It’s not supposed to work this way. The BBJ’s Greg Ryan has the details on the life-sciences building bust. …

He became an instant Dem star by calling Donald Trump and J.D. Vance et gang “weird” – and they are weird. But, is it me, or is Tim Walz’s explanation of his “weird” comment itself weird? It’s definitely unclear and meanders all about. … No matter, I guess. As long as the word is sticking to the weirdos. 

There’s a lot that lawmakers left out of the just passed $6.5 billion housing bond bill, such as a local-option transfer fee. But it did include a provision allowing so-called accessory dwelling units (ADUs) to be built as a right in single-family zones. … Abundant Housing Massachusetts is rightly praising passage of the ADU provision, noting it could lead to construction of thousands of apartment-like units attached to single-family homes in Massachusetts. 

This has to be one of the strangest mini-issues in presidential-election history, showing just how petty and low our politics have sunk, to wit: the dispute over the correct pronunciation of Kamala Harris’s first name. Is it KA-ma-la, or Ka-MA-la , or KUH-ma-la? For a person who has a medium-low Boston accent (some of those ‘r’s really are difficult to say) and who has trouble correctly pronouncing words like ‘banal’ (no matter how many times I’m corrected), I’m not going to find fault with someone getting a pronunciation wrong. It happens to everyone. The brain can get locked into a mispronunciation, and that’s that for life. 

But … but Donald Trump is now openly mocking the VP’s name in speeches, when he’s not calling into question her racial identity. He certainly seems to be ridiculing the non-European nature of her first  name, as linguist John McWhorter notes at the NYT. But you know what? Let him. He’s on the defensive. Harris is gaining. And he loses independent support every time he plays the racial card.

Update – True: ‘Trump is suddenly running scared.’

The state’s misguided emergency shelter program has not only cost  Massachusetts taxpayers more than a $1 billion, hotel owners are earning millions via the program … 

A commercial property tax hike, as approved yesterday by the Massachusetts House, will hurt businesses in Boston at a time when the city’s post-Covid economy needs all the help it can get. There’s little doubt about this. But … but the business community needs to calm down a bit. Politicians do this all the time when they have to choose between raising taxes on voters or raising taxes on businesses. 

Mayor Menino raised commercial rates in 2004 and repeated it (to a lesser extent) in 2009. (You gotta love the Herald’s “Scrooge” headline in the latter link.) And now Mayor Wu is pushing a similar tax plan. She’ll win no Profile in Courage Award for doing so. Though she’ll try, she’ll also win no Most Moral Person award. But she will win politically. And the business community will survive.

Impressive. And here’s more on Harris’s impressive polling numbers in key states.

Paul Krugman has a great column that connects all the cryptocurrency political dots as they apply to J.D. Vance, Donald Trump and Silicon Valley billionaires like Peter Thiel. … The only problem with his column: he doesn’t mention how the cryptocurrency political dots connect to some prominent Dems as well. But maybe Dems will start backing away from cryptocurrency now that Trump and Republicans have gone all-in on it etc. … Fyi: Elizabeth Warren and Joe Biden have been fighting the good fight for sane cryptocurrency oversight.

I’m not going to defend each and every measure in Gov. Maura Healey’s sweeping changes to the state’s shelter law. Some of the items do appear harsh (such as five-day shelter limits and months-long waiting lists for shelter etc.). But it’s so easy to criticize the governor’s plan on moral grounds while not offering specific proposals on how to deal with skyrocketing costs of the shelter law. Supporters of Healey’s plans are being urged to look in the mirror to view their moral selves. Maybe critics should look too, for they made (and continue to make) promises to migrants they know full well are untenable. 

Those migrant families now walking the streets of Boston without homes? They’re victims of both overpromises and broken promises.

Btw: Those families should be immediately helped in the short-term while the state develops more realistic long-term shelter policies.

This is cool: ‘plug-and-play’ solar panels that you simply hang on your back porch/wall/balcony and plug in. No electricians needed. … And they’ll only get better and less expensive by the day.