond: Each is the child of an interracial marriage.

For most of U.S. history, in most communities, such unions were taboo.  It was only 40 years ago - on June 12, 1967 - that the U.S. Supreme Court knocked down a Virginia statute barring whites from marrying nonwhites. The decision also overturned similar bans in 15 other states.  Since that landmark Loving v. Virginia ruling, the number of interracial marriages has soared...  More often, though, the difficulties are more nuanced, such as those faced by Kim and Al Stamps during 13 years as an interracial couple in Jackson, Miss.

Kim, a white woman raised on Cape Cod, met Al, who is black, in 1993 after she came to Jackson's Tougaloo College to study history. Together, they run Cool Al's - a popular hamburger restaurant - while raising a 12-year-old son and 10-year-old daughter in the state with the nation's lowest percentage (0.7) of multiracial residents.  The children are homeschooled, Kim said, because Jackson's schools are largely divided along racial lines and might not be comfortable for biracial children. She said their family triggered a wave of "white flight" when they moved into a mostly white neighborhood four years ago - "People were saying to my kids, 'What are you doing here?'"  Read the rest of this Worcester Telegram story here.  Leave a comment
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Bullard.  Jearld appointed to Mass. Maritimes Board

NEW BEDFORD — Gov. Deval Patrick has appointed former Mayor John K. Bullard to the board of trustees of the Massachusetts Maritime Academy.  The governor's office announced the appointment of Mr. Bullard, as well as that of Ambrose Jearld Jr. of Falmouth, on Wednesday.

Mr. Bullard, 59 (on right), an environmental and political activist, is the president of the Sea Education Association (SEA) in Woods Hole. He was an early supporter of Mr. Patrick's gubernatorial campaign.  He told The Standard-Times yesterday he is honored to join the trustees of the Buzzards Bay school, which prepares students for careers in the commercial maritime industry.

Mr. Bullard said the appointment is a natural fit since he is already involved in ocean education through SEA... (which) runs a college credit program that teaches students about the ocean by combining studies of the science of the sea with a trip abroad aboard a traditional sailing vessel...  Read the rest of this Standard-Times story here.  Leave a comment
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 Coach MacPherson recalled as role model 

HARWICH -- Bruce W. MacPherson, who led Melrose High to the 1982 Super Bowl two years after arriving in town, died April 5 at his home in Harwich. He was 64.  Born in Quincy and raised in Eastham, Mr. MacPherson graduated from Nauset Regional High School in 1960.  Following his graduation from the University of Bridgeport, he went on to receive his master's degree from Springfield College, where he also served as an assistant football coach. He continued to develop his coaching skills as an assistant in Newark and at the University of Rhode Island.

He became a physical education teacher and the head football coach at New Bedford High School in 1973. In 1980, wearing a tie covered by tiny blue whales during his interview with the School Committee, the relatively unknown Mr. MacPherson beat out two local finalists to become director of health and physical education for the Melrose public schools and succeed the legendary Joe Hoague as football coach...  Read the rest of this Globe story here.