Chronicling the past week via quick links and pithy commentary (channeling our inner Yankee edition)

We liveblogged the Sox opener: And Flannery got to work overtime thanks to extra innings.

Mitt Romney can’t pick a winner: John McCain brings him on board anyway.

The Mike Barnicle haters are organizing: They’ve got a blog. Fear them.

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A veteran Hingham Police Lieutenant has been suspended and is being investigated by the Department of Social Services after his 17-year-old son called 911 saying that his father pointed a loaded gun at him during an argument, Boston has learned.

Lt. Kris Phillips is accused of “racking a bullet” into his service revolver weapon and pointing the weapon at his son after an altercation in a car on March 22, a state official said. The teen called 911 from the family’s Hingham home shortly after the alleged 8 p.m. incident.   (more…)

If we could choose a super power, it would be a toss-up between flight and invisibility. We’d either save a ton of money on airfare, or we’d be the best journalists in the world.

But what would Mayor Tom Menino choose? If you ask the Globe, he’s chosen the power of invincibility. According to the Herald, his preference remains a mystery.

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We’ve spent the last couple weeks in a state of denial. We kept reading Steve Bailey’s columns, still not quite believing that he’d given up his job with the Globe after 30 years. But today, the reality of Bailey’s departure set in with his final piece for the paper of record.

Man. We’re so bad at goodbyes.

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It’s the weekend. You can spend it anxiously awaiting the arrival of weather that actually indicates it’s spring, or you can put on your parka and enjoy it. Here are some suggestions for your precious two days of total freedom, prepared for you by Boston Daily.

Tonight
Club Passim has been good to Joan Baez, and tonight she returns the favor. The folk singer (and Gonz Show participant) plays the venue in which she got her start.

The parking lot at the Burlington Mall is already a nightmare. We can’t even fathom how long it will take us to find a spot now that Nordstrom has opened at the popular North Shore shopping destination.

Keep your bundle of joy toasty for less. 9 Months has taken as much as 60 percent off original prices on its baby winter wear.

These kids on YouTube really hope They Might Be Giants play “Freezing at Pee-Wee Hockey” at the Somerville Theater tonight.

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That was fast. Boston.com reports that Gov. Deval Patrick has scored a deal with Broadway Books. The governor’s autobiography will be released in 2010. Looks like that personal day in New York was worth it after all.

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Each Friday, Paul McMorrow will take you inside the smoke-filled rooms and darkly-lit corridors of government to bring you the hottest and juiciest political tidbits. This Week: Therese Murray slips into a power vacuum, the Mashpee won’t give up the ghost, canoodling at City Council, and sartorial help for Mike Ross.

We may be watching the balance of power tip on Beacon Hill. While Gov. Deval Patrick and House Speaker Sal DiMasi go back and forth about casinos and taxes—and whether or not they’re going back and forth at all—Senate President Therese Murray is showing herself to be both smart enough to recognize the power vacuum brought on by the bickering, and strong enough to fill that vacuum with substantive policy proposals.

The death of the governor’s casino bill should shine a spotlight on Murray’s health care reform-reform bill. That’s for the best since it does what magical slots leprechauns doesn’t, that is address the real reason cities and towns are going broke. Murray should also get serious credit for leading the effort to implement the now one-year-old Transportation Finance Commission report, especially by harpooning politically thorny MBTA health care benefits and police details.

These are weighty and decidedly un-flashy issues, but it’s going to take heavy lifting on boring issues to raise the state out of the hellward fiscal death-spiral it’s currently locked in. Interesting that it’s Murray, who just celebrated a year on the job, and not her two counterparts, who is leading the way. (more…)

The Globe had a story yesterday about a Burlington Internet firm that unknowingly hosted a terrorist website, Leemedia.net. It was a strange piece. Acknowledging that the government played no role in the site’s closure, the Globe nonetheless spent all its time talking with a “senior U.S. counterterrorism official who asked not be identified because of his sensitive position.” Like the guy was a big get.

Well, the paper missed the bigger story: that a Boston-area man helped shut the site down. (more…)

The internet has been buzzing with rumors that WBUR is looking to hire former Globe columnist and NBC contributor Mike Barnicle. Yesterday, Dan Kennedy posted an email from WBUR general manager Paul La Camera in which he doesn’t confirm or deny, but says that we should all get over that whole plagiarism thing.

It seems like some people aren’t willing to let Barnicle off the hook quite yet. Someone’s started a blog simply called nomike.

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Gov. Deval Patrick said last month that he has no political ambition beyond being governor of the Commonwealth for the foreseeable future, even though he’s one of the most visible surrogates for presidential hopeful Barack Obama.

Not that anyone has ever used the governor’s office to try to jump to a national office or anything, but Patrick didn’t do much to quell the skepticism generated by his announcement by heading off to New York to shop his autobiography as House Speaker Sal DiMasi was savagely killing his casino proposal.

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