Sittin’ here typin’ on my computer, when the phone rings. It’s Barbara, calling from ICF Macro, asking for my participation in a brief survey on current issues in Vermont.

So, what issues did she want to discuss? Only one issue, actually.  

The entire survey centered on the Brooke Bennett murder, the circumstances surrounding it, and the appropriate punishment for Michael Jacques. (The survey presumes his guilt, of course.) From the tone and direction of the questions, the aim was to elicit respondents’ attitudes toward the death penalty — in the context of Vermont’s most notorious murder case in years.  

I’m afraid I wasn’t very helpful to ol’ Barb. I couldn’t recall many details of the case, because it happened so long ago. And on whether he should get the death penalty, my answer was an unfun (but legally correct) “That depends on what he’s convicted of.” This answer was clearly not on her checklist; I had to repeat it a couple of times, and she didn’t quite know what to do with it.

ICF Macro, by the way, appears to be a straightforward research/survey/information/consultancy outfit. (As far as I could tell from five minutes of Googling.)

Which brings us to the question: as a campaign year is about to begin, who is looking to make political hay out of the abduction, rape, and murder of Brooke Bennett?  

From the Associated Press, courtesy of the Concord (NH) Monitor’s website: “FairPoint Hires Two Ad Firms in Bankruptcy.”

FairPoint Communications, struggling to emerge from bankruptcy, has hired two Maine firms to beef up marketing and communications.

The phone company has hired Portland-based Garrand and the VIA Group to help get the word out about its services.

Okay, I acknowledge that every business has to publicize itself, and that this is most likely a legitimate expenditure. (It’s certainly a legitimate type of expenditure; I’m not willing to concede that this particular expenditure is legitimate because of FairPoint’s record of, ahem, business savvy.) But FairPoint has no one to blame but themselves for the massive outbreak of teeth-grinding this story will evoke among its benighted customers, and for the inevitable jokes the story will inspire.  To wit…  

I assume the PR firms are getting paid up front.

Suggested tagline for a new ad campaign: Bullwinkle T. Moose saying “This time, for sure!”

One more from me. A brief visit to the VIA Group website reveals this motto:

The difficult we do immediately.

The impossible will be done by Thursday.

So, by Friday, everybody will be happy in FairPointLand?  

( – promoted by odum)

In another example of Press Release Journalism, the 7/17 Times Argus brings us news of two promotions in the VT Agency of Natural Resources:

Justin Johnson, who has served as deputy DEC commissioner, was named commissioner on Thursday.

Sabina Haskell, the Natural Resources Agency’s communications director, moved up to deputy secretary.

Haskell is the former Brattleboro Reformer editor who became the ANR spokesflack a couple of years ago. She’s clearly qualified for that position, but what skills or experience does she bring to a top management post in a major state agency?

As for Johnson, I don’t know anything about him except that he may have been the agency’s spokesflack before Darren Allen. I could be wrong about that; a Google search reveals only faint traces of Johnson, past or present. (Can anyone in GMD-land fill in the gaps?)

At least in Haskell’s case, this appears to be another example of the Douglas administration promoting people with no apparent qualifications (other than loyalty) into important state positions. Maybe Haskell and Johnson are budding geniuses — but they might also be Mike Browns. If there were any reporters left in the state, maybe they could do a background check. Or at least get these people’s resumes, and flesh out the ANR press release a little bit.  

Fresh news from Dan Barlow from the Vermont Press Bureau, offered without comment. Because what more need be said?

Vermont officials asked state regulators Tuesday to revoke FairPoint Communication’s authority to operate, saying they have lost faith in the company’s ability to do its job.

The Vermont Public Service Department asked state regulators to investigate the troubled telecommunications company, specifically why its certificate of public good – essentially its authority to operate in the state – should not be taken away.

( – promoted by odum)

Today’s Burlington Free Press, front pager entitled “Vermont Looks to Save $30M,” about the search for places to cut state spending. Nice example of creative thinking at work:

Lunderville told the committee the Douglas administration has its own plan for finding efficiencies. Starting this week, 10 “Tiger Teams” from throughout state government and including outside volunteers will search for savings, he said.

Okay, first of all, “Tiger Teams”? Hasn’t Dilbert been making fun of Tiger Teams for about ten years now? What’s next, Six Sigma? Will every state worker get a free copy of Who Moved My Cheese?  

Second, if this is such a great strategic move, why not do it earlier? How long, exactly, has Jim Douglas been Governor? And he’s only now thinking of this?

Third, “outside volunteers” would scare me if I were a state worker. Some PHB-type (Dilbert reference again) from the private sector, maybe a Republican operative, is coming to my office to stand over my shoulder and judge my work process? Great.  

When push comes to shove, however, I expect that this will turn out to be another lame and impact-free PR tactic. If you can’t give ’em results, at least make it seem like you’re trying.  

( – promoted by odum)

Item from today’s Herald/Times Argus…

Entergy Nuclear has asked state regulators to approve a plan that would change the regulatory boundary surrounding Vermont Yankee nuclear plant, which would move the spot where radiation doses are measured further away from the reactor.

Excellent, as Montgomery Burns would say. Entergy helpfully explains that it is seeking greater “regulatory clarity.” It has asked the Vermont Public Service Board for permission to make the change.

I say we let them do it with the following conditions: That they rename the territory inside the boundary “The Kill Zone,” and post huge skull-and-crossbones signs around the perimeter. What say you, Mr. O’brien?  

Senator James Inhofe — the guy who calls global warming “the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people” — reacting to Obama’s Cairo speech: (from the Daily Oklahoman)

Sen. Jim Inhofe said today that President Barack Obama’s speech in Cairo was “un-American” because he referred to the war in Iraq as “a war of choice” and didn’t criticize Iran for developing a nuclear program.

Inhofe, R-Tulsa, also criticized the president for suggesting that torture was conducted at the military prison in Guantanamo, saying, “There has never been a documented case of torture at Guantanamo.”

“I just don’t know whose side he’s on,” Inhofe said of the president.

Senator Inhofe: how dare you undercut our President in a time of war? How dare you publicly expose our political differences in a way sure to embolden our enemies?

Oh, wait, I forgot… you’re a Republican, and those arguments only hold when a Republican is President.  

( – promoted by odum)

Okay, so Eric Davis, everybody’s go-to guy for political analysis in Vermont, was on the Mark Johnson Show this morning. At one point, Eric and Mark rather casually asserted that, regarding the state budget, the Vermont electorate is significantly to the right of the Legislative majority.

I stewed over that for a while, and then called the show.  

First of all, I made a brief case that the Legislative leadership, in fact, pursued a moderate course on the budget rather than a liberal one. And then I asked about their unsubstantiated assertion: If the Legislature is significantly to the left of the voters, how exactly did that happen? And, if the Legislature is so badly out of touch, is there something fundamentally wrong with how we choose our lawmakers?

Eric had two answers: First, that the GOP took its eye off the ball regarding Legislative races a few years back, concentrating on re-electing Jim Douglas and getting Martha Rainville into Congress. (Oops.) The Republicans didn’t even contest a bunch of races, he said. Well, nonsense. If the GOP isn’t strong enough to walk and chew gum at the same time, they’re in trouble. They didn’t run candidates mainly in districts where they had no chance of winning. Also, how does that Republican distraction somehow produce a two-thirds majority if, in fact, the electorate isn’t fundamentally center-left?

Eric’s second point: Polls give the Legislature very low marks for job performance… but individual lawmakers are popular in their own districts. So they get re-elected whether or not their views fairly reflect those of the electorate. Thus, presumably, the Republicans continue to pay the price for their 2006 inattention. There’s certainly some truth in this; Vermonters are very slow to oust incumbents (and Jim Douglas thanks you from the bottom of his heart). But still, it seems a mighty thin basis for the assertion that Vermont is a center-right state that has somehow managed to elect a solidly left-wing Legislature.  

This disconnect between politics and pundits is also playing out on a national level. There’s a basic assumption that America is a centrist or center-right nation. But somehow the Americans managed to overwhelmingly elect a Democratic President, and sizeable Democratic majorities in Congress. I realize that “objective” pundits like Eric Davis try to play it down the middle, but there’s a much simpler explanation: Vermonters and Americans, by and large, want their government to do a lot of things. Regulate the excesses of the free market, furnish services that the market does not, redress social imbalances, maintain the infrastructure, and provide for a secure, orderly society. We may not be fond of paying for all that, but we do want our government to do it. On that score, it’s the Republicans, including Douglas, who are out of touch with the electorate.  

Ever since the veto override, and Jim Douglas’ rather mumbly reaction to it, I’ve been thinking that this may prove to be a watershed moment — not just for equal rights, but for the politics of Vermont. I’ve talked to, and read comments by, people who speculate on how the override may have been exactly what Jim Douglas wanted: that he planned it all out this way.

And I couldn’t disagree more. I see this as a huge defeat for Douglas, from start to finish. And I think we’ll look back on it as the beginning of the end of his time in the corner office.  

As I see it, Douglas failed to chart a clear course on the issue. As a result, he satisfied nobody and made some fresh enemies. First, when the legislative leadership pursued the issue, he made purely tactical arguments against it: too much of a distraction, civil unions are good enough. He never made a moral, legal, or even political case on the issue itself. If he had laid out an argument on the merits (whether we would have agreed or not), he might have persuaded some undecideds. At least he would have appeared to be taking a stand on principle.

Then, when legislative passage was a sure thing, he suddenly announced he would veto. This pissed off a lot of lawmakers  because traditionally, Governors don’t announce vetoes while a bill is before the Legislature. Also, his announcement invalidated his central argument — the issue is a distraction — because all he did was ensure that it became even more of a distraction. If he’d made a previous stand on principle, a veto would have been the logical course.

Then, after his veto, he did nothing to jawbone undecided legislators. He said he was allowing people to vote their own consciences; but he was also unilaterally disarming himself. That’s bad politics. If he’d lobbied within his party, couldn’t he have turned a single vote?

Instead, he was saddled with Vermont’s first veto override in 19 years. It shattered the image of Douglas the Unbeatable Politician. It had to leave the Dem/Prog majority feeling their oats.

There are two arguments for Douglas-as-Yoda, wizarding his way through this issue. One: He wanted it to become law because he didn’t want it to be a campaign issue in 2010 with an outraged, unified Left opposing his re-election. Well, isn’t the Left more unified anyway? And didn’t he spark plenty of outrage, between his untimely veto announcement and the veto itself? Won’t all marriage-equality supporters be bound and determined to get him out of office?

Two: He was maneuvering for the support of the national GOP — either for a run at Leahy or Welch, or for maybe a job as Michael Steele’s right-hand man or (heh) replacement.  Big problem there: the hard right has long memories and very high standards of purity. They will see Douglas not as the man who tried to stop same-sex marriage, but the man who let it happen on his watch. Also, with all the challenges the Republican Party will face in 2010, do you really think they’re going to spend money in Vermont? On a longshot like defeating Leahy or Welch? I just don’t see it.

The only way I can interpret Douglas’ course on marriage equality is that he’s just plain getting tired. He may or may not be planning to step down next year, but he’s certainly lost his edge. For the first time in his long tenure as Governor, he’s let the Left outmaneuver him.  

The Burlington Free Press’s story on the same-sex marriage rally at the State House, and the meeting with the Governor, includes the following classy quote from Smilin’ Jim:

“I think many Vermonters who agree with me don’t have the time to come to the Statehouse to rally.”

Nice, very nice. I guess what you’re saying, Jim, is that hardworking productive Vermonters support traditional marriage, while the layabouts, the unemployed, and the rabble are causing the “distraction” over this issue.

One more thing to remember in 2010, when Douglas again pulls out his good-guy moderate act.