Over 2000 people in Vermont due to become homeless due to sequestration!  

Massive federal budget cuts, known as sequestration, are continuing to wreak havoc on poorer Americans. One example: More than 2,000 Vermonters in 774 households may lose their homes in the next few months as a result of funding reductions for low-income housing.

 

http://thinkprogress.org/econo…

And they got this from Seven Days:  

Housing officials plan to remove 774 households from a program that subsidizes rents for many of the state’s poorest residents. The cuts have already affected hundreds of Vermonters who had been taking part in what’s known as the Section 8 voucher system. No one knows what’s become of many of the tenants who have already been turned out.

http://www.7dvt.com/2013gimme-…

Submitted for your approval:

1. Vermont’s jobless rate rises for the fourth straight month. What’s worse, the number of employed Vermonters continued to drop: our employed workforce has dwindled by 4,400 since January 2012.

2. Break out the tiny violins, folks: Walmart’s sales are dropping and its 2013 outlook is dim, because its customer base — the working poor and middle class — can’t afford to buy their shit.

3. And as if on cue, here comes El Jefe General John McLaughry to tell us the real problem with our economy: the overly generous “cornucopia” (his word) of welfare benefits keeps Vermonters dependent on the public dole.

Taken together, this is what we get after three-plus decades of outsourcing, downsizing, rightsizing, productivity gains, union-busting, and a ruthless devotion to the immediate bottom line among corporate executives and Wall Street wise guys.

(This is why I have so much contempt for Bruce Lisman, who spent his entire career immersed in the Wall Street mindset — you know, the one that cratered the economy in 2008? — and who clearly buys into it whole-hog, and dares to wander around Vermont claiming to have all the answers.)

This is what you deserve, Walmart, for your years of cannibalizing local businesses, driving down wages, hardballing unions, and forcing your suppliers to cut and cut and keep on cutting. Really, you couldn’t see this coming? Look at this graphic, which shows the “middle class” as high as the 60th percentile not very far from poverty, and tell me you don’t understand why consumer purchasing power is “surprisingly” weak:

After the jump: discouraged Vermonters, Walmart schadenfreude, and a particularly noxious McLaughry ragespew.  

Vermont’s unemployment figure is actually a bit of a mixed bag. The initial rate showed a slight decline in July; but when the usual seasonal adjustments are applied, that drop turns into a slight increase. Either way, not statistically significant. And, as Labor Commissioner Annie Noonan pointed out, the number of people filing claims for unemployment insurance “continues to decline.”

The key word there is “filing.” That leaves out the unemployed who’ve stopped looking for jobs. Which brings us to the more disturbing figure, as reported by Paul Cillo of the Public Assets Institute:

According to the monthly household survey, 335,689 people said they were employed-a drop of about 500 from June and almost 4,400 since January 2012, the most recent peak.

Hey, boys and girls, can you say “jobless recovery”?

4400 fewer workers in a state the size of Vermont? I find that deeply troubling.

And, of course, it’s 4400 fewer Vermonters who can afford those luxurious trips to Walmart.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world’s biggest retailer, said the weak global economy continues to batter its low-income shoppers.

… “The retail environment remains challenging in the U.S. and our international markets, as customers are cautious in their spending,” [Walmart CFO Charles] Holley said in a statement, noting a “reluctance” among customers to spend on things items like flat-screen TVs.

Aww, jinkies. You lowball your workers on pay and bennies, and those miserable ingrates are “reluctant” to splurge on high-ticket electronics? Color me shocked.

Other tidbits from Walmart: “sporting goods and entertainment products like toys saw declines”… clothing sales were solid as “the discounter refocused its offering on basics like socks and no-frills jeans” … grocery sales were hurt by shoppers “trad[ing] down to cheaper products to save money.”

Go back and look at that wealth-distribution chart, and you’ll know exactly why consumers are “trad[ing] down to cheaper products” and “reluctant” to buy your shiny new TV sets.

The maldistribution of wealth isn’t “merely” a problem of social justice; it’s a huge impediment to our economy. Businesspeople ought to realize this — and economists certainly ought to. As long as more than half of Americans are barely scraping by, and have little or no financial security, our economy will be hamstrung. For their own sake, businesses need to pay their employees a living wage — and provide a sense of longer-term security so people can commit to car loans and mortgages and the like.

Oh, but John McLaughry would disagree. Citing the Cato Institute, a free-market megaphone “think tank,” he notes that Vermont’s total welfare benefit package ranks eighth in the country. Leaving aside the credibility of Cato’s ideology-driven “research”, let’s focus on El Jefe’s argument:

According to Cato, an out-of-work Vermonter can draw benefits worth $37,705, including everything — welfare, food stamps, housing aid, health care, LIHEAP, etc. (Presuming that a single Vermonter could actually qualify for top aid in all categories. But again, for argument’s sake, let’s let Cato be Cato.) Which means, its report says, that a recipient transitioning to the workforce would need to earn more than $42,000 just to equal the value of his/her “cornucopia.”

(Not that $37,000 a year is anybody’s idea of a cornucopia. Wonder how much El Jefe draws from the Ethan Allen Institute, a nonprofit whose sole raison d’être seems to be distributing the thoughts of John McLaughry and Rob Roper to a grateful populace. Yeah, we taxpayers indirectly foot that bill, since high-rolling conservatives can take a tax deduction for donating to EAI. Same thing for Cato. We’re paying for this swill.)

El Jefe then quotes the Cato conclusion:

…it is undeniable that for many recipients – especially long-term dependents – welfare pays more than the type of entry level job that a typical welfare recipient can expect to find. As long as this is true, many recipients are likely to choose welfare over work.

So, I guess, the problem isn’t the mass proliferation of shit jobs that don’t pay a living wage; it’s the “generosity” of our social safety net that allows  the unemployed to — and I quote — “enjoy a life unburdened by gainful employment.”

Oh snap! Well, I guess John McLaughry would know all about being “unburdened by gainful employment,” having been amply remunerated by EAI for doing nothing more than sharing his opinions.

McLaughry’s prescription, in case I haven’t telegraphed it already, doesn’t involve improving wages and working conditions; he wants to slash away at that welfare “cornucopia” so that working — even working two or three low-paying, part-time jobs with irregular shifts* — is preferable to enjoying that “life unburdened.”

*Many of which require their employees to be available at all hours with very little notice. That gives employers a lot of flexibility, but workers find it almost impossible to work more than one job, find child care, and commit to education or retraining.

Because, as he puts it, when people start working, they can “hopefully climb up the income ladder” to financial independence and prosperity.

Problem is, America isn ‘t a financial ladder anymore. As that chart clearly shows, it’s a long slow slog through the swamplands of low pay followed — at best — by a grueling rock-climb up an almost sheer cliff. And if you lose your grip, well, best get climbin’ again. We don’t want you “enjoy[ing] a life unburdened,” after all.

Oh, and even if you don’t have any money, please keep buying shit. If you do, maybe the economy will grow enough that you can get another crappy job.  If you don’t, well hey, “weak consumer confidence” is holding us back.

That, and our overly “generous” welfare programs.  

Who knew that southern states would take the gift John Roberts handed them in June and move so quickly to start with their voter suppression efforts? (Okay, we all knew, and that was pretty much the point.)

The latest is something you really need to look at, involving some pretty outrageous parliamentary maneuvering between North Carolina governor McCrory and the two thugs he installed on the Watauga County board of elections to suppress the progressive (student, minority, you know the drill) vote.

The back story as nearly as I can make it out is that McCrory appointed two teabaggers to the three-member board and those two guys either cooked up a set of amendments or had them fed to them, to consolidate voting precincts, crack down on absentee voting, and even block public comment at board of elections meetings. Then, when they had all these amendments in place they kept Kathleen Campbell, the only Democrat on the board, from even seeing the proposals until they met to elect themselves chair and secretary and ram the amendments through.

(Apparently there are some issues about whether their pre-meeting consultation violated the state's open meetings law, and that may be subject to challenge.)

We've seen this kind of thing here in Vermont, and we know that when the majority acts unilaterally to crush its opposition it is essential to have a strong voice to stand up to them. 

The story is at Kos but there is a longer video here, and you should really watch it. From what I saw, Kathleen Campbell is another Wendy Davis.

Keep fighting, Kathleen and North Carolina Democrats! 

(This is a very interesting development.  VASA has been making their arguments for opening public lands to them for a number of years now.  It’s nice that the citizens of Woodbury can get it together themselves to lobby effectively! – promoted by Sue Prent)

Last month, the Woodbury Select Board approved the VASA-written ordinance allowing ATVs on certain class 3 town roads.  This was after a 4 hour long, very heated, public hearing the month before.

Almost immediately a petition was started to hold a Special Town Meeting on the Board’s ordinance.

Well, last Thursday that Town Meeting was held.  Usually Woodbury Town Meetings draw 100 – 120 people, but this one brought in 170-something! Six people spoke, all of them against the ordinance.  The three best points made were:

1) This ordinance is not about the townfolk, this will go out nationwide to ATV clubs everywhere and our town’s roads will be torn up by non-tax payers. It will cost the townspeople to fix them.

2) Some of these roads dead end in wetlands and other sensitive habitats. North Road is supposed to connect to Cabot, but they voted to close all their roads…

3) There will be NO enforcement.  One resident’s home was burgled and the VSP jumped into action – and took 3 hours to show up.

Woodbury has already seen an increase in unlicensed and unhelmeted riders on all roads, even Rt 14, because the low-intelligence riders already believe this ordinance allows them to ride anywhere they want. My wife almost ran over a kid on Rt 14 on a sharp corner with short sightlines.

The question was called and the vote was taken.  The Select Board’s ordinance was voted down by 2/3 (100 and teen-something) to 1/3 (60-something).   The meeting ran 35 minutes, not including the time it took to vote.

I was out of town most of last week, so I hope you’ll pardon a piece or two of catch-up business. Still relevant, I think.

The Progressive Party’s recent state meeting caused a brief flurry of punditic ejaculation on one aspect of Our Little Engine That Could (Maybe)’s future: should they run a candidate for Governor in 2014?

They sat it out in 2012, in support of Governor Shumlin’s stands on Vermont Yankee and single-payer health care. But dissatisfaction grew this year, due to Shumlin’s proposed cuts in programs for the working poor and his obstinate rejection of any kind of tax increase (except, of course for the ones he supported). Plus some disturbing signs that his commitment to single-payer might not be as rock-solid as we thought. Either way, Shumlin is likely to cruise to re-election should he (cough, choke) decide to seek a third term.

So, what’s a Progressive to do?

Here’s one view from a liberal freelance who doesn’t like Shumlin’s centrist and hippie-kicking tendencies.

(And who, in the interest of full disclosure, occasionally finds the Progs too twee and self-absorbed for his taste, but who appreciates their existence and wishes them well.)  

The Progs have been in rebuild mode since hitting (what appears to be) an electoral glass ceiling in 2008, when Anthony Pollina narrowly beat out a very weak (sorry, Gaye) Democratic candidate, but still finished way behind Jim Douglas. The party turned its attention toward the grass roots, concentrating on legislative races. Which was the best thing to do. And it still is. And it’s a solid argument for staying the course, sitting out the 2014 gubernatorial elec Shumlin coronation, and aiming toward a full statewide ticket when the party is strong enough to have a significant impact.

On the other hand, the arguments for running a Prog in 2014 are (1) to keep Shumlin honest and remind him not to take the Progs for granted, and (2) to have a Prog voice in the campaign, and particularly in the debates. Both good arguments.

But is it worth diverting resources and, possibly, sacrificing a candidate who might be truly viable in two or four more years?

I’d say no.

After the jump: my reasoning, and the promised punditry FAIL.

If I were King of the Progs, the only way I’d run a sacrificial lam candidate for Governor is if I could find someone who (1) has a decent public profile already, to lend a veneer of credibility to a very longshot candidacy, and (2) is willing to run as a low-budget figurehead.

(Unless, of course, Bernie Sanders decides to open up his bank vault and actually, y’know, tangibly help the party whose colors he used to fly. Bwahahaha.)

But the Progs with a high enough profile (Anthony Pollina, Tim Ashe, David Zuckerman, Chris Pearson) already hold elective office and would be better served by staying there. As would the party.

So again, I’d say no, no Prog on the 2014 ticket.

2016 maybe; by then, Shumlin will have a longer track record to support or oppose — most importantly, by then it ought to be clear whether we’re still on track for single-payer or not. By then, the Progs ought to be a stronger party with higher-profile leaders. Also, 2016 carries a low risk of a Prog splitting the vote and tipping the race to the Republican because (1) it’ll be a Presidential year with a strong liberal turnout, and (2) the VTGOP is likely to remain a basket case.

And now, I note a punditic personal foul committed by our friend, Paul “The Huntsman” Heintz.

In recent days, he has twice addressed the Progs’ Predicament. Before the statewide meeting, he posted a piece entitled “Should A Prog Run for Gov? Nope.” In it, he laid out the reasoning against a Prog run in 2014.  

And then, a couple weeks later, he listed the Progs as Losers in his weekly roundup of winners et al:

…The Vermont Progressive Party seemed no closer to pulling the trigger at a state committee meeting last weekend, according to Seven Days’ Kevin J. Kelley. If they can’t or won’t run in a year when the Democratic governor’s taken a sharp right-ward turn on fiscal issues and the Vermont Republican Party has nearly imploded, what good are they?

Oooookay, let’s recap. On one hand, the Progs are ill-positioned and lacking an obvious candidate for 2014. On the other, if they don’t run in 2014, they’re useless cowards.

In the words of Walnuts McCain, “That’s not punditry you can believe in.”

Hearty congratulations to “Angry Jack” Lindley, chair of the VTGOP, for rising — however briefly — out of the fog of political irrelevance that is his usual lot in life, and actually… wait for it…

… making NEWS.

That’s right, ol’ A.J. (pictured at right in his day job, as proprietor of “Angry Jack’s Shell Emporium,” one of the finest retail establishments in all of Bikini Bottom) managed to catch the attention of our state’s political press with one of his overheated, knee-jerk press releases. This one, snarking all over Two-Fisted™ Bill Sorrell’s Appeals Court defeat in the state’s effort to close down Vermont Yankee.

A press release that only took him, as Dave Gram reports, two days to come up with. Must be busy season at the Shell Emporium, eh, Jack?  

After the jump: Republican Hypocrisy! And, a disavowal of Randy Brock.

Anyway, Lindley argued that the fight against VY has been “ill-advised, inappropriate, and ultimately ineffective*.The state of Vermont has nothing to show for it now, except wasted resources.”

*Which, as Gram points out, puts Jack Lindley somewhere to the right of his own gubernatorial nominee, Randy Brock. In 2010, then-Senator Brock was part of a 26-4 majority voting against a measure that would have authorized an extension of Yankee’s operating license — putting the state squarely in Entergy’s path. Lindley now says Brock’s vote was “ill-advised.” SO, I must conclude, the VTGOP has moved to Brock’s right on the Vermont Yankee issue?

But Angry Jack is right that Vermont faced long odds in its effort to block relicensure, and in seeking to close VY it risked losing an expensive legal fight. And you could certainly question the stewardship of public resources.

However, I would just like to point out that every Republican-controlled state in the country feels absolutely no compunction about passing legislation that’s likely to be overturned in court. To name two examples that have occurred dozens of times across the country, Republican legislatures have passed (and Republican Governors have signed) restrictions on reproductive and voting rights that are very unlikely to survive a court challenge. And when one of their laws is overturned in court, they keep on coming back with slightly rejiggered laws that are, again, subject to court review. Ad infinitum, ad nauseam.  

And they don’t seem to give a good goddamn about all the taxpayer money they’re spending on lawyers.

So Jack, to the extent that you have a point in your attack against Sorrell, Shumlin, et al., I do hope that you press the same argument against all your ill-advised, inappropriate, and ultimately ineffective Republican colleagues who are far more guilty of wasting resources than Vermont’s Democratic leaders.

Sorry, Jack, I can’t hear you. Did you say something?  

 

He was not famous. He never invented anything. He never created a great work of art. He never composed a symphony. But there was something special about him. He had lived a life of moral perfection.  He never told a lie. Never disappointed a friend. Never disrespected his parents.

On March 21, 2013, while sleeping in his stroller, someone fired a bullet into his head. In an instant Antonio Santiago was dead…just six weeks after his first birthday.  One more dead child in America’s war with itself. Another dead baby in a nation that celebrates violence.

Every human being has equal value, but somehow it seems different when a child is murdered.  Maybe it is the absolute innocence of children that makes any harm to them so extremely painful to all of us.  

But wait a minute – the USA has an official policy of killing children with Drones. This happens on a regular basis. Then we claim it was an accident – an unintended consequence – collateral damage. The claim is that this war on everyone, everywhere is justified because on 9/11 the US was a victim.   Maybe as the Trial of the accused murderer of Antonio gets underway, the Defense can use that same strategy. Will the Defense claim that the shooter was a victim. He had a hard life. Bad things happened to him. The fact is that he did grow up in a culture saturated in violence.

De’Marquise Elkins has been charged with the murder. The Trial will take place in Cobb County Court in Marietta, Georgia.  Superior Court Judge Stephen Kelley presides.  Elkins will not face the death penalty, because at the time of the crime he was only 17.  If convicted, he could be sentenced to Life in prison.  

In this case there is no silver lining. There is nothing of redeeming value. Nothing that can sooth the anguish.  Even if the accused is guilty and even if the jury convicts the accused, that does not compensate for the loss.  

But wait another minute…when the US kills those in other countries with Drones, a few thousand dollars of compensation is sometimes given to the family.  If that is Justice, maybe the accused should offer monetary compensation to the family of Antonio.  Justice served?   Most in the US would not find that acceptable, so why is it an acceptable US policy?  Why do we accept the killing of children in other countries? Are their lives less precious?

The killer of Antonio is no more innocent and no more guilty than those who kill unarmed civilians in other countries.  US citizens who support and enable the Drone killings are every bit as guilty as whoever murdered Antonio Santiago.  That includes voters, taxpayers, and those who design, manufacture, and operate the Drones.

Justice should not be doled out by geography.  The Drone killings in Afghanistan are crying out for Justice. Murder is murder.

Rosemarie Jackowski

dissent@sover.net  

The open-doors policy at Vermont’s statehouse suggests a level of citizen access that should be the envy of every other state; yet, all is not nearly so rosy as one might expect.  

Open community government is more difficult to achieve.  It’s all about who your people are and where you come from.  Sometimes it gets downright nasty.

I was drowning in a local issue when the news broke last month that Vermont stacks up abysmally to other states in the department of transparent government.   We apparently are particularly susceptible to violations of the Open Meeting Laws.

Now that I can at last see a little daylight,  I’ve got an itch to revisit that story, since conflicts of interest have most certainly played a role in nearly every local issue in which I have become engaged over the past dozen or so years.

The Better Government Association (BGA) ranks Vermont 43rd out of the fifty states on its integrity index. Wow!  Who’d have thought?

The BGA reasons that states having experienced the most government scandals have responded with transparency improvements; so Illinois, home state of the infamous Rod Blagojevich, now ranks third in the nation for transparency.

LIttle old Vermont has a relatively quiet past in terms of statewide public scandal; so, bolstering government transparency here has assumed a low priority.

This, coupled with the comfortable intimacy of a small population, has given rise to some very bad habits, which are simply not recognized as such by the people who wield the power on a local level.  A few large and well-connected families effectively hold the collective reigns of local decision making in many communities; so that we routinely see cousins issuing permit approvals to cousins.

It never occurs to most people to question this arrangement, but they should.

Compounding the problem are the extremely limited parameters that define conflicts of interest in Vermont, and the almost total lack of consequences.  If the individual executing a decision on behalf of the public good, or that individual’s spouse or immediate offspring, cannot be demonstrated to directly gain financially from that decision, Vermont law looks no further.  

It doesn’t matter whether issuance of a permit, for instance, will directly impact the value of the decision maker’s property; or if a first cousin is the applicant whose project is under consideration.  Under such circumstances, nothing in Vermont law requires the decision maker to recuse (withdraw) him or herself from the process; and these relationship conflicts routinely occur and remain unchallenged.

It is left entirely to the individual to determine whether or not he or she has a conflict of interest requiring recusal from the decision-making process.

One of my favorite stories illustrating the pitfalls of government that is just too small comes from early in the annals of Vermont’s own blue collar “crime wave,” which catapulted the state to another dubious distinction as the state having the tenth highest risk of embezzlement.  

Back in 2007, Isle-La-Motte’s Town Clerk Treasurer Suzanne LaBombard confessed to having embezzled $100,000. The Selectboard consisted of her father, who tried to mitigate the loss by purchasing her house so that she could return what she stole to the town coffers; her boyfriend who was the Chair; and one more individual who, as far as we know, had no direct relationship to Ms. LaBombard.  

That was it. That was the entire brain trust and firewall protecting the 375-strong community’s public assets. LaBombard had been Town Clerk/Treasurer for twenty-one years when she finally had to confess!  Who even knows how much went on before she completely lost control and had to fess up to the $100,000. dip?

This was a pretty spectacularly criminal example of Vermont-style conflicts of interest; but speaking just about Franklin County, the “family feasting” that goes on around public permits and patronage jobs  is notorious.  

Until the legislature gets serious about adopting restrictive language and real consequences for public officials exercising conflicts of interest, we can expect to continue our history of bad behaviors on the local level.

Those behaviors disenfranchise citizens and rob communities of the value they can get from open minds, constructive dissent, and creative vision.

A couple of interesting tidbits in the aftermath of the Lac-Megantic disaster, courtesy of the Montreal Gazette:

1. Railways are fleeing responsibility as fast as they can.

2. The chemical composition of the oil may have made the disaster much worse.

For those just joining us, Lac Megantic, Quebec was devastated on July 6 when an unattended train carrying 72 cars of crude oil rolled into the town and exploded. The oil came from the Bakken oil fields of North Dakota; CP Rail had contracted to move the oil to New Brunswick, and had subcontracted the last portion of the transport to the Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway. The train was being run by MM&A when it exploded.

Now, the two points (and their implications) in more depth.  

1. Corporate cravenness. After being ordered to pay $7.8 million toward cleanup and recovery (an operation whose total cost is likely to top $200 million), MM&A ducked into the protection of bankruptcy court, from whence it is highly unlikely to re-emerge. Indeed, Canada has revoked MM&A’s license to operate (although a brief extension is possible, just to keep freight moving) because, for some odd reason, the railway is having trouble getting liability insurance! How about that.

Which brings us to CP Rail. The Canadian government says CP is also liable because it was “the entity responsible for ensuring the transport” of the oil to its final destination. CP’s response?

“As a matter of fact, and law, CP is not responsible for this clean up,” the rail giant said in response to Quebec’s decision to add the company’s name to a formal legal notice on Wednesday. “CP will be appealing.”

What does the government think of that?

“I will leave it up to lawyers, but let’s be clear: under the law on environmental quality, the minister does not ask for, or suggest, compensation … he orders it,” [Environment Minister Yves-Francois] Blanchet said in a statement. “It’s not optional.”

Heh.

2. The oil “reacted in an abnormal way.” Oil is flammable, obviously. But a tanker full of oil doesn’t necessarily explode. It’s kind of like a library: full of flammable material, but the material is so densely packed that it can’t burst into flames. Unless you tip over the shelves and rip up quite a few books, a library is surprisingly fire-resistant.

An oil tanker isn’t as safe as a library, natch, but the principle is the same.

In Lac-Megantic, though, the explosions came fast and furious — “in an abnormal way,” said an official of the Transportation Safety Board. Which prompted the Gazette to ask the obvious question: Why?

And the most likely answer: traces of natural gases, such as hydrogen sulfide, in the crude oil. H2S is an extremely volatile (not to mention deadly) substance; most of the Bakken crude is low in H2S, but some is not. In fact, the oil pipeline company Enbridge filed a complaint with the US government earlier this year, after receiving batches of crude with high concentrations of H2S. Levels high enough to cause instant death if you breathe the stuff.

Even so, it’s not especially dangerous if it’s vented properly, according to Paul Bommer, University of Texas professor of petroleum engineering. But when crude is transported in a rail car, vapors can build up at the top of the tank. This is one significant way in which train transport of crude oil is more dangerous than pipelines, which keep the oil moving and make gas buildups unlikely if not impossible.

“If you had an accident where you overturned a tank car and it ruptured, the first thing out of there potentially could be the little bit of vapour.

“And if there’s any heat source at all, that’s likely to explode, and if it explodes, the oil’s going right up with it.”

We don’t know yet if there were high levels of H2S in the Lac-Megantic crude; the Transportation Safety Board is testing oil from the same Bakken source to determine what, if any, other substances were in the crude. But H2S appears a likely culprit.

Due to the lack of pipelines, a whole lot of crude from the Bakken reserves and the Alberta tar sands is being transported by rail. This means good money for the railroads — and heavy pressure to deliver. The Gazette notes:

Data collected by the U.S. Federal Railroad Administration show railroads have been asking for approval to move a significant number of tank cars that may be overloaded, without enough room to allow for vapours expanding in transport.

Oh, yay.

Two things I think about this. In the immediate case, if CP Rail has made any similar requests of Canadian authorities, then I’d say CP is screwed.

And in the broader view, I think this is cause to question whether pipelines are really the worst things. Certainly, at the very least, this should make us consider the options and the real pluses and minuses of each. And I know, I know, for the sake of the planet what we really need to do is get off fossil fuel.

The best way to do that is to go as hard and fast as we can on renewable energy. Until renewables can beat fossil fuels in the marketplace, there will be strong pressure to move the oil, one way or another.

Honestly, I can’t say which is worse: trains or pipelines. And saying “neither” is unrealistic, at least until we wean ourselves off fossil fuels.  

No, not about its rancid Panhellenic system; I expect they’ll sweep the “Crips and Bloods” costume party embarrassment under the rug. But it has taken back its lovely job offer to Anglican Bishop James Tengatenga, now deemed inconvenient to serve as head of the College’s Tucker Foundation due to his record of anti-gay rhetoric. Seeing as how the Foundation is supposed to be all about “moral leadership,” y’know.

[Dartmouth President Philip] Hanlon, who met last week with Tengatenga on Dartmouth’s campus in Hanover, N.H.,said in a statement Wednesday that after much reflection and consultation with senior leaders at the college, he decided that Tengatenga’s past statements compromised his ability to lead the William J. Tucker Foundation.

“The foundation and Dartmouth’s commitment to inclusion are too important to be mired in discord over this appointment,” Hanlon said.

Yeah, you’d think if its “commitment to inclusion” was so important, somebody at Dartmouth might’ve Googled “Tengatenga” and “gay marriage” before offering the job, given the highly publicized intra-Anglican battles of recent years. Could have saved the College some trouble, for sure.

Could have also saved the Bishop from dead-ending his own career, apparently.

Tengatenga… had already resigned his diocesan post and expressed public support for gay marriage after receiving the Dartmouth post.

That belated public support wasn’t enough to keep his Big Green Sinecure, but it’s likely to cause him some problems among his former brethren in the Intolerant Wing of the Anglican Communion.

You could almost feel sorry for the guy. Not his fault, really, that Dartmouth College once again revealed the big fat blind spot in its moral sensibility. Indeed, if I were him, I’d be consulting an employment attorney.