I’m sure this won’t change any minds in the anti-smart meter crowd, but…

A report commissioned by the Vermont Legislature on the potential threat to human health posed by smart meters… found the devices emit only a small fraction of the maximum exposure levels set by the Federal Communications Commission.

The report found that the maximum peak radio frequency level, as measured a mere one foot from a meter, was 3.9% of the FCC’s top exposure limit. And nobody, ever, ever, spends any significant amount of time standing one foot away from a utility meter.

By comparison to that one-foot maximum: a cordless phone emits 1% of the FCC’s limit; a microwave oven emits 6.5%; and a cellphone hits 10.5%. And if you own any of those devices, you’re a hell of a lot closer to them than to the nearest utility meter.

“It is concluded that any potential exposure to the investigated smart meters will comply with the FCC exposure rules by a wide margin,” said the report, which was released Wednesday.

I would now invite Senator Bob Hartwell, the new chair of the Senate Natural Resources Committee, to recant his previous opposition to smart meters. Since he bears the responsibility for being the Senate’s chief voice on environmental issues, and this report was commissioned by the Legislature, it’s the only responsible course he could take.

Granted, that’s assuming Hartwell is “responsible.”

The AP reporter tried to reach anti-everything Vermonters for a Clean Environment for reaction to the report, but “no one from the organization responded.”

I think I can fill in the blank:

The report was skewed, the consultant was in the pocket of Big Energy, the FCC is corrupt, our own favorite research says otherwise, Big Brother is Watching, the black helicopters are coming, and wind turbines are worse than nuclear power.  

Did I get that about right?

A few miscellaneous items from our local media world, some not so fresh but all worth a comment: Another loss for the capitol press corps, a change at the helm of Common Sense Radio, and a further diminishment of its lefty counterpart.

VPB shrinkage. The once-proud Vermont Press Bureau, jewel in the crown of the Mitchell Family Organ, continues to suffer from the declining fortunes of the newspaper business. Not long ago, the VPB had three full-time reporters. Now, it has only one — the redoubtable Peter Hirschfeld.

The practical effect is that Hirschfeld is basically responsible for one story per day (a heavy load in itself), while the Herald and Times Argus will depend on the Associated Press for other Statehouse news. I have lots of respect for Dave Gram and company, but every time we lose a pair of eyes on state government, the available information dwindles.

I have to wonder how long Hirschfeld will stick around. It’s a daunting challenge and the Mitchells don’t pay very well (understandable, given their financial circumstances). How long before he hears the siren song of the PR/Communications world that has proven irresistible to so many underpaid scribes in the past?

And if/when he does move on, will the Mitchells replace him, or simply shut down the VPB entirely?  

The Robster apparently departs. Readers with encyclopedic memories will recall the recent big news from the small pond of Vermont conservatism: the Robster, Rob Roper, was named the new chief of the Ethan Allen Institute. (This frightening “Your hide will make a fine poncho” photograph is his official mugshot from the EAI website. Yikes!)

Roper’s tens of devotees were on tenterhooks: would his ascension to the top of El Jefe General John McLaughry’s “think” tank imperil his future as the deceptively glib host of “Common Sense Radio,” the EAI-funded conservative hour on WDEV Radio?

The answer, sadly, apparently, is yes. I don’t know it for a fact, but I did happen to catch the opening of CSR recently, and the Generic Announcer introduced the host: not Rob Roper, but Bill Sayre.

Awwww. Sleepy Bill Sayre, the man who always sounds like he just woke up from a long winter’s nap. Is this really the best that EAI could do? A guy who projects no energy or personality whatsoever?

If you think I’m exaggerating, try listening sometime. I dare you. However, I wouldn’t advise doing so while operating heavy machinery.

I’d love to see the ratings for WDEV before and after 11:00 a.m. I bet they lose at least three-quarters of Mark Johnson’s audience when that conservative crapfest comes on.

Less and less “Equal Time.” Central Vermont radio listeners with encyclopedic memories will recall the salad days of “Equal Time Radio,” the liberal counterpart to “Common Sense Radio” (formerly “True North Radio”), heard weekdays at 1:00 and hosted by Progressive stalwart Anthony Pollina.

(Brief explainer: WDEV does not program either show. The airtime is bought by the shows’ producers, who then have to find a funding source. That’s why True North collapsed; it couldn’t raise enough money to stay on the air.)

When Pollina decided to run for the State Senate, he had to step away from the mic. Energy activist Carl Etnier took his place. But he struggled to get funding, and never had enough to make it a solid paying gig. (It also wasn’t that great a program; Etnier is deeply knowledgeable about energy issues, but he’s not a dynamic on-air presence* and he never successfully broadened the program to include other topics.) Finally, he and/or WDEV struck a funding deal with Vermont Businesses for Social Responsibility.

*Nothing against Etnier, just that hosting a radio show isn’t his strong suit. It wasn’t Pollina’s either, for that matter.

Over time — both before and after VBSR entered the picture — ETR has gradually diminished. The Friday edition was replaced by one hour of The Thom Hartmann Show — Thom’s weekly hour with Bernie Sanders. When VBSR came on board, the Wednesday show began to focus on business issues from a leftish perspective, and the Thursday hour was given over to Small Dog Electronics as a sort of call-in computer news and advice program. (Small Dog founder Don Mayer is one of the big players in VBSR.)

Now, the next step in the slow extinction of Equal Time Radio: VBSR has taken over the Wednesday edition for a new show called “The Vermont Conversation,” hosted by David Goodman, writer, Waterbury resident, and brother of national radio firebrand Amy Goodman.  VBSR head Andrea Cohen explained the new program:

“It will shine a light on important issues that Vermonters and our businesses deal with every day and on the opportunities for positive change in our state, and it will help keep the Vermont community informed of VBSR activities.”

I think ETR is still intact on Mondays and Tuesdays, but frankly I don’t listen to much midday radio other than Mark Johnson, and the WDEV and ETR websites haven’t been updated recently.

Overall, the program shifts mean that WDEV no longer has a balance of paid talk shows. It has conservative talk five days a week, and live, local, all-topics liberal talk no more than two days a week. I’d be more upset about this if it wasn’t for the fact that Common Sense Radio is so unlistenable. CSR preaches to a very small choir, and has no influence at all on the general political conversation in Vermont.  

Barely two weeks after the surprise departure of telecom czar Karen Marshall, Governor Shumlin is closing his ConnectVt office. The announcement is found on the Vermont.Gov website just below Fish & Wildlife’s new baitfish rules for February.  Shumlin will transition the responsibilities and accountability to the Agency of Commerce & Community Development.

…the temporary office created to expand high-speed broadband internet access statewide by the end of 2013, will be transferred to the Agency of Commerce & Community Development, under Secretary Lawrence Miller

Marshall, ConnectVt’s sole employee, left abruptly on January 8th to take a high-level job with VTel. Until her departure she worked on the fifth floor of the Pavilion building with the governor’s closest advisors. Her duties were to work with private companies (including her new employer) to speed broadband development and facilitate the acquisition and distribution of $410 million in government grants.  

Immediately following Marshall’s  surprise departure, Vermont Telecom Authority board member Rep. Sam Young observed

“It doesn’t look good,” […] “It took a lot of work to get telecom providers to trust state government and share some of their information,” Young says. “I think that trust will be diminished for any future chiefs of Connect VT. I’m not quite sure there will be another one.”

The Glover representative certainly called that one right. With high-speed broadband expansion reportedly nearing 95% completion (according to a puzzlingly complex mapping system) the governor is quietly ending the position of telecom czar, closing ConnectVt, and strategically announcing “incredible progress” but not quite declaring broadband ‘victory.’

Good thing: there are still too many Vermonters whose ‘broadband’ service is provided over phone lines (as dsl) at relatively slow speeds (better than antiquated dial-up, but still …), or who have no broadband at all.

And we’re not even talking about (the lack of) statewide  cell phone coverage!

Great judgment on your personnel pick, there, Gov.  

The wrong side of history looks like.

It's been a couple of days, and I continue to think that President Obama's second inauguration speech was as inspirational as the first, although in different ways.

The first was inspirational in large part because it actually happened, and we still had that element this year. You couldn't watch the television coverage without seeing interviews of black people who just had to be there because they never imagined that in their lifetime they would be watching the inauguration of a president who looked like them. It's impossible to overstate the power.

Still, to me, the most inspiring part of the speech, the part that really demonstrated how far we and the president have come, was when he spoke of the heroes of Seneca Falls, Selma, and Stonewall in the same sentence, and with the same honor.

Again, even after all the changes we've seen in recent decades, for the president to publicly recognize that the struggle for women's rights, for civil rights for racial minorities, and for equal rights for gays and lesbians are the same struggle, and it is a struggle that we all share and must honor is a huge step. In years to come, this will be what people remember of the speech.

And here's where the wrong side of history comes in. A sidelight of this story is that President Obama had originally invited a minister named Louie Giglio to give the benediction only to have it come out that Giglio had written about the evils of homosexuality and gay marriage, saying that legalizing gay marriage would risk “absolutely undermining the whole order of our society”, and asked his listeners to “lovingly but firmly respond to the aggressive agenda” of gay activists.

After some negative reactions to his selection, recalling the choice of Rick Warren to speak at the 2009 inauguration, Giglio withdrew from the ceremony.

Oh, you should have heard the right-wing Christians scream! Or should I say whine?

A post in the online publication “Christian Post” refers to the withdrawal as the result of the power of “Tolerance Tyrants,” and an evangelical blogger who apparently took an OD of his umbrage-enhancing substances (doesn't anyone screen these guys?) said, apparently without a hint of irony,

“January 21, 2013 may go down in history, as the day Americans lost their most important freedom—their freedom of conscience.”

As I say, this is the sound of people witnessing their power over mainstreamm society slipping away.

Monday's events showed where American society is going. The struggle isn't over, not by any means, but we can look forward to the time when the anti-gay forces will be sitting around with the “South's gonna rise again” crowd.

And they won't be missed. 

Now, here’s a novel way to commemorate Martin Luther King Jr. Day: issue a big-ass report criticizing Vermont for spending too damn much money on poor people.

Yep, you guessed it: Bruce Lisman’s Campaign for Vermont is at it again. This time, plausibly bipartisan CFV co-founder Tom Pelham unveiled an analysis of state spending from 2008 to 2012, showing a 22% increase in Vermont’s budget. The biggest fiscal profligate, says Pelham: the Agency of Human Services.

Pelham… told reporters at a Montpelier press conference that despite a 29 percent increase in human services spending since 2008, life for poorer Vermonters hasn’t significantly improved.

Okay, Tom, three points. First, comparing human services spending with a 2008 baseline is a mug’s game, because 2008 was when THE ECONOMY WENT INTO THE TOILET thanks to Wall Street geniuses like your colleague, Bruce Lisman. You whomp up a big hairy recession, and guess what? Human services spending shoots up, and tax revenues fall off.

Is that too complicated?

And second, Tom, OF COURSE poorer Vermonters’ lives haven’t significantly improved, because (a) our economy is still pulling itself out of the ditch that Lisman’s high-flying buddies drove us into, and (b) much of human services spending isn’t meant to improve people’s lives — it’s meant to keep them from freezing and starving and living on the street.

Can you understand that? Guess not.

Oh, and third? A little thing you might remember called TROPICAL STORM IRENE. Hit Vermont about eight months into Governor Shumlin’s first term? Wreaked incredible destruction to people’s lives and livelihoods and the state’s infrastructure? Yeah, that might just have played an eentsy-beentsy — and non-recurring — role in lost revenue and increased spending.

Ya think?

What’s more, Pelham also ignores the impact of the Wall Street crash (and Irene) by asserting that the upward trend of the last four years is destined to continue. Not true; if the economy continues to improve and we don’t get another hundred-year storm, the revenue and spending trends will reverse.

Doug Racine, head of the benighted AHS, also laid blame at the doorstep of Pelham’s former boss, Smilin’ Jim Douglas:

“When the Shumlin administration came in, we found a lot of problems, and thought that Vermonters were not getting the same quality of services they were getting previously,” Racine said.

…Racine said declining federal revenues and increasing caseloads together accounted for the rise in human services spending. In a struggling economy, he said, residents tend to rely more on state services.

“That’s the conundrum we face in human services,” said Racine. “Generally, when the [state] revenues are the lowest, the needs are the highest. … The need is great out there.”

And now, after all that, is where Pelham pulls something of a switcheroo — perhaps belatedly realizing the significance of the day on which he was speaking:

Significant human services cuts are widely expected to be unveiled in the governor’s budget later this week. Despite pointing out the 29 percent AHS budget increase as a cause for concern, Pelham said he wouldn’t necessarily back cuts to AHS.

Pelham says he prefers saving money through efficiency reforms, but cuts must remain an option.

Okay then, Tom. All we need is some magical “efficiency reforms” and we won’t need any nasty cuts after all. But I do have a question:  If there are so many “efficiency reforms” to be had in the system, why in hell didn’t Governor Douglas do something in his EIGHT YEARS in office? Why blast Shumlin for failing to solve the problem in only TWO years during an economic downturn?

It’s a funny thing, I will add, about guys like Lisman who enter politics from the business world. They all believe that if we make government more efficient — if we “run government like a business” — we can avoid cuts and make services even better. Then, when they get into office, they find it ain’t so easy. And if they are forced to trim spending, they usually fall back on old tricks like across-the-board cuts or deferred maintenance.

There is no magic bullet. I can’t really blame Bruce Lisman for not realizing this; but Tom Pelham, with his long service on the front lines of government, ought to know better.

And happy King Day to you, too.  

Special Twilight Sparkle edition! Cute pony make me feel all warm inside on cold day, aww.

Newly minted State Senator Eldred French, for accomplishing the rare task of legitimately failing upwards. As you may recall, State Representative French lost his bid for re-election in November through no particular fault of his own; redistricting put him in direct competition with incumbent Republican Dennis Devereux, who won their face-off. On election night, Speaker Shap Smith singled out French as a particularly tough loss, citing his exemplary service as a State Rep.

Then, State Sen. Bill Carris unexpectedly resigned, citing health reasons. And now, French has been named by Governor Shumlin to fill out Carris’ two-year term in the Senate.

In retrospect, it’s a good thing he lost in November; otherwise, he’d be one of 150 in the House. Now, he’ll be in a much more exclusive club: the 30-member Senate.

 Smartass New York foodies Madeleine Davies and Sen. Chuck Schumer, for dissing Vermont’s culinary goodness. Davies wrote a brief post for Jezebel.com about Vermont coming in first in the nation in cats per-capita. That’s fine, but why-oh-why did she have to toss in a completely ad hominem slap at our dairy industry?

Vermont’s previous accomplishments include the production of not-as-good-as-Wisconsin cheese and Brigham Young.

Oh yeah? Well, at least we don’t color our cheese BRIGHT ORANGE.

As for the usually-distinguished Senator from New York… as chairman of the Senate Rules Committee, the Chuckster got to be emcee for President Obama’s inauguration. Part of his job was arranging an inauguration lunch, which relied heavily on New York products. That’s fine, but why-oh-why did he have to say that his state has “the best maple syrup”? C’mon, Chuck; it’s unbecoming for such a skilled politician to be caught telling such an obvious falsehood.

After the jump, moose on the loose, a dirty, dirty Lincoln, and a poke in one’s own eye.

An intrepid Vermont moose, for going viral with his December guest appearance on the slopes at Sugarbush Resort. A brief video clip of the moose venturing on the slopes and chasing a skier has been viewed nearly 160,000 times on YouTube. Video dude Bill Applegate recalled the encounter: “At first it was just amazing to see a moose and then it started walking towards us and it went from amazing to scary pretty quick.”

Yes, he’s from Massachusetts. Why do you ask?

The Statehouse’s dirty Lincoln. Er, that’s a marble bust of Lincoln on a pedestal directly opposite the front doors. Civil War historian Howard Coffin says it’s one of the best Lincoln sculptures you can find — but he adds that it’s time for Abe to get some TLC: “He’s discolored, he’s dirty and in desperate need of cleaning.” The estimated price tag: $12,000.

The Senate panel gave Coffin a positive reception, which is only as it should be. With a Lincoln movie among 2012’s best, and with 2013 being the sesquicentennial of the Emancipation Proclamation, you don’t want to have a dirty Lincoln welcoming visitors to the Statehouse.

Bob Klein, the first and only director of The Nature Conservancy’s Vermont office. He’s been in charge since the office first opened in 1979; he will step down in April.

During his tenure, the Conservancy has purchased or helped conserve nearly 200,000 acres of significant land across the state. And he grew the Vermont chapter from an all-volunteer group to an office with a staff of 14. Happy trails to Bob Klein, and may the Conservancy’s next director prove just as productive and durable.

The financially troubled Keene, NH-based Baybutt Construction, for continuing to affect businesses and institutions on both sides of the Connecticut. Last week, Baybutt got the Thumbs Down for bollixing the Rockingham Library project; this time, its financial difficulties have led to lost sales and 11 layoffs at the Brattleboro Food Co-op.

General Manager Alex Gyori blamed the layoffs — and a 3% pay cut for managers — on lower than expected sales in 2012 due to delays in its reconstruction. Mostly thanks to Baybutt, the opening of the new Co-op was delayed for seven months. And that meant lost sales. Not the worst effect of Baybutt’s financial woes, but it caused unnecessary harm to one of Bratt’s brightest spots and the loss of work for eleven employees.

Me, for jumping to conclusions about last week’s visit to the Vermont Foodbank by members of Bruce Lisman’s Campaign for Vermont. Based on a poorly-worded press release and my own disdain for CFV, I speculated that its visit to the Foodbank was nothing more than a publicity stunt.

However, Foodbank Director “Not That” John Sayles has let me know that the CFV crew spent a good three hours “sorting 4000 pounds of grocery salvage product.” And he adds that, yes indeed, Bruce Lisman himself was part of the work crew.

So, good on you, CFV, for doing some real, meaningful work. And a reminder that the Foodbank relies on volunteers to sort incoming food, and welcomes the participation of all kinds of groups at their Barre and Brattleboro locations.

And now, I shall carefully remove my finger from my own eye. And wonder how Twilight Sparkle can be so damn happy with an entire HOOF in her eye.  

Special Twilight Sparkle edition! Cute pony make me feel all warm inside on cold day, aww.

Newly minted State Senator Eldred French, for accomplishing the rare task of legitimately failing upwards. As you may recall, State Representative French lost his bid for re-election in November through no particular fault of his own; redistricting put him in direct competition with incumbent Republican Dennis Devereux, who won their face-off. On election night, Speaker Shap Smith singled out French as a particularly tough loss, citing his exemplary service as a State Rep.

Then, State Sen. Bill Carris unexpectedly resigned, citing health reasons. And now, French has been named by Governor Shumlin to fill out Carris’ two-year term in the Senate.

In retrospect, it’s a good thing he lost in November; otherwise, he’d be one of 150 in the House. Now, he’ll be in a much more exclusive club: the 30-member Senate.

 Smartass New York foodies Madeleine Davies and Sen. Chuck Schumer, for dissing Vermont’s culinary goodness. Davies wrote a brief post for Jezebel.com about Vermont coming in first in the nation in cats per-capita. That’s fine, but why-oh-why did she have to toss in a completely ad hominem slap at our dairy industry?

Vermont’s previous accomplishments include the production of not-as-good-as-Wisconsin cheese and Brigham Young.

Oh yeah? Well, at least we don’t color our cheese BRIGHT ORANGE.

As for the usually-distinguished Senator from New York… as chairman of the Senate Rules Committee, the Chuckster got to be emcee for President Obama’s inauguration. Part of his job was arranging an inauguration lunch, which relied heavily on New York products. That’s fine, but why-oh-why did he have to say that his state has “the best maple syrup”? C’mon, Chuck; it’s unbecoming for such a skilled politician to be caught telling such an obvious falsehood.

After the jump, moose on the loose, a dirty, dirty Lincoln, and a poke in one’s own eye.

An intrepid Vermont moose, for going viral with his December guest appearance on the slopes at Sugarbush Resort. A brief video clip of the moose venturing on the slopes and chasing a skier has been viewed nearly 160,000 times on YouTube. Video dude Bill Applegate recalled the encounter: “At first it was just amazing to see a moose and then it started walking towards us and it went from amazing to scary pretty quick.”

Yes, he’s from Massachusetts. Why do you ask?

The Statehouse’s dirty Lincoln. Er, that’s a marble bust of Lincoln on a pedestal directly opposite the front doors. Civil War historian Howard Coffin says it’s one of the best Lincoln sculptures you can find — but he adds that it’s time for Abe to get some TLC: “He’s discolored, he’s dirty and in desperate need of cleaning.” The estimated price tag: $12,000.

The Senate panel gave Coffin a positive reception, which is only as it should be. With a Lincoln movie among 2012’s best, and with 2013 being the sesquicentennial of the Emancipation Proclamation, you don’t want to have a dirty Lincoln welcoming visitors to the Statehouse.

Bob Klein, the first and only director of The Nature Conservancy’s Vermont office. He’s been in charge since the office first opened in 1979; he will step down in April.

During his tenure, the Conservancy has purchased or helped conserve nearly 200,000 acres of significant land across the state. And he grew the Vermont chapter from an all-volunteer group to an office with a staff of 14. Happy trails to Bob Klein, and may the Conservancy’s next director prove just as productive and durable.

The financially troubled Keene, NH-based Baybutt Construction, for continuing to affect businesses and institutions on both sides of the Connecticut. Last week, Baybutt got the Thumbs Down for bollixing the Rockingham Library project; this time, its financial difficulties have led to lost sales and 11 layoffs at the Brattleboro Food Co-op.

General Manager Alex Gyori blamed the layoffs — and a 3% pay cut for managers — on lower than expected sales in 2012 due to delays in its reconstruction. Mostly thanks to Baybutt, the opening of the new Co-op was delayed for seven months. And that meant lost sales. Not the worst effect of Baybutt’s financial woes, but it caused unnecessary harm to one of Bratt’s brightest spots and the loss of work for eleven employees.

Me, for jumping to conclusions about last week’s visit to the Vermont Foodbank by members of Bruce Lisman’s Campaign for Vermont. Based on a poorly-worded press release and my own disdain for CFV, I speculated that its visit to the Foodbank was nothing more than a publicity stunt.

However, Foodbank Director “Not That” John Sayles has let me know that the CFV crew spent a good three hours “sorting 4000 pounds of grocery salvage product.” And he adds that, yes indeed, Bruce Lisman himself was part of the work crew.

So, good on you, CFV, for doing some real, meaningful work. And a reminder that the Foodbank relies on volunteers to sort incoming food, and welcomes the participation of all kinds of groups at their Barre and Brattleboro locations.

And now, I shall carefully remove my finger from my own eye. And wonder how Twilight Sparkle can be so damn happy with an entire HOOF in her eye.  

A bit of good news late last week: Vermont’s unemployment rate went down a tick in December, and stands at 5.1%, well below the national rate of 7.8%. State Labor Commissioner Annie Noonan called it “a strong ending to 2012,” and noted that private-sector jobs were up by almost 4,000 for the year. While acknowledging that economic recovery has been “slower than [in] prior recessions,” she concluded: “We are optimistic that economic growth will continue in Vermont as businesses and job seekers gain confidence. ”

So, good news. And it really is. But there is more to the story, as pointed out by those killjoys at the Public Assets Institute in a report entitled “More payroll jobs, yes. Economic security, not so much.”

To begin with, PAI noted that although the private sector did, indeed, create thousands of new jobs in 2012, “3,200 fewer Vermonters, including the self-employed, were working at year’s end.”

Private sector jobs up, total workforce down. Which means, presumably, fewer jobs in the public sector, in addition to setbacks for the self-employed. And then there’s this:

It will take another 18 months or more for Vermont to recover all the jobs it lost in the Great Recession. That’s according to a December forecast from the New England Economic Partnership (NEEP). Vermont shed approximately 13,000 non-farm payroll jobs from December 2007 to July 2009 and has regained more than two-thirds of them. The rest won’t return until the second half of 2014, says Jeffrey Carr, state economist and Vermont’s NEEP representative.

“It will take another 18 months or more…to recover all the jobs it lost in the Great Recession.”

If anyone in GMD-land ever wonders why I’m so mean to Bruce Lisman, there’s why.

After the jump: a reminder of Lisman’s skewed vision, and food insecurity hits six figures.

Lisman’s group, Campaign for Vermont, claims to be all about growing the economy and creating “more jobs than there are people.” Lisman claims to know the way to a golden age of prosperity. But it was his Wall Street buddies that put America in a hole so goddamn deep that it will take almost a decade to crawl our way out.

And lest you think Lisman learned anything from the financial world’s implosion, I shall remind you of this line from a 2010 speech in South Burlington:

This thing that happened to us in ’08 and ’09 was not the ordinary garden-variety recession. It was a Darwinian asteroid that hit us.

“This thing” that somehow just “happened,” this “asteroid” that fell from the sky. Wasn’t anybody’s fault, just one of those “things” that “happened.” Somehow I doubt that Bruce has learned any lessons from 2008.

So yeah, when I read that it’ll take another four years, at least, for Vermont’s economy to recover, then I think, unsoundly, of former Wall Street titan Bruce Lisman.

Finally, one more fact from PAI that illustrates the ongoing cost of 2008’s Wall Street Follies:

In November, participants in 3SquaresVT-Vermont’s name for the food stamp program-exceeded 100,000 for the first time.

There’s a milestone nobody wanted to see. It means that nearly one-sixth of Vermont residents live in households that can’t stock the pantry on their own. And, PAI notes, it means that…

…policymakers can’t just look at the number of jobs to see how Vermonters are doing. They need to focus on the quality of those jobs-including wages-and ensure that public services are adequately funded.

(In the interest of balance, I think this diary deserves a front page presence. – promoted by Sue Prent)

I admit that I was quite surprised when our friend Senator Philip Baruth introduced his so-called assault weapons ban in the State Senate.  It wasn't something I'd expected from any Vermont pol, and I am very glad he did it.  Not that I necessarily support that idea here in our state with its history, gun culture, rural population, etc.  Nor did I give it much of a chance of passage, at least in its original form.

That said, I think he did exactly what he ought to have done: saw a societal problem and as a legislator tried to begin the process of addressing it in Vermont.  There are never guaranteed outcomes in the sausage factory.  Yet it's clear that Phil's risky move did two important things: it started a very passionate debate, and it proved that the legislative process works.

First, by introducing a controversial bill such as S32, people from all over the political spectrum began arguing about its constitutionality, its general merits, and Vermont's role in the national problem.  The larger debate in the US and the daily toll of firearm violence can seem fairly remote to us, and I don't think this discussion would've had a lot of immediacy without Phil's taking a big step ahead of our political community.

Second, he has in fact withdrawn his bill, as the Raptorman reported earlier.  Senator Baruth heard from his constituents, he heard from people from all over the state, he heard from his caucus, and after all that wisely decided that it was better to take the ban off the table rather than push something that was out of sync with current political reality.  The process worked exactly as it should, and one would hope that demonstrates to folks that we're a long way from any imagined tyranny.

Here's an excerpt from his statement to the other Senators for them to send to their constituents (posted with his permission):

It seemed to me that with the Federal government paralyzed, it had been left to the states to address both the mental health and gun-related components of these tragedies.

But it is painfully clear to me now that little support exists in the Vermont Statehouse for this sort of bill.  It’s equally clear that focusing the debate on the banning of a certain class of weapons may already be overshadowing measures with greater consensus, like tightening background checks, stopping the exchange of guns for drugs, and closing gun show loopholes.  Finally, as incoming Majority Leader, I owe it to my caucus to remove an issue that seems increasingly likely to complicate our shared agenda this biennium.

To the many responsible gun-owners with whom I’ve communicated over the last several weeks:  I’ve heard you.  Please hear me when I say that government is not your enemy – we are all alike threatened by the kind of violence we saw in Newtown, violence that is clearly spreading.  And all of us are responsible for stopping it.  It’s my hope that with this ban set aside, you’ll join more willingly in that effort.

I applaud Phil for his courage in proposing the bill, as well as for his courage in withdrawing it.  I'm glad we have such a thoughtful and responsive leader in Montpelier, and I hope we all can continue having a fruitful debate with him and the rest of our citizen legislators about how we can protect liberty for all.

ntodd

PS–As I noted in comments on kestrel's post, I was looking forward to hearings on the issue.  I wasn't convinced the ban was a good approach for VT–despite its clear (to me) constitutionality per both SCOTUS and SCOV precedent–but I wanted to see what people said about its potential efficacy, if anybody had good data on our role as a net arms exporting state, etc.

user deleted, content banned.

or something like that.