When I read this Globe story on a conservative group targeting Smith College over admitting transgender women and not transgender men (yes, they really went there), my mind drifted to the sadly humorous opening lines of Jonathan Chait’s recent piece in the Atlantic about Democrats getting so tangled up in their identity-politics language and policies. … Conservatives have become so obsessed with the left that they’re now getting tangled up in their own reverse identity-politics language and policies. …  And our culture wars keep getting stranger and stranger.

Note: Sometimes I don’t have time or enough to say to write a full post on a subject that I might find interesting, so I’ve decided to experiment over coming weeks with occasional ‘Short takes’ posts, similar to what other bloggers do. Anyway, here’s my inaugural ‘Short takes’:

— We still need to get to the bottom of why the state went with a financially inferior bid: “Healey: Nothing ‘untoward’ about MassDOT plaza contract award’ (BBJ)

— And we need to get to the bottom of this too: “Legal Group Wants Probe of Boston ‘Hidden Real Estate Tax’” (B&T)

— Sorry, I’m not convinced: “Wu Rejects Claim of Retaliation on Assessments” (B&T)

— The answer to Larry’s question: No. “Trump mulls a ‘shadow’ Fed chair as he rips Powell on rate cuts. Is the president right?” (Globe)

— Good idea, bad execution: “Online university UMass Global could spell financial trouble for the state” (Globe)

— We didn’t even make the list: “The 50 best airports in America, ranked” (Washington Post)

— Maybe a national millionaire’s tax isn’t such a bad idea: “A Family Spent $500,000 on Built-In Cabinets for Those Costco Runs” (WSJ)

— Tom Brady loves this elite beautiful-people stuff: “Jeff Bezos is getting married in Venice. Here’s who made the guest list.” (Globe)

I’m not wild about a socialist becoming  mayor of NYC – or mayor of any city for that matter. But I loved the WSJ headline above. Let ‘em panic. The moderate establishment types need a good kick in the butt for having lined up behind a disgraced sexual predator.

Update – 6.26.25 — The WSJ has another follow-up piece on the NY mayoral election: “The Young College Grads Who Propelled Zohran Mamdini’s Victory in NY.” … I know of more than a few of such voters in New York. They’re in love with socialism now. The disillusionment will come later.

Update II – 6.27.25 — More freakout news from NY, via the WSJ: “NYC Developers Gripped by Hysteria After Mamdani’s Sudden Rise”

After yesterday’s part anti-establishment and part anti-boomer election results in NYC, you’d think Sen. Ed Markey, 78, might have waited a bit before unveiling a re-election endorsement from a fellow near-octogenarian, establishment, boomer pol, i.e., Sen. Elizabeth Warren, 76. But, nope, Markey probably sees the progressive wind at his back due to 33-year-old socialist Zohran Mamdani’s primary win yesterday in New York. … And establishment Dems sleep walk yet again toward another Original Sin-like moment. … It’s going to be interesting next year to see how Mass. progressives, who have lately been touting the need for younger party leaders, handle the Markey candidacy. My assumption is that, of course, they’ll conclude that objections to “overripe baby-boomers in or near their eighties who insist on hanging around” apply only to non-progressive incumbents.

Fyi: Obviously, Mamdani’s impressive win yesterday in NY wasn’t only about anti-establishment and anti-boomer sentiments. It was also about young voters pushing the party to the left and common-decency opposition to a sexual predator. See “Confession of a moderate NY Democrat” below. … Fyi, II: yet another overripe baby boomer who insists on hanging around is running again for the U.S. Senate in New Hampshire, as the Herald reports.

I feel a little guilty. Kristaps Porzingis is indeed a classy guy. But, unlike Jrue Holiday, I’m not going to miss Porzingis after last night’s trade. He was too injury prone and a second-apron drag on the Celts’ payroll, so Brad reluctantly needed to get rid of him. … I’m not so sure the Celts got top value for the move. But Brad Quinn, who gave the Celts’ Holiday trade an ‘A’ grade, is giving the KP deal a ‘B+’. … The Globe has more on the trade.

Update – 6.26.25 – This is a big gamble by Brad. From the Globe: “Celtics select Real Madrid’s Hugo González with first-round pick.” … At NBC Sports Boston, experts’ grades for the Gonzalez pick are mixed: A and C+ and A- and B and B-. … But the Celts could still nab Maxime Raynaud with their second pick of today’s second round. 

Update II – 6.27.25 – I’m a little disappointed the Celts didn’t take Maxime Raynaud,  but they did select a center in the second round, Amari Williams, and he sounds like a potential brute. So good. The Globe has more on last night’s moves. And NBC Boston has more on Amari Williams.

Zohran Mamdani, a little-known democratic socialist, has won the Democratic Party nomination for mayor of New York, defeating perhaps the most perfectly unfit establishment candidate the establishment could have supported, as the Post and Times report. From a Hub Blog reader in the Big Apple:

Confession of a moderate NY Democrat. I voted Commy today, not Cuomo, or was it yesterday? I did not rank Cuomo. I voted Lander, Adreinne Adams, Stringer, Mamdani. I could not bring myself to vote for Cuomo with his faux tough guy persona, Octogenarian Democratic endorsements and 11 (or is it 13?) sexual harassment accusations which he disdainfully denies. … I really wanted to vote more moderate but he is such a creep. And then Biden-like all the Democrats closed ranks and endorsed him. It’s the same mistake over and over again. Cuomo is like Trump. He is on a vindication crusade defending his family honor. This is all about him. What message does it send to young women when Bill Clinton and Cuomo team up for the final push?

Bonus election lament from the same reader: “I’m dismayed by society page articles about Democratic ‘royalty’ attending Huma Abedin and Ales Soro’s wedding. Sorry boomers, it’s time to hand the keys over to the next generation.”

Speaking of Huma Abedin, I’m sure Hub Blog readers are anxious to know that her ex-husband’s dramatic comeback bid has apparently failed. It would have been so much fun. Think of all the penis-pun headlines, now gone, forever unsplashed.

How do you deal with a man like Donald Trump? He’s rude one day, gracious the next. Fearless in the morning, TACO in the evening. He’s so mercurial. For that reason alone, I don’t envy Harvard’s attempt to broker a deal with the totally unpredictable president, as the NYT and Globe report . But reading the Globe story in particular, it kind of hit me: Harvard’s strategy may come down to the university convincing Trump that he’s already won on many issues – and that he can declare a great and glorious victory as a result. Bottom line: they may need to stroke his gigantic ego a bit. The Globe provides a pretty solid list of the changes Harvard has already made that align, sort of, with some of the president’s demands. Harvard should also point out to the president another key change that it made last year: dumping its obscene ideological litmus test for new faculty hires. That change was implemented well before Trump won election. But it doesn’t matter. Give him credit anyway! He’ll love it. …  Maybe Harvard president Alan Garber can present this list of changes in a personal letter to the president?

… Don’t get me wrong. I hate what the president is doing to Harvard, as I’ve emphasized here, here and here. I don’t want Harvard to cave. But there’s a difference between appeasement and strategic use of flattery. And the man-child president has repeatedly shown he loves the latter more than the former.

I’m sad to see Jrue go. But if he had to go, this ain’t a bad trade by the Celtics. The Globe has more on Brad Stevens’s first move in the partial dismantling/rebuilding of the team. … Sam Quinn at CBS Sports is giving the Celts an ‘A’ grade and the Trail Blazers a lowly ‘C-‘ for the trade. … Next up: Kristaps Porzingis. The Kristaps rumors are swirling all about. Even the Times of India is getting into the act. … 

Update – The Globe’s Gary Washburn has the Celtics picking Stanford center Maxime Raynaud in Wednesday’s NBA draft. That would be another smart move — and another sign of Kristaps’s imminent departure.

I’m siding with the NIMBY types on this one, i.e. Boston’s proposed zoning rules that would make it easier to build new residential skyscrapers in Downtown Crossing, as the Herald and Contrarian Boston report. I know we need more housing. But enough with these banal glass-covered monstrosities. They’re harming the city’s historic quaintness. Aesthetics matter. … Past rants on this subject here and here.

Update – From the BBJ: “‘This is not New York City:’ Proposed downtown building guidelines face opposition.”

This is one of those stories that makes you stop in your tracks and think: ‘Did he just say what I think he said? I think this is important.’ … And it is important. Amazon’s CEO Andy Jassy is not saying AI may soon eliminate lots of corporate jobs. He’s saying it will eliminate lots of corporate jobs, reports the AP. And AI is going to create a lot of career turmoil in general. … The question is: Whose career turmoil? The more I think about it, the more convinced I am that white-collar workers are about to find out what blue-collar workers have been enduring for more than a generation now: massive outsourcing of their jobs. Except the jobs won’t be outsourced to workers in other countries. The jobs will be outsourced to AI. … What new jobs might be created in the process is the great unknown. But lots of career disruption is indeed coming.

Update – 6.23.25 – From the WSJ’s Allysia Finley: “When new technologies made manufacturing more efficient, many workers lost jobs and dropped out of the labor force. … College-educated young people face the same risk if they don’t develop intellectual vigor, curiosity and grit.”