With the weather forecast for the week looking good (with the exception of the possibility of showers or thundershowers on Tuesday), we expect to see between 250,000 to 300,000 motorcycle enthusiasts over the next 7 days.
Sections of Weirs Beach have been closed off to 4-wheeled traffic for the duration with other roads scheduled to be closed to anything other than motorcycle traffic starting Thursday.
Laconia Motorcycle Week is one of the Big Three motorcycle rallies in the US, with Daytona and Sturgis being the other two. Laconia is the oldest, celebrating its 96th year this year.
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It seems that Oberlin College has been doubling down on stupid, sending out a mass e-mailing criticizing the jurors decision in Gibson’s v Oberlin College, a suit that claimed that Oberlin College defamed, libeled, and slandered Gibson’s Bakery and damaged the business after the bakery had three Oberlin College students arrested for shoplifting wine from the shop. The jury found in favor of Gibson’s and awarded $11.2 million in compensatory damages.
As mentioned numerous times, “from the start of this case I have questioned the aggressive and demeaning attacks on the Gibsons as a defense strategy,” and “I’m still shaking my head at the tone-deafness of the defense in belittling this family business.” The jury seems to have agreed, rendering a combined $11.2 million compensatory damages verdict against Oberlin College and its Dean of Students, Meredith Raimondo.Seems stupid of me to antagonize jurors who will be deciding how much additional damages may have to be paid to Gibson’s. Then again, we’re dealing with a ‘woke’ college who let uninformed, overly emotional know-nothing students go off on a crusade that wrongly accused the bakery of racism, canceled long-standing contracts with the bakery, and gave blatant support to the SJW students who protested and defamed the bakery.
The next stage is a punitive damages hearing, since the jury found the defendants acted with intent and malice. A separate punitive damages hearing is required under the Ohio Tort Reform legislation that passed several years ago. The point is to keep some of the more inflammatory evidence that does not go to liability or compensatory damages away from the jury during the initial deliberations. That additional evidence relevant to punitive damages could include information as to the wealth of the defendants, but also additional information supporting the need for punishment.
In this context, there is nothing more baffling than a statement sent to alumni after the verdict by Donica Thomas Varner, Oberlin College’s Vice President and General Counsel.
The statement was contained in a mass email sent to alumni (and possibly others) criticizing the jury verdict and repeating the same stale defenses that failed at trial…
Oberlin isn’t receiving a fraction of the punishment they deserve.
If I had to guess, I’d say that no one in the Oberlin administration is likely to lose their job despite their major screwup despite that fact that they should be fired and thrown out bag and baggage.
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John Ringo adds his take on the Oberlin matter:
One point that none of the commentors seem to be making/noticing is the ‘town/gown’ dynamic.Indeed.
Oberlin is the classic small liberal college in a less liberal (though still very) town that exists entirely to support the small liberal college.
Thus the jury was made up of ‘townies’ who resent the college, the students and the administration and the college resented that the unwashed townies were ALLOWED to have any input on the actions and deportment of their superiors.
Throw in the many notable examples of the current ‘elites’ being both lacking in competence and unlacking in hubris and you get everything from the protests against an innocent (townie/unwashed/ignorant) baker through the hubristic email. Not to mention a jury that’s about to throw the Oxford Unabridged Dictionary at them.
I’m not getting why others aren’t getting this. The dynamic is obvious to me.
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Common Core has failed. Seven years of a liberal education experiment shows it doesn’t work.
How much damage has this “experiment” caused? A lot, damage from which our kids may never recover.
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Sometimes it take the viewpoint of a foreigner to teach us the American Dream.
Starr DeJesus admits she learned a lot about both the generosity of the American people and her own potential from an immigrant who spoke to her civics class.Read The Whole Thing.
--snip--
The larger lesson she and 100 or so other high school students here at East Allegheny High School learned was something they sheepishly admitted afterward that they had taken for granted: how lucky they are to be born in America.
Nick Adams, the immigrant from Australia who spoke to the students, appreciates this in a way a native may never truly understand.
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And that’s the (abbreviated) news from Lake Winnipesaukee, where motorcycles abound, the lake waters are slowly getting warmer, and where the schools are closing for the summer over the next two weeks.