[Crossposted to Broadsides.org]
Please, can anyone out there other than the fawning Vermont media think anything other than “loser” when the name Anthony Pollina is mentioned? I can’t. And for good reason, too. He’s a loser. He loses elections (many of them). He loses in his issue efforts (many of them). And he even loses in court when – oddly – he challenged his rare victory with campaign finance reform. I guess it must have felt weird for him to actually win something so he went to court to fight it. Good for you, Tony. Keep that record clean.
We all know about Pollina’s electoral losing. He’s something like 0-for-5. But Pollina seems to get energized by losing the way most politicians are energized by winning. The average politician, for example, begins with a lower office, wins, aims higher, wins and so forth. Not Pollina. He aims high, starting with a run for Congress, loses, and then just keeps aiming high for jobs like governor (a couple of times) and keeps losing. What’s worse is that each time he loses – and loses big – Pollina acts like he won. “Wow, I’m up to over 20% of the vote! Wait’ll next time!”
I’m guessing that when Pollina secures his next, great loss this November he’ll be so damn energized by it that he’ll probably launch a bid for the presidency in 2012. And that could be the best thing that could happen to Vermont’s Progressive Party. Because, let’s face it, Pollina’s been sucking a lot of energy out of their movement with all this losing. Worse, it’s preventing a whole new breed of Progs from stepping up and taking a fresh shot at one of the offices that Pollina keeps sacrificing to the Republicans.
It would also be nice if Pollina would stop “saving” Vermont’s dairy farmers. Because let’s look at that track record. In the 1980s, when Pollina started saving them, there were more than 3,000 dairy farmers in Vermont. Today, after more than 25-years of Pollina fighting for them, there are about 1,100 of them left. Thanks, Tony! Sure, it’s totally and completely unfair to blame him for the dramatic drop. But it’s certainly fair to ask him why – given these facts – he’s so proud of his dairy work?
About the only real progress made in the dairy industry in Vermont over the last 25 years has been the advent and growth of organic dairying. And – as if to protect his losing record – Pollina has had NOTHING to do with it. Pollina’s new Vermont Milk Company, for example, even shuns organic. Oh yeah, feel the progressive vision. And pass the pesticides…
Today, a group of so-called Democrats are gathering in Burlington to launch a skimpy little website called “Democrats for Pollina.” It’s a not-so-veiled attempt to “prove” that Pollina is getting gobs of support from mainstream Dems in his Prog bid for the governorship. The group is officially launching a “write-in” campaign for Pollina in the Democratic primary in September. Since Pollina will be on the Prog’s primary ballot, he can’t be on the Dems’. But he could – if he won as a write-in – don both labels in the general election. If, that is, the Dems let him get away with it. Fat chance.
This all kind of reminds me of the announcements last week by Hillary Clinton that she would welcome Obama to be her running mate. It’s the kind of thing that forces that cocked puppy head look that says: Huh? And I’m not sure if it’s more arrogant or ignorant for a person running behind to offer a lesser job to the front-runner.
In Vermont, of course, the early polls show Pollina being in the place he’s always in: third amongst three. Or, for those of us outside Pollina’s groupie shadows, it’s usually called LAST. What’s worse, Pollina was a good distance behind what the pollsters only identified as a “Democratic candidate” since a Dem hasn’t announced – yet. Look Mom, I’m literally losing to a no-name! Good job, Tony. Now get to your room and re-arrange your Buffalo Bills memorabilia….
But that won’t stop Pollina and his groupies who can’t stop losing to think that they’re somehow entitled to a Dem Party primary endorsement via a write-in campaign. Chris Pearson, a Prog who has actually gotten elected and a Pollina sidekick, told the Free Press that Pollina won’t enter the Dem primary officially because “that’s what Peter Clavelle did and it didn’t work.” But then Pearson goes on with this: “People know (Pollina) as a Progressive and for him to suddenly run as a Democrat doesn't pass the straight-face test.”
Well, yeah. But it also doesn’t pass the smell test for Pollina and his fumble-fingered handlers to think Vermont voters are stupid enough to fall for this write-in nonsense. Let me get this straight: It looks funny to have Pollina get the Dem primary endorsement by earning it with his name on the ballot but it’s fine for him to be sneaky by coordinating the write-in effort for it? Give me a break.
And there we have it: The mush that is the Pollina political spine. If he believed his and his party’s own rhetoric, he’d be announcing that he doesn’t want the Dem’s endorsement – no matter how it came. Instead, he’s taking us all for fools as he skips down this silly little write-in route.
Of course, there’s one way to put an end to all of this: A true progressive needs to challenge Pollina in the Prog Party primary so his followers will have to focus on their own party’s efforts rather than soiling that of the Dems.
And I think I know someone who’s interested. Stay tuned.