The Boston Globe - 19.09.2019

Metro

THE BOSTON GLOBE THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 2019 | BOSTONGLOBE.COM/METRO

B

With $290m more raised,

Ginkgo becomes Boston’s

top VC-backed startup

Federal Reserve delivers expected interest rate cut

CHESTO:There may yet be another day at the races

Reeve Foundation investing in spinal cord research

Meet the modern Irish pol:
Jasiel F. Correia II.
The fact that his father
is from Cape Verde and his
mother from the Azores
misses the point. That he is
facing multiple indict-
ments is beside the point.
He’s like Willie Lan-
tigua, the fast-talking, double-dipping for-
mer mayor of Lawrence who was Domini-
can but a consummate Irish politician, and
James Michael Curley, Boston’s most noto-
rious mayor, who wrote the book on being
an Irish pol in Massachusetts.
Just as Correia is not the first politician
tofacemultiplecriminalcharges,Lantigua
was hardly the first to hold two jobs at tax-
payer expense. When Irish pols double-
dipped, my tribe called them industrious.
Some were less forgiving when the double-
dipper or some other ethically challenged
pol had darker skin or spoke a different lan-
guage.
Slick Willie Lantigua had more investi-
gations aimed at him than taxpayer jobs
held, but that didn’t stop most people in
Lawrence from liking and voting for him.
Whatever you think of Correia and Lan-
tigua, they were pikers compared with Cur-
ley, who served four terms as mayor, two
terms as a congressman, a term as gover-
nor of Massachusetts, and a couple of terms
in the slammer.
Curley made his political bones by going
to jail for taking civil service exams for Irish
immigrants. The Brahmins who ran Boston
were appalled. Immigrants struggling to
get a foothold loved him.
The good ladies of Beacon Hill clutched
their pearls, wondering how the great un-
washed from Ireland and Italy and Lithua-
nia and God knows where else could vote
for a rogue like Curley.
They didn’t get it.
Once, I wrote a piece about Curley in
which I included a précis of his corruption,
and my mother lit into me. She was having
none of this guff about Curley being a thief.
Curley helped her brother Henny when he
couldn’t find a job during the Depression.
“Ma,” I said, “Curley was shaking down
the banks.”
My mother, the daughter of Irish-speak-
ing immigrants who grew up poor in South
Boston, snapped back, “What did the banks
ever do for us?”
While Correia faces charges, a lot of peo-
ple in Fall River, channeling my mom,
would ask, “What have the feds ever done
for us?”
Correia’s odds at beating the rap are
long. When the feds come after you, you
face the choice of pleading guilty or going
broke. If you go to trial, most often you get
convicted; acquittals are rare.
Correia is undeniably charismatic, and
in politics, charisma matters far more than
ethics. Just look who’s in the White House.
Older women in Fall River, who vote dis-
proportionately, love Correia. He’s a college
boy from the ’hood who made it. They want
to hug him. They don’t care what federal
prosecutors — who couldn’t possibly un-
derstand what it’s like to be poor in Fall
River — think.
Correia is just a new-model Curley and
Lantigua. Or even a new Buddy Cianci, an-
other Irish pol who happened to be Italian,
the longtime mayor in Providence, where
Correia went to college. They all spoke with
silver tongues and were heroes to the poor.
They dismissed prosecutions aimed at
them as witch hunts against uppity ethnics.
I was in Ireland last week, and the ste-
reotype of it being a backward, devoutly
Roman Catholic country full of pasty white
people being led around the nose by deeply
conservative bishops with skeletons in their
closets is so outdated as to be ridiculous.
Ireland is a thoroughly modern, increasing-
ly diverse place.
The prime minister, or taoiseach, Leo
Varadkar, is openly gay, the son of an Indi-
an immigrant. He’s also conservative, at
least in a European context.
Being Irish isn’t about race or ethnicity
anymore. It’s a state of mind, for both good
and bad.
Jasiel Correia would be a great speaker
at the Paddy’s Day breakfast in Southie next
March.
That’s if he isn’t in the can by then.

Kevin Cullen is a Globe columnist. He can
be reached at [email protected]. Follow
him on Twitter @GlobeCullen.

InFallRiver,

historyrepeats

kevin cullen

Business

PAGES B7-10
Forbreakingnews,goto
http://www.bostonglobe.com/business

By Stephanie Ebbert

GLOBE STAFF

This time of year, back-to-school

time, used to evoke fresh notebooks

and clean slates, unsharpened pen-

cils and new beginnings.

These days, it brings reruns of

the same old story and evokes a fa-

miliar dread.

It’s the season of “Access Holly-

wood” and Harvey Weinstein, of

Brett Kavanaugh-The-Trial and

Brett Kavanaugh-Possible-Impeach-

ment-Sequel. It’s the season Anto-

nio Brown surges onto the field as a

New England Patriot just days after

being accused of rape.

It’s the season that has demon-

strated, four years running, how lit-

tle America thinks of women.

First, there was Donald Trump’s

pussy-grabbing, dismissed as locker

room talk, and the dawning realiza-

tion that the guy who bragged about

getting away with it was going to get

away with that, too. The following

fall brought Hollywood producer

Harvey Weinstein’s horror show,

teaching us an entire industry could

be complicit in enabling a powerful

man and crushing women, even the

women we envy.

Ayearlater,wegotachanceto

watch these lessons play out in real

time. In the fall of 2018, when alle-

gations of sexual misconduct

emerged against Supreme Court

nominee Kavanaugh, our govern-

ment institutions were paralyzed by

WHAT SHE SAID, Page B4

Samestory:disrespectforwomen

It’s a new season, a new school year, but some things never change

COMMENTARY | WHAT SHE SAID

By James Vaznis

GLOBE STAFF

A preschool seat in the Boston

Public Schools often seems harder

to come by than a winning Mega-

bucks ticket, even for some of the

city’s most politically connected

residents.

City Councilor Michelle Wu

struck out getting a seat for her 4-

year-old son, Blaise, who was wait-

listed earlier this year at the Sum-

ner Elementary School in Roslin-

dale. That is until this Monday,

when she finally received a phone

call from the school system that

many families in her situation

wait months for: A seat had

opened up at the Sumner.

Shocked about her good for-

tune two weeks into the new

school year, Wu yanked her son

out of Sacred Heart School, scram-

bled to buy him new school uni-

forms, and brought him to the

Sumner on Wednesday.

But once she got there, a very

apologetic school staff informed

her that he was not on its list and

— making matters worse — the

school system’s registration offices

didn’t open until noon. After

spending an hour at the school

trying to sort through the mess,

Wu left with her son — another

victim of the chaotic Boston school

registration system.

Wu took to Twitter to vent her

WU, Page B6

By Felice J. Freyer

GLOBE STAFF

It’s been a bad year for Eastern

equine encephalitis in Massachu-

setts. The mosquito-borne virus

claimed the life of a Fairhaven

woman and infected eight other

people, including a 5-year-old

Sudbury girl.

State officials announced the

latest case on Wednesday, a man

in his 70s from Essex County.

EEE rarely makes people ill,

but when it does the consequences

are grave: One-third of those in-

fected die, and most of those who

survive suffer permanent neuro-

logical damage.

The Globe recently asked four

experts about whether EEE can be

prevented, and why it is so bad in

the first place. What we learned:

EEE , Page B4

Wu,son

runinto

confused

BPSstaff

Assignment snafu

irks city councilor

Threat’s

real,but

vaccine’s

unlikely

For drug makers,

EEE market’s tiny

By Brian MacQuarrie

GLOBE STAFF

John Bercow, the stentorian

speaker of the British House of

Commons, wouldn’t take the bait.

In an interview Tuesday, Bercow

wouldn’t criticize fiery Prime Min-

ister Boris Johnson, whom last

week he compared to a bank rob-

ber.

The speaker wouldn’t comment

on whether he opposes a “no-deal”

Brexit, which Johnson has said he

is determined to implement Oct.

31, even though the House of Com-

mons last week demanded an ex-

tension if no exit agreement is

reached with the European Union.

And Bercow wouldn’t cast

stones at President Trump, either,

despite withering criticism in the

past of his immigration policies.

Instead, like a tennis player us-

ing the angles, Bercow took aim at

all three subjects without challeng-

ing them head-on. In precise, pas-

sionate language that has gained

him global notoriety, Bercow re-

turned again and again to the criti-

cal role that legislatures — in this

case, the House of Commons —

play in a democracy.

“The role of a parliamentary de-

mocracy should be preserved, nur-

tured, and celebrated,” Bercow

said. “If we degrade Parliament, we

do so at our peril.”

Bercow, who announced last

week he is stepping down in Octo-

BERCOW, Page B5

UKHousespeakertakesthehighroad

Declines to criticize

Johnson or Trump

PHOTOS BY DAVID L. RYAN/GLOBE STAFF

Scientists from NOAA’s

Office of National Marine

Sanctuaries, the Woods

Hole Oceanographic

Institution, and Marine

Imaging Technologies

explored the shipwreck SS

Portland on Tuesday. The

vessel sank in a gale in

1898 in waters now part of

Stellwagen Bank National

Marine Sanctuary. During

the mission, a cinema-class

ROV drone was deployed

to survey and document

the shipwreck (top) and

the marine life that adds to

the sanctuary’s heritage

(left). Scientists also

dropped a wreath into the

ocean at the site where the

Portland sank.

DIVING

INTO

HISTORY

PAT GREENHOUSE/GLOBE STAFF

British House of Commons

Speaker John Bercow visited

The Boston Globe Tuesday as

part of his US speaking tour.