( – promoted by Jack McCullough)

You know the saying that one picture is worth a thousand words? Here's a case where that is true.

You've probably heard the stories about Vermont Yankee having to reduce power, and you've seen the press reports that it was caused by “problems” in the cooling towers.  Wooden components and piping had failed in one of the towers, said Sheehan and Robert Williams, spokesman for plant owner Entergy Nuclear.

What you probably haven't seen or heard are descriptions of the cause of the problems or pictures of what the damage really entails. According to a filing yesterday by VPIRG, Arnie Gunderson, an expert  on cooling towers, 

 the current damage and derate shares causes identical with the June/July 2004 fire, outage, and derate. Those identical shared causes are poor maintenance, lack of attention to detail in engineering, failure of aging management, and the impacts of extended power uprate (“EPU”).

  VPIRG's filing also shows photographs of the failed cooling tower. The photos depict the wooden and metal wreckage of the cooling tower, with water flooding out of a huge broken pipe. It's pretty dramatic, and it certainly gives one pause about whether the MSM coverage has been enough to convey the scope of this problem.

Here's the most dramatic picture in the group:

 Maybe, the next time we hear conservatives in the Douglas Administration bragging about Vermont's “clean” power portfolio, we should remind them of the costs of this “clean” power.

I'm on vacation on Martha's Vineyard this week (in fact, I'm missing a chance to see Howard Dean in Oak Bluffs tonight–fifty bucks is a little steep), so I'm reading the Globe every day, which I never do at home.

Here's a story that doesn't seem to have made the national news yet, but it's troubling nonetheless. The Anti-Defamation League is a national sponsor of a popular anti-bigotry program called No Place for Hate that is designed to challenge anti-Semitism, racism, homophobia, and all forms of bigotry in their communities and schools.

Unfortunately, “all forms of bigotry” apparently don't include the Turkish genocide of Armenians in the last century.

From 1915 to 1923, Ottoman Turks massacred as many as 1.5 million Armenians in what is now modern-day Turkey. Armenians, historians, and some European nations recognized the killings as genocide. The Turkish government has refused to accept the genocide label, and the ADL's national director, Abraham H. Foxman, has also infuriated Armenian-Americans for refusing to call it a genocide.

When asked in a Globe interview last month if he believed what happened to the Armenians was genocide, Foxman replied, “I don't know.” Critics have seized on the remark as suggesting the issue is open to debate, and some have called it genocide denial.

Yup, it's true, and this position puts the ADL at risk of losing some of its credibility and hurting its programs. One town in Massachusetts has already pulled out, and Armenian leaders around Massachusetts and the United States are already moving in the same direction.

Maybe it's time for the ADL to take another look at the issue, and resume its proud position as a leading opponent of bigotry.

It's not just a partisan question, but we're certainly hearing lots of stories about how Rove was the greatest political genius we've ever seen, never lost, and blah, blah, blah.

A story in today's Globe raises yet another question about that, although Rove's name isn't even mentioned.

I've made this observation before over at Rational Resistance, and now it's been confirmed and even Arlen Specter agrees with me. It has to do with the unceremonious way they dumped Rumsfeld after the election last year. You remember, a few days before the election Bush was asked if Rummy was staying on and Bush replied that he absolutely was, that he was going to be the Secretary of Defense for the forseeable future? And then, the day after the election, Rummy was out all of a sudden. Bush even admitted lying about it, although not in so many words.

Today's Globe has a story based on a long series of FOIA requests, which were finally successful after months of stonewalling by the administration, and now it turns out that Rummy's letter of resignation was signed the day before the election. The White House confirmed yesterday that Rumsfeld's letter of resignation was dated Nov. 6, 2006, the day before voters — many of them furious about the war in Iraq — evicted Republicans from the leadership of the House and Senate.

Now we know that no decisions were made in the Bush White House without Rove, but doesn't it strike you that it might have been smarter to toss Rove under the bus before the election? That's what Arlen Specter thinks: “If Rumsfeld had been out, you bet it would have made a difference,” Senator Arlen Specter, Republican of Pennsylvania, said at the time. “I'd still be chairman of the Judiciary Committee.”

So this obviously proves that Rove isn't as smart as the conventional wisdom (and he) would have you believe.

It also proves that, after all these years, we finally have something to thank Rove for.

Who would have thought it?

Throughout the war, the reporting in The New Yorker, both by Sy Hersh and Jane Mayer, has been indispensable to understanding what is actually going on.

In this week's New Yorker, Jane Mayer has a great piece about  how the CIA has used torture to extract confessions from people it has decided are terrorists. The things that are being done in our name, with no assurance that they are gaining useful information or protecting the American people, are nothing short of shocking.

What may be newer is the way Mayer documents the manipulation of intelligence “disclosures” by the government, and how credulous the American press has been in swallowing whatever the government has decided to dish out.

Read this article today:

In March, Mariane Pearl, the widow of the murdered Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, received a phone call from Alberto Gonzales, the Attorney General. At the time, Gonzales’s role in the controversial dismissal of eight United States Attorneys had just been exposed, and the story was becoming a scandal in Washington. Gonzales informed Pearl that the Justice Department was about to announce some good news: a terrorist in U.S. custody—Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the Al Qaeda leader who was the primary architect of the September 11th attacks—had confessed to killing her husband. (Pearl was abducted and beheaded five and a half years ago in Pakistan, by unidentified Islamic militants.) The Administration planned to release a transcript in which Mohammed boasted, “I decapitated with my blessed right hand the head of the American Jew Daniel Pearl in the city of Karachi, Pakistan. For those who would like to confirm, there are pictures of me on the Internet holding his head.”

Five years ago: Iraq's information minister, Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf, told the Arabic satellite television station Al-Jazeera that there was no need for U.N. weapons inspectors to return to Baghdad and branded as a “lie” allegations that Saddam Hussein still had weapons of mass destruction.

Thanks, Ralph.

You may have already read about the tax assessment controversy in the Capital City.

The news today is that last night (actually early this morning, since the meeting went past midnight) the Montpelier City Council voted unanimously to base the next year's property tax bills on the old assessments, giving the city another year to be sure it's getting the appraisal system right. 

The room was packed with people challenging the seemingly arbitrary way the figures were arrived at, the lack of transparency in the methodology, andwhat they considered an inadequate response to their concerns by city officials. Complaints also raised broader policy issues, such as the allocation of tax burdens between commercial and residential properties.

There is room to be impressed both by the thoughtfulness of the comments, the responsiveness of the Council members, and the organizing job that Gary Schy did to get this rolling. 

Cross-posted from Beyond VSH: 

And on kids, no less!

You probably know that the Brattleboro Retreat is making a bid to replace at least some of the beds at VSH (Vermont State Hospital) when VSH goes out of business sometime later this century, right?

And you may also know that four years ago the Retreat called the Brattleboro Police to the Tyler 3  ward to help them control a 16-year-old patient, the police used their Tasers on him, and Vermont Protection and Advocacy (P&A) investigated that report. P&A found:

Vermont Protection & Advocacy concludes that the Brattleboro Retreat’s reliance on the police and the subsequent use of a Taser on A.N. was a treatment failure of serious proportions. Our investigation demonstrates that A.N. and his parents were clear about their concerns leading up to his hospitalization and the difficulties the Retreat could expect to encounter related to A.N.’s behavior. Further, our review of the Retreat’s response to the October 10, 2003 incident indicates an overly heavy reliance on psychopharmacological interventions. VP&A concludes that the use of force on A.N. by the police and the subsequent administration of involuntary medication may have been unnecessary had adequate treatment planning and proactive crisis planning occurred prior to the triggering events that led to A.N.’s agitated and aggressive behavior on October 10, 2003. VP&A also concludes that the Retreat apparently failed to adequately exhaust the de-escalation techniques that staff are trained and certified in, including therapeutic hold when appropriate, prior to calling for police intervention. The facility’s documentation around the resort to police assistance was inadequate to demonstrate its contention that all other reasonable means of de-escalation were attempted and applied appropriately. Our concerns about the physical environment, that being the location of the seclusion room, and the failure of the seclusion room door to withstand damage, are also areas where VP&A believes more forethought by Retreat staff and administration could have provided for a different outcome in this situation.

So what does it say about the Retreat, the Brattleboro Police Department, and the way Vermont law enforcement officials relate to people with mental illnesses when it happens again?

Whatever you might say about VSH, I don't recall ever hearing about them using Tasers. It certainly makes me think twice, or even more, about whether the Retreat should ever be considered as a replacement for VSH, and whether they should be entrusted with the care of anyone in this vulnerable population.

It takes me back to the slogan we used to chant at Nuclear Freeze demonstrations:

 Take the toys away from the boys! 

One of the hoariest truisms about Vermont politics these days is this: “Bill Doyle will always win.” Or sometimes: “The first chance anyone has to beat Bill Doyle will be the second election after he dies.”

It's true that Doyle has had impressive and remarkable longevity since 1969, and that Washington County Democrats have been frustrated at his seeming invincibility for years. He's also legendary for his hard work and his ubiquity, so his string of victories is hardly a surprise.

 And yet, does it have to be that way?

Sen. Doyle crashes cars on car sales lot

August 7, 2007
 

By Susan Allen Times Argus Staff

    Although seatmate Sen. Phil Scott is the professional race car driver in the Legislature, it was Sen. William Doyle who accidentally found himself in a Demolition Derby last week on the lot of Twin City Subaru in Montpelier.

Doyle said he visited the dealership on Thursday afternoon to test-drive some cars. On his final test drive, he had trouble with the brake and ended up speeding over bushes and then into three used cars on the lot, causing considerable damage. Doyle said an ambulance was called to the scene, but he waved off any medical attention.

 I like Bill, and I don't want to be ghoulish about what might happen, but it's hard to believe this news won't be of interest among potential candidates.

Cross posted from Rational Resistance.

You remember Rep. William Jefferson, the Louisiana Democrat who was caught in a bribery sting with $90,000 in cold cash in his freezer?

Of course, that was a long time ago, so you may be wondering why the case is taking so long compared to other prosecutions, like that of Duke Cunningham. You would think they would have this guy locked up already, wouldn't you? Especially since he's a Democrat, which would make the Bushies even more interested in nailing him.

Well, you would think that, except that the people who were going to restore honor and integrity to the Oval Office can't even prosecute corruption right, and that's kept the case tied up since last year.

You see, the Justice Department had the FBI raid Jefferson's Congressional office, something that had never been done before, and Jefferson challenged the search in court. Today, the court ruled that even though the search was legal, the FBI violated the Constitution by searching his Congressional records and papers. The court said the Constitution insists that lawmakers must be free from any intrusion into their congressional duties. Such intrusion, even by a filter team, “may therefore chill the exchange of views with respect to legislative activity,” the court held.

This was an intrusion that was so egregious that it brought together Democrats and Republicans, with former House Speakers Newt Gingrich, a Republican, and Thomas Foley, a Democrat, fil[ing] legal documents opposing the raid, along with former House Minority Leader Bob Michel, a Republican.

Now they still have to litigate whether they can use anything they scooped up in the raid of his office, and there's no telling how long that will take.

Maybe Gonzalez has a new motto: “Sure we're corrupt, but we're incompetent, too!”

Cross posted from Rational Resistance: 

A friend of mine was asking me yesterday if I'm against Obama, and I'm really not. Still, I've come across a couple of things that really show him in a bad light, and since he is the leading candidate among liberals (for instance, he just won the Vermont Democratic Party's straw poll), I think it's important to look closely at him before he's our candidate, not after.

Therefore, I want to link to this diavlog that in it Matt Stoller makes some important points:

1. He was right on Iraq, but he hasn't done anything effective against the war or torture since he's been in the Senate.
2. He doesn't like activists, partly because of his whole “let's just get along” approach to things.
3. He wants to be part of the establishment, and consequently he hasn't really taken on the powerful institutions and politicians, like the press, that got us into the war.
4. There are no spots where you could show that his positions differ from those of Hillary Clinton.

Stoller is also saying that there are things he can do that would get away from these errors, like identifying the people who caused the war (“if he would Sister Souljah a liberal hawk . . .”) and saying that they were wrong and will have no role in his administration.

I know that most of the readers around here probably support him, so I'd be interested to hear what you think after you watch this.