Looks like the deafening silence coming out of Mashpee is making Middleboro nervous

Seems we haven’t heard much from the tribe recently – leading Middleboro Selectman Pat Rogers to ask:

Free will begone
At this point I’ll point out how one-sided our casino agreement is. The tribe gets to do whatever they want – go commercial, go elsewhere, or pretty much anything else they damn well please. We on the other hand, are shackled to the agreement and in fact are bound to work on the tribe/casino’s behalf whether we want to or not. This is spelled out in Section 22 of the Intergovernmental agreement between Middleboro and the Mashpee Wampanoag – or as I call it – the free-will-begone clause.

Cone of Silence
Problem: Pat’s doom and gloom downer attitude is probably in violation of Section 22 and might be exposing the town to risk. Maybe just to be safe we should get a Cone of Silence installed in the Selectman’s meeting room. Alternately we could develop code words that all of us in Middleboro understand that will allow us to talk openly about the casino. You get the idea – innocuous words that will let us say what we want and skirt Section 22. For instance, we could agree that “nifty” means “a disaster of Biblical proportions”. And maybe “fruitful” could mean “like crap on a stick”.

Nifty and fruitful
Then if the casino comes, I’ll be able to honestly say:
“This casino is nifty. The agreement and relationship between the town and the tribe is really fruitful.”