On Monday afternoon Edna Fairbanks Williams, a giant in Vermont antipoverty advocacy, died in a car crash. Vermont's large media outlets covered the story, including WCAX,  The Rutland Herald, and Vermont Public Radio. 

The irony is that probably not one person in ten who saw the coverage had ever heard her name.

Edna's funeral was yesterday, and it was attended by a throng of her admirers, including young and old, people who came in using wheelchairs and crutches, walkers and canes; as well as lawyers, judges, a Supreme Court justice, Vermont's member of Congress, and current and former state officials, lobbyists, and antipoverty activists. In all, a very unlikely collection of mourners for an impoverished, 77-year-old widow.

I wasn't sure I would have anything to add to the powerful remarks from important people who talked about her influence in Vermont public policy and the Legislature, her commitment to helping people every day of her life, or the way the professionals with their impressive educations would routinely defer to her insight and wisdom, but I found that I did have a few recollections that I'll share here.

I first met Edna Fairbanks Williams in 1983 when I came to Vermont to interview at Vermont Legal Aid. She was the President of Legal Aid's Board, and she had chosen to sit in on the staff attorney interviews. This is not a common choice, but it reflected Edna's view of the importance of Legal Aid to the antipoverty struggle. This began many years of working together on issues that affected the tens of thousands of Vermonters living in poverty.

You may remember that back in the 1980's there was a magazine called Vermont Magazine. One year they did a special issue on the Ten Most Influential Vermonters. It included the usual suspects: The head of National Life; probably one or two of those three-hundred dollar an hour lobbyists for the phone company or the electric company; possibly, although he denies it, John Dooley, who was Madeleine Kunin's chief of staff at the time, known as “The Little Governor”. Among all these powerful people was Edna Fairbanks Williams, recognized for the power of her dedication, commitment to understanding the issues she was working on, and the eloquence of her advocacy that grew out of her personal experience. Vermont Magazine was probably right: at that time, for that year, Edna was probably one of the ten most influential Vermonters. If you look at her body of work, from the years before this issue through all the years that followed, though, there is no question that Edna's influence was greater than any of the other listed Influential Vermonters.

As I have sat listening to the comments of other people I have heard repeated mentions of people attending the annual Legislative Supper put on by VLIAC, the Vermont Low Income Advocacy Council, every winter. On the night of this particular Legislative Supper people talked about how Edna was able to make it to the supper despite a blinding snowstorm. As I sat there listening, though, I thought there must be something wrong. I was there in many of those VLIAC board meetings when the Legislative Supper was being planned, and I know that Edna would never schedule a Legislative Supper without consulting her omnipresent, and in her eyes infallible, Old Farmer's Almanac. I don't what could have happened on this particular year, but clearly on this one occasion something went wrong.

Finally, some of us recall a time several years ago when Edna had a little difficulty with the town. Her house and yard were so full of auto parts, used furniture, tires, dishes, pots and pans, and other discarded items that she had collected to distribute to people in need that the town had decided to force her to clean it up. She got legal help from one of the attorney members of the Legal Aid board that held the town off, but eventually there was a massive cleanup operation organized for one Saturday in the spring. Friends and volunteers from Legal Aid showed up with our boots and work gloves to help get the situation into some kind of order.

It was hard work because there was so much stuff there, but what made it harder was that whatever you picked up, whether it was a broken car part or a spare cooking pot, if Edna saw you with it she wouldn't let you dispose of it. She always knew “a young guy who's learning to be a mechanic who can use that”, or a “young single mother who needs that”. Eventually, one person was assigned to keep Edna distracted so that the rest of us could get on with the work of cleaning the place out.

The thing was, that the way Edna went through life, whenever any object, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant, came into her view or into her hand, Edna couldn't help thinking of how it could be put to use helping someone else.

On this occasion of Edna's death, we would all do well to consider this example. If this was how Edna saw the world, how can any of the rest of us justify doing any less? 

More evidence that law enforcement can't be trusted with Tasers. In this incident, the victim was a 17-year-old idiot who decided to run out on the field during a Philadelphia Phillies game. These guys are annoying, but the present absolutely no threat to anybody; the crime, if there is one, is undoubtedly a misdemeanor and probably never results in jail time.

So what's the justification for the use of deadly force? According to the chief of police, “He was attempting to make an arrest and the male was attempting to flee.”

In case the chief didn't notice something, I'll point it out to him: He was attempting to flee in an enclosed space. He had nowhere to go, he was surrounded, and he was within a few feet of the cop and several security people at the time they hit him with the Taser.

There was also an interesting comment from Tony LaRussa, the manager of the St. Louis Cardinals:

Cardinals manager Tony La Russa agreed the use of a Taser was appropriate. “If somebody comes up there and does some damage, they're going to be second-guessing not doing anything,” La Russa said. “I just think it's acceptable, because it's a good deterrent.”

This shows an appalling lack of understanding from someone who is well known to be not only a baseball manager but also a lawyer, or at least a law school graduate. Maybe what they teach at Florida State is different, but where I went to law school the theory of deterrence applied to punishment administered by a court after the defendant is charged and convicted. The police don't get to decide that they're going to torture criminal suspects and chalk it up to deterrence.

Once again, the answer is clear: Take the toys away from the boys.

On the other hand, if things turn sour in Philadelphia, this cop might consider a move to Barre. After all, they're all for tasering people who pose no threat to anybody.

Up until forty years ago today, there was only one thing I knew about Kent State University: it was where Sam Bair ran. He was a miler who was known for running very well during the indoor season but fading in the outdoor season (he was short, so he had an advantage in the tight turns on the indoor tracks).

Then the National Guard murdered four students for the crime of disagreeing with their government.

This is a day to remember.

And this time democracy won.

As a member of Montpelier's Board of Civil Authority I have to go out and work every election day, doing various tasks connected with counting ballots. One of our tasks is to record and count the write-ins, and there are often a lot. We don't count votes for obviously fictitious characters, like Mickey Mouse or Eric Cartman (an actual write-in this year), but we do count votes for everyone else.

Sometimes it actually makes a difference, especially for the down-ticket offices, and on rare occasion an organized write-in campaign gets someone elected, but ordinarily the write-in is probably a protest vote or a friendly gesture to someone the voter likes and thinks might get a kick out of getting a vote or two.

Counting the write-ins can be time-consuming because even in towns with machine counting the write-ins must be recorded and counted by hand. It would be a misstatement to say that the election officials are always happy to deal with them.

A couple of weeks ago, in the context of some legislation pertaining to recounts, the House Gov Ops Committee got the idea to squelch the curse of write-ins once and for all. Here's the amendment they proposed:

Sec. 3. 17 V.S.A. § 2414 is added to read:
§ 2414. WRITE-IN CANDIDATES; DECLARATION OF CANDIDACY
(a) A person who has not been nominated by any other procedure set forth n this chapter and whose name will not appear on the ballot for a particular office may be written in on a ballot for any office in a primary, general, or pecial election. However, a “write-in” candidate shall file a declaration of andidacy for an office with the office of the secretary of state not later than 5 p.m. on the Friday preceding the election if the candidate wishes to have the votes cast for his or her name counted by name for that office. The secretary

FRIDAY, APRIL 23, 2010 1089
of state shall prepare and make available a declaration of candidacy form to be ompleted, signed, and filed by a “write-in candidate” before the deadline.
(b) The secretary of state shall notify all town clerks of each write-in andidate who has filed a declaration of candidacy prior to the deadline. Each andidate who has filed a declaration of candidacy shall have votes cast ecorded next to his or her write-in name in the vote counting process and shall ave his or her votes reported by name on the official return of votes. If a eclaration of candidacy has not been filed, the name of the write-in candidate hall not be recorded, but the vote cast shall be recorded as a “scattered rite-in” on all counting forms and on the official return of votes.

Get it? It doesn't matter who you wanted to vote for as a write-in, if they didn't file a candidate declaration it's just as though you hadn't cast a vote.

 I just think this is wrong. Democracy means you get to vote for whoever you want to vote for. That's partly why I don't like term limits.

I'm happy to say, this didn't stand up for long. Special appreciation goes to a tripartisan array of opponents: Reps. Anne Donahue, Sandy Haas, Willem Jewett, and Tom Koch, who vociferously opposed this proposal and got the committee to drop it.

Remember: it's your vote, so use it.

UPDATE: Matt's going to get to play after all. Here's a note that Jim Mostyn just posted at the Facebook group:

SB LL President Tim KaczMarek called and advised they had a kid drop out of a team and Matthew will be able to play in his place. Thank you all for your support. I am sure it was everyones efforts that made this happen. My sincere thanks and appreciation. Jim

I suspect it might be very hard to find that other kid who dropped out, but if that's what they have to say to save face and let Matt play, that's okay with me.

Hint: Youth sports are not there for the adults.

“It is about maintaining the integrity of our rules,” Tim Kaczmarek said.

The story was in today's Burlington Free Press.It's about a ten-year-old kid whose mother missed, by four days, the registration deadline for a 9-10 year old instructional Little League program.

The penalty? “Tough shit, kid, you don't get to play.”

Raising two sons in Montpelier, I confess that I have occasionally been guilty of the unforgivable crime of being late for a sports registration deadline. The penalty my sons suffered? None at all. You see, in Montpelier, and in most other places, the people running the sports programs recognize that youth sports programs exist to give kids a chance to participate in sports. To, if I may use an archaic and possibly outdated concept, play.

This clearly isn't the first time this kind of thing has happened. You may recall that last year some officious track officials disqualified Minh John Lu from going to the New England track championships because he wore the wrong kind of shorts for his winning long jump. They eventually backed down, and just recently the Vermont Principals' Association changed their rules so competing coaches can't protest uniform violations.

This is a ten-year-old kid, whose mother, raising two kids and working six days a week, missed the deadline by four days.

If you live in South Burlington it might be worth giving the people who run this program a call.

If you're interested you could also join the Facebook group about it.

In case you missed some of the news of the week.

  Vermont NewsGuy: after decades of underfunding unemployment insurance, Douglas Administration seeks to take it out of the workers' hide.

Some time today, the Douglas Administration and the leaders of the Legislature either will or will not reach agreement on how to restore Vermont’s depleted Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund.

If they do agree, the Legislature will pass a bill that Gov. Jim Douglas will presumably sign.

If they don’t, the Legislature will pass a bill anyway, effectively daring Douglas to veto it.

 Vermont Daily Briefing:

That Damn Arnie Gundersen Ruins Another Perfectly Good Turtle Egg Breakfast With His Constant Harping On Safety And Science

 Mulish Behavior:

A Better Way to Fix the Unemployment Fund

The Brattleboro Reformer endorsed an unemployment fix today that would gradually increase employer contributions and avoid benefit cuts to laid off workers and their families – a position we have advocated for months. You can read the editorial here.

 John Boehner:

Republicans saved Health Care Reform!

New York Times–Just wondering: Did you see this covered on TV?

As the Senate began debate on a financial overhaul bill, thousands of union members pressed for higher taxes on the nation’s banks and a bigger jobs program in a rally in Lower Manhattan on Thursday.

 

 Daily Kos–Readers support corporate heavyhandedness:

Once again, we see that the cool, hip, Apple people decide that the way to act in the world is to do their best impression of the Spanish Inquisition. This time Gizmodo ran an article about the next generation of the Apple Brick, which. I'll grant you, may be a totally cool phone.

Salon:

Sarah Palin sticks with “Drill, baby, drill.”

 

Cross posted from Beyond Vermont State Hospital: 

Hardly anyone in Vermont sees this, but one of the activities at Vermont State Hospital is the forced drugging of some of the patients there. The Vermont Supreme Court has held that forced drugging is an even greater infringement on someone's personal liberty than someone being involuntarily committed to the hospital.

The psychiatric drugs provided at Waterbury can have very dangerous side effects. At Beyond VSH we're always glad when news of the dangers of psychiatric drugs, dangers that people who deal with the mental health system every day are already familiar with, crosses over into the mainstream media. Here's an interview in Salon with the author of a new book, Anatomy of an Epidemic.

The timing of Robert Whitaker’s “Anatomy of an Epidemic,” a comprehensive and highly readable history of psychiatry in the United States, couldn’t be better. An acclaimed mental health journalist and winner of a George Polk Award for his reporting on the psychiatric field, Whitaker draws on 50 years of literature and in-person interviews with patients to answer a simple question: If “wonder drugs” like Prozac are really helping people, why has the number of Americans on government disability due to mental illness skyrocketed from 1.25 million in 1987 to over 4 million today?

I haven't read the book, but I understand that one of the people profiled in the book is from Vermont.

I think policy makers, people considering using psychiatric drugs, and all Vermonters should take a look at this book to get a greater understanding of the potential consequences of expanded use of these drugs.

I started working on unemployment cases back in the 1970's, even before I graduated from law school. This was partly because it is possible for nonlawyers to represent claimants in unemployment cases, and partly because of the vital importance unemployment benefits pose for unemployed workers. Representing unemployed workers in the unemployment system is fighting for workers' rights.

Like most states, Vermont's unemployment trust fund is in deficit spending because of the severe financial crisis that has hit the country. To the extent it's been caused by any local condtions, it is not because of overly generous benefits here in Vermont, but because of a decades-long policy of holding unemployment taxes down, a policy that subsidized employers by enabling them to pay less than they would have had to pay to keep the system on a sound footing.

Now that the fund is in trouble, the Douglas Administration is trying to “share the pain” by cutting eligibility and benefits for unemployed workers. That's right–when the administration looks around for someone to pay the bills, what better target than workers who have already lost their jobs?

National experts agree that this is not the way to go.

Vermont – The National Employment Law Project (NELP) today criticized proposals being considered in the Vermont State Senate that would cut benefits as part of a legislative plan to restore solvency to the state’s unemployment trust fund.

“The benefit restrictions are among the most severe being proposed in the entire country,” said George Wentworth, a policy analyst with NELP who specializes in unemployment insurance policy. “There are currently 34 states that have seen their trust funds go in to debt since the beginning of the Great Recession, but none has adopted a package of cuts as tough on the unemployed as the one proposed by the Douglas administration.”

NELP cited proposed changes to the formula for calculating an unemployed worker’s benefits as particularly harmful. In testimony before the Senate Finance Committee last month, Wentworth pointed out that only four states – Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana and West Virginia – use “the 4-quarter averaging” formula which drives down weekly benefits by placing added emphasis on any recent gaps in employment. The average benefit amount for an unemployed Vermont worker is currently about $304 – which ranks 25th in the nation.

In addition, NELP criticized the proposal to bring back the idea of a “waiting week” for unemployed workers – a provision that was repealed from Vermont law ten years ago. The proposal would impose a one-week disqualification on the first week of every claimant’s unemployment.

In his testimony last month, Wentworth noted: “At a time when over 40% of (unemployment insurance) claimants are unemployed for six months or longer, does it make sense to start every worker’s bout of unemployment by de-stabilizing the worker’s family finances? …Jobless workers get no waiting week on their rent payments, mortgages or utility bills.”

NELP spoke last month in support of proposed increases in the wages that are subject to unemployment insurance taxes and has cited Vermont as one of many states that did not engage in the necessary forward financing to withstand increases in jobless claims.

“The insolvency of Vermont’s trust fund is not the result of workers exploiting an overly generous system. Insolvency is the result of a prolonged recessionary economy and years of under-funding the UI system. …(T)hese cuts are not necessary to make Vermont’s trust fund solvent. They are merely further punishing the victims of a tough economy,” said Wentworth.

Earlier this month, NELP released “Understanding the Unemployment Trust Fund Crisis of 2010,” which lists the trust fund balance of every state and jurisdiction in the country as of March 31st, and estimates how many months of remaining funds each state has. The study found that, at the time of publication, 33 states had fully depleted their unemployment benefit funds, forcing them to borrow billions from the federal government in order to maintain the safety net for millions of unemployed workers.

ACTION ALERT!!!!!!

GMD has learned that  Doug Racine is  planning on introducing an amendment during third reading of the budget today calling for the use of rainy day funds to close the $20 million budget gap.  
 
Calls to the Sgt-at-Arms (800-322-5616 or 828-2228) with messages for senators to vote yes on the rainy day fund amendment would demonstrate support for that action.   The Senate is scheduled to convene at 10:30.

I decided to hold off on this cross-post from Rational Resistance because there was so much other good content here this week. I think it's still relevant.

A favorite theme with conservatives is that rich people are overtaxed. You know, 47% of people pay no taxes (false), the percentage of income tax that rich people pay is too high, blah, blah, blah.

Courtesy of David Corn we have a chart that dispatches these claims handily.

I think we now know why most people, including a lot of teabaggers think they're taxed fairly: it's because they are.