My father often reminds me, writes auditor Tom Salmon:

"It's not what you say, it's what they hear," so I'm hoping you hear what I say in the spirit intended.

So begins Tom Salmon’s rambling Burlington Free Press My Turn op-ed feature Blame no one and engage everyone.The opening quote used here like some type of editorial Miranda warning puts the reader on notice that any possible misreading is the fault of the reader not the author.  

Auditor Salmon keeps demanding to be listened to. People may still be listening, but what is he saying?

A few years ago as states' revenues fell dramatically nationwide, he proposed that Vermont allow in casino gambling to cover budget shortfalls, ignoring that gambling revenues were in drastic decline. More recently, as the desire for government transparency has grown, he proposed boundries be placed on public information requests.  

Salmon’s recent My Turn winds like a car out of control swerving down several paths,veering at, then away from, topics as they might come into focus, and ultimately running up on the sidewalk.  

Blame no one. He notes post-election opinion columns popping up titled ‘Where do we go from here?’ then proceeds to blame Ruth Marcus of the Washington Post for misreading the political situation surrounding the President’s Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform report. Marcus says both sides must listen to what they don’t want to hear. Salmon asks: What if there are more than two sides? Reform, Salmon declares, will require new players. He hints that he may be one of these players because, as Vermont Auditor of Accounts:

I warn of dangers, and the loss of "listening" is a real danger.

Will his next party be a tea?      

Then spinning his tires and laying a little more blame on the pavement, he says

Ms. Marcus fell prey to the same inclination many big brains do; they speak of the problem as if it lay under a glass case .

Salmon then steps on the gas and speeds away to other issues.

Clutching a favorite quote: "People do not lack strength, they lack will." Salmon now steers our attention to single payer health care, claiming he didn’t hear much about the fact that 70 percent of our health care costs are attributable to preventable causes. (Was he not listening?)

While vaguely alluding to preventable causes of illnesses (lack of will?) he fails to engage us with any positive proposals  but finds fault with those who find it easier to blame: teachers, schools, MacDonalds and soda for childhood obesity for missing the mark.  

He sums up by looking over his shoulder back to the campaign and shouting,   “I could dazzle you with financial facts that are all big and bad”.

Engage everyone. At last braking to a shuddering conclusion of sorts he posses several unanswered policy questions in rapid fire, demands more involvement and skids headfirst into a dire warning:

We need participation, and the time of good intentions and “hoping for volunteers” is over. It’s time to get in the game, or watch our country, as we’ve known it, vanish.

Has the airbag mercifully have gone off ?