1). She’s a creationist.

2). She’s under investigation for abuse of power.

3). What?  That’s not enough?

This pick is the Harriet Myers of VP selections.  This is absolutely hilarious.

This is the new voice of the Democratic party:

I’m sort of amazed.

One of Vermont’s “local” papers has a piece in it this morning which I noticed was an AP piece seconds into reading it (I hadn’t looked at the byline yet).

I’ll give an example.  The piece quotes Biden:

“Barack Obama will bring down health care costs by $2,500 for the typical family, and, at long last, deliver affordable, accessible health care for all Americans.”

It follows that up with the “fact” about the story:

Obama’s health care plan does not provide for universal health care coverage. He promises to make it affordable and would require children to be covered, but not adults. Estimates of how many would remain without insurance vary. Hillary Rodham Clinton said during the primaries that Obama’s plan would leave 15 million people uninsured.

You know what’s interesting about this?

It doesn’t contradict what Biden says.  It presents the “fact” as though it’s contradictory, in a format suggesting there were facts missed, but Biden refers to “affordable” health care, and the AP hack piece responds with a comment about universal health care.

More, after the fold, all of these from the August 28th edition of the Brattleboro Reformer, “FactCheck: The fuller story in Denver by Darlene Superville”

The piece quotes Albright:

Sen. McCain says that American troops should remain in Iraq perhaps as long as they have been stationed in Korea and Japan, as if there were no difference in history, religion or culture between our friends in Asia and those in the Middle East.

It’s response?

Democrats have made much of McCain’s “100 years” comment at a town-hall meeting earlier this year in New Hampshire. It was in response to a questioner who had challenged him about President Bush’s view that U.S. troops could be in Iraq for 50 years.

“Maybe a hundred,” McCain said. “We’ve been in South Korea. We’ve been in Japan for 60 years. We’ve been in South Korea for 50 years or so. That’d be fine with me as long as Americans, as long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed. Then it’s fine with me. I hope it would be fine with you if we maintain a presence in a very volatile part of the world where al-Qaida is training, recruiting and equipping and motivating people every single day.”

McCain also has said he envisions victory in Iraq and the return of most U.S. troops by January 2013 – the end of his first term if elected. He also says withdrawal should be based on security conditions in Iraq, not hard deadlines.

In other words, the piece confirms exactly what Albright says, but frames it so as to present her as incorrect.

Next they target Chet Edwards, who said:

In the last two years, Sen. Obama helped pass the new GI education bill.

The AP’s comment on this?

The GI bill became an issue during the presidential campaign because it illustrated a stark difference between the two candidates. Obama, a member of the Veterans’ Affairs Committee, supported the bill; McCain, a veteran himself, did not. Each side accused the other of playing politics with the issue.

The bill, part of a larger war funding bill President Bush signed into law, increased education benefits for troops and veterans. McCain, siding with the Pentagon, said he opposed it because the enhanced benefits could encourage people to leave the service early during a war. McCain and Republican colleagues proposed a bill to tie increased benefits to length of service. Obama showed up for the Senate vote; McCain, who has missed more than half the votes in the Senate during the current Congress because he was campaigning, did not.

So… the news here is that what Edwards said was entirely accurate…?  And you’re presenting this in a statement vs. fact format because…?

The piece in question opens with:

Sen. Barack Obama’s formal nomination Wednesday as the Democratic candidate for president brought with it a barrage of renewed attacks on his Republican opponent, Sen. John McCain. Some were on point, others missed the mark.

What I’d like to know from the AP is what “mark” those attacks missed.

I mean, seriously, what the hell is this crap?

Per The Rutland Herald:

Final details of a plan to fill a $24 million hole in the state’s General Fund were hammered out by administration officials and lawmakers Wednesday and will rely in part on cuts to the state’s funding of higher education, already the worst in the country by some measures.

and…

…The salaries for a dozen executive branch spokespeople… were left untouched. There were still few specifics given about 13 new layoffs expected among state workers, except that the workers cut would likely be all classified or union positions.

but at least Symington knows enough to make an issue of this:

…Governor Douglas is fighting to keep his million dollar PR operation while sacrificing services vital to Vermonters. The Governor has repeatedly been asked by legislators to reduce spending on public relations and each time he has stubbornly refused.

…He would rather promote himself and his administration than fund the affordable housing, college scholarships, job training and other critical programs Vermonters need.

The Governor’s misplaced priorities are just another reflection of his short-sighted and piecemeal approach to handling our budget problems…. I will follow in the tradition of Governors Snelling and Dean and pull the Lt. Governor and legislative leaders together in a bipartisan effort to develop a long-term fiscal plan. That is the common sense, responsible approach that Vermonters expect their leaders to take, and it builds on my track record as Speaker where I have reached across party lines to get results for Vermonters.”

More like this, Gaye.  Good job with the rapid response.

A few things I noticed reading today’s news:

I’m not linking to this one because it’s an AP piece, but apparently Pollina is in talks with one of his donors who happens to be a lawyer who wants to sue in federal court to overturn the campaign finance law.

Brattleboro suffered major flooding today:

There are two water mains on this stretch of Putney Road, one on either side. On the west side, the main dates from the 1940s, and is made of asbestos lined with cement. On the east side, installed in the late 1960s, is a pipe made of cast iron.

In other antiquated utility news, Vermont Yankee was evacuated Tuesday.  Per the Reformer:

At approximately 11:09 a.m. Tuesday, plant operators received a reactor building high radiation alarm, he said. At the same time, operators received a report that a technician had “misoperated” a valve in the reactor coolant water clean-up system, said Sheehan.

“They determined the radiation levels were consistent with those expected for a clean-up filter resin intrusion event,” he said.

Radiation levels were higher than normal for about 10 minutes before the began to trend downward, said Sheehan.

“The reactor building was evacuated until the radiation protection personnel could survey the building and release it for unrestricted use.”

According to Rob Williams, “We are looking into where and how the error was made.”  

Well that’s comforting.

Oh, and I hear Leahy gave some kind of speech yesterday:

Per the Kids are Priority One Coalition:

The projected revenue for the rest of the state’s 2009 fiscal year (which just began July 2008) is lower than the estimates used when the legislature approved the state budget in May. Experts project a $24 million shortfall in the General Fund. As a result, some changes need to be made in order to prevent deficit spending. Neither the Douglas administration nor the legislators will consider additional revenue-raising measures or using rainy day funds (funds set aside for a specific purpose) until later in the fiscal year. Instead, the Governor has proposed cuts in General Fund spending–recommended without the benefit of public input.

This is a rerun of what we saw a few months ago.  We’ve blogged about this extensively, so I’ll just recap:  the plan is not to cut such expenses as Douglas administration spokespersons.  It’s to cut human services.  

Again.

So let me make this simple: there is no legitimate need for Jim Douglas to have multiple spokespeople.  Those are well-paid positions which provide no public service, but do help the governor self-promote.

Another thing we do not need is to move money from the Catamount fund to mitigate cuts in the early childhood education budget.  

These budget proposals screw the poor for the sake of the convenience of the Douglas administration.  This is pathetic.  It is amoral.  

It is horrendous.

Both of these from the Rutland Herald:

Budget cuts irk critical politico:

Efforts to trim $32 million from the state budget turned political Monday when a prominent Democrat (sic) lawmaker criticized Gov. James Douglas for proposing more than $400,000 in cuts to child-care subsidies while preserving at least seven public relations positions.

In the wake of a downgraded revenue forecast in July, the Douglas administration last week unveiled a proposal to cut spending by $24 million in the General Fund and $8 million in the Transportation Fund. That list included $436,000 in cuts to a child-care subsidy program that helps low-income Vermonters pay for daycare.

Rep. Floyd Nease, Assistant Majority Leader of the Vermont House, said that Douglas could restore the cuts by instead axing seven taxpayer-funded public relations jobs.

“What we’re doing is cutting child-care subsidies to working Vermonters instead of cutting Governor Douglas’ public relations machine,” Nease said.

and…Dem rivals pile on Dubie:

Tom Costello and Nate Freeman faced off Monday night in a polite debate that saw most of the two Democrats’ criticisms aimed at the man one of them will face in November, incumbent Republican Lt. Gov. Brian Dubie.

These are the headlines we should be seeing.

I’m having fun in Vermont with my new web cam 🙂

…either Obama’s web site has been hacked, or he’s chosen Biden as his running mate.

I’d give it 50/50 odds.

I have concerns with Biden, but he also delivered some of my favorite lines in the debates (referring to Rudy, he explained that every sentence out of his mouth consists of a noun, a verb and 9/11).

But seriously, I didn’t much give a damn who his running mate was going to be and I still don’t.  I will say that yesterday there were a lot of rumors from some pretty good sources flying about it being Clinton and I do feel a bit of a relief to know they weren’t true.

UPDATE: Biden on nuclear power:

We were camping in Maine all week, so I’ve been a bit out of touch with respect to Vermont news.  

This afternoon I got this photo of a Merlin hanging out at our local marsh (she was not amused to see me).  I like to talk about Merlins because they’re overlooked: the middle child of falcons.  They’re medium-sized falcons (a little larger than Kestrels and significantly smaller than Peregrines).  They’re a key part in our ecology and they are very smart (read: sneaky) hunters.  After I spotted this one, I tried to figure out where it flew and then found it accidentally a few minutes later.  When I moved to the other side of the marsh to get some (unsuccessful) photos of a green heron, I accidentally flushed the merlin, which flushed all the ducks in the area (as well as the green heron itself, which flew off while croaking at me indignantly).  

I had no idea it had doubled back behind me.  I don’t even know how it managed to do it without my noticing, but somehow, it managed to sneak its way around behind me without my even realizing.  Then it did it again to get back to its original side.  

But really, this is just an open thread.  I’ve heard that Obama might be announcing his VP nominee soon.  I have no idea who it’s going to be, and I’m not inclined to make a prediction.  

In the meantime, what’s up in your neck of the woods?  

This is going to be a short-lived open thread, because it will be bumped easily by whichever choice Obama made (combined with a listing of the various groups who are offended by his choice and why they’re offended).  Speaking of which, whatever happened to that guy Gore ran with?  Is he available?

In the meantime, I’m thinking we should all take some time off and go looking for the mysterious ninth house of McCain.  I hear there’s adventure, fraught with peril, but lots of treasure as well.