Some random thoughts on recent news items:

Local biotech buyouts spree

If three examples really do make a trend, then we have a local biotech mergers trend underway, based on newly announced deals here and here and here. … Granted, the annual JPMorgan health care conference is underway in San Francisco, prompting publicity-minded firms to make their big M&A announcements in and around this week. … Still, the recent merger activity tends to confirm that the biotech industry as a whole is slowly but surely on the rebound, as the Globe’s Larry Edelman noted the other day. … The sector may be improving, but not enough to fill all the empty lab space around Greater Boston. Not even close.

Update — And more from the Globe (scroll down): “Eli Lilly acquires $2.5 billion cancer program from Scorpion Therapeutics”

‘LA fire statistics: Area burned is larger than city of Boston’

This kind of puts the scale of the tragedy into local perspective, doesn’t it?

The politicization of the LA fires

Speaking of the LA tragedy, ideological warfare has broken out over its cause, as you may have noticed. It’s mostly been Trump and other usual suspects on the right blaming Dems for something we used to attribute to an act of God. … But now Elizabeth Warren appears to be getting into the act, in a slightly different way. … It reminds me of the politicization of Hurricane Katrina so many years ago. The same damn thing is happening today. 

Update — Scott Van Voorhis’s Contrarian Boston is hosting a chat Wednesday at noon. [I initially got the chat’s day and time wrong. It’s now correct.] The topic: “Another blue state disaster or just more of them same old blame game.” … You know where I stand. I.e., the exact same ideological/partisan hacks we’ve seen in the past take the exact same sides we’ve seen in the past and make the exact same blown-out-proportion arguments we’ve seen in the past. …

Healey open to shelter residency requirements, says ‘original intent’ of shelter law is important

This is potentially big. The governor is at least talking about possible program reforms that could effectively exclude recently arrived migrants from the state’s right-to-shelter program. … She’s not putting it that way. But that’s what a residency requirement would effectively do: exclude just-arrived migrants. … She’s also talking about possibly “aligning” the right-to-shelter law with its “original intent,” which is a nod to the fact that the right-to-shelter law was initially intended to help find housing for homeless residents of Massachusetts, not for migrants arriving from around the world.

Ed Flynn’s mayoral candidacy crashes before it takes off

All that George Regan advice for naught. The Herald has more. … And so does the Globe.

A second Republican eyes long-shot bid for governor 

Worcester County Sheriff Lew Evangelidis sure sounds like he’s mulling a run for governor. … Former Baker cabinet member Mike Kennealy has already said he’s eyeing a bid too. 

‘Outworked and unfocused, Celtics have slipped into being just another contender’

I know the local sports story of the day is the hiring of Mike Vrabel as head coach of the Pats, which is great news. But right now I’m concerned about the Celts. They started the season looking like a juggernaut destined to win a second straight banner. They don’t look that way now, as Gary Washburn notes.

Early candidate for Story of the Week: ‘Diary of a Dead North Korean Soldier’

Finally, here’s a pretty amazing WSJ article (which actually ran last week) on the heavy casualties the North Koreans are suffering at the hands of the Ukrainians. The headline suggests the story is about a diary the Ukrainians captured but the article is really about how the NKs are faring in the war in general — and it’s pretty ugly.