A few days ago I posted about having noticed a Dubie for Governor poster attached to a truck doing road construction in Brattleboro.
This time I have pictures:
We’d already figured that this was a truck involved in receiving state funds. It’s also a company that’s a Dubie donor.
(update: I forgot to provide the link demonstrating that they receive state funds. Here’s a link to one of the bid results from the AOT website itself. I think this is for the same contract that they’re doing currently, but they were the winning bidders on multiple other contracts as well.)
Deb Ricker not only gave $2000 personally, but two of her companies – L&D Safety Marking Company and WorkSafe Traffic Control Industries – also pitched in $2000 apiece. Maybe a birthday hat in the shape of a safety cone?
What’s on the side of this truck?
I don’t know enough about how trucks are marked and labeled. I didn’t get its license plate, but I did get this:
I want to be clear about something: while I am somewhat concerned about someone who receives contracts for state work donating large sums of money to candidates for Governor, I am deeply concerned about someone using the support they get from the state as an opportunity to advertise for a candidate for Governor.
In my years of working as a state contractor, doing presentations across the state, I never used that opportunity to advocate for candidates. I would never have dreamt of wearing a Clavelle or Parker t-shirt when presenting in the public on behalf of the state of Vermont. I wouldn’t even put campaign buttons on my laptop case. Similarly, when I teach for the Vermont State College system, I do not advocate for candidates to my students. I even had a perfect lesson to use with my students about plagiarism in the form of the Martha Rainville campaign that would have fit perfectly with an existing lesson plan, but I chose to avoid that specific issue because it would have been inappropriate to bring a specific political campaign into the mix.
So while I don’t have any problem with this company receiving contracts from the state of Vermont. Assuming their work is of good quality and they’re being paid appropriate for the services they render (and I see no reason to assume otherwise), that part is fine.
The other part should be easy to understand. This is a company which has maxed out its donations to Brian Dubie, but is, additionally, providing an in-kind donation by using its truck fleet to advertise for him while doing work on behalf of the state.
I’m not out to berate anyone here, but there’s something I’ve got to say, and if people take offense at it, I’m fine with that.
I’ve seen some statements here over the past week which boil down to “I can’t believe these poll results! It looks like [Dubie/Salmon/Scott] will win this thing. How the hell can that happen?”
The answer to that question is actually quite simple: it will happen if you let it. The outcomes of elections are not determined by politicians. They are not determined by polls. They are determined by votes.
So here’s my question to the naysayers and those who are afraid that Dubie will win this thing: what are you going to do about it? What steps will you be taking over the next few weeks to help keep Dubie out of the Governor’s office? What will you do to support Doug Hoffer?
I was in Brattleboro last night, mostly to do a live blog of a candidate forum, but on the way home I stopped by the Rotary to do some night photography. While I was there, crews were doing night road work by the rotary, which made for cool blinking lights and other patterns that were interesting and make for good night photography.
Then I noticed something: one of the construction vehicles had two signs attached to it. If I hadn’t been set up for an entirely different type of photo, I might have been able to get a picture of this, but motion blur in the dark would not have done me much good (motion blur was kind of the point of taking these photos).
What I saw was two signs on a large yellow work truck: one was a Dubie for gov poster, and the other was a Scott for Lt. Gov poster.
I’m working under the (possibly incorrect) assumption that these are municipal vehicles doing municipal road work. In other words, they are functioning as an arm of government. Even if they are private contractors, they are doing work on behalf of government.
So why are they engaging in high visibility advertising on behalf of a political candidate?
(Promoting up top. The forum begins at 6:30 and I will start live blogging around that time. – promoted by JulieWaters)
I will be live blogging tonight’s candidate forum in Brattleboro, VT, so I will update this piece then, but I want to list the candidates and provide details on the event first. The confirmed candidate list (10 candidates) is:
Jeanette White
Hillary Cooke
Richard Davis
Mollie Burke
Michael Obuchowski
Carolyn Partridge
David Deen
Mike Mrowicki
Richard Marek
John Moran
The forum will take place in the multipurpose room of Brattleboro Union High School at 6:30 pm.
The above represents a mix of incumbents and new candidates, and a mix of parties as well. I’m looking forward to seeing these candidates be challenged on issues crucial to Vermont’s future.
It’s interesting to do these forums outside of your own district, because you see the issues presented in ways that are fairly different from how you’re used to seeing them. I didn’t live blog last night because I’m live blogging Brattleboro tonight (6:30 pm, Brattleboro Middle School), and didn’t want to do two nights of that in a row. I also know the Brattleboro candidates fairly well and feel more qualified to live blog that session.
But I’m extremely glad I went to the Rutland forum for one specific comment, more than any other.
Peg Flory, a Rutland Republican, talking about Challenges for Change, said “We were cowards.” She explained how they were too scared to make the specific cuts they needed to cut so instead they turned them into “objectives” and pushed them onto the state agencies and just said that they had to find ways to save money in a way which allowed the legislature to pretend to make hard decisions while evading actual responsibility for those decisions. This wasn’t someone posturing. Her body language, her tone? This was anger.
I don’t agree with Flory on a lot. She voted against same sex marriage and she voted against adding protections on the basis of gender identity (real or perceived) to employment non-discrimination, both of which I find to be extremely unfortunate choices on her part. She was one of 4 Senators to vote to extend Vermont Yankee’s license, which suggests to me either incompetence or mendacity.
But, even with all that, I came out of last night with a lot of respect for her willingness to own the problems inherent in Challenges for Change and, most likely, burn herself within her own committees. I’d still never vote for the woman, but I did not expect to come out of that evening respecting her more than any other candidate on the stage.
This will be a great opportunity to meet your local candidates and find out more about their positions and policies. Democratic, Republican and Progressive candidates local to the site’s district have been invited, but not all have chosen to attend (no Republicans showed up for the White River Junction forum last week).
Note: this is not about Vermont, but every once in awhile I need to delve into something different. Today is National Coming Out Day, so this seems appropriate
I came out in a small conservative college in the Midwest. This was in the 1980’s. When I did so, I was threatened routinely and mostly anonymously.
I am not going to dwell on this, but I will say a little about it later. It’s not the point of what I’m writing. I’m writing about this:
It started with a Twitter message on Sept. 19: “Roommate asked for the room till midnight. I went into molly’s room and turned on my webcam. I saw him making out with a dude. Yay.”
That night, the authorities say, the Rutgers University student who sent the message used a camera in his dormitory room to stream the roommate’s intimate encounter live on the Internet.
And three days later, the roommate who had been surreptitiously broadcast – Tyler Clementi, an 18-year-old freshman and an accomplished violinist – jumped from the George Washington Bridge into the Hudson River in an apparent suicide.
Ellen says it better than I can (embedding is disabled but you can still view the video), so please view the video and come back here, ’cause I’ve got a bit more to say.
When I came out, I did so by choice. I knew I had to at the time, even though it was a bit of a scary prospect. It was shortly after that that I formed a gay rights group at my college.
I didn’t do this alone. I did it after a man named Brian McNaught came to speak at our college. Several of us met with him for dinner and talked about the old style gay support groups which made everyone feel as though we were in hiding.
It was through his inspiration and the work of a small number of us that were willing to be out, despite the dangers and fears, despite the death threats, despite the problems it caused for us.
I’ve known people who couldn’t live with what they knew about themselves but were unwilling to face. Some of them have died by their own hand, unable to deal with their homosexuality or transsexualism. Others have died the way I may have at one point in my life: not through active suicide, but simply through falling into depression and fatalism and just falling and failing until life swallows you up, either killing or disabling you.
I never let it get that far– I came to my senses long before rock bottom came and I moved myself forward and pulled myself out of that hole, but I was fortunate; I had friends and resources and interests that moved me forward.
But what I really want to say, right here, right now, is that though things are better, they are not better everywhere. Though conditions are improved for many of us, they’re not improved for everyone. Coming out can still, in the wrong place and at the wrong time, get you killed. I am isolated. My marriage is recognized in Vermont and though I have occasionally dealt with homophobia in my personal life, such incidents are few and far behind and lack institutional support. On the few occasions I’ve complained about my treatment by people in official conditions, I’ve been apologized to profusely, and treated extremely well in the future.
But this does not ring true for everyone and so many of us, transsexual, lesbian, gay and bi, deal with our own roadblocks that may be common to us, but may also be unique to our own personal psyche.
So this is the thing: my coming out and my ability to be myself and recognize the parts of myself that at one point terrified me? That was facilitated by people who came out before me and spoke in public with eloquence and grace.
Those of us who have been allowed to come out with relative safety do not have the luxury to allow ourselves to to be complacent about those who will follow, and those of us who have benefited from those before us have an obligation to continue to pave the way for others.
This story? This story where someone gets outed and ends up dead, either quickly through violence, or slowly through the mental attrition of one’s psyche into frightened oblivion?
I’m not out to berate anyone here, but there’s something I’ve got to say, and if people take offense at it, I’m fine with that.
Peg Flory, a Rutland Republican, talking about Challenges for Change, said “We were cowards.” She explained how they were too scared to make the specific cuts they needed to cut so instead they turned them into “objectives” and pushed them onto the state agencies and just said that they had to find ways to save money in a way which allowed the legislature to pretend to make hard decisions while evading actual responsibility for those decisions. This wasn’t someone posturing. Her body language, her tone? This was anger. 