In his book ‘An Army at Dawn,’ Rick Atkinson writes how Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower ruthlessly cashiered a number of military officers who had shown battlefield incompetence during America’s initial humiliating defeats in WW II. I thought of Eisenhower after reading this WSJ piece on how Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has effectively cashiered a four-star general who has consistently exhibited exactly what Eisenhower sought in officers: battlefield competence. … Hegseth may have a point that there’s way too many four- and three-star chiefs strutting around the Pentagon. But we all know there’s more to it than that when it comes to this loyalty-obsessed administration. From the WSJ: 

During his years as a Fox News broadcaster, Hegseth decried what he called a “war on warriors,” insisting that stringent rules of engagement and the push for diversity have hurt the military’s ability to fight wars effectively. 

Central to Hegseth’s campaign is a small circle of senior advisers, including Ricky Buria, a retired Marine colonel and Hegseth’s chief of staff, as well as Tim Parlatore, his personal lawyer, according to current and former officials with knowledge of the internal deliberations. Those advisers informally evaluate (officer) candidates based on a number of subjective factors, including their loyalty to the president and their association with the previous administration’s diversity, equity and inclusion policies, the people said.

Re Hegseth’s “warrior spirt” obsession, the Hub Blog mind hippity hops to the French general staff’s “élan vital” ethos that repeatedly sent troops over the top to slaughter with no gain in WW I. … But., hey, I’m just a lowly Boston blogger. Who am I to question the brilliance of a former Fox News commentator?

Some slightly off-the-beaten-path stories that you may have missed over the past week:

— If accurate, this is a very solid number: “Massachusetts Added Over 34K Homes in 2025” (Banker & Tradesman)

— And more good economic news: “Boston Dynamics plans $100 million, 1,250-job Waltham expansion” (BBJ)

— Make it a good-news threefer: “Metal manufacturer to build $1.3B ‘gigafactory’ in Mass., add 1,000 jobs” (BBJ)

— I’m surprised this op-ed hasn’t generated more attention: “Rollins has yet to prove she deserves a second chance” (Globe)

— Find British politics confusing? This is a good explainer piece: “Burnham Is Britain’s Last Chance Before Farage” (The Atlantic)

— In the sense he thought it reflected reality, he also got Atlas Shrugged wrong: “Greenspan got the economy right. He got Wall Street wrong” (Globe)

— It isn’t what they deserve. It’s what they can grab: “Top-Paid CEOs Smash the $200 Million Payday” (WSJ)

— It’s about ego, vanity, control, etc.: “The Real Reason Bosses Want You Back in the Office Full Time (It’s Not Productivity)” (NYT)

— The only thing scarier than an AI tech bubble is AI tech itself: “Anthropic’s Mythos AI Model Reportedly Breached NSA Classified Systems in Hours” (Cybersecurity News)

— Military history-buff alert: “This Futuristic Japanese Warship Is on the Market and Winning Fans” (WSJ)

— Another military history-buff alert: “For Heirs of Custer and Sitting Bull, a 150-year-old battle is personal” (NYT)

Fyi — I modified the headline blurbs a bit since originally posting this, in case you noticed, largely for succinctness, accuracy and clarity’s sake.

Zohran Mamdani has definitely established himself as a political kingmaker in New York, as the NYT reports. But I’ll believe Democratic Socialists are on the verge of taking over the Democratic Party when they start routinely winning elections in non-deep blue states. I don’t see that happening anytime soon. Still, I get Joe Battenfeld’s point: the far left’s recent successes within the Democratic Party are “mirroring how MAGA has seized control of the Republican Party.” … 

The failure of our two-party primary system is one of the reasons I support the elimination of party primaries in Massachusetts.  

Re calls to take the compromise rent-control deal before it was too late: On second thought, never mind. … Yes, the state Supreme Judicial Court has struck down the proposed rent-control ballot initiative, the second major referendum proposal rejected by the court in as many weeks. This time it’s not AG Andrea Campbell’s fault per se, though her bumbling office did certify the rent-control measure and she’s now saying she’s “surprised” by the SJC’s ruling, as reported at Boston.com. … Anyway, it appears proponents themselves added a religious exemption to the ballot question’s wording – and that was enough for the high court to nix the initiative on constitutional grounds. Well, good riddance. Rent control is a bad idea, religious exemption or not.

Needless to say, this is a huge win for those in the real estate community who balked at any compromise rent-control deal until after the court had rendered a decision. They stuck to their guns – and won. And needless to say, it’s a huge loss for housing “advocates,” some of whom are now hoping a compromise plan may yet be struck on Beacon Hill, as Banker & Tradesman reports. Forget it. They just lost all their negotiating leverage. There ain’t going to be a compromise deal.

Other passing thoughts — Did rent-control proponents sense this ruling was coming? In retrospect, they seemed awfully eager to strike a compromise deal. … The bigwig developers who negotiated a compromise rent-control agreement don’t look so smart today. Nor for that matter does Hub Blog. But we won’t get into that. … The SJC deserves credit for being consistent with both the tax-cut and rent-control measures: the wording of ballot questions matter. … I guess you can say the business community is now 1-1 when it comes to ballot-question rulings by the high court. …

Update – 6.24.26 – AG Campbell is having it both ways: owning up to the referendum blunders while downplaying them. The Globe, which has temporarily set aside its pat-a-cake coverage of the AG, has the details.

Update II — 6.25.26 –– I missed this one from GBH’s Adam Reilly: “‘We made a mistake’: After court tosses 2 ballot questions, attorney general defends her record.” … And then, of course, she proceeds to downplay the mistake.

Update III — 6.25.26 — From the Globe: “Rent control’s survival on Beacon Hill ‘diminished’ after high court tosses ballot question.” But as Scott Van Voorhis bluntly notes (scroll to Quick Hits at bottom): “Let’s not mince words here: It’s not ‘diminished,’ it’s dead.”

Let Miami have Giannis Antetokounmpo. He isn’t worth what Miami paid, according to the ridiculous terms reported by the Globe. … The Celts made a very solid offer. But now it’s on to Plan B, which in an ideal world would include landing both a new center and new head coach. 

Yet, an HB reader wonders if the Celts’ offer was indeed solid enough, if keeping Hugo Gonzalez was a possible deal killer (scroll down): “Really, worrying about Hugo Gonzalez when you can get Giannis? It’s like worrying about Ryan Gomes when you can get Kevin Garnett!!!  (And I like Hugo, and I liked Ryan).”

Update –– It looks like the Celts refused to trade both Hugo Gonzalez and Baylor Scheierman. From Hardwood Houdini:

Those are two promising youngsters who had very solid seasons for the Celtics, but ironically, they were two of the players that Joe Mazzulla was bizarrely hesitant to trust during the playoffs.

So, Celtics fans have gone from watching in frustration as Mazzulla refused to play Gonzalez and Scheierman, to now watching as Brad Stevens has refused to include them in a trade for the two-time MVP, Giannis Antetokounmpo.

The Celts are not going to reach their full potential with Joe M at the helm. No way.

Update II — 6.24.26 – A very uninspiring draft pick by the Celts. We don’t need another young player who requires a couple of years to develop his potential, as the Herald reports (scroll down to analysts’ less-than-awed views of Cenac.)

Update III — 6.24.26 – From Hardwood Houdini: “It’s a worthy shot on upside at the end of the first round, but make no mistake about it: Cenac is a project. He’s an incredible athlete, but for now, most of his upside is hypothetical.”

So the Goodwin Procter lawyer representing backers of the blockbuster tax-cut referendum says he doesn’t believe Attorney General Andrea Campbell’s office was acting in bad faith when it suggested word changes to the proposed ballot question – word changes that turned out to be inaccurate and cited by the SJC when it deep sixed the tax-cut proposal on Thursday. But the fact remains it was the AG’s responsibility, not the backers and their lawyers’ responsibility, to get the ballot wording right – and the AG’s bumbling office screwed up that responsibility, big time.   … Setting aside Howie Carr’s patented vitriol, his summary of the summary controversy is fair enough: “The obvious question is, did AG Campbell make this, uh, mistake, because of a) gross incompetence, b) corruption or c) both.” … Howie votes for both. I vote for incompetence. And that’s being generous.

Update – 6.23.26 – From the Globe’s Joan Vennochi: “The misleading summary ultimately undermined the people’s right to vote on the income tax issue, while feeding conspiracy theories that what happened was not a mistake but an intentional act of sabotage, designed to provide grounds for a legal challenge.”

Some slightly off-the-beaten-path stories you may have missed this past week:

— His wife (or whomever) must be a pretty sophisticated investor to be plunking so much dough on young companies: “Rep. Moulton holds stakes in defense-linked startups overseen by his committee” (WBUR)

— Progressive critics are not sure what they want but they know it doesn’t involve bi-partisan compromise: “Trahan faces pushback over federal AI plan” (Axios)

— It’s not all bad news on the life-sciences front: “Mass. broke two biotech IPO records in a matter of weeks” (MassLive)

— Ideally, they’d eliminate them, not fix them. But this will have to do for now: “Economic development bill would close noncompete ‘loophole’” (BBJ)

— Another fascinating under-the-radar Mass. firm: “Woburn company lands $500M federal contract to build rare-earth facility” (BBJ)

— There’s gotta be a pension play here somewhere: “House lawmakers tuck into budget a $36K raise for longtime Boston politician” (WBUR)

— Newton’s Third Law as applied to politics: “How Harvard radicals inspired the conservative legal movement” (Globe)

— A fascinating racial role reversal is under way within the party: “The Democrats’ ‘Upstairs-Downstairs’ Coalition Is at a Breaking Point” (NYT)

— Unfortunately, Miami may have the inside track if there’s ever a bidding war for him: “Celtics reportedly make trade offer for NBA superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo” (Herald)

— And his little-known piece of fiction was set right here in Boston: “Nathaniel Hawthorne’s American Horror story” (The Atlantic)

— Despite its reported faults, it sounds like a pretty good flick: “Finally, an action movie about Washington’s French and Indian War years” (Atlantic)

 

If you can only read two pieces on the sad death of Eddie Andelman, make them John Powers’ remembrance at the Globe and Dan Kennedy’s long-ago profile of the sports-radio pioneer. … Eddie was indeed amazing. As a friend put it: “Hard to overstate the man’s influence. … He was the Iggy Pop of sports radio. Funny as hell.” … 

My friend and I also reminisced about, among other things, the ticking time bomb schtick Eddie used when a caller went on too long, such as “poor Violet from Malden (Saugus?) who was always getting blown up after praising the Red Sox for ‘all the pleasure they gave us this summer.’”

Update –– 6.17.26 — Add Howie Carr’s column this morning to the list of good Eddie Andelman remembrances.

Re the latest Globe/Suffolk poll showing Gov. Healey with a commanding lead over her GOP opponent despite not having a ‘signature achievement,’ a reader writes in: “The secret of her success: she did not make things worse … and it could be much worse (California, Minnesota, Illinois). It’s Massachusetts and she’s Governor so count down to the Presidential question.”

Actually, I don’t mind if she doesn’t have a signature achievement. Governors are just a ladder step above mayors when it comes to what voters expect from them: competence and fairness. They’re not looking for ‘signature achievements.’ … Read deeper into the Globe story and you’ll find that’s what some voters are thinking. … Btw: Other than his handling of two natural disasters that bookended his time in the Corner Office (the winter of 2015 and Covid), can you name a non-act-of-God-related  signature achievement of Gov. Charlie Baker? 

In an email slugged ‘I no longer hate the Knicks,’ a Hub Blog reader and long-time Celts fan writes in about the new NBA champs:

Maybe it’s reaching a certain stage in life. I still grimace a little every time I hear about the Knicks’ ‘first championship in 53 years’ because the Celtics were by far the best team in 1973 and were only stopped by a serious John Havlicek shoulder injury (suffered while playing the Knicks…) But even that is fading.    

Two words: Jalen Brunson. Just gets it done.

Two more words: The Team. Despite stars and big salaries, they complement each other.

The Celtics did a few things differently from the Knicks in the last part of this season, and infamously during the playoffs last year:

– The Celtics started games well. The Knicks finished games well.

– The Celtics fired at will from long distance. The Knicks mixed up their offense.

– The Celtics forgot about the supporting cast that served them well during the regular season this year. The Knicks used the same people in the same ways throughout the playoffs. When they fell behind early they didn’t overuse the starters to try to stay alive. Back to *The Team* above.

Geez, the Knicks are even rivaling us on the historical front with Ewing, Oakley and Clyde the Glide showing up prominently for games!

I am not going so far as buying a blue-and-orange #11 jersey! But I hope this playoff season is a great motivator for the Celtics – because the Knicks are currently the benchmark, and one that must be respected.

I’ve heard a number of Celts fans expressing similar admiration for the Knicks. I gotta say: I’m among the admirers. I love their style of play.