Karen Read case Canton lookalikes and other thoughts

Nobody asked me but:

Sometimes in life you really do get lucky, and this weekend is one of those moments to be grateful.

The summer Olympics are in Paris, not Boston — thanks for nothing, God! And I mean it.

Boston 2024 wasn’t as close a call as, say, Dukakis 1988 or Kerry 2004. But can anyone argue that the mega-boondoggle wouldn’t have been an utter catastrophe, especially when you consider who the governor and the mayor are now.

Even in 2016-17, it seemed like guaranteed doom when knuckleheads like Charlie Baker and Marty Walsh were trying to jam it through. Still, compared to Maura Healey and Michelle Wu, those bust-outs look like Churchill and DeGaulle.

The only task Healey and Wu would have been able to handle would have been printing up the “Sumner Tunnel Is Closed” signs in 57 different languages – just like their welfare applications for illegal aliens in Massachusetts.

Every time I need to cheer myself up, I take out my souvenir lapel pin and realize our good fortune.

By the way, I heard the terrorists are disappointed that the games are in France, because they had to go out of their way to try to sabotage French mass transit.

In Boston, they wouldn’t have had to bother — the T has been crippled for years.

Mary Jo Kopechne would have turned 84 years old Friday, if she hadn’t accepted a ride from the Lion of the Senate.

Ted Kennedy could not be reached for comment.

Josh Kraft has got as much chance of being elected mayor as Althea Garrison.

Michelle Wu = bike lanes, and God help us, there’s enough blow-in drifters here now who absolutely adore her for crippling vehicular traffic in the city.

Separated at birth, Canton Confidential edition: Republican candidate for U.S. Senate for Massachusetts John Deaton and ex-Boston cop Brian Albert; Canton Select Board member John Connolly and Norfolk District Attorney Michael Morrissey; Brian Albert Jr. and Freddie Mercury; Julie Albert and Iggy Pop of the Stooges fame; and Al “Grandpa Munster” Lewis and Massachusetts State Police Sgt. Yuriy Bukhenik.

Massachusetts Republican U.S. Senate candidate John Deaton and ex-Boston cop Brian Albert. (Collage of photos of Deaton by Matt Stone/Herald staff and of Albert by David L. Ryan/Pool)

Canton Select Board member John Connolly and Norfolk DA Michael Morrissey not only look alike but are seen here speaking at the same retirement dinner in 2022 for Canton PD Chief Kenneth Berkowitz. (Collage of screen grabs of the dinner provided by Canton Community TV)

McAlbert family member Julie Albert, left, looks an awful lot like legendary punk singer Iggy Pop, left, Howie thinks. (Collage of photos of Pop by Valery Hache/ Getty Images and of Albert by David McGlynn/Pool)

Internally investigated MSP Sgt. Yuriy Bukhenik’s hairline is reminding Howie of Al “Grandpa Munster” Lewis, seen at left. (Collage of photos of Lewis by Hulton Archive/Getty Images and of Bukhenik by David McGlynn/Pool)

“Childless cat ladies” – has there ever been a more spot-on description of the Democrat party’s core constituency in 2024?

J.D. Vance is looking better every day, especially when he doubled down by saying, “I have nothing against cats.”

If you want a sure-fire way to spot a Trump-Vance voter, look for calluses on their hands.

To ID every single Biden-Harris-fill-in-the-blank voter, look for the grimy masks on their faces.

Someday I’ll drive by that $5-million GBH billboard on the Pike and see somebody on it who looks even a little bit like me.

But I’m not holding my breath.

Question: Why exactly does Suffolk County need three elected clerks of court, and every other county, at least one of which has a much larger population than Boston’s, only requires one?

Answer: It’s the hackerama.

Has Boston ever been the same since Jack’s Joke Shop closed?

Whenever an armored-car robbing crew from Charlestown used to strike, Jack’s Joke Shop was always one of the first places the cops visited, because that’s where the Townies always bought their Halloween masks.

Every neighborhood has other landmarks, like Jack’s Joke Shop, that are gone:

In the South End, you had Harry the Greek’s, the Red Fez, Uncle Ned’s Money to Loan and the Waltham Tavern, where you could get not only a beer and a beating, but Class B controlled substances as well.

In the North End, arrivederci to the Caffe Pompeii, Francesca’s, Polcari’s — Jerry Angiulo hangouts one and all.

Speaking of the passage of time, is there any bar in the city left that still has Pickwick Ale on draft?

I’m asking for a Charlestown armored-car robbing crew — they’re all gone too.

Maybe it’s time to go back to requiring the Massachusetts State Police to live in barracks, and to keep them the hell out of the city of Boston, like back before the “merger” with the Mets and the Capitol and Registry cops.

After all, there once was a time, within living memory, when the troopers were more renowned for solving crimes than committing them.

Summer Friday night news dumps seemed to be going out of style, but then the DOJ decided to hand corrupt fired FBI agent Peter Strzok $1.2 million and his married gal pal Lisa Page $800,000 as “settlements” in their phony-baloney lawsuits.

The payoffs were made because… Democrats.

For the record, Strzok learned his sleazy trade in the Boston office of the FBI, following in the footsteps of Mob hitmen who moonlighted as G-men, like H. Paul Rico and John “Zip” Connolly.

The tradition continues…

A couple of Catholic-type words you once didn’t hear very often are now back in common usage — hagiography and beatification.

A hagiography is a life of a saint or religious, moral titan – you know, like all the puff pieces on Willie Brown’s ex-girlfriend in state-run media this week.

And “beatification” – according to the dictionary that is “a declaration by the Pope that a dead person is in a state of bliss, constituting a first step towards canonization and permitting public veneration.”

Paging Joe Biden, but then, even when he was alive he was publicly venerated by the Democrat stenographers with press passes because… Democrats.

One final thought: Could Peter Strzok be the next colonel of the Massachusetts State Police?

He’s dirty, he tries to frame innocent people for sport, and he’s a rabid Democrat.

What more could Maura Healey ask for? Again, the tradition continues.