The Cambridge City Council fired up its version of the Wayback Machine last night and transported us all the way back to the dark days of early 2009. At the time, the economy was a wreck, unemployment was sky-high, and everybody knew exactly whom to blame for the mess: bankers. Thus, protests raged on Wall Street, and mobs piled into buses and spit venom at AIG execs. Even the president tossed around words like “outrage.”

Those days have passed. Current consensus pegs most of our current maladies on pervy airport security agents and insidious inside-trading hedge funds. The exception to this rule is Ireland, where bankers have actually managed to topple both the economy and the government. But few Americans can whip up any serious outrage at banks anymore, partly because companies are making money again, and partly because most everybody needs money from banks.

Enter the People’s Republic. Last night, the Cambridge City Council asked city administrators whether they’re allowed to forbid the opening of new banks in the city. The policy order, sponsored by former mayor Denise Simmons and councilor Leland Cheung, notes that a moratorium on bank branch construction could be warranted because the industry is “already well represented in the city’s squares,” and raises the specter of all non-banking businesses being swept from the city. Then, there would be no economy in Cambridge, just fat cats and bonuses.

Dipping, X2

On “Greater Boston,” Middlesex Sheriff James DiPaola basks in the glory of his change of heart in legally scamming the pension system.

On The Howie Carr Show, DiPaola downplayed rumblings his decision to resign may have been prompted less by honor and more by a scathing FOX-25 report over abuse of his position and his campaign fund. FOX says that the Attorney General’s office is reviewing the allegations.

The Globe’s Sean Murphy goes on Jim Braude’s Broadside to talk about his chat with Middlesex County Sheriff James DiPaola.

In a followup interview with the Globe, DiPaola reveals he’s also under investigation by the State Ethics Commission. Unsurprisingly, he vows to beat that rap.

And to cap it off the retired soon-to-be-ex-sheriff lets it slip to the Lowell Sun that he began planning to exploit the pension loophole a year and a half ago – and that the opportunity for double-dipping was a major reason for seeking reelection in the first place.

Civil rights

A Harvard degree only gets you so far. A group of black Harvard alumni in town for The Game against Yale was told to shut down their celebration at the new lounge at the Wilbur Theater because the management was fearful they’d attract the “wrong crowd.” Via Universal Hub.

PROBATION

The union representing Massachusetts probation officers says it will sue the Probation Department and the state’s Trial Court over the rigged hiring process that has been in place in the department. The independent counsel who directed the recent probation probe says the state could be on the hook for big bucks.

Meanwhile, the tepid outrage over the scandal from inside the State House is beginning to get a bit less tepid, with the Senate chair of the legislature’s public safety committee vowing to tie probation hires to the Civil Service exam.

State Sen. Thomas McGee of Lynn, a patronage powerhouse at the state’s Probation Department, says he will stop recommending people for jobs at the agency until hiring practices there are cleaned up, reports the Lynn Item.

LOCAL POLITICS

Rep. Barbara L’Italien of Andover lost her reelection bid earlier this month to Republican James Lyons, but she’s landed on her feet with a $100,000-a-year job from incoming state Treasurer Steven Grossman. L’Italien will serve as director of government affairs, the Eagle-Tribune reports.

Beginning in January, the state’s Office of Campaign and Political Finance will post online the contributions and expenditures in searchable form for all mayoral candidates in cities with populations between 40,000 and 100,000, according to the Patriot Ledger. Up to now, anyone wanting to see the filings had to go to the local clerk’s office and pull the hard copies, which hardly anyone ever did.

The Massachusetts Democratic Party outspent the state GOP by a big margin in the homestretch of the recent election, reports the Globe.

Former state senator Anthony Galluccio lost in court again yesterday. An appeals court judge upheld a parole violation that landed him in jail last year – a violation triggered by a failed breathalyzer test Galluccio blamed on toothpaste.

A state rep race in Charlton has been decided by one vote. Or has it?

BUSINESS AND THE ECONOMY

Cape Wind got the final OK needed from state officials, but the project’s developers didn’t get everything they were hoping for in the ruling, which could force a scaling back of the wind farm.

CommonWealth’s Bruce Mohl reports that the high cost of Cape Wind wasn’t that big a factor in the DPU’s decision because the state desperately needs the wind power to meet its ambitious goals on renewable energy production. A footnote in the decision says the state needs the equivalent of nine Cape Winds over the next 15 years to meet the goals.

October home sales in Massachusetts dropped for the fourth month in a row. The last time sellers saw an October this bad was 1990.

The Salem News says the system for awarding liquor licenses in Massachusetts is terribly out of date and in need of reform.

WBUR talks to the Massachusetts inventor of the full-body scanner that’s causing such a ruckus at airports.

New York takes note of the new tech bubble, and explains why it’s kind of but not entirely different than last decade’s tech bubble.

Gay marriage

Opponents of gay marriage are losing the battle because they are making the wrong arguments, says Stephen Baskerville in The American Conservative.

Nonprofits

The Chronicle of Philanthropy looks into what the revamped congressional order means for nonprofits as the new breed brings a change in course to the estate tax, charitable gift-giving and oversight of nonprofit hospitals.

Education

Lynn School Committee member Maria Carrasco is asking her fellow committee members to explore using a dress code with uniforms.

National Politics

Right field could be a bit crowded in the 2012 GOP presidential primary. The National Review is touting Indiana Congressman Mike Pence as a true conservative to the core, even though he’d be the first since James Garfield in 1880 to make the jump directly from the House to the White House.

Talking Points Memo reports on a Pew Research Center study documenting a Republican slant to polls that focus on landline-only voters and exclude cell phone-only or dual-user households.

The Wall Street Journal uses data to administer a beating to the theory that Democrats lost in November because liberal voters were too depressed to bother voting.

Decent ideas

Federal officials would like to curb drunk-driving and bar fights among drivers responsible for transporting nuclear material around the country.

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