( – promoted by odum)

(cross-posted from Vermont Watch, here)

Governor Peter Shumlin recently declared his firm commitment to replacing the embattled Vermont State Hospital (VSH) with a new version of the same old thing.

Besides building along these lines, the administration’s plan also includes providing an additional 16 to 24 beds elsewhere as well.

This all to the tune of millions and millions of state taxpayer dollars in remaining dependent on an outdated institutional treatment model surely to follow wherever the facility or such other beds would be located.

This is much like had been done in New Hampshire to the detriment of the community mental health system there and, as a result, the state came under scrutiny by the U.S. Department of Justice, which issued a scathing report earlier this year (here and, here).

Such monies, as Governor Shumlin is recommending be put aside to replace the state hospital in this fashion, could be better used to build the holistic community system needed in closing VSH and, not replacing it, save for a small forensic facility to be located somewhere within the state.

If we could close the former Brandon Training School without building a new version of the same old thing, creatively putting in place a more robust community system instead, we can indeed close VSH and, although there might be differences in such a system, do much of the same for our fellow citizens currently forced to languish at the state hospital, in prison, in homeless shelters or on the street.

Read more on the subject (via Beyond VSH blog), here.

Morgan W. Brown

Montpelier

Firfst, our senior Senator, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee and has served Vermont in the Senate since 1975:

Senator Leahy chaired the first-ever congressional hearing on legislation to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act on July 20. The hearing, held by the Senate Judiciary Committee, focused on the significant economic harm to families that is continually caused by DOMA, from how they are able to care for one another during poor health to how they plan for retirement, and other issues.

 Then, from The Nation:

'Gang of Six' Plan? 'Not So Fast,' Says Bernie Sanders

But the one senator who has stood most steadily in defense of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid—and for fiscally sound budgeting—is not joining the mob.

He is objecting. And he says the American people should join him in challenging a a plan that he says would result in devastating cuts to needed programs.

“While all of the details from the so-called Gang of Six proposals are not yet clear, what is apparent is that the plan would result in devastating cuts to Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and many other programs that are of vital importance to working families in this country. Meanwhile, tax rates would be lowered for the wealthiest people and the largest, most profitable corporations,” says Sanders.

And Representative Peter Welch:

Since Republicans won an overwhelming majority in the House, we’ve seen the new crop of Tea Party Freshmen move hungrily from  taxes, through education, social services and  fundamental public safety regulations, attempting to gut and devour the systems that have kept this country’s hopes and dreams alive since the 1930’s. The next victim of the mob may well be our clean water supply.

Though unlikely to pass, the Clean Water Federalism Act of 2011 may be an early warning that interstate water-grabs are about to heat up; but let’s not get too far ahead of the story right now.

As its title suggests, HR2018 would take all power to regulate water quality away from the EPA and return it to the individual states.

It would prohibit the federal government from “specification of any defined area as a disposal site for the discharge of dredged or fill material into navigable waters,” so if the state does not believe the dumped material would harm drinking water or fisheries, then chemical dumping and manufacturing runoff would not be prevented.

Bad as that may sound, it is just the narrow edge of the wedge.

In the event that this or similar legislation finally managed to worm its way through to passage under a future Republican president, it would no doubt be challenged in the Supreme Court.  As currently constituted,  and unless major changes in ideological representation on the Court were to happen between now and then, I think we can all imagine a scenario in which the Supreme Court finds in favor of the constitutionality of such a bill.

Once control of water quality is legally ceded to the individual states, it will be just a matter of time before water and all natural resources will come under the sole purview of individual states.  

As pure water becomes less and less freely available, look for hostile damming, drilling and denial of access between neighboring states.  Water-rich states will punish and manipulate dry states through restrictive water policy.  Poorly managed states will negotiate to lease or maybe even sell their water rights to bottlers and speculators for a thirsty world market.

Add competition over clean water to the greatest income inequity in the developed world and you have the key ingredients for civil unrest; quite possibly for civil war.

Clean water is the one essential resource that no one can do without.  Its further manipulation and commoditization could very well mean the end of the United States as we know it.

*Updated 4x*

In case you missed it, State Representative Sam Young (D Orleans/Caledonia 1) reported on his Facebook page Sunday evening about how someone borrowed/stole his car, a blue 2000 Suburu Outback with a bike rack and a Vote Young sticker (License # FBL 192), from outside his West Glover home Saturday night (here). $500 Reward offered.

*Update 1*: State Representative Sam Young reported that he found his car (via a comment posted to his earlier Facebook post):

I found it. Call off the hunt.

In addition, Taylor Dobbs of vtdigger reports there will be a tidbit posted with details later.

*Update 2*: In response to a comment posted on his Facebook page, state Representative Sam Young reports:

I got all my stuff back. Somebody took a joy ride down one of my logging roads and didn’t get too far.

*Update 3*: There was an article within the local news section of the Tuesday edition of the Caledonian-Record about state Representative Sam Young’s car and the title of it suggests it was wrecked: i.e., “Rep. Young’s Car Found Wrecked”

WEST GLOVER — When Rep. Sam Young, P-Orleans-Caledonia 1, awoke Saturday morning to find his blue 2000 Subaru Outback missing after a Friday night gathering at his house, he initially believed a friend had taken it and would return it.

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

The article is behind a paywall.

*Update 4*: State Representative Sam Young reports:

Damaged a little but not wrecked. They love ratcheting up those headlines

( – promoted by odum)

From an unexpected source — the Wall Street Journal — comes a bit of insight into the blithe safety assurances we get from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission every time there’s a question, issue, or event at a nuke plant.

The article, from Tuesday’s WSJ, is entitled “Earthquake Risks Probed at U.S. Nuclear Plants.” A nice pleasant little breakfast read there.

The gist of the article: in the wake of the Fukushima Daiichi incident, even as NRC officials were delivering their breezy “no threat to public health or safety, everything hunky-dory, please move along” reassurances, something very different was going on inside the agency. Take it away, WSJ…

Privately, though, internal emails from March show staffers at the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission fretted about the public attention on the potential earthquake vulnerability of some U.S. plants. Since 2005, the agency had been working on a study of seismic hazards that is far from complete but showed good reason to worry about two dozen reactors.

Earthquake dangers have long been known in the American West. Most of the new concern is focused on the central and eastern U.S. (The list of “about two dozen” plants includes Seabrook, but not VT Yankee.)

Now, the risk of a big quake in, say, New Hampshire or South Carolina or Michigan is far lower than in California. But it isn’t zero. And quakes are especially feared “…because earthquakes produce tremendous forces, but also because they are impossible to predict.”

How did this new concern come to the fore? Well, in applications for new nukes filed since 2005, utilities included environmental reviews. And…

NRC staffers say they noticed something in some applications for proposed new plants to be built adjacent to existing reactors: Using updated scientific information, seismic experts hired by the utilities produced “hazard” calculations showing a potential for stronger earthquake-caused ground motion than the original plants were designed to handle.

In other words, the utilities’ own experts reckoned there was an increased chance that an existing reactor could be struck by an earthquake that could overwhelm its ability to shut down safely.

Now, the additional risk from an earthquake is relatively small. It’s low on the list of concerns about nuclear power. To me, the key item to take from this story is that even the NRC itself doesn’t necessarily believe its own public-relations pablum.  

   

This is just a reminder that Saturday, July 23, from 10AM to 5PM, “The Vermont Nucelar Power Conference: From Fukushima to Vermont” will be held in the Livak Ballroom on the 4th Floor of the UVM Campus Building.  Arnie Gundersen will be presenting from 10:30 until noon. His topic: “Nucelar Power 101.”

___________________________________________________________

There is fresh evidence that the contamination in Japan extends well beyond Fukushima Prefecture.

In the newest video release from Fairewinds Associates, Arnie Gundersen explains how radioactive materials have made their way much more deeply into the food chain than was earlier anticipated, through deposits of so-called “black rain” that was carried by plumes from the early releases at Fukushima, and settled on feed straw as far away as 45 miles from the site.

Also in this video segment, Gundersen discusses the dismal outlook for neutralizing onsite hazards in the forseeable future, and worrisome findings in environmental test samples collected in the vicinity of Tokyo.

Ex Japanese Nuclear Regulator Blames Radioactive Animal Feed on “Black Rain” from Fairewinds Associates on Vimeo.

The Wildflower Inn, located just a bit north of St. Johnsbury, in scenic Lyndonville, VT, boasts “Four Seasons for Everyone,” has a very nice looking restaurant attached to it, and looks like a pretty cool place to stay if you’re looking for lodging in Northeastern Vermont.

Unless, of course, you’re a pair of lesbians who want to get married:

The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Vermont filed a lawsuit today against a Vermont resort that refused to host a lesbian couple’s wedding reception…

Oh and by the way: they are no longer hosting weddings.

But they do have contact info:

   (800) 627-8310

   (802) 626-8310

Fax: (802) 626-3039

   Reservations and General Info: info@wildflowerinn.com

   Weddings: weddings@wildflowerinn.com

   Sales: sales@wildflowerinn.com

(87 year-old man to his great-grandson)

I speak to you of history

of facts

But you are having

none of that

They have taught you instead

to avoid facts

As facts get in the way

of your career

I speak to you of art but

you are into design

The computer has become

your culture

I fought against Hitler & the Nazis

you haven’t a clue

I speak to you of injustice

against women

And you reply you are

pro choice

I ask you to consider the planet

you see it as a market

I tell you of the wars of the sixties

you say you have the CDs

I want you to think about ideas

you say it’s all in the data

When you were four I gave you

your first real book

At twenty-four you read for self-help

so you can prey upon others

I should take my gun from the wars

and put an end to you

Before you make everything

so much more worse

Yet I still have these foolish hopes

you will reject all this evil

That you will learn to think and act

like a human being

You say I am old and full of hate

but you are hatefulness itself

You talk of political correctness

I know about right and wrong

I will not give in to death because you

have already canceled me out

I must live to see the world

as it would have been

Long ago if we had lost that first war

if I had died in it

If we had never had your mother

if you had never been born

If I knew then what I know now

making all of it meaningless

And that is what you want it to be

isn’t it?

Peter Buknatski

Montpelier, VT.

( – promoted by odum)

From the press release:

“I am proud to add Mark Larson to my administration and look forward to his leadership at DVHA,” said Gov. Shumlin. “Mark has a deep understanding of health policy in Vermont, including complex systems like Medicaid, which is central to health planning. Mark has also demonstrated his commitment to the principles behind Act 48, and will be a valuable member of my health care policy team.”

As commissioner, Larson will oversee management of Vermont’s publicly funded health insurance programs.  He will also play a key role in moving forward Vermont’s health care reform efforts, including the new Vermont Health Benefit Exchange and Green Mountain Care. Larson will officially begin the position on Aug. 17.

Mark has worked hard over his years in the house to improve and protect the well-being of Vermonters. He’s a great choice for this position.

I didn’t watch the coverage of the Casey Anthony trial. At all. I just wasn’t interested, so I really have no opinion about whether the jury did the right thing, or whether she actually killed her baby, or anything like that.

What I am interested in, though, is prosecutorial misconduct. In a criminal trial the cards are already stacked against the defendant, with all the investigatory and prosecutorial resources of the state lined up to throw one person in jail.

What we have learned now, though, is that the prosecution’s tactics went beyond its permissible advantage against the defendant and withheld potentially crucial evidence it had.

The murder case against the defendant was based in part on a finding that she had done on-line searches for chloroform, and that demonstrated her intent to kill her baby and her knowledge of the means of doing it.

Only it turns out that the computer analysis was wrong. The expert who did the analysis realized that he had made a mistake, and that when he thought he had identified 84 times that the defendant had searched for “choloroform”, it turned out that it was only one time. He did the responsible thing. He redid his analysis, presented it in spreadsheet form to the prosecution, and even offered to fly down at his own expense to explain his error to the jury.

According to yesterday’s New York Times:

Concerned that the analysis using CacheBack could be wrong and that a  woman’s life might be at stake, Mr. Bradley went back to the drawing  board and redesigned a portion of his software to get a more accurate  picture.        

He found both reports were inaccurate (although NetAnalysis came up with  the correct result), in part because it appears both types of software  had failed to fully decode the entire file, due to its complexity. His  more thorough analysis showed that the Web site sci-spot.com was visited only once – not 84 times.        

Mr. Bradley, fearing that jurors were being given false information  based on his data, contacted the police and the prosecution the weekend  of June 25. He asked Sergeant Stenger about the discrepancy, and the  sergeant said he was aware of it, Mr. Bradley said. He waited to see if  prosecutors would correct the record. They did not.        

If you’re a regular viewer of any of the myriad of Law and Order shows on TV you know about the Brady rule. Based on the Supreme Court decision of Brady v. Maryland, it requires prosecutors to turn over potentially exculpatory evidence to the defense. Among other things, evidence that evidence being presented against the defendant may not be credible is specifically covered by case law applying the Supreme Court’s Brady decision.

This body of law was addressed by the Supreme Court this spring, when they allowed a conspiracy by New Orleans prosecutors to conceal evidence to go unpunished.

So now we have a well-established example of the prosecution sitting on substantial exculpatory evidence in a high-profile case.

What’s the response from the prosecution?

The State Attorney’s Office in Orlando did not return messages seeking comment.

“We’re not going to relive the trial again,” Captain Nieves said. “We are not prepared to do that nor are we going to participate in that.”

I hope there is followup to see that justice is done.