(A face from the past! Heya goDLC. – promoted by odum)

Don’t let freedom die in the name of Freedom.  While we focus on the big issues, such as War, and Health Care, pesky little issues, like attacks on Net Neutrality sneak, in the back door and gnaw at our freedom.

Today, Senator John McCain introduced legistlation to block the governement’s efforts to block net neutrality.

I’m sure most here know what this means, but just in case you don’t, here’s a quick run down.

You connect to the internet via an Internet Service Provider, such as:  Burlington Telecom, Comcast, Green Mountain Access, Sovernet, etc.

What if your Internet Service Provider could block your access to a certain search engine?  Let’s say that Yahoo pays Burlington Telecom to block access to Google- your freedom of choice would be limited.

Let’s say that a giant, oh I don’t know, beverage company wanted to block your internet access to the website of a small brewer…and they had the money to pay your ISP to make it happen.

Or let’s say that some rather conservative types at the ISP felt that a certain pesky website like Green Mountain Daily was getting too big for it’s britches…and decided make the connection so slow that most readers didn’t find it worth the wait.

While we are concentrating on the big things, like war, and health care, pesky little issues like net neutrality fly in under the radar, and, if we’re not careful, our lives, our freedom of speech, even the free market, get changed for the worse…

Please take a few minutes to write Leahy, Sanders, and Welch and remind them that you ARE paying attention…

Thanks.

You Tube Vid on Net Neutrality:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v…

Having recently moved from Vermont to Minnesota, I had the strange experiance of getting an email the other day from YOUR Pat Leahy’s Green Mountain Pac about MY Al Franken and his Senate race.  I’m sure many of you got it as well…

“After trailing his opponent, Republican Senator Norm Coleman, for most of the race, recent polls now show [Al Franken] leading by the narrowest of margins.We need 60 votes to finally pass the Consumer-First Energy Act, to roll back excessive tax breaks for oil companies.

We need 60 votes to pass the Medicare Prescription Drug Price Negotiation Act, so that the federal government can bargain with pharmaceutical companies to reduce prescription drug prices.

And we need 60 votes to pass the long overdue Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, to guarantee equal pay for equal work — regardless of gender.

These critical pieces of legislation, and many others, all failed because we couldn’t overcome Republican filibusters. And if elected President, many of Barack Obama’s most ambitious proposals could face the same fate, unless we act now to reach 60 Democratic votes in the Senate.

”

I’ve been knocking on doors for the Minnesota Democratic Farmer Labor party for the past few days and I can tell you that it is true…the support is really thin but it seems to be growing. The question is, will there be enough time?

And I think Obama is going to be facing so much in his first term that he is going to need all the help he can get.  

So, if anybody in the Green Mountain State CAN help with a donation to the Land of 10,000 Lakes, I think America will thank you for it…

Leahy’s fund-raising form is here:

http://www.actblue.com/page/gm…

Thanks.

Alex

Beyond the appeals to race and gender, there is another dynamic at play in this primary fight. A struggle to define what kind of people the Democratic party speaks to.

This primary fight is certainly about the politics of identity. To ignore that would be silly. The reaction to photos of Obama in African Dress proves that many see the Clinton Campaign as saying that America is not ready for a Black President. This primary fight is about Race.

And this primary fight is certainly about Gender. A post by Monica Guzman at Seattle PI lead me to a Washington Post Article in which some feminist leaders claim that:”There are some people who promote Barack Obama because they want anybody but a woman. Would they like a white man instead of a black man? Of course. But they’ll take a black man over a woman. I never thought, in 2008, that we’d still be dealing with this.”

(This has been a debate over at Green Mountain Daily for sometime- with NanukFC challenging male bias every step of the way.)

But there is another dynamic going on here. The press, in it’s attempt to see around corners, has given us a lot of demographic information about the two camps. In addition to race and gender, we learn that the Obama camp is dominated by the young, the educated, the technically connected and savvy- people well able to compete in a global, and technology driven economy. Clinton, on the other hand, finds her support among those who are dependent on the “old” economy- blue collar and service workers- according to an article on CBS News, these are the people who respond to Hillary:

Clinton surely knows that as she promises to lower the costs of going to college, offering debt relief for people who graduate and go into teaching, or nursing, or law enforcement. “And I want to say something about all the other people who don’t go to college,” she adds. “You know, most people don’t go to college and graduate. And these are the people who build the buildings that we live and work in. They keep the economy going. They do most of the jobs in our society. I want to pay more attention to you.” She promises job training and community college programs.

At the same time, we’ve seen, recently on Green Mountain Daily, an anti-Clinton you-tube screed called: “The Clinton Hillbillies“. Which lampoons Hillary as a carpet-bagging fake, and, by inference makes the point that her supporters are a bunch of beer drinking, tobacco spitting in-bread morons.

This race is dominated by the question of who will get the historic honor of being the first (X or Y) to be the first (X or Y) President in American history.

But on another level, I’m wondering if we are witnessing the Democratic party making a choice about which type of American we want to serve and help- and, if so, I’m wondering if it’s possible to enlarge the tent again?

cross-posted at http://rip-and-read.blogspot.com/

A great post on this subject has already appeared on  GMD- I suggest looking at:

Missing Emails: “Where are What?

In Orwell’s 1984, inconvenient truths contained in historical documents were consigned to “The Memory Hole”; quite simply, an incinerator, which destroyed all traces of documentary evidence contradicting the Government’s current version of the Truth.

Of course, Orwell did not foresee that, in the digital age, very little in the way of “hard copies” would exist, making the task of alteration or disposal even easier.

According to The Washington Post (

“White House Has No Comprehensive E-Mail Archive:System Used by Clinton Was Scrapped” by Elizabeth Williamson and Dan Eggan):

For years, the Bush administration has relied on an inadequate archiving system for storing the millions of e-mails sent through White House servers, despite court orders and statutes requiring the preservation of such records…

As a result, several years’ worth of electronic communication may have been lost, potentially including e-mails documenting administration actions in the run-up to the Iraq war.

Henry Waxman’s House Oversight Committee is planning to hold hearings on this matter, currently scheduled for February 15.  Let us hope that this committee, of which Vermont’s own Peter Welch is a member, makes plenty of copies of what they find.

From a Vermonter in London: I was sitting in the pub today, having lunch and reading the Times, when I read the following in the Times of London:

Barack Obama received a boost to his presidential campaign yesterday when one of the most senior Democrats on Capitol Hill endorsed him, a rebuke to Hillary Clinton and further evidence that members of the party’s old guard are ready to desert her. Patrick Leahy, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee and a 34-year veteran on Capitol Hill, said that his support for Mr Obama was like backing John F. Kennedy for President. His move follows the endorsement last week of Mr Obama by John Kerry, the Democrats’ candidate in 2004.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article3206400.ece 

I've always known that Europe takes our election cycle quite seriously, but it's a little surreal to see it up close. Glad to see St. Patrick gets good press here, too.

Chittenden Corp, Vermont’s banking Goliath, has announced that IT will be sold to an out of state bank.

The issue of loss of control lead me to spend a little time at the website of “Local First Vermont”, in an attempt to see what this might mean for Vermonters.

Cross-posted at Rip-and-Read

Thursday’s big news was that Vermont’s biggest bank was going to be bought by an even bigger bank from out of state. In a $1.9 billion dollar deal, Chittenden Corp is going to be sold to United Financial Inc. of Connecticut.

I don’t think the Chittenden Bank sale is the end of the world, but I do think it is worth keeping an eye on.

One obvious reason for concern is the potential loss of white collar jobs here in Vermont; both the Burlington Free Press and the Rutland Herald report that although officials from both banks expect layoffs to have minimal impact, there will be layoffs.

But there is something else to consider…the headquarters of Vermont’s largest banking presence will no longer be located here on Vermont soil. Vermont’s citizen’s will have lost a measure of local influence over an institution that plays a very important roll in the lives of many, many, many of our fellow citizens.

It may not seem important that the top officers of the bank may no longer reside in Vermont neighborhoods, belong to Vermont civic organizations, or send their children to Vermont schools, but there are studies that show that it might.

A trip to Local First Vermont’s website yields the results of several studies which illustrate the point. For example, Local First Vermont cites one study by the National Federation of Independent Business that claims that:

Small firms give an average of more than two and a half times the amount per employee than do medium or large firms (small firms give $789 per employee, medium-sized firms $172, and large firms $334)

It is of course more than community involvement or charitable giving…in the end, it comes down to the basic strength of our Vermont Economy….

The Economic Impact of Locally Owned Businesses vs. Chains: A Case Study in Midcoast Maine – September 2003
By Institute for Local Self-Reliance
This study tracked the revenue and expenditures of eight locally owned businesses in Midcoast Maine, as compared to big box stores.Key findings:

* Locally owned businesses spent 44.6 percent of their revenue within the surrounding two counties, and another 8.7 percent elsewhere in Maine, largely on wages and benefits paid to local employees, goods and services purchased from other local businesses, profits that accrued to local owners, and taxes paid to local and state government.

* Big box retailers return an estimated 14.1 percent of their revenue to the local economy, mostly as payroll. The rest leaves the state, flowing to out-of-state suppliers and back to corporate headquarters.

so I’ll leave you with one more thought and then urge you to to visit Local First Vermont’s website.

In a recent comment on the H.520 situation, one GMD writer wrote…

Why bother? Now, I hear that Douglas has said he won’t even meet.

This is pathetic.

For what it is worth, I don’t think we should give up…even now…I think given the right attitude, we still might find a way to save it. What if we had, say, John Wayne at the head of the party?

It might go like this:

FromThe Hypothetical Herald

MONTPELIER, VT—  Senate President Pro-Tem Peter Shumlin drew his sword and threw away the scabbard this morning.

“We are going all out on H.520” said Shumlin.  “We may not override the Veto, but we are going all out, and when we’re done, the people are going to wonder why Governor Douglas hates the environment so much.”

“We’ve done everything we can to find common ground.  We’ve even offered to protect the Governor’s precious tax break for big energy.” said the President Pro-Tem.  “But the time for compromise has now passed.  And this bill will be a reality in the next session of the Legislature.”

Unidentified sources have indicated that the Democrats are putting together a war chest of contributions raised from party members to fly certain legislators home from vacation for the special session on July 11.

One Democrat who asked not to be named said he had been told in no uncertain terms that he needed to vote for this bill.  “They told me if I didn’t vote to override, I’d spent next year as the junior man on the shit-shoveling committee.”  Democratic Leaders would neither confirm or deny that they were enforcing party discipline on this issue.

But that’s just my opinion.

( – promoted by Jack McCullough)

From the Barre Montpelier Times Argus

June 27, 2007

…highs yesterday in the region were around 90 degrees, with 91 recorded in Montpelier…

Unfortunately, the arrival of hot summer weather also has brought in some unhealthy air.

… the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued a warning Tuesday advising that unhealthy ozone levels and air quality across New England can aggravate asthma and other lung diseases, and make people more susceptible to respiratory infection and other breathing problems.

Adults with respiratory problems and children are especially vulnerable.

DAMN- Just think of what the H.520 Headline could have been….

From The Paper In My Mind

MONTPELIER, VT– Senate Majority Leader Peter Shumlin and Speaker of the House Gaye Symington braved near record high temperatures and an EPA health warning to castigate Governor Douglas for his obstruction of The Energy Bill.

“On a day when our children, who should be swimming, are warned to stay indoors, we call upon the Governor to recognize that we have a big problem” said Shumlin as he stood under the blazing summer sun.

“Because protecting a tax break for big business is more important to Governor Douglas”, added Symington, “I am disappointed to say that we are probably not going to be able to pass a global warming bill this year.”

“But we’re sure as hell going try”, growled Shumlin…

But, as far as I know, as of 8:23 PM tonight, that didn’t happen.

I’ve been gently taken to task by some in my assertion that the Democrats “Caved” on H.520 by offering to surrender the funding mechanism (a perfectly equitable tax on Vermont Yankee) for H.520- the Energy Bill.

So I will rephrase my point…

DEMOCRATS MADE A STUPID STRATEGIC DECISION AND LOST GREAT OPPORTUNITY

Now, we probably won’t only not get an energy bill, but the Governor won’t get tagged with the responsibility.

I am very, very, very disappointed.  I’m still a Democrat, but I’m a disappointed one…and I kind of hope they can find away to make it up to me, and, more importantly, to themselves, soon.

When Democrats were swept back into power in 2006, Rush Limbaugh said:

“But the way I feel is this: I feel liberated, and I'm just going to tell you as plainly as I can why. I no longer am going to have to carry the water for people who I don't think deserve having their water carried”

Liberals enjoyed his admission that he'd been basically spewing hot air and that he knew the Republicans were full of it.

But after reading that Vermont Democrats have caved in to Governor Big Jim Douglas and Big Business, letting THEM frame the debate on the energy bill rather than forcing them to support Government Subsidy and Defend Global Warming.. I kind of know how he felt…

…the only difference is….I believed.

crossposted at Rip and Read >

Well, you know what they say…it’s all fun and games until somebody looses an “aye”.

Vermont Democrats have talked tough, but at the last minute, they ducked and swerved on H. 520. The picture at left shows my present opinion of Democratic Leadership. (And yes, I suppose some of my fellow bloggers are entitled to watch me eat a piece of humble pie at the blogger’s barbecue.)

First, in an excess of politeness, they decided NOT to move the July 11th veto session until later in the year to give themselves more time and more votes to override the Governor’s Veto on H.520.

From the AP (via Boston.com):

Symington had said the day before that she was contemplating delaying the
July 11 vote until September to accommodate some lawmakers that said they
couldn’t make it to the Statehouse that day.
But Republican legislators
wanted the session held July 11, as scheduled.
“I’ve had a commitment from each and every one of the 49 Republicans to be there on July 11, but I know that Democrats don’t have a full slate,” said House Minority Leader Steve Adams, R-Hartland.
Symington said she decided not to change the date after speaking with the minority party caucuses.

That’s what I like about Democrats…we’re so NICE! We speak to the minority and make things convenient for them….and I’m sure, positive in fact, that the Republicans would do the very same for us…they are such decent folk. (Careful, dear reader, or some of my dripping sarcasm will fall on your shoe.)

Now, after talking tough and even bringing AL GORE into the act…Vermont Legislators turned tail and dropped the tax on Vermont Yankee at the last minute…maybe, they begged Governor “BIG JIM” Douglas….you’ll like us better now, please, sir, please?

And of course, the Gov. smiled and said, “No. I don’t like you any better than I did before. I’m STILL going to Veto your bill. And now, I’ve taken your measure and found that you, despite your numbers, are lacking in strength, in determination, and will power.”

And I’m sure we Democrats will growl, and show our tiny little yellow teeth, and then go cower in a dark hole somewhere.

This was a clear case of what we should do (H.520- combating global warming, promoting exciting new Vermont businesses, not giving Nuclear Power a cheaper tax rate than wind energy) and what we shouldn’t do…

As a friend of mine just put it: “Sometimes, you have to draw the line and just stand there…win or loose.”

Sometimes, it’s the Heroic Last Stand (the Alamo, Masada, Roland and Rear-Guard) that gives others the courage to carry the fight to victory…but Vermont’s Democrats have refused to do that. They have decided to play it very safe…

…and that makes me very sad, very sorry, and frankly, very much less likely to lick a stamp or write a check the next time around.

PS- My friend just added one more insightful comment: I find it ironic that they are caving in on this on a day when we are expect to reach near record temperatures.”  Well said.

I am not an expert on the History of the Roman Republic. But what I do know leads me to believe that I would never have gotten along with Marcus Porcious Cato The Elder and, (which is basically to say the same thing in a different way) if Marcus Porcious Cato was alive today– he would have been a neo-con.


Thus, it may seem odd that I would turn to Cato as inspiration in the fight to save H.520….the Vermont Energy Bill.

As most readers of GMD know, The Vermont Legislature passed H.520, Governor Jim Douglas has Vetoed it…and it’s going to take a lot of work on everyone’s part to help the Vermont Legislature rise to the occasion and Override the Veto…”Ed’s” post on GMD is a great summary of the issues involved. I, and many other readers here, would like to see this Veto over-ridden.


And it is in that desire that I turn to this Ancient Roman. Cato the Elder was nothing if not single minded and, like him or hate him, his single-minded approach lead to results. Having decided that the Rome’s rival city-state, Carthage, constituted a major threat to the Republic, Cato developed a single minded obsession with that city.


He therefore ended every single speech, no matter what the topic, with the phrase: “Delenda est Carthago”- which means: Carthage must be destroyed.


And so his speeches would sound something like this: “….and so we must implement this agricultural policy…AND CARTHAGE MUST BE DESTROYED.”


Eventually, Cato’s single-mindedness paid off, and Carthage was literally wiped off the face of the earth.


Why tell this story? Simple…I would like to propose that Vermont’s liberal blogging community adopt a similar tactic between now and the July vote to override the Governor’s Veto of H.520….


…write about whatever you want…but somewhere in each post…don’t forget to mention “…AND H. 520 MUST BE PASSED.”


You could even write in Latin if you want…but, like George W. Bush, I?m not sure if there is a Latin word for “Veto”.

At any rate, I hope you have a great weekend…and H.520 MUST BE PASSED.