Per The Chicago Tribune.  McMillan is the mayor of Jena:

No sooner did tens of thousands of African-American demonstrators depart the racially tense town of Jena, La., last week after protesting perceived injustices than white supremacists flooded in behind them.
[…]
McMillin has insisted that his town is being unfairly portrayed as racist-an assertion the mayor repeated in an interview with Richard Barrett, the leader of the Nationalist Movement, a white supremacist group based in Learned, Miss., who asked McMillin to “set aside some place for those opposing the colored folks.”

“I am not endorsing any demonstrations, but I do appreciate what you are trying to do,” Barrett quoted McMillin as saying. “Your moral support means a lot.”

McMillin declined to return calls seeking comment Monday.

Barker’s father, David, said his family did not know the nature of Barrett’s group when they agreed to be interviewed, adding, “I am not a white supremacist, and neither is my son.”

But Barrett said he explained his group and its beliefs to the Barker family, who then invited him to stay overnight at their home on the eve of last week’s protest march.
[…]

It’s funny; in Southeastern Vermont, I can’t think of a single time I had a problem connected with my sexual orientation.  It’s difficult to tell, however.  It’s not like I’ll know if I got turned down from a job for being queer vs. some other factor.  And I’m sure that I’ve had students who have a problem with it.  But, still… it’s never really been a problem for me in any way I can perceive.  And yet, clearly, it’s still a fairly big problem in Vermont, in ways that honestly surprise me.  Maybe it’s more common in different areas, or maybe it’s just something that I see as so completely ridiculous to hassle someone about that it just goes right over my head these days.

It’s not like I don’t know what the dehumanization is like.  I remember college, and being harassed almost daily, with people coming by at all hours of the night to leave nasty notes on my door and sometimes just to bang on my door so I couldn’t get any sleep, and I remember the administration completely ignoring it at the time, hoping it, and probably I, would just go away.  I remember one time being harassed by a guy on the street and being scared for my life because I wasn’t sure where I could go to get away from him fast enough.  I remember having been threatened by another student once and absolutely nothing happening to stop it, even though the administration said they’d back me up if I filed a complaint.  But these things happened a long time ago, in another place and another time.

I guess I just don’t feel that way living here.  In Vermont, I feel comfortable that I won’t get harassed or hassled.  While I’m sure homophobia exists here, it’s not my experience that it’s a problem.  The Burlington Free Press, however, reports on some fairly nasty stuff:

Rachel Rosenberg knows what it’s like to feel dehumanized.

The transgender-identified University of Vermont student, who prefers male pronouns but still uses his birth name, says he has been barked at while walking with his partner on campus and has endured so many instances of sexually explicit harassment, it’s hard for him to keep track of it anymore.

Rosenberg, 20, came to Vermont from New York because of UVM’s reputation of being an inclusive place for sexual minorities. But after just a couple of months on campus, Rosenberg realized that the student body and the Burlington community do not necessarily subscribe to the same ideas of tolerance and inclusion that UVM as an institution does.

What Rosenberg learned about the university community was what many lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Vermonters have known about the state for a long time. While Vermont as an institution seeks to promote tolerance and acceptance through policies such as civil unions and same-sex adoption, the community as a whole has a long way to go toward fostering an environment that is safe and welcoming for LGBT Vermonters.

On the books, Vermont does look really good.  But having something on the books is not the same as enforcing it, and having a school which has good principles is not the same as having good communication about those principles.

Allowing kids to get away with harassing lgbt kids isn’t really acceptable and I think UVM needs to step up to the plate here and see what they can do to support these kids who are getting harassed and to curtail the harassment that does exist. 

I just watched CBS’ “60 Minutes” for the first time in a long time.  The interview I watched was this one.

I swear, I thought I’d tuned into Fox News.  Scott Pelley is either a shill for the Bush administration, or possibly, a shill for the Vice President’s office.  What a complete farce of an interview.

Is this what happens when I don’t watch Mainstream News for awhile?  When I see how bad it becomes, I’m appalled in ways that others who have watched it slowly decline over the years wouldn’t be. 

This was just horrible.

I don’t post as much about racial issues as I might here and I feel as though I’m already late to the game on this one, but I don’t see anyone else having posted about this so I think it’s worth some discussion.



So picture this scenario: a group of black kids decided they want to sit under a tree that’s on the traditionally “white” side of a high school. When asked if it’s okay, the Vice Principal tells them they can sit wherever they like. Shortly after, several nooses are hung from the tree.

Over the next few months, there are a series of racial incidents. In one case, a group of black kids is charged for theft when they wrestle a white man to the ground and take his shotgun away. This is immediately after they’d been in an argument with him and he ran back to his car to grab his gun.

This all ends in an incident in which six black kids are arrested, called “criminals” because of a fight at their high school which leaves a white kid unconscious.

This is contemporary. This is all within the last year.

This was what led to one of the biggest civil rights marches this country has seen in a long time.

What did we do during this monumental act?

We bitched about Patrick Leahey voting for the condemnation of the moveon.org ad.

I’m sort of disgusted with myself for not having posted about this sooner. I’m really of disgusted with myself for not having had it clear in my head just how important this is.

Per The Rutland Herald:

Inspection process criticized; tower work nearly complete

VERNON – The state says it is not satisfied with the inspection process at Vermont Yankee nuclear plant’s cooling towers, even as Entergy Nuclear Thursday announced it is on the verge of returning the reactor to full power this weekend.
[…]
David O’Brien, commissioner of the Department of Public Service, and other state officials also suggested Thursday that Entergy think seriously of replacing the wooden structure of the cooling towers with a different material, in order to make the plant more reliable, especially if the company plans on operating another 20 years.

“I’m very disappointed in the inspection process,” O’Brien said after the briefing, as officials were given a tour of the repairs to the three-story high cooling tower. “There was inspection work that could have been done.”
[…]
Sullivan told O’Brien that while other nuclear reactors with similar cooling towers were switching to composite materials instead of wood, there were no plans to make such a change at Vermont Yankee.

The company said it didn’t see the rotted wooden beams, which caused the collapse because they were blocked by sheets of perforated plastic, through which millions of gallons of cooling water drips.
[…]
O’Brien also said the state would revisit Entergy’s original 2002 power contract with Vermont utilities to see whether there was some relief for Vermont utilities and its ratepayers because of the power reduction.
[…]

Bipartisan efforts?

Are you *&*@ kidding me? 

Anyway, here’s Edwards’ response ad:

( – promoted by JulieWaters)

“Nuclear Plant”
“Emergency Shutdown”
“Scram”

Per the Rutland Herald article “Failed valve triggers Yankee shutdown:”

[…]
Workers at the Vernon reactor had “flagged” a large troublesome steam valve when it failed to shut off during testing Wednesday. When they returned Thursday to further test the troublesome valve, all four steam line valves started to close, throwing the plant into an emergency shutdown, or scram, according to State Nuclear Engineer Uldis Vanags.
[…]
Vanags said the plant remained in “hot” shutdown rather than “cold” shutdown. Such a shutdown is usually an indicator that Entergy Nuclear believes the problem can be fixed quickly.

But Vanags said he didn’t know what the original problem with the first valve was at this point and he was waiting for additional information from Entergy.
[…]

Well, that’s comforting.

UPDATE– Bearing Blamed in Yankee Outage…

Lack of grease in a bearing in a large motor-operated valve is being blamed for Thursday’s emergency shutdown at the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant.

And the plant’s staff may have made things worse during their troubleshooting and actually caused the shutdown, a state official said Friday.

Uldis Vanags, the state nuclear engineer, said it appears that the bearing was inadequately lubricated during the last refueling outage at Yankee.

“There was insufficient grease applied in the last outage,” Vanags said. “They’ve put in a new bearing and lubricated it really well.”

Vanags said that federal regulators were investigating the possibilities that actions by Entergy Nuclear staff during troubleshooting of the sticky valve is what actually caused the reactor to shut down, rather than the valve itself.

“The way the troubleshooting was conducted could have caused the trip,” he said.

We need to really push right now on lack of faith in Vermont Yankee and its ability to maintain core safety standard.  One way we can do this is to start pushing the Democratic/Progressive majority’s energy plan NOW, before the legislature even gets back in session, to make it a top priority and make it politically difficult for Douglas to veto it again. 

We need to start blanketing our papers with letters, not only talking about the dangers of nuclear power, but tying them in to three things:

• The energy bill that Douglas vetoed and why it’s more important to refocus our work on safe, clean and renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power;
• local economy and how when people are invested in their own community, they don’t have  to worry about their safety being in the hands of large corporations which see the surrounding communities in terms of profit and loss and little else;
• that lack of regulation and supervision is a dangerous thing and if we can’t adequately insure that VY is up to the task of maintaining their own equipment (be sure to mention the recent incident, the fire and the rods that they just couldn’t find one day).
  

This is a big deal.  We need to write letters about it.  We need to make phone calls about it.

Per today’s Rutland Herald:

Following the lead of Washington state, Vermont will develop a high-security license with radio frequency ID chips and other security features that can be scanned at the border. The license will cost more than a standard driver’s license, but will be considerably cheaper than a passport, according to Douglas spokesman Jason Gibbs.

Per Yahoo’s Tech News:

Vermont plans to develop an enhanced driver’s license for residents who volunteer to use it. The enhanced driver’s license will be slightly more expensive than a standard Vermont state driver’s license and will require proof of citizenship, identity, and residence, according to DHS. It will also contain security features similar to a U.S. passport, which uses RFID.

This looks very benign on the surface, but let’s talk about this for a second, because RFID is something that may or may not be familiar to y’all.  RFID is, as the article notes, “Radio Frequency” identification.

What does “Radio Frequency Identification” mean?

It means that there’s a chip in your driver’s license which can be tracked by anyone with the right technology.  It means that you can be tailed, tracked and followed without ever knowing about it.  It’s like your Driver’s license has a built in Lojack and most of us won’t even know it’s there.

Where did this plan come from?  Did anyone in the legislature have an opportunity to weigh in on it, or is this just a unilateral decision on the part of Douglas to help lead Vermont into an end run against the bill of rights?

Per The Brattleboro Reformer:

BRATTLEBORO — Structural problems in one of the banks of cooling fans at Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant forced operators to dial back on the facility’s power output.

Though the cause for the failure of one of the plant’s 22 cooling towers has not yet been determined, said a spokesman for the power plant, he assured the public that shutting down 11 of the fans doesn’t affect safety.

Yes, because who could we possibly trust to assess the safety of a nuclear powerplant, if not that plant’s spokesman?