(UPDATE: Thune amendment defeated.)

The US Senate is preparing to vote on an amendment to the Defense Department appropriations authorization bill (S. 1390) that would override laws in 48 states by mandating that a concealed weapon permit from one state be accepted by another. Opponents are rightfully concerned that someone in, say, New York City, could take advantage of the far more limited restrictions in a state like Vermont (through a friend in the area, by getting a second address, etc) to legally import weapons in violation of the letter and intent of their home state’s restrictions. Proponents simply want an end to any and all restrictions on firearm ownership.

I’m not a big fan of gun control laws. Still, I recognize the “nukes in Wal-Mart” argument and have made it myself – simply that no one anywhere is truly in favor of literally unrestricted arms dealing and/or possession, and that the adjective “well-regulated” in the second amendment does mean something, even if we can’t agree on what.

What I have a problem with is large scale, sweeping, federal-level laws that impact what we would think of as “traditional” firearms. I recognize that, if a major US city like NYC is having an epidemic of gun violence, its citizenry has the right to support extra restrictions. But that right ends where that local jurisdiction – and the local problem – ends. We in Vermont should not have a right – any right (even one we may not personally find appealing and choose not to take advantage of) – curtailed to address a problem we do not have. If people start shooting each other – sure. When society is threatened, it is common to have a public discussion about the merits of curtailing some freedoms for the health of the greater community. That’s always a scary conversation, I’ll grant, but its a dynamic that has defined civil society since the emergence of the very first cities, if not before.

And while it would seem that this sort of federal approach to personal firearms would be anathema to those concerned with gun rights, we are now seeing – yet again – that Republicans such as bill sponsor John Thune (R-ND) are always too ready to abandon what they purport to be their core principles in order to force society to reflect their own parochial worldview. “Federalism,” “original intent,” “state’s rights” are once again shown to be nothing more than buzzwords in the toolbox used by the right to force their view of society on everyone and anyone they can. All this serves to underscore the complete absence of any core values in so much of the modern Republican Party besides a base desire for control over others – either at the personal level as with abortion and gay rights, or, in this case, the community level.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m anything but an absolute state-rightser. Not even close, really. But after all, if state and local sovereignty is to mean anything at all, it should at the very least allow for the control of the flow of arms across borders.

So if this law should pass, we should consider a companion bill to change the flag from a field of 50 stars to one, big, Republican-red one.

Blue-Green Algae Bloom Detected in Missisquoi Bay

July 21, 2009

BURLINGTON – Elevated levels of toxins detected in a blue-green algae bloom on the eastern shores of the Missisquoi Bay has prompted the Vermont Department of Health to advise boaters, swimmers and residents to take the following precautions:

• Avoid contact with algae-contaminated water.

• Do not swim or bathe in the water. Remember that children are considered to be at higher risk because they are more likely to drink the water.

• Monitor water intakes for private residences. If you see algae present near the intake, switch to an alternate safe source of water.

• Do not use algae contaminated water to prepare meals or brush teeth.

Boiling water will not remove toxins.

• Do not allow pets in algae-contaminated water.

http://www.vermont.gov/portal/…

Green rating site that gave Gov. Douglas his 8th Greenest Gov. in US rating

http://www.greenopia.com/USA/G…

I spoke with Senator Bernie Sanders late last week about the issue of the moment nationally: reforming the health care system. Sanders spoke about his views on the prospects for a strong public plan to survive the legislative process, discussed the prospects of meaningful reform against an often too – conservative Democratic caucus and without hitting the private insurance industry head on, the stakes for the nation and the state, and what Vermonters can do to help the process.

My recording rig was decidedly low tech, so there are some gaps where the conversation could not be cleanly transcribed, but 98% of the conversation remains, I think.

odum: You’re obviously a proponent of single payer health care. You’ve suggested in the past that it might be more workable at the state level…I understand you’ve tried to include that option in the health care bill – and you’ve also introduced the American Health Security Act of 2009 (which would introduce single payer at the national level), so its easy to infer that you’re just going at the issue from every way you can. But of those two approaches, the state level or the federal level – which do you really feel is more practical and attainable?

Sanders: Well at this particular moment, neither is going to be attained. This country is facing a major, major health care crisis, and I think most Vermonters know the dimensions of that crisis. It’s 46 million without any insurance, more are underinsured. John, its very important not to forget that a lot of folks who count for having insurance end up with $10,000 deductibles and very weak insurance programs that really don’t address their health care needs. We have 60 million Americans who do not have access to a doctor on a regular basis, and that can end up in the emergency room or in the hospital at great personal suffering and great expense to the system. In the midst of all that we end up spending twice as much per person on healthcare than almost any other country on Earth.

(Continued below the fold…)

So we have a system clearly which is dysfunctional, which is not working, which results, by the way, in some 18,000 people dying every year because they don’t get to the doctor when they should.

So in my mind, if you are serious about doing the following three things; number one, providing comprehensive – that means coverage for all basic health care needs to all Americans, and if you want to do that in a cost effective way – the only solution is to end the dominance of the private insurance companies, and the 1300 private insurance companies and the thousands of different programs which end up, just in terms of administrative and bureaucratic costs, wasting about 400 billion dollars a year. That’s the only approach – and I say that not from an ideological approach, just from a basic economic point of view –  that you can save 400 billion a year through administrative costs, and that’s why I’m for single payer.

Now, you’re asking me which way is going to be more practical – I’ve introduced in the health committee the state option for single payer. I got 4 votes. Out of 23 members. No Republicans and 4 out of 13 Democrats.  I think, you know, there is the potential to do better, but right now – for a variety of reasons having to do, among other things, with the fact that the insurance companies and the drug companies are spending hundreds of millions of dollars in lobbyists, in campaign contributions, single payer is not going to prevail at this particular point. We have more and more people in Vermont, more and more people in America, that  support that concept, but that grassroots strength has not manifested in the congress right now.

odum: Do you think universal coverage is attainable and sustainable without actually eliminating the private insurance industry or is leaving multiple payers on the table – even in a sort of Medicare-for-all scenario – limit the ability to capture savings from inefficiency too much?

Sanders: That’s a very good question. What my fear is, you know, you can put a lot of money into the system, you can expand Medicaid which will cover perhaps 20 million more people if you take it up to 150% of poverty – you can put heavy subsidies and help people, low and moderate income people to find private insurance or a public insurance program – but the question you’re asking is a good question. Because it suggests that if you put that much money – more money – into an already wasteful system, at what point does the federal government just say, you know what, we just can’t afford to keep throwing money at a wasteful system, we’re going to cut back.

So theoretically, yes, you can have universal insurance simply by throwing more money into a dysfunctional system. There is, given the fact that we have an $11 trillion national debt right now, what would probably happen is that at some point people would say, you know what, we’re going to have to cut back.

odum: Now talking about the plan that’s being bandied about and the so-called ‘public option.’ Opponents say it will be too competitive with private insurers and will lead to single payer from everybody opting into it. Proponents generally say no it won’t, but during the campaign, there was at least one Presidential candidate who was openly saying that such an approach might do just that, and was trying to make it a selling point. What do you think? Could this help grease the skids to single payer?

Sanders: Well, what it does do, if you – what the polls seem to indicate, in fairly overwhelming numbers, over 70% in a New York Times poll – is people would like the option of being able to choose a Medicare type program in competition with the private insurance companies. I think, on a level playing field offering the same set of benefits, the public proposal wins out but the administrative costs would be substantially less, and in general people feel better about a Medicare type program than they would private insurance. So I think you will see significant numbers of people coming into a private program.

Would that mean that after a certain period of time, with the existence of an expanded Medicaid, Medicare, and a public program that brings more and more people into it, that if that program performs well, you’ll be left with private insurance companies left with private insurance companies having relatively small numbers of people… perhaps, but there are other scenarios … where that would not take place, but it is a possibility.

odum: Will you vote for a bill that doesn’t include a public option?

Sanders: I don’t want to – the answer is, I have been probably – you know, my view is that there should be a single payer – at the very, very least there has got to be, not just a public option, but a strong public option, and let’s leave it at that. That is what my view is, and I don’t want to be talking about what I will do and what I won’t do, but I think at the very very least there has got to be a strong public option.

Now in the bill – the bill that passed has, I don’t know how many pages it has, but many many many hundreds of pages, so a lot of good things in this bill. While it is not single payer, and while even the public option is not as strong as I would like, there are a number of things in it that have not gotten a lot of publicity which are very important.

For example, I have pushed very hard on the whole issue of primary health care. Because I think you’re not going to tackle the health care crisis in general, to what it means to the people and the costs, unless you significantly change our approach to primary health care. In this bill, we have basically laid the groundwork for a revolution in primary health care, and that’s something that I pushed. There will be a quadrupling of community health centers in Vermont. In the last six years we’ve gone from 2, to 8, and you know have over 30… federally qualified health care centers which provide on a sliding scale basis primary health care, dental care, mental health counseling and so forth – prescription drugs. We have over 30 satellites treating over 100,000 Vermonters in terms of their primary health care right now. We’re going to increase that number with new health centers in Bennington and Addison Counties over the next couple of years. This legislation quadruples the number of community health centers in America. Quadruples them. Providing them in every underserved area in America. … we’re going to get tens of thousands of new doctors and dentists into primary health care. Is that pretty significant? It is.

This legislation puts a lot more money into disease prevention, so that we can do our best to prevent people from coming down with heart disease, cancer, diabetes, and other chronic diseases, which cost significant sums of money. We have language in there dealing with quality control – (to) deal with the reality that some medical facilities provide higher quality care at lower costs than other facilities do, and to learn from that experience. Is that important? It sure is.

So there are a number of components in this bill that are pretty good. Pretty significant. There are others that are fairly weak, and that’s where we are today.

odum: How committed do you think the Obama administration is to making sure this bill comes out the other end a meaningful bill – it seems like the signals have been sometimes mixed.

Sanders: I think that’s not necessarily the right question. I think they are committed. The problem is – here’s what you’ve got politically. You have the Republicans who essentially don’t want to do anything. So that means the ballgame is completely with the Democrats, and as you know, the Democrats are not a particularly progressive party. So you’ve got a number of conservative Democrats whose views on this issue are not different than the Republicans. They don’t want – forget single payer – they don’t support a strong public plan. You need to expand funding for example – they don’t want to do progressive funding, they would do a tax on health care benefits for example, which is totally anathema to many progressives.

Here in an instant is the heart of the problem; you have a health care system today that is disintegrating, and it ends up being the most wasteful, expensive, bureaucratic, in the entire world. The situation if we don’t do anything will only deteriorate further…

…you have Republicans saying no to anything significant, which leaves only the Democrats to deal with it. You have a number of conservative Democrats who are not prepared to do that for a variety of reasons, you have the insurance companies and the health care industry spending $1.3 million every single day – every single day – on lobbying, drug companies spending huge sums of money.

So the political question you have – is the United States Congress with the Republicans saying no – right wing and not wanting to do anything. With the Democrats not being particularly progressive. Is there the political capability of addressing this crisis? And the answer is, it’s not quite clear. It may well be that there is not. You know, its like saying that there’s is a major fire in a downtown in a small town and you just don’t have the fire department to put it out, and the fire is wreaking havoc. That’s where we are right now. It’s a huge crisis, it is getting worse, we are in worse shape than any other major country on Earth, and we may not have – for a variety of reasons – the political will to stand up to the insurance companies … and that just may be the political reality. I hope it is not, but that may be.

odum: Well, we’re working on those Democrats…

At this point, how are the prospects for keeping the caucus together against a filibuster looking – and that’s been an effort you’ve really been at the forefront in.

Sanders: And I’ve helped kind of raise that issue. In some respects, the election of Al Franken is the best thing that could happen to the Democrats, and in some respects its the worst thing, because what it says now, when the average American says ‘Wait a minute, we’ve given you a Democratic – we had 8 years of the worst administration in the modern history of America, George W Bush, all right? We turned that administration aside and we gave you a Democratic president, we gave you a strong vote in the house, and now we’ve given you a filibuster proof vote in the Senate with Al Franken. You’ve got 60 votes. And the good news is you have the power to do something.’

What I have said is that every Democrat in that caucus – or independent – can say to the Republicans that we’re not going to let you filibuster and filibuster and filibuster and defeat the ability of the American people to address the health care crisis, and that’s wrong. We’re going to vote to stop the Republican filibuster, and the point here that’s underlying that point is that  you do not need 60 votes to pass legislation, you need 60 votes to stop a Republican filibuster. And my view from day one has been that every Democrat has to pledge to stop a Republican – every person in the Democratic caucus – has got to vote to stop a Republican filibuster. And if after that, there are some Democrats who are not prepared to support at the very least a strong public plan, let them vote no. All you need is 50 votes plus the vice president and you’re going to have health care reform with a strong public plan. And that’s been my view.

And running to the Republicans – and Chuck Grassley and others in the conservative group saying ‘oh you need our vote.’ You don’t need their vote. There’s 60 in the Democratic caucus, you can stand together you can defeat the Republican filibuster, then you need 50 of them plus one and you’ve got 50 of them plus one to pass a strong public plan

odum: On the way out, I’d ask if you have any suggestions of what Vermonters can do to help this process, given that, you know, we’ve got a pretty solid delegation in you three guys up there. Is there any other way we can weigh in and try to affect it?

Sanders: The answer is, I think, you have – the message has got to be that every member of the Democratic caucus has got to be prepared. That number one – at the very least, there’s got to be a strong public plan within the legislation. And the Finance committee is not going to report out a strong public plan. The Health Committee did and the House bill has a reasonably strong plan. And number two, that if there are people in th4e Democratic caucus that don’t want to support a strong public plan, that’s fine. Let them vote no. But let the entire caucus stand together against the Republican effort to do nothing, and that we need a national movement – a strong grassroots national effort to do that, and I hope Vermonters will participate in that effort.

“But it's my house.”
“You're under arrest anyway.”

America's newest crime: being in a house while black.

BOSTON (July 20) – Police responding to a call about “two black males” breaking into a home near Harvard University ended up arresting the man who lives there — Henry Louis Gates Jr., the nation's pre-eminent black scholar.
Gates had forced his way through the front door because it was jammed, his lawyer said. Colleagues call the arrest last Thursday afternoon a clear case of racial profiling.

You've gone out for the evening and forgotten your keys, or maybe the door is stuck, so what do you do?

It's your house, right? So if you have no other choice, you break the door in, or break a (preferably cheap) window and let yourself in.

Then, if you're a black man living in Boston, be prepared to deal with the police, and be careful how you talk to them.

Skip Gates broke into his own house, and when the police showed up he took umbrage, reasoning that he was being targeted for his race. If you're the cop, and you have any sense, what do you say? How about, “Sorry to bother you, sir, but we had to check out the break-in report. I'm glad you were able to get in.”

What do these cops do? They arrest him for disorderly conduct.

Gates — the director of Harvard's W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research — initially refused to show the officer his identification, but then gave him a Harvard University ID card, according to police.
“Gates continued to yell at me, accusing me of racial bias and continued to tell me that I had not heard the last of him,” the officer wrote.
He was arrested on a disorderly conduct charge after police said he “exhibited loud and tumultuous behavior.” He was released later that day on his own recognizance. An arraignment was scheduled for Aug. 26. Police refused to comment on the arrest Monday.

The next time you find yourself wondering if there is still a need for the NAACP after 100 years, remember this story.

 Center stage to a large degree  was  his for the  taking as some of the bigger lites of  the Republican  party  were  no shows Arnold Schwarzenegger ,Sarah Palin ,Tim Pawlenty and Bobby Jindal  failed to attend .Governor Mark Sanford may still be resting after hiking to South America . This past weekend Douglas debuted as chairman of the National Governors Association. Recently greenwashed online as the 8th greenest governor in the nation Douglas moved his performance on to Broadway or eh Biloxi. Haley Barbour RGA head and the former head of the RNC back in the  Contract for America glory days has a soft spot for the new chairman Gov.Douglas .After the last election he described Douglas as “being stronger than a  field of garlic up there in Vermont”. (It is wonderful to think when they are alone together Barbour calls him Jimbo.)

Last week some here in Vermont were most atwitter in anticipation about this milestone in Douglas’s career. “This month Douglas adds to his resume the chairmanship of the National Governors Association. The timing is fortuitous. He assumes a leadership position that will give him incredible national exposure in what will primarily be a bipartisan setting.” Chris Graff corporate spokesman for National Life gushed

Sadly it looks like Governor Douglas may see his new role in simpler terms, mainly balking, balking at unfunded federal mandates.

Several governors joined Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano in calling on Congress to revise requirements by this fall for secure driver’s licenses that are intended to help boost national security. The governors said federal mandates for the licenses are too expensive, and 13 states have voted not to participate in the Real ID Act passed after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

In response NGA Chairman Douglas sagely noted that “Security standards are only useful if people are willing and able to use them,” said Vermont Gov. Jim Douglas, a Republican.

Such comforting simplicity in a world so  complex , many things in life are only useful when people are willing and able to use them.

Who could have predicted that he would shine so brightly in Biloxi, a star in the Republican field of garlic indeed?

http://www.vermontbiz.com/arti…

http://www.timesargus.com/arti…

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07…

It’s not new news anymore, but…

(The Vermont Milk Co.) formed by farmers who were seeking stable milk prices and added value for their product has shut its doors…

…Board member Sam Burr told The Burlington Free Press that the company was forced to close this week because of insurmountable debt.

Against my admittedly bare bones impression of their business model, I remember a few years back questioning its long-term viability. Maybe without the economic downturn it would’ve worked, but we’ll never know. It was clearly in trouble before the bottom fell out of the economy.

Anyone inclined to celebrate because Anthony Pollina bugs them shouldn’t. This endeavor was not Anthony Pollina – although he was obviously a huge part of it. But even that’s beside the point. Pollina has bugged me relentlessly over the years for a variety of reasons, but the fact is he was trying to do something good here. Trying to make a difference. It what he always does, what we try to do here, and the news of the VMC’s collapse has no silver lining. Sure, there were things about the operation that gave me the creeps – such as its anonymous bailout during the Pollina gubernatorial campaign – but it was without question a force for good… just not a force built to survive.

What its collapse will be is fodder for those who feel that the very nature of the market makes it impossible to do any meaningful, systemic good within it. I think this is a deceptively simplistic path to go down – in its way, as deceptively simplistic as some of the assumptions behind troubled endeavors such as the VMC; that one can avoid the downsides of capitalism simply by getting into business and choosing not to be greedy and playing by your own rules. Of course, the realities of a complex system like our economy are largely immune to being influenced by our personal (often way too easy) dogma, no matter how dearly it is held.

But at the end of the day, Pollina & company were trying to think outside the box. Much like his Progressive Party itself is an attempt to think outside the box. And when such outside-the-box attempts fail, there’s the added downside of feeding cynicism and making it even harder for the next outside-the-box idea to get traction, at least for a while.

I don’t know what the next creative idea will be – either for Vermont farmers, or any other demographic in dire straits. I do know that we have to find ways to encourage this sort of creativity, but we need to be smarter (and less dogmatic) about it – and that means not only challenging what we may see as a hostile system or status quo, but challenging our own easy assumptions and ofttimes-seductively-simple solutions as well.

From today’s (Sunday) Times Argus:

In one email, staff members write a response to an article. The e-mail’s title is “Proopsed surrogate: Chad Walldorf.” That indicates Sanford’s office wrote the piece for Walldorf, a political ally and former chief of staff, to sign his name to.

Sanford spokesman Joel Sawyer said the practice is common among politicians. “I wouldn’t say we do it often,” Sawyer said.

(E-mails show concern about image of Sanford’s administration, Sunday Rutland Herald/Times Argus, 07/19/09)

More reference to the guv’s friends’ plagiarism is found further on in the article.

I would really like to know … how common is the above?

Most parents of college-age students have had the same experience: complete the FAFSA, which is burdensome enough in itself, submit the information, wait for the notification of the expected family contribution, and then try to face the shock. Whatever you thought you could afford to pay, it’s not nearly as much as what they tell you you’re going to pay. Not even close.

There is a crisis in higher education in the United States. People just can’t afford it, and many students graduate with paralyzing levels of debt. What we should do is what many civilized countries do: provide higher education free, or nearly free. We’re not going to do that, but we should.

Obama’s new proposal is a major step in the right direction. By directing more money to community colleges, the new plan will bring higher education within reach of many who cannot now afford it; direct funds to some of the most motivated students, who are best able to benefit from it; and provide education and training that is directly relevant to the career needs of many students.

Community colleges have never gotten the respect they deserve. Everyone knows a derogatory nickname for the community college in their community: when I was at Michigan State I couldn’t tell you how many times I heard Lansing Community College referred to as Last Chance College. What a mistake. Community colleges provide great value for the money, are nimble, and reach nontraditional students who are there not just because it’s expected of them, but because they are prepared to get something out of it.

I think this proposal is a great idea. It’s also a major campaign promise kept.And if you’re a parent or a prospective college student, this proposal builds on a great educational option.

I’d like to see us follow this model here in Vermont.

The word “absentee” has a context to it: it’s not always used to simply describe absence, but it’s often used to describe neglectful absence.  Its context is generally one that’s perjorative, which is why it was alarming to see the headline in today’s Free press: “Absentee rates rise for teachers in Burlington.”

But the article itself isn’t referring just to unscheduled absence or people disappearing from their jobs:

Burlington teachers were absent an average of 14.6 days for illness, conferences, personal days and other reasons in the most recent school year, and school-district officials are studying that number as they address a 23 percent jump in substitute-teacher costs since 2007.

Now… if this piece had been serious journalism, it would have done a little investigation: how did these breakdowns vary from previous years?  Are teachers really shirking off more (as the headline implies), or are they just being dragged to more work-related conferences?  “illnesses,” “personal days,” and “conferences” are three very different things and lumping them all together into a single factor is irresponsible and potentially misleading.

From my point of view, I can’t tell if this is a deliberate attempt to make teachers look like they’re not doing their jobs or just a poorly executed piece, but either way, there’s a level of irresponsibility here that needs to be called out.

(Good stuff from Matthew. Wish I’d written it. – promoted by odum)

Before I begin, I feel like I should put a disclaimer out.  I don’t often expect much from the opinion page of the Burlington Free Press, but I think most of us agree that it hasn’t been too rough on our side of debate this year.  But after reading executive editor Mike Townsend’s “Commentary Lite” piece in the paper today, I was a bit baffled.  If it was all just simply an engaging piece of self-satire aimed at the lack of depth seen in their own coverage of the July 15th filing reports and their implications in the race, then my hat is off to them.  Unfortunately, it appears that isn’t the case, and the rest of the editorial board must have taken the day off for this one to have seen the printing press.

If you have not clicked on the link yet, and read for yourself, it is probably worth doing so.  Among other things, the article touches on Democrats stifling Progressives, economists at Vermont Tiger, and Democrats needing to become more like Republicans.  In all situations, it falls flat on its face.  So I figured I would tackle the questions, and maybe we could have a Q&A of our own.

Why has the election for governor already begun? Didn’t we just have an election?

It has begun because this is the window of time that a modern political campaign needs to get going.  All across the country there are gubernatorial candidates filing to run.  The difference is that the Vermont Constitution gives the governor only a two-year term.  While we can have the debate as to whether the short-term is a positive thing, it certainly congests the election calendar.

Why are Democrats pushing the election campaign up so early?

Because they want to win, and were frankly embarrassed with how late the Symington campaign began.  It takes time to connect with every part of the state, and that is why the framework is being laid now.



So this is the answer? Starting the election a year and a half before we vote and disrupt my Sunday dinner with phone calls and door-knockers?

If that is their strategy, then they are not running a smart campaign at this point.  Though there are no guarantees as to whether Jim gets nervous and you get called for a poll.

Will the Progressives permit the Democrats so rudely to relegate them to the dustbin of obscurity?

Now here’s one that’s not happening anywhere.  Democrats know they’ll need Progressive voters to unseat Douglas, it’s a no-brainer.  So if courting them and ignoring them are now the same, then yes, it is occurring.  Given that the Racine camp is already reaching out to Progressives, I would guess that they will receive plenty of attention, particularly during the primary.

What can they possibly do about the issues 17 months before the election?

No one is on the stump.  They are fundraising.



Oh, Democrats are going to make campaign finance reform an issue again?

No.  I doubt it shows up on any candidates radar.



With the potential of a big Democratic field, will they be able to work together to defeat Jim Douglas?

No one knows at this point.  There certainly is potential for them to, but candidates haven’t really had to make their pitches against each other yet.  With the Tom Salmon Show still in operation however, surely there will be some level of conflict.

Next is a section about “money”, where Jim does take a few hits, VT Tiger is invoked, all sorts of odd stuff goes on.  It eventually finishes with the notion that Democrats are going to have to become more like Republicans, which is foolish given the state’s partisan make-up, the struggles tied to the incumbent, and the way the public has reacted to the past legislative session.

Finally, the seminal question…

How will this affect me?

For the average Vermonter, it won’t.  You’re not going to see TV ads.  You’re unlikely to get called for a long while.  You probably won’t even see people on the side of the road asking you to honk your horn.  Most likely, you’ll just decide when you get in the booth on election day, if you choose to show up.  But candidates raising early money won’t become an emotional burden for the average Vermonter.