Two years ago, Entergy Nuclear’s Vermont Yankee exceeded  state regulations for radiation released offsite at the Vernon reactor, according to measurements by the VT Dept. of Health.

Vermont’s standards are stricter than the federal standards, and Vermont Yankee almost exceeded those, too.

Entergy’s response was, “Who you gonna believe, me or your lying instruments?” Since then, the state and Entergy have been “negotiating” the issue.

Windham Regional Commission is sponsoring an event to give the Health Dept a chance to explain on Thursday, November 16, 7:00 P.M. at the American Legion Hall, Linden St. Brattleboro. It’s billed as “The Vermont Department of Health and Vermont Yankee”.

Sevaral diaries on Daily Kos, including this one by KevinNYC, are reporting that Chad Castagana, the man arrested yesterday for sending anthrax scare letters to Nancy Pelosi, Keith Olbermann, David Letterman, Jon Stewart and others, was a frequent poster at Free Republic.
My love note to them, and my immediate demise as an occasional irritant on that website, are detailed on the jump.

Too cool for school.
Look at this post from the dKos thread linked above.
Here is the screenshot of the posting, which was pulled within three minutes, as well as my user ID having its posting privileges revoked.
Oh well.
Recently, when I got into wingnut trouble behind my calling out Bush on the air over habeas corpus, the diary I linked in the preceding became my most sucessful effort to date, and spawned a sequel.
From the original diary, I wish to quote kossack Delaware Dem, who has been proven right time and again:

The one thing I have learned about wingnuts. (29+ / 0-)

  They are cowards.  Little chickenshits.  They talk tough and make threats.  But they never back them up and run crying like little babies when challenged. 

  If you are receiving threats, immediately report them to the police or the FBI.  Terroristic threatening is a crime.

  Have courage. 

  My Photoblog, Milhouse’s Glasses

  by Delaware Dem on Fri Oct 20, 2006 at 07:47:46 PM EDT

  [ Reply to This ]

Banned from Free Republic. AGAIN. Heh. That’s my second damn screen name.
Guess I’ll have to come up with another one.

Zephyr Teachout writes an interesting op-ed in today’s Burlington Free Press.

Following an example from Estonia where “the legislature created a Web site called “Today I Decide” that tracks all upcoming legislation and allows citizens to propose legislation. If any citizen proposal gets a sufficient number of e-votes, the parliament commits to reviewing it.”, Teachout discusses the various ways we could “now use the Internet for engaging citizens in setting priorities, identifying problems, and drafting and passing legislation.”

She includes a GMD shout-out for good measure…

Connections: The Internet may be the greatest tool for solving collective action problems in the last few hundred years, but unless there are opportunities for people to connect laterally, it becomes another broadcast tool. Wherever a politician posts information online, they should also be sure that there are chances to respond and discuss. If one of the issues on their Web sites is “Energy,” I’d hope they include a section that asks for solutions, and another that asks for help on legislative research. Even connecting to lively, preexisting forums — that they don’t moderate — will enable political connections that would otherwise dead-end after the last sentence. This year’s election season brought out Scudder Parker’s Campaign Blog, Welch’s insta-letter-to-the-editor software; the “Exit Voices” video and blog site for post-voting stories; Philip Baruth’s citizen-interviews; John Odum’s community site, and the Freyneblog that allows you to read Peter’s screed daily, instead of weekly … and screed right back at him.

And she closes with what amounts to a challenge…

A little state like Vermont — following the lead of a little country like Estonia — can lead the way in using the power of the Internet to open up government and engage citizens in the messy, muddy, chaotic world of political decision-making, by bringing the life of politics, not just politicking, online.

So what’re your ideas for doing what Zephyr proposes?