(my emphasis)

Employers of all sizes, in all sectors, have made clear what they need to restart the engine of our prosperity: lower taxes; universal broadband and wireless; reliable, affordable energy; a well-trained workforce; and an education system that is top-notch without being top-dollar.

(Gov Douglas’ 2010 State of the state address, incorrect year in document title noted)

Read that paragraph several times over. That’s right, according to Douglas it is businesses of all sizes that want that miraculous something huge for nothing.

Douglas is a lying ass plain and simple.

Further, the estate tax was increased last year to collect a greater portion of assets from deceased Vermonters. This change is particularly unfair to farmers whose assets are not easily mobile. It is a punitive tax that discourages farmers and small business owners from passing along their life’s work to sons and daughters. And, in the long run, it will have a tangible, detrimental effect on our revenues, as individuals change their residency to another state. I ask legislators to join me in rolling back this tax increase.

(ibid)

Yup, we’re discouraging hard working Vermonters from dying … after all … we’re all aware of all those family farms that are worth tens of millions of dollars.

Oh, and don’t forget the favorite whipping boy … education (again):

Our school governance structures are a vestige of the 19th century and, like our unsustainable personnel costs, must be reformed. We have 290 separate school districts – one for every 312 students – 63 different supervisory bodies and a State Board of Education. That’s a total of 354 different education governing bodies for a state with only 251 towns. We spend, by some estimates, nearly triple the national average for school administration. There is no doubt that we have room to make our system of education more efficient and affordable.

(ibid)

(Hey Douglas, those supervisory union boards are made up of representatives from the local boards … so stop your bullshit numbers fantasy … okay?)

I mean … our school boards really drain our state and town coffers. For example last year Williamstown voted to give each school board member $600 to help defray expenses. The chair of the board got $750 … HOLY ECONOMIC DIARRHEA BATMAN, WE GOT OUT OF CONTROL SCHOOL BOARD COSTS!

Oh, and those administrators that are required not because local communities love to hire them, but because of such as Douglas much approved of no child left untested law? Think the need for them will go away simply because we lose local control and accountability over our for now local school systems? Do I hear anything about reducing the federal and state information reporting mandates that make those administrators a requirement?

Didn’t think so.