Well, well. Great Britain’s largest bird conservation group, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, is building a 100-meter-tall wind turbine at its headquarters in Bedfordshire. Well, technically, it’s being built by the British green-energy firm Ecotricity, but you get my drift.  

Shocking, I know. Those good-hearted folks at the RSPB have succumbed to “climate change” bushwah, and they’re gonna build themselves an “icon to worship,” in the immortal words of Rob Roper. And soon, if the Windies are to be believed, there’ll be a large and growing pile of avian corpses at the RSPB’s doorstep.

Er, maybe not.

Both Ecotricity and the RSPB say they have undertaken thorough environmental assessments of the site, and they are confident that there will not be a significant impact on either local wildlife or the surrounding community.

The RSPB does call for care in siting wind farms; you don’t want turbines in prime raptor habitat, or in places that rare species call home. But…

…the charity insists that cutting carbon emissions has to be an urgent priority for any organization concerned about the survival of wildlife.

RSPB director Paul Forecast notes that “We can already see the impact that climate change is having on our countryside with salt marsh and mudflats declining at a rate of 100 hectares per year in England.” Which is the point I’ve tried to make in previous diaries on this blog: if we don’t make a strong commitment to renewable energy, then our environment is going to change drastically. If we try to preserve Vermont exactly as it is, it’ll change in dramatic and unpredictable ways. I’d rather have some sensibly-sited ridgeline wind farms, myself.

But I’ll give Paul Forecast the last word:

“We hope that by installing a wind turbine at our UK headquarters, we will demonstrate to others that, with a thorough environmental assessment, the correct planning and location, renewable energy and a healthy, thriving environment can go hand in hand.”

I think we can all agree on that.  

There was a rally yesterday in Montpelier (Mitchell Family Paywall Alert) — one of ten around the country — drawing attention to massive hikes in flood insurance premiums for many Americans living in flood-prone areas, as defined by our good friends at FEMA. The local rally was organized by one Chris Winters of Berlin, who owns a home near the Dog River, and who faces a sticker-shock-inducing $8,000-per-year flood insurance premium.

The cause: The Biggert-Waters Act of 2012, which reformed the federal flood insurance subsidy program.

And while I sympathize with Winters, I have to say that the feds’ flood insurance program was sorely in need of reform. In effect, We The People have been subsidizing the cost of flood insurance for a whole lot of folks with expensive lakefront or beachfront real estate. Not to mention encouraging unwise development of flood-prone lands.

Winters is  a sympathetic figure in all of this; he doesn’t have deep pockets and would have great difficulty paying the premiums. As it happens, his home did not flood during Tropical Storm Irene; but when FEMA updated its flood-zone maps, his home was listed in the danger zone.

From his point of view, Biggert-Waters is “trying to balance the budget for FEMA, and they’re doing it on the backs of the policyholders.” I’d put it another way: Biggert-Waters was an attempt to eliminate one of the biggest boondoggles in the system, and make policyholders pay the true cost of insuring their properties.

There’s room for some creative thinking on ways to ease the burden on people like Winters (some sort of means test?), but I’d hate to see Biggert-Waters completely undermined. I’d especially hate for shorefront developers to latch onto cases like Winters’ in an effort to roll back the reform.

As for Vermont’s Congressional delegation, they’d like to see a postponement in the new insurance requirements until an affordability study (called for in Biggert-Waters) can be completed.

Nothing wrong with that. But the problem with the notion of “affordability” is that previous federal policy made a lot of flood-prone real estate artificially affordable, and Biggert-Waters seeks to correct that. Generally speaking, I hope it stands.  

I’ve had a lot of fun at the expense of Jack Lindley, chair of the Vermont Republican Party. But not today:

Jack Lindley, chair of the Vermont Republican Party, has been hospitalized in critical condition since Friday.

The Vermont GOP issued a statement Monday morning saying Lindley is at the Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, N.H.

According to party treasurer Mark Snelling, doctors are still trying to determine the nature of Lindley’s illness.

Best wishes to Jack and his family.  

State Rep. Margaret Cheney has a new job. She’ll leave the Legislature to become one of the three members of the state’s Public Service Board, which regulates utility and telecom issues.

And thus, she enters the curious Twilight Zone of the wind-energy debate — her image bifurcating into diametrically opposed concepts. You make the call:

Cheney no. 1 is a former teacher and journalist who’s in her third term in the House. As vice chair of the House Energy Committee, she is very familiar with the issues facing the PSB. She is, as VTDigger reported, “a leader in the Green Mountain State for renewable energy reforms and programs.”

Impressive. An ideal choice, it would seem.

But then there’s Cheney no. 2: a lackey of corporate interests, bought and paid for through campaign contributions. Her appointment is just another example of “crony capitalism,” and her tenure in the Legislature a “mistake” by the voters.

(Well, technically, three mistakes, since those darn voters kept sending her back to Montpelier.)

The first Cheney emerges from two sources: her long and very public record, and her colleagues in state government.

The second? Two guesses, and the first doesn’t count.  

Cheney no. 2 is a golem created by opponents of ridgeline wind energy, or “Windies,” as I unaffectionately call ’em. They see her as a corrupt, soulless sellout, fundamentally unfit for public office.

Which tells you more about the Windies than about Cheney’s record or character. Because the Windies see everything through the prism of ridgeline wind. Those who oppose it are champions of the people; those who support it are unscrupulous crooks.

Let’s take a closer look at the Windy sociopathy on display in VTDigger’s Comments section, shall we?

“She opposes any participation of communities and towns in the siting and placement of energy generation.”

False. She might oppose giving veto power to a community — or to a dead-ender subset of a community — but she is not at all opposed to “any participation.”

“She doesn’t listen to anyone who opposes the corporate interests that have funded the careers of her, her husband or the governor with whom she shares party affiliation.”

“Doesn’t listen to anyone”? Come on, now. The Windies’ definition of “doesn’t listen” goes something like this: “fails to accept the righteousness of Our Cause.” I know; I’ve been accused of not listening to anti-wind arguments. Truth is, I’ve listened to them all; I simply find them unconvincing.

“Ms. Cheney has taken political donations from corporate energy players in Vermont. That is an alarming potential conflict of interest…”

This is one of the milder versions of a common theme: Cheney is a bought-and-paid-for puppet of Big Wind. But let’s take a closer look at this corporate largesse.

Margaret Cheney ran a low-budget campaign in 2012, raising and spending barely $1,000. She received $250 from Windy bete noire David Blittersdorf, and $200 from those soulless corporate hacks at Renewable Energy Vermont.

And that’s it.

$450.

Geezum. If that’s all it takes to buy Margaret Cheney, she’s the bargain of the century.  

It’s nonsense, of course. To the Windies, the fact that Cheney isn’t a member of their tribe automatically tabs her as a corporate tool. There’s no middle ground.

“Cheney… is a leader for renewable energy reform and in this state that means charging full speed ahead to achieve 90% renewables…”

Well, f*ck yeah! If that’s her position, then I’m all for Cheney. Climate change is the single overriding environmental challenge of our age. Building a renewables-based energy system is a necessary step in limiting climate change, and our public officials should be praised for moving us in that direction.

That includes small, home- and community-based systems and an all-out commitment to energy efficiency — but it also includes larger installations as well. It’s not enough for individuals to button up their homes or build a windmill or go off the grid; we need solutions that will sustainably energize a technology-based society capable of feeding, housing, and employing hundreds of millions of people. If Vermont can play a small part in that effort, then we owe it to our planet and our fellow Earthlings to do so.

FInally, let’s hear from Dona Quixote herself, Annette Smith, who weighs in with a juicy anecdote supposedly illustrating Cheney’s corporate-vassal status:

She attended the PSB’s August hearing on GMP’s violations of the noise standard for the Lowell wind project. I thought, “good for her, a legislator is actually showing interest in what happens at the Board.” Then I watched as she sat with GMP’s people, and waved and smiled to GMP’s general counsel, who then came and sat next to her.

Aha! You see? Cheney is chummy with Big Energy! Worse, she “waved and smiled” at a corporate lawyer! OMG!

Cough.

What Smith doesn’t seem to realize is that the Statehouse is a very small place, and everybody knows everybody. I’ve seen people who are sworn political enemies greet each other warmly in the hallways, displaying all the markers of affection and friendship. During a recess in a very contentious floor proceeding in the Senate this year, I saw a Republican and a Progressive Senator (who were diametrically opposed on the issue in question) engage in a very friendly conversation, with no hint of the impassioned arguments that took place mere minutes before.

It’s a little bit disconcerting to the outsider, and I don’t know that I could act that way toward my political opponents. But it’s the way of the Statehouse, and Cheney’s actions are perfectly normal. Hell, if she saw El Jefe General John McClaughry in that hearing room, she’d probably offer him a handshake and a heartfelt greeting.

So no, the fact that Cheney is friendly with GMP officials doesn’t mean she’s in their pocket.

But then, the Windies’ only real question is: Are you with us or agin’ us?

And Cheney’s not with ’em, so therefore she must be agin’ ’em.

Nonsense.  

So, we had a bit of a kerfuffle at Middlebury College yesterday. Campus Democrats and Republicans placed 2,977 flags on the grounds in front of Mead Memorial Chapel, to commemorate the victims of 9/11/2001.

And then five people came along and ripped them all out,claiming that the flags were on a sacred Abenaki burial site.

Mmmkay, if you say so. But riddle me this, Abenaki sympathizers: This memorial is an annual event at Middlebury. It’s been done for “nearly ten years,” according to the campus newspaper.

Did it just now become a sacred burial site?

Has there ever been any communication between the Abenaki and the College about the site, its significance, and appropriate uses thereof? Or did this just sort of happen?

But let’s, just for a moment, leave all that aside. Let’s accept the flag-rippers’ assertion. Just for a moment.

Is this the right way to respond?

I’m sorry, but no. This is the kind of mindlessly, thoughtlessly provocative action that gives peaceful protest a bad name.

Now, if you want to have a dialogue about the sacredness of this site, if you want to bring in archaeologists and tribal officials and make your case, try to work out an agreement with the College, I’d be all for that. I’d hope that the College would listen and respond appropriately. If the site is that important to Abenaki history and culture, I think it’d be good to memorialize that in some visible way. And maybe next year, the flags can be placed somewhere else on campus.

But please: come forward, present your evidence, make your case. Don’t vandalize a heartfelt commemoration.  

Signs O’ The Times, number 1:

Secretary of Administration Jeb Spaulding says that if Vermont’s need for acute psychiatric care remains high, the Shumlin administration is committed to opening the Berlin State Hospital at its full 25-bed capacity in summer 2014.

“I would be surprised if it doesn’t open with 25 beds,” he said Friday.

His statement, as reported by VTDigger, came after the Department of Mental Health informed lawmakers that psychiatric patients continue to experience longer and longer wait times, languishing in emergency rooms, jails and prisons due to a shortage of psychiatric inpatient beds. You may recall that after Irene, the Shumlin Administration wanted to move to a community-based system with an absolute minimum number of hospital beds — no more than 16 in any one facility, and far fewer overall than the 54 at the old Vermont State Hospital. Indeed, earlier this summer, key lawmakers were still indicating a desire to stick to 16 beds at the Berlin facility.

I don’t know what kind of progress the Administration has made with establishing that community-based system — it may well have been slowed due to the constant revolving door at the top of DMH — but it sure hasn’t done a damn thing to reduce the need for inpatient care.

Of course, the Administration and Legislature haven’t, ahem, budgeted for a 25-bed BSH. But Spaulding says they can “tweak the budget.”

Funny how there’s always room for a “tweak” when it’s something the Administration wants or needs, but the wallet is empty when it’s somebody else’s idea.

Signs O’ The Times, number 2:

Governor [Shumlin] says he is going to ask the Legislature next year to look at Vermont’s involuntary medication law to make it easier for doctors to administer medication to a state hospital patient who is refusing treatment.

… In Vermont, a doctor must seek a judge’s approval before administering medication to a patient who is refusing treatment, a process that can take two months or more to complete.

Actually, the average time is almost three months — and it can take twice that long or more. During that process, a patient is basically warehoused in one of the state’s rare inpatient beds — greatly exacerbating the strain on the system. And on caregivers, who have to deal with unmedicated patients every day. It also generates huge costs for lengthy and treatment-free hospitalizations.

Shumlin framed this as a long-term issue that was also a problem at the old Vermont State Hospital. Indeed, the law  apparently played a part in VSH’s decertification by the feds. And it’s one of the reasons that the Brattleboro Retreat is in danger of losing federal certification. Which would be, among other things, a huge blow to Shumlin’s master plan for mental health care.

There’s sharp disagreement in the GMD community (and Vermont’s Dem/lib community) on the issue of involuntary medication for psychiatric patients. Both sides do agree on one thing: the current judiciary process takes too long. They disagree on the remedy, of course; and if Shumlin plans to pursue this in the 2014 session, he’s going to have a hard row to hoe.

The Governor described this as a matter of giving “acutely ill patients” better treatment. But really, it’s of a piece with Jeb Spaulding’s commitment to a 25-bed BSH: it’s another sign that the current system is overtaxed. And it’s a sign that, while the Governor may be trying to craft a better system with better treatment options, he clearly has an eye on the bottom line as well.

Streamlining the involuntary-medication process would move patients in and out of hospitalization much faster. That will reduce the strain on the inpatient system and cut costs. Would it improve the quality of care? That’s up for debate. But when the Governor suddenly unrolls a proposal to fix a longstanding problem, there’s got to be a more immediate reason. In this case, that reason is the inadequacy of the post-Irene mental health care system.

And Governor Shumlin is slowly, painfully, executing a complete reversal on the issue, gradually expanding the inpatient side of the system. (By the time he’s done, the system will have almost as many beds as the old one. They’ll be spread around the state, which will create new challenges in staffing and specialty care, but that’s one of the drawbacks to Shumlin’s Big Idea.)

He’s being dragged along by reality, and he’s probably hoping to do it slowly enough that he can claim he hasn’t changed one bit. But he has.

p.s. Congrats to the Mitchell Family Organ (North) a.k.a. the Times Argus, Print Edition, for putting its thumb on the journalistic scale with its headline, “Shumlin: Forced Medication OK.” Yeah, that’s kind of the most emotionally freighted wording you could have chosen. Images of Nurse Ratched and Evil Mad Scientists come to mind. The M.F.O. (N) online version opts for the more neutral “Vt. Governor Wants to Ease Involuntary Medication.”

Update: Freeploid reports that UVM police are investigating, and the ad has been pulled from Craigslist.

Dunno what they’re teaching our young men at the U o’Vee Em, but apparently it doesn’t include “How to Tell the Difference Between Penthouse Forum and Reality.” Craigslist Burlington, “Casual Encounters” section::

Mmm hmm. Counseling, anyone?

A few things that pass through the mind…

— My first thought was “frat boys again,” but this isn’t provable from the text of the ad. It might just be ten young, testosterone-fueled (but not at all gay, no sirree) men sharing a house with no Greek letters on the front. Then again, can you say “Sigma Phi Epsilon,” kids?

— I guess they’ve got no issue with the Mommy/Whore dichotomy, since they’re looking for a combination of the two. Way to break through the glass basement.

— That’s one highly elastic definition of “MILF,” boys: you’re looking for a “mother” who’s no more than a few years older then you. I’d love to see your genealogy charts.

— Glad to hear the boys are “clean.” I would, however, like to see some medical documentation.

— Somehow I think they’ll be hearing from University officials (and maybe their parents) before they hear from any “ladies,” cough.  

We may be in the dog days of summer, at about the halfway point between the end of the 2013 legislative season and the beginning of the 2014, but that doesn’t mean there’s nothing going on. As Peter “The One” Hirschfeld* reported last Sunday (sorry, I’ve been out of town)(Mitchell Family Paywall alert), the late-session standoff over raising the effective state income tax rate on the wealthy is not over — it’s merely on hiatus.

* When he gets a withering glare from Gov. Shumlin, he simply raises his hand. The glare stops in midair and falls harmlessly to the ground.

As you may recall, certain lawmakers came up with a plan late in the session that would have capped tax deductions for top earners, effectively raising their taxes. The additional revenue would have allowed for tax cuts for the working poor and middle class. Supporters of the plan argued that this wouldn’t violate Shumlin’s curiously selective anti-tax increase stance, because it would have been revenue neutral overall.  

The plan would have made Vermont’s income tax much fairer. Right now, as Shumlin is fond of noting, the income tax rate on the top bracket is a hefty 8.95%. But those in the top bracket actually pay much less — 5.5% — because of how Vermont income tax is calculated, and the various deductions that rich people can claim. The legislative plan would have been a modest step in equalizing the tax burden.  

Nonetheless, Shumlin stonewalled the plan, making arguments that weren’t terribly convincing. The bill was pulled in order to avoid an embarrassing intra-party standoff, with supporters promising to bring the idea back in 2014. And they’re still planning to do so; the effort is being headed by Sen. Tim Ashe, Senate Finance Committee chair, and Rep. Janet Ancel, chair of the House Ways and Means Committee.  

“It being summer, there hasn’t been a lot of activity, but (the proposal) is still something we anticipate taking up in January,” Ancel says. “We will probably gear up and do more advance work when we get into fall.”

Ancel and Ashe’s proposal, which may undergo tweaks before January, would cap income-tax deductions at 2½ times the standard deduction, meaning filers could claim maximum deductions of about $30,000.

They say the plan is an attempt to inject some fairness into a system where unlimited deductions allow some high earners to minimize their contributions to the state treasury.

The Shumlin Administration is signaling its continued opposition. But, perhaps aware that their previous rationalizations weren’t cutting it, they’ve rolled out a new one:

…the administration is now questioning the wisdom of moving ahead with a major tax code overhaul in 2014 when the Legislature will grapple with the issue of health care financing just a year later.

… “We’re willing to listen and talk,” Administration Secretary Jeb Spaulding said last week. “But we think it would be better to do tax reform in the context of how we reconfigure our payment system for health care in the 2015 session.”

In other words, it’s the old “can’t walk and chew gum at the same time” argument. Spaulding’s new line isn’t any more convincing than past Administration efforts. What, really, does a sensible, targeted income tax reform have to do with health care financing? If there’s a problem with the income tax system (for example, the wealthy can claim deductions for mortgages on out-of-state vacation properties), then go ahead and fix it.

Besides, doesn’t it make good political sense to give working Vermonters a tax cut, when we might be asking them to pay more for a single-payer health care system? Unless single-payer will be heavily financed by punitive premium rates for top earners, then a modest income tax hike won’t appreciably hurt Vermont’s One Percenters.

Granted, the middle-class tax break wouldn’t be much; about $80 per year for people earning $75,000 to $100,000. But, as Ancel put it,

“When you can give a tax cut to 70 percent or more of Vermont filers or households, that seems like something that is good politics and good policy both.”

I think we can expect the Governor to continue protecting the interests of his fellow One Percenters. Maybe by January he can dream up a rationale that might convince a few more people.  

Paul “The Huntsman” Heintz performed a real public service in this week’s issue of Seven Days, as his “Fair Game” column was entirely devoted to Bruce Lisman’s thoroughly opaque political plans. He fell short in a couple of key areas, but it’s full of news and insight, and well worth your time.

First big news: The price tag for Lisman’s vanity project nonprofit advocacy group Campaign for Vermont is over the $800,000 mark. And, in spite of CFV’s claim to be the fastest-growing grassroots organization* in Vermont**, all of it comes out of Lisman’s Wall Street fortune.

*If, by “grassroots,” you mean “top-down group completely funded by its wealthy patron.”

**It’s easy to be the “fastest-growing” when you start from a membership of one.

Second big news: He’s prepared to spend a lot more. Yep, now that the Summer of Bruce is wrapping up and his merry band of Lisketeers* is headed back to campus, Lisman’s minions will start haunting the halls of the Statehouse, lobbying on behalf of… er… cough… whatever it is that CFV stands for.

*The much-bruited “grassroots advocacy team,” initially described as a skilled, experienced group with a broad range of political views, was in fact little more than a squad of cheerleaders. As Heintz put it, the “seven part-time, paid interns” were “charged with marching in parades and manning booths at county fairs.” It’s easy to gather names on your mailing list and claim the title of “fastest-growing” when you can afford to pay a bunch of college students to do your scutwork.

Because after a whole lot of time and effort — Lisman’s own two-year personal tour of Vermont, meeting and speaking with “real Vermonters,” and a series of well-publicized but sparsely-attended policy forums, CFV still has precious little to show in the way of specific proposals.

They’ve got a truckload of glittering generalities couched in reassuringly nonpartisan catchphrases: overall, a public-policy fog thick enough to hide a hundred Jack the Rippers. In its present form, CFV’s platform turns Lisman’s preoccupation with “transparency” into a bad joke.

Anyway, so Heintz’ piece is recommended reading. Now, for the two places where he fell short of the mark.  

First, he falls into a common trap for political reporters: the laser-like focus on future campaigns. Heintz just can’t help but ask Lisman if he’s running for Governor. Over and over and over again.

This is always a waste of time. It never works. And it didn’t work here:

[H]is answer… was as dodgy as answers get.

“Well, right now we are entirely focused on Campaign for Vermont,” he said.

Asked whether that was a yes or a no, Lisman responded, “No plans to.”

No plans to. OK. Does that mean you are affirmatively saying, “I will not run for governor in 2014?”

“I’m affirmatively saying this is what I do. This is what I’m good at,” he said.

That’s not very affirmative.

“I think it is,” Lisman countered.

But you’re not ruling it out, obviously.

“I don’t give it any thought,” he said. “I don’t take it seriously.”

The sad thing is, according to Heintz’ reporting, he’d been trying to corner Lisman on a much more important point: his political ideology. And Lisman was, as usual, playing rope-a-dope. But instead of pushing that point — instead of, say, citing some of Lisman’s past words and seeking his reaction — Heintz went back to the same-old same-old “are you running” business.

Sorry, Paul, but that goat was long ago sacrificed and its entrails thoroughly examined.

And besides, I don’t care whether Lisman wants to run for Governor. Because he’s not going to win.

Why? Because (1) He’s not conservative enough for the dead-enders in charge of the VTGOP, (2) third-party or independent bids never work unless you’re Jesse Ventura, which Lisman definitely is not, (3) he has no political profile among the general populace, (4) he has no political skills, and (5) Vermont has shown a consistent antipathy toward One-Percenters who try to buy elections. (See: Rich Tarrant, Jack McMullen, Jack McMullen, Lenore Broughton, et al.)

No, I’m much more concerned with Lisman’s policy agenda than his political ambitions, real or imagined. And here’s where Heintz falls back on another tired trope of his profession: the ol’ he-said-she-said, without any attempt to weigh the evidence. And, despite Lisman’s efforts to cloud the picture, there are plenty of signs that his policy prescriptions lean rightward.

Let me count the ways…

— CFV’s full official name, which is almost never used publicly, is “Campaign for Vermont Prosperity.” Despite Lisman’s scrupulous attention to high-minded concepts like transparency, accountability, and education, when shit gets real, it’s All About Da Scrilla.

— One of CFV’s two (count ’em, TWO) position papers is on energy, and it is also A.A.D.S. It pays lip service to renewables and reducing carbon emissions, but “affordability” is its top priority. CFV wants Vermont to develop clean energy only if it doesn’t cost any more than other sources.

— CFV’s first advertising blitz, in the winter of 2011-12, hammered over and over again at “the politicians in Montpelier” and at Governor Shumlin’s policy priorities, because they allegedly created barriers to prosperity. In other words, anti-business. While the ads never mentioned “Democrats” by name, we all know who was in charge in Montpelier at the time. It wasn’t Jack Lindley.

The group’s later advertisements adopt a friendlier, nonpartisan tone. But its energy policy paper once again drags out the old “politicians in Montpelier” bugaboo. If this is true nonpartisanship, it’d be nice to hear some criticism of the Republicans. We never seem to get that, do we?

— Since launching CFV, Lisman has refrained from directly expressing his own opinions. But on one occasion, back in 2010, he did so. And in a talk delivered to business groups in South Burlington, he revealed a decisively right-leaning, Wall Street oriented worldview. The video can be viewed online, thanks to Burlington’s community access Channel 17; I reported on the speech in a pair of GMD posts in the spring of 2012. The highlights:

a. Lisman was a top executive at Bear Stearns when the economy cratered in 2008. His 2010 description of the Wall Street meltdown? “This thing that happened to us in ’08 and ’09… It was a Darwinian asteroid that hit us.” In other words, a completely unforeseeable natural disaster, for which no one on Wall Street should be blamed.

b. He stated, baldly, that “economic growth… is the ONLY answer for what might ail [the state of Vermont]. …The Governor has to make it the most important thing on his or her schedule every day.”  Does that sound like a liberal — or even a centrist — to you?

c. He said that investment capital is “the most precious thing in the galaxy,” and that those willing to invest capital should be rewarded with lower tax rates on capital gains and corporate earnings. In other words, lower taxes for those wealthy enough to be able to put their capital in the markets, rather than those of us who put our dollars and cents into frills like electricity, heat, housing and food.  

d. He echoed the Republican talking point that there are too many people who get away with paying no income taxes. Well, shortened to “paying no taxes,” which is untrue. He wants to broaden the taxpaying base by raising taxes for the working poor and middle classes. His rationale: everyone should pay something in, so they have a stake in the process.

e. He called for a close examination of Vermont’s social safety net, and a benchmarking of all benefits to the national average. No consideration for variations between states, or to the philosophical question of whether average generosity is good enough. (Hey, if we benchmarked LIHEAP against, say, Arizona, we could save a whole lot of money right there!)

f. He issued a warm-hearted call for a return to the “kindness and caring” that “are in our gene pool,” and connected that with practicality and frugality, which he identified as two other defining traits of the Vermont character. Put those together, and what do you see? Privatizing help for the poor.

g. He called for “performance-shaped budgeting,” with every public program having a defined goal within a defined time period. Which is an echo of the conservative shibboleth that we should “run government like a business.” When, in fact, government is by nature NOT businesslike.

h. He wants us to “embrace economic growth” without trying to pick winners — another Republican talking point. Government shouldn’t invest in specific industries; it should let the markets sort things out. Which ignores the fact that most of the investments that built America — from the Erie Canal to the opening of the American West (subsdized by land giveaways to the railroads and the provision of military and communications service across the continent) to the development of medicines and medical technology to the space program to the natural-gas bonanza provided by hydraulic fracturing.

Yes, fracking was developed through government-funded research, at a time when the fossil fuel industry thought the idea was laughable.

Certainly, government funding sometimes fails. But so does private-sector investment. And when government funding pays off, it creates new vistas of economic development that private investors, with their short-term orientation toward profit, would never have the patience to underwrite.

Is that enough evidence for you? Does that provide reason, at the very least, to mistrust Bruce Lisman as an avatar of nonpartisan centrism? Does that provide grounds to question his real motives, as he continues to keep his rhetorical Fog Machine cranked up to 11?

So, Mr. Heintz, the next time Bruce Lisman consents to an interview, feel free to print out this diary and put his feet to the fire.  

Now that our annual Lake Champlain Toxic Algae Festival is off to a rip-roaring start, I thought it was time to explore a question that’s been percolating in the back of my mind for a while now. The question that’s the title of this diary.

It’s almost an article of faith around these parts: Vermont has a strong devotion to the environment. We feel closely connected with nature, and are dedicated to preserving it whenever and however we can. On environmental issues, we set an example that others should follow.

Well, in the words of Lee Corso, “Not so fast, my friend.”

Sure, there’s some truth in that comforting self-image — but there’s also a whole lot of horse hockey. And that comfy self-satisfaction prevents us from truly examining our environmental performance and evaluating the choices we face.

It’s a given that Vermont is a relatively green, natural place with above-average environmental quality. But that’s mostly due to two factors that have nothing to do with our inherent virtue as a people, or our diligent stewardship of the land:

— A small population, and

— A relative lack of extractable resources.

It’s easy to be environmentally friendly when your numbers are small. Heck, there’ve been people on Earth for two and a half million (or six thousand, as you prefer) years now, and we didn’t begin to f*ck up the atmosphere until the last two hundred or so. Here in Vermont, we can let our unfiltered woodstoves belch fumes all winter long, flout clean-water standards, drive trucks and SUVs and four-wheel drive vehicles* all over the place, and allow unregulated junkyards to flourish, and it hardly makes a dent on the Green Mountain State. (Well, except for the water part; but more on that later.)

*I’ve lived here for seven winters, and I can count on my fingers the number of days I wished I had four-wheel drive. Overall, I’d rather have two-wheel drive and get two or three more miles to the gallon. Sure, there are those who really do need FWD, but for most of us, a Subaru is a badge of Vermontiness rather than a necessity of life.

And it’s easy to be green when you don’t have significant deposits of coal, oil, natural gas, iron ore, or precious minerals to exploit. (Our much-touted fracking ban is essentially an empty gesture, since we don’t have any known reserves of gas and nobody’s even looking.) If our Appalachians were as loaded with coal as West Virginia’s, do you think we could have spurned the financial rewards of strip mining? I’d like to think so, but the truth is, we’ve never had to make that choice.

Of course, we do have much to be proud of.  

One great example: coming from a state with no “current use” protection for landowners, I can say that Act 250 is a terrific thing, and has done a lot to rein in development. Of course, our lack of population has done even more; outside of Chittenden County, there’s just not much of a market for suburban sprawl.

Indeed, our low population has allowed us to be disturbingly lax on many environmental issues. To name a few:

— As the annual algae blooms can attest, we have a lousy track record on water quality. We’re still awaiting word from the EPA on what Vermont has to do to catch up with the Clean Water Act; that’s likely to be an expensive process, and nobody seems to have the political will to take it on.

Our sewage and stormwater systems are outdated and frequently overflow, sending untreated waste into our rivers and streams. And, as Seven Days’ Ken Picard recently reported, Vermont has a laughably weak system for reporting overflows. What’s worse, there is no real system for tracking the health impacts of overflows:

State toxicologist Sarah Vose says that testing for E. coli, considered a “fecal indicator bacteria,” only occurs at managed beaches and swimming areas, such as Burlington’s North Beach and Oakledge Park. When the public swims, boats or fishes at other locations, she says, they do so at their own risk.

Yep, the ol’ swimmin’ hole may actually be an ol’ shithole.

— Some people are very concerned about emissions from biomass plants (which are held to very strict air-quality standards), but they seem completely unbothered by Vermont’s unregulated woodstoves. According to the ANR, between 1/3 and 1/2 of all Vermont households use wood for some or all of their heating. That’s a lot of smoke.

In most areas of the country, woodburning from fireplaces and woodstoves is the largest source of particulate matter air pollution (PM) generated by residential sources. In some localities, fireplaces and woodstoves have been identified as the source of 80% or more of all ambient particles smaller than 2.5 microns in diameter (PM2.5) during the winter months.

Well, I guess particulate matter is acceptable, as long as it’s generated The Vermont Way.

Now, I’m not saying we should abandon wood heat. I’m just saying that it’s one of our many environmental blind spots.

— We have an appalling record on junkyards. Indeed, until the year 2010 — three years ago! — auto junkyards were essentially unregulated. Before then, the responsible agency was the Department of Motor Vehicles, which had no staff with environmental training and regulated entirely on the basis of appearance. Which meant, as long as you had a high fence along the roadside, you were A-OK with the state of Vermont.

And since the DMV had no resources to enforce its piddling rules, it unilaterally decided, quite a while ago, to only regulate junkyards along state highways. There’s a junkyard right in Montpelier, about a half mile from its picture-book downtown, that has never been effectively regulated. The soil and groundwater has never been tested. It’s located a few hundred feet from the Winooski River. And nobody cares.

— And then there’s our response to climate change. We’ve established some very progressive goals on renewable energy — which is the easy part. Attaining them is the real challenge. This year, our political leaders basically punted on energy efficiency, which is one of the keys to limiting greenouse gas emissions.

In terms of implementing the transition to renewables, even at this early stage we’re getting significant blowback — not only from pro-business groups, but from portions of the environmental community who fear change above everything, and who seem to hold the magical belief that if we don’t change, the climate will respect our borders and leave us untouched.

The unspoken guiding principle seems to be this: If it’s old, traditional, familiar, or small, it’s good (or at least acceptable). If it’s new, shiny, different, or (gasp!) corporate, it’s bad and we need to resist it.

And there’s where our self-satisfaction becomes counterproductive. Not everything old, traditional, familiar or small is good; not everything new, shiny, different, or even corporate is bad.

Vermont needs to take off those Green-tinted glasses and take a clear-eyed look at itself. In many ways, it needs to stay the same. In some important ways, though, it needs to change, if it’s going to be the environmental bellwether of our collective imagination.