Did you see this? Outrageous!

This week Rolling Stone published an interview with Serena Williams, and she says some terrible things in it.

The biggest deal, and what has attracted the most notice, was her extended discourse blaming the victim in the Steubenville rape case.

Serena just shakes her head. “Do you think it was fair, what they got? They did something stupid, but I don't know. I'm not blaming the girl, but if you're a 16-year-old and you're drunk like that, your parents should teach you: don't take drinks from other people. She's 16, why was she that drunk where she doesn't remember? It could have been much worse. She's lucky. Obviously I don't know, maybe she wasn't a virgin, but she shouldn't have put herself in that position, unless they slipped her something, then that's different.”

Amazingly bad, especially for someone who holds herself out as a voice for women's rights, eh?

Don't worry, it gets worse. How? It gets worse because of what has been reported as her apology. I'll post the entire thing so you can decide how to think about it yourself:

What happened in Steubenville was a real shock for me. I was deeply saddened. For someone to be raped, and at only sixteen, is such a horrible tragedy! For both families involved – that of the rape victim and of the accused. I am currently reaching out to the girl’s family to let her know that I am deeply sorry for what was written in the Rolling Stone article. What was written – what I supposedly said – is insensitive and hurtful, and I by no means would say or insinuate that she was at all to blame.

Granted, she acknowledges that what happened to the victim was bad, which is a start, but she goes way downhill from there. First, she refers to the convicted rapists as “the accused”. Second, she posits that the suffering of the rapists is morally equivalent to the suffering of the victim. And finally, in three different ways, she tries to weasel out of what she did. As we know, an essential element of an apology is an admission that you did something wrong, but she fails to do this. First, she uses the passive voice (“what was written”) in the classic “mistakes were made” tradition of fake apologies. Second, she refers to the interview as “what I supposedly said”. The only way this statement makes any sense is if it is coupled with a denial that she said what she is quoted as saying, but she is too cowardly to go that far. If she really didn't say it, and Rolling Stone is lying about what she said, this would be a serious matter and she should be going all-out to attack Rolling Stone for lying about her, but it's telling that she never does that. Third, she says she “by no means would say or insinuate that [the victim] was at all to blame”. Of course, this is another lie, because that is exactly what she did. I've always kind of liked Serena Williams. She's a great player, and she seems to be pretty gracious about the fact that she's better than her older sister. Still, both her original statement and her fake apology fall far short of the standards that anyone should live up to.

I think it's worthy of note when someone who has done some really bad things makes a sincere apology, and we have an example of that today.

There's a group called Exodus International. It's a Christian group founded in 1976 that has provided some of the theological and ideological ammunition for the bogus outfits that claim to “cure” homosexuality. I can hardly conceive of the suffering that Exodus and groups like it have caused to people who were indoctrinated to hate themselves for being different.

I have to admit, this week we saw a serious, sincere, and meaningful apology from these people. I'm not kidding: they admitted they were wrong all along, they apologized for the suffering they caused, and they shut themselves down.

Take look at part of his apology, and then read the whole thing:

Please know that I am deeply sorry. I am sorry for the pain and hurt many of you have experienced. I am sorry that some of you spent years working through the shame and guilt you felt when your attractions didn’t change. I am sorry we promoted sexual orientation change efforts and reparative theories about sexual orientation that stigmatized parents.

It's hard to read this,and the rest of their post, and not believe that they're sincere. Plus, their action in shutting down the organization, at least as currently constituted, seems like a big, big deal.

For these reasons, the Board of Directors unanimously voted to close Exodus International and begin a separate ministry. “This is a new season of ministry, to a new generation,” said Chambers. “Our goals are to reduce fear (reducefear.org), and come alongside churches to become safe, welcoming, and mutually transforming communities.”

I'm not one of the people they hurt by their actions, so I'm in no position to accept the apology, but in times like these, when every politician's change of position on marriage equality, however tardy, is rightly welcomed into the movement, this change seems as big as the unprecedented swing in public opinion we've seen in the last ten years.

 The Vermont Agency of Commerce and Community Development has rejected a plea by EB-5 investor-financed project DreamLife to reconsider the project’s cancelation. The ‘final’ decision to end the state’s authorization for  the plan to build high-end assisted-living units in Vermont was recently reported in the Free Press.

[Vermont] – unswayed by an appeal from DreamLife, an EB-5 project to build assisted living homes around the state – has finalized its cancellation of the project.

DreamLife Retirement Resorts proposed building six, 160-unit high-end assisted-living facilities in Vermont. Using the EB-5 investment program they were seeking to raise $144 million cash from 300 foreign investors seeking green card visas.

The EB-5 project arrangement with the state was initially canceled March 27th because of “material misrepresentation” by DreamLife. Four individuals representing the company in Florida claimed to be attorneys but were not licensed to practice law in that state. As long ago as last September, the state had canceled a memorandum of understanding with Dreamlife over the company’s failure to provide proper notification of expanding development plans.

Now the  promised “detailed response” by DreamLife’s head Phil Mooney to the state’s concerns has been rejected and cancelation made final, according to Secretary of Commerce Lawrence Miller.

However Mooney is not giving up the company’s Vermont dream easily, according to the Free Press. He would like to meet with Secretary Miller about salvaging his investment scheme.

“We maintain that our project brings substantial benefits in employment and quality of life in several communities in Vermont,” Mooney said. “We have hope of being able to bring the benefits of these projects to Vermont.”

Phil Mooney took up the DreamLife leadership from Richard Parenteau, the founder who remains a “background” investor. Parenteau, a Canadian, was convicted of perjury in Quebec last summer in a dispute over a will. In an earlier diary about DreamLife I noted that Parenteau was serial business starter or creator.

Over the last 20 years, Parenteau has created and dissolved more than two dozen companies in Florida and Vermont […] Five of the entities bear the DreamLife name, including an insurance company, a real estate firm and a finance company, all three of which are now inactive.

And now Phil Mooney also seems to have his head in the endless dream life cloud. But in this case, the clouds are full of rain.  

Just as South Burlington is poised to vote again on whether or not to oppose siting of F-35’s at Burlington Airport, I see that the Air Force has acknowledged more “mistakes” made in the F-35 impact study.

Beyond configuring their impact assessments with population data more than ten-years out-of date (from the 2000 census), it now appears that they misrepresented public support for the siting

as 8-2 in favor.  Apparently, the true numbers are more like the exact reverse.

‘Kind of makes you wonder what else has been fudged.

So the City Council has decided that the Rule of Law doesn’t apply to the Church Street Marketplace District.  In total secrecy the public body decided that the police can banish whomever they want from this district with no due process and no chance of appeal.  The cop’s word is the only law.

Despite Miro’s promise of transparency, the City Council is making the brazenly fraudulent claim that no one can know how they came to this resolution, despite Vermont’s Open Meeting law, by claiming attorney-client privilege! Their preposterous claim is that because they received council from the city’s lawyer, they are not allowed to tell anybody what happened.

Only now are the Progressives realizing the grave mistake they made in agreeing to this draconian power authorized to the police. The Democrats on the council however are fighting tooth and nail to keep the council’s doing secret.  Why? Because they are actually Republicans pretending to be Democrats.  That’s the only explanation I can come up with.

1) The ordinance is in itself illegal.

2) The demand of secrecy on the council is also illegal, based on a false premise of ‘privilege’.

Burlington has come a long, long way from the days of the People’s Republic of Burlington…

More:

http://www.alternet.org/civil-…

After spending a few minutes of my morning listening to Jim Douglas guest-hosting the Mark Johnson Show on WDEV*, my attention turned to the Mitchell Family Organ which I happily subscribe to. And there on the front page was news of the Vermont Health CO-OP’s extremely belated come-to-Jesus moment.

*I could only take a few minutes before the bile hit flood stage in my throat. Good ol’ Jim was hosting a discussion about Our Most Misunderstood President, Calvin Coolidge. He and his guest were explaining how Silent Cal’s presidency was a smashing success that left our economy in terrific shape, and deserved absolutely no blame whatsoever for THE WORST CRASH IN OUR HISTORY happening only seven months after he left office. Based on that discussion, I’m sure Jim Douglas wouldn’t mind if we called him the Calvin Coolidge of Vermont Politics. “When restraint was called for, he was restrained; when action was called for, he was restrained.”

Lika an alcoholic taking The Pledge after waking up in a gutter, the CO-OP has belatedly responded to its failure to win a Certificate of Public Good by thoroughly overhauling its management structure:

— Founder and board chair Mitch Fleischer, forced to choose between a lucrative contract for his brokerage and leadership of his brainchild, has opted for the big money. He’s gone from the VHC Board.

— A bunch of new people have been added to the board, including Governor Shumlin’s real estate lawyer Jerry Diamond, Steve Post of VSECU, and three guys with experience in health care management, insurance, and regulation. The original board didn’t have much of that, which is one reason that Financial Regulation Commissioner Susan Donegan called VHC’s structure a “recipe for a corporate governance disaster.”

— A statement that the lucrative, no-bid contract with Fleischer’s brokerage is “under review.”

— A promise to release new insurance rates in the near future, that will be more competitive than those originally considered by Donegan.

— And, most importantly of all, a complete change of tone by CEO Christine Oliver. After Donegan rejected VHC’s application, Oliver reacted angrily, saying VHC had been “blindsided,” hinting that Blue Cross Blue Shield had undue influence in the process, and all but accusing Donegan of unprofessional conduct.  

Oliver’s new tone is conciliatory to the point of subservience (Mitchell Family Paywall warning; a less comprehensive but adequate account is available free at VTDigger):

“We knew we had to go back and regroup and address her issues, and that’s what we’re in the process of doing right now,” Oliver said Tuesday. “We are completely and thoroughly taking stock of everything that’s mentioned in that ruling, not putting Band-Aids on things but really fundamentally re-looking at what we’re doing.”

This is clearly a desperation bid by VHC to win approval in time for the launch of the health care exchange in January. (It’d actually need approval long before then, since consumers will be able to choose coverage through the exchange starting October 1.) 2014 is, by a country mile, VHC’s best opportunity to get into the insurance marketplace. As a brand-new company facing entrenched competitors, it needs the chance to compete at a moment when all parties will be starting from square one. If it has to wait until 2015, it’ll be at a huge disadvantage.

So VHC needs quick action, and is fully aware of that. Hence the complete change of heart.

If I were Donegan, I wouldn’t give in. The application process was lengthy and thorough; now VHC is asking her to accelerate the process for a reinvented organization with no track record. It’s simply too little, too late.

Oh, and one more note from the Mitchell Family account, penned (of course) by Peter Hirschfeld:

The CO-OP’s troubles have begun winning headlines in Washington, D.C., where congressional Republicans are turning troubles for the CO-OP into ammunition in their war against “Obamacare.”

… The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform issued a subpoena to the Vermont Health CO-OP recently seeking documents related to its finances.

Great. Not that VHC’s missteps are going to single-handedly destroy health care reform, but the last thing we need is to be giving House Republicans more ammunition for one of their anti-Obama jihads. Thanks, VHC.  

Yesterday I offered some pointed commentary (“idiots” rolled out of my Blogger’s Thesaurus) about the off-again, on-again firing of VSEA chief Mark Mitchell. Well, today brings another life lesson in Why Public Sector Employees Have Such a Bad Reputation.

To wit, the hothouse flowers who work for the Agency of Education, who are all upset over the Agency’s pending move to downtown Barre. Per Terri Hallenbeck of the Freeploid, some Agency staffers are worried about CRIME!!!!! and possible environmental contamination.

Okay, yes, there’s crime in Barre. But we’re not exactly talking Hell’s Kitchen here. And as for environmental contamination, well, it’s a NEW BUILDING which will presumably meet current safety standards.

C’mon, people. This is the kind of thing that gives public-sector employees a bad name. If you’re complaining about a steady, union-protected, nine-to-five job in Barre, then, well, a lot of people are going to think you’re pampered little lapdogs. And they’re going to resent the taxes that pay your salaries.  

Shock! Horror! OMGOMGOMG!!!!!!! From the usually cautious folks at VPR News…

GMP Wants Permit To Kill Endangered Bats

Images swirl into view. Scary, unpleasant images. I see Dotty Schnure strangling bats with her bare hands. I see the GMP Board skeet-shooting freeze-dried bats. I see David Blittersdorf* eating Little Brown Bat Pie for dinner with lava beans and a nice Chianti. I see GMP staffers tossing bushels of Tasered bats into the whirling blades of a windmill. I see, in short, a wanton slaughter of the furry little creatures.

*Yeah, I know he’s not with GMP, but he’s part of the Turbine-Industrial Complex. Close enough.

But then, there’s the actual story:

The utility has asked for a state permit to kill four of the endangered creatures a year at its 21-turbine Lowell wind project.

Four.

FOUR.

Cough.

Okay, if you read further, it’s four Little Brown Bats and three more of other species, for a total of up to seven per year. But still, that seems like awfully small potatoes. Given the oft-stated concern for bird and bat kills by turbines, I’d think that a mere seven per year would be a cause for relief, not concern. It’s certainly not cause for VPR’s sensational headline.  

The biggest threat to our bat populations is, of course, White Nose Syndrome, which is the reason our species are endangered. The second biggest threat is disturbance of maternal colonies, usually by development.

I don’t know where Kingdom Community Wind ranks in the list, but it’s definitely somewhere below domestic cats, who are responsible for killing millions of wild animals every year, including 230,000 bats in Britain alone, according to one study. (Somehow I don’t hear anyone demanding leash laws for cats.)

This won’t stop Vermont’s anti-wind activists from seizing on the bat issue, just as they seize on any pretext for opposing wind energy development.

And it won’t apparently stop VPR from putting its thumb on the wind-energy scale with an eye-popping headline and this howler from the body of John Dillon’s report:

Some environmentalists argue that since bat populations are already precarious, they should not face more threat from wind projects.

“Some environmentalists.” Which means “environmentalists whose primary issue is stopping wind energy.” Because otherwise, the environmental community in Vermont is unified behind wind development as part of a renewable energy strategy.  But those environmentalists — the vast majority — don’t get a voice in Dillon’s piece.

This isn’t the first time John Dillon — VPR’s primary environmental reporter — has seemingly tilted the scales against wind energy. And given the fact that VPR’s editorial process is extremely thorough, perhaps excessively so, I have to wonder if the entire news operation doesn’t lean that way.  

Looks like somebody at our state’s second-largest labor union had a sudden revelation. Because after several days of bringing public disrepute on themselves, the board of the Vermont State Employees Association took a step back from the brink, and figured out a way forward that won’t involve everybody looking like selfish idiots.

It all began, as I’m sure you know, last Wednesday, when a majority of the Board voted to fire VSEA Executive Director Mark Mitchell. The vote came after a seven-hour marathon meeting kicked off by two union lawyers accusing Mitchell of violating labor laws.

Adding fuel to the fire were trustees who support Mitchell. They went public with their side of the dispute. Which led anti-Mitchell trustees to fire back. Oh, and Mitchell himself sought counsel with an employment attorney, which carries the implicit threat of a wrongful-firing lawsuit. In other words, a big ol’ circular firing squad.

All this, of course, without regard to the harm that might be done to the union, its members, the liberal cause in Vermont, and the broader labor movement.  I mean, it’s hard enough, in this Koch-addled, clusterFoxed country of ours, to support organizing rights, without VSEA making a public spectacle of itself.

Today’s developments, for those just joining us: the VSEA board held an emergency meeting and voted to (1) reinstate Mitchell, (2) put him on paid leave, and (3) arrange for an investigation of the allegations against Mitchell.

I do hope the apparent perestroika holds.  

 VSEA doesn’t need any internal divisions when it’s about to launch new contract talks with the state. And public sector unions in general don’t need this kind of negative publicity when they’re already under siege.  

I don’t know who was right and who was wrong about Mitchell. All I know is that just about everyone acted poorly, rashly, with no apparent concern for the damage being done. The union lawyers and last Wednesday’s majority covered themselves in the opposite of glory by hearing the charges against Mitchell and firing him, all in the same day. It reeks, not of considered judgment, but of a putsch.

As for Board President John Reese and other Mitchell supporters, they went public with the whole mess, which is precisely what they shouldn’t have done.

Today’s news is welcome, but there’s a long way to go to repair the damage and get the union as unified as possible heading into contract talks. With or without Mitchell, they’d better be ready.  

…And, speaking of the “confidence quotient” for Congress…

I have just returned from DC, where I joined representatives of the League of Conservation Voters from all over the country to bring an appeal to the doorsteps of our President, our Senators and our Representatives:

Act to address Climate Change Now!

We want to send a message to President Obama, that all the distractions of the past few months are no excuse to neglect the commitment he made in his second inaugural speech, to get the U.S. onboard with responsible climate action.

I seriously doubt that more than a handful of key Republicans continue to deny climate change in their most private conversations; yet, they have succeeded in paralyzing the U.S. response to this global threat.  That paralysis leaves us, as a nation, not just guilty of colossal neglect, but also vulnerable to incredible economic impacts for which we remain officially unprepared.  

There are good people proposing some kind of meaningful action ( like Bernie Sanders‘ bill proposing a carbon tax); but there are not enough of them and the problem has grown too big for a single bandaid fix.  

Even if, by some miracle, the carbon tax was adopted, there would still be contamination by methane from the newly introduced practice of “fracking” which represents a windfall for fossil fuel speculators but ignores the fact that the methane released in the process has roughly five times the potential for climate impact of carbon. We haven’t even succeeded in weaning the fossil fuel industry from it’s grip on the  government teat, so we are essentially suckling the demon child that will devour us all!

And, while the President spoke eloquently on Climate Change in January, it is now June and the agenda still appears to be to claim fuel “independence” by ramping up extraction and production of domestic dirty fuels. It’s as if Dick Cheney still haunts the Oval Office. Of course he does; and so do all the fossil fuel industry poltergeists.

I remember reading a couple of years ago about climate change deniers in the legislature of a southern state actually prohibiting state planners from factoring the impact of climate change into projections of shoreline decline over the coming years.  I’d like to think that even those folks are finally getting the picture now.

As if on cue,  as soon as Bill McKibben announced to the world that we had already exceeded the dreaded 400-ppm, the heavens opened to release some of the most violent storm and climate events of recent memory.

The City of New York, no longer the blase capital of the world, got ahead of the news (and they hope the next big wave) when Mayor Bloomberg announced a $20-billion plan to prepare the city for shoreline loss and the catastrophic weather events predicted for the future.  While Mayor Bloomberg may represent the leading edge of official U.S. response to Climate Change, he is well-behind much of the world, where many feel “the end is here,” and nothing is left but to adapt as the inevitable blight descends, leaving island nations homeless and others in economic and societal peril.

And where are all those great plans for reversing the trend?  Where are all those folks who claimed we would come up with a “solution” in plenty of time to prevent catastrophe?  Let’s hear something helpful from the roughly 1.5% of scientists who are always cited as experts by the knuckledraggers who restrain even the White House from meaningful action.

I only saw the really “good guys” on my Capitol Hill visits; but what they said was uniformly discouraging: “We’re trying but we can’t get much of anything done.”

Unfortunately, that isn’t good enough.  Climate crisis won’t wait for the political stars to realign with reality.  It’s here right now.