Just a quick kvetch…

This morning on VPR, they were talking to Peter Welch, and he was talking about the looming budget standoff with the GOP, and a few things that are deal breakers for him… defunding the CPR and Planned Parenthood, and defunding Obamacare. Yes, Obamacare.

Perhaps if Mr. Welch, who I’m sure had nothing but good intentions in the interview, plans on using right-wing frames to describe healthcare, at least he could throw us a bone and use the term teabaggers next time he mentions the teahadists? Just for the sake of fairness, if nothing else.

There is honor in being a minority in a democracy. Somebody needs to tell the Vermont GOP that, as they have engaged in decidedly dishonorable behavior in the last week.

First was the anti-health reform speech by Rep. Burditt that invoked “communism” and “radical islam” – and was apparently an act of plagiarism.  According to Hallenbeck, that speech was largely lifted from Association of American Physicians and Surgeons president Lawrence Huntoon:

Burditt said he’s inexperienced at writing speeches and didn’t see anything wrong with using another person’s words. “It’s the same opinion that I have,” he said. “There’s nothing wrong with having the same opinion as anyone else.”

House Assistant Republican Leader Patti Komline, R-Dorset, said Vermont lawmakers are not well-versed in such issues.

Hey, who cares, right? No biggie. Now don’t we have some school funding to go cut somewhere…?

Second was the rumor in full-blown circulation last week that Senator Patrick Leahy was ill and planning to retire next month. It apparently got enough traction that it caused Leahy’s Vermont staff to feel the need to engage and quell the rumors.

All I’ve been able to find out was that the rumor originated with Statehouse Republicans, and since it has no basis in – well, apparently any reality whatsoever – insiders assume it was merely started as an act of mischief. Presumably spreading concerns around the Senators age, health and competence are all they feel they’ve got to undermine him.

Class act, this “loyal opposition.”

President Obama is getting together later day with Congressional leaders in a last ditch attempt to avoid a government shutdown. Meanwhile, the administration is preparing for a possible government shutdown, as was revealed through a memo that was leaked to the Washington Post. If an agreement can’t be reached on continuing funding government activities through the rest of the fiscal year 2011(ending on September 30th), many vital government activities will cease, except those that are vital to national security, etc. I have been following the ongoing drama, and if this can be averted, there are still vital battles ahead on government funding: first, is the debt limit on the amount of money the federal government can borrow, which will be reached at some point this spring and if not increased, will cause at least a partial shutdown of government services and FY 2012 budget, with a first proposal being released today by Rep. Paul Ryan that proposes to phase out and slash Medicare, with the ever-ready voucher system conservatives profess so much love for to take its place.

As a federal employee I am disturbed at the lack of seriousness and dimwitted ideology that the Republican Party has wrapped itself merrily in and I am grateful knowing that at least initially I wouldn’t be seriously affected by the shutdown (working in an agency with its own source of revenue and only a relatively small supplement from Congress makes it easier). Republicans on the national level are pretty happy with a scorched earth policy and to hell with whoever gets caught in the way, as we are all just collateral damage. So far I’ve heard no serious debate on them cutting their own pay and benefits during a shutdown, even as some Congressional Democrats have been pushing for it. They truly know no pain because they don’t even bother to empathize. That’s what willfull ignorance does to you. I’m not very hopeful that President Obama and Congressional Democrats will have the spine to stand up to such nonsense and dare to put the Republicans’ feet to the fire. There will be a price to pay. If Democrats blink, it will be them and there will be more misery in the coming years.

 Know hope!

It’s time we had a conversation about “growth.”  



By that, I mean it’s time to challenge the model that shapes contemporary economic assumptions and society as a whole.  I have only a layman’s perspective, but it seems to me that the conventional wisdom that “growth” rather than “sustainability” is the primary goal for human enterprise, is fundamentally unsound.  

Even on the most abstract plane, one can argue that the nature of our visible world is self-limiting and finite; so it stands to reason that economic models and expectations that do not honor that blanket truth represent magic thinking.  

Nature strives perpetually for balance in order to sustain its life-forces; and when uncontrolled growth runs amok in nature, it is a cancer that quickly extinguishes life.  We see this principle demonstrated  all around us every single day, and yet the economic and political assumptions that drive human endeavor remain stubbornly resistant to the lessons being repeated by the natural world since long before mankind learned to count.

Some consideration has been given, from time to time, to population, with all its implications; but we never seem to have extrapolated from that conversation about population to one about the inherent folly of striving for perpetual economic growth.  We’re actually more comfortable talking about the possibility of limiting human population, with all that implies, than we are with the idea of abandoning forever any idea of growing richer…let alone the thought that achieving a truly sustainable world at this point would most likely require that some of us should be somewhat poorer.  

Ironically, nature is pretty good at limiting populations, unaided by human intervention; but as economic models are human constructs, nature can’t apply the brakes.

Wall Street, that pinnacle of magic thinking, has foisted on us the idea that unlimited growth is not only possible but compulsory; so much so that corporations engage in all kinds of financial sleight-of-hand to convince their stock-holders that they are meeting this phantom goal.   And the interests of Wall Street have become firmly wedded with domestic economic policy.  They are almost indistinguishable now.  Those interests almost completely exclude sustainability in order to focus on the next quarter’s bottom line.

In a finite system,  for some to benefit from perpetual growth, perpetual contraction is necessary in an opposing sector.  This is the stuff of expanding income inequities that are rendering thread-bare the very fabric of America.

The politicians and conventional media won’t talk about it, because it flies in the face of the great American myth of upward mobility; so it’s really up to us.  

Pass it on.

who is John Gault?

or is it John Gaul?

whatever  Anne Rand (Ann?)

is one of our heroes

we’re going to the movie

the book is too long

and it has big words

but we know no gays

or socialists or Moslams

will be there

we’ll be watching for them

all six of us

this will be our answer

to all those intellec…intelectuals

we have our authors too

we just can’t read them

but we don’t have to

cause we have our candidates

did you know Tom Salmon

is an Objectionist?

and so is Sarah Palin

that’s why she writes

on her hands

you wait til next year

we’re going to take over

then it’ll be your turn to ask

who is John Gaalt?

he’s going to the White House

as in White

we can spell that

and after we take over

nobody will have to spell anyway

why bother spelling

when you can make a sign?

Peter Buknatski

Montpelier, Vt.

(AND–Today is a Bad anniversary day.  43 years ago, in Memphis, they murdered Martin Luther King.

When you remember the courage and eloquence of that man, and what he stood for, the people I’m talking about above don’t seem very amusing after all.)

In a recent report  The politics’ of health care on WCAX  (aka Vermont’s most trusted news source) three people were quoted; a pro,a con and a “political analyst”.

The pro and con, no problem .One a member of the pro single payer Health Care is a Human Right group and the con , executive director and chief fund-raiser of Vermonter’s for Health Care Freedom. The pro, the con, no problem were clearly identified.

Ah, but the third person the “political analyst” Chris Graff who dispensed this wisdom:  

"It's in the specifics; the old devil is in the details. You will see lobbying become more intense,”

   Indeed the lobbying may be underway even as he speaks.

Isn’t it long past over due, after five years as National Life’s Vice President of Corporate Communications & Government Relations Chris Graff  comes out from behind the neutral moniker “political analyst” ?  Especially when quoted in a story about Vermont’s biggest proposed health care /insurance regulation changes ever.  

For many local Franklin County folks in politics and law enforcement, moving the state’s women prisoners to NWSCF (Northwest State Correctional Facility) in St. Albans a few years ago made no sense. Among other concerns expressed was the loss of local space to house men being held by local law enforcement for trial and of federal money for housing federal immigration detainees. Now, the proposal to move men back to the St. Albans prison, and the women to the Chittenden Regional Correctional Facility would alleviate those concerns. Further, some argue, more male beds at Northwest means more local corrections jobs.

The diary below provides another point of view, under a pseudonym, because DOC workers are not allowed to speak publicly on DOC issues. ~ NanuqFC

By Concerned Observer

When the new governor was elected partly on a platform of changing the paradigm of criminal justice in this state, many of us who work in this field were optimistic that the time had come for some thoughtful long term planning, to not only save money, but to keep the community safe while changing people’s lives for the better.

The recent proposal from the Shumlin administration to move the women’s prison from the St Albans facility stunned almost everyone who works with this population. This is being called a plan, but in reality there seems to have been virtually no planning involved. None of the DOC staff here at NW were consulted prior to the announcement. Certainly none of the contracted staff were consulted. As far as I can tell, no one involved with this decision stepped foot in either facility before it was announced.

Let’s stop the charade that this is somehow better for the female inmates in Vermont. This will be an enormous step back for them, and to portray it as some kind of wonderful opportunity is disingenuous in the extreme.

• When the Governor announced this decision a great deal was made of how this would create new opportunities for incarcerated women. Anyone who’s been inside of the Chittenden facility would see this immediately as absurd.
• We keep hearing that this will enable women to see their children easier. St. Albans is not the end of the world, it’s only 25 min. from Burlington. I don’t believe there are any women who haven’t been able to see their children because of location. In fact, if the underlying issues of substance abuse, mental health, education, employability training aren’t addressed, the sad fact is that most of these kids will be better off not being reunited with their mothers. Children who visit their mothers in jail are many times traumatized by the experience of entering a correctional facility. The proposed family center at CRCF [Chittenden Regional Correctional Facility] is amazingly bleak and depressing.
• Since  there is no room at CRCF for the type of programming available at NWSCF, the  non-profits are being told they will have to figure out a way to deliver these services outside the facility. This will involve more money, public opposition to siting these type of outside facilities, security issues, etc. The list of obstacles to be overcome is a long one and will take a great deal of planning and money. We are being told we have till July 1, 2011, and there will be very little if any money.
• The  plan at CRCF is for there to be a wing that can house up to 80 women who will be able, so we’re told, to leave the prison daily for jobs in the community. I can’t imagine where these jobs will come from, since, in the population of around 155 at NWSCF there are nowhere near 80 women who can even keep a job inside the prison. In today’s economy to think that, without any kind of preliminary work, there are jobs for these women seems to be spectacularly  optimistic.

• PREA:  The Prison Rape Elimination Act was enacted to stop coercive sexual contact in prison populations. One of the reasons for moving the women in 2009 from Windsor and Dale was the high number of PREA incidents mainly due to having 3 or more inmates to a cell. Re-locating women to CRCF will put the women at risk and force the facility to have 3 and 4 inmates to a cell again.
• The  #1 issue the female population has is substance abuse. At NWSCF Phoenix house  runs a comprehensive, residential treatment program with 6 employees, 5 offices and a conference room. Phoenix house also runs a highly effective, 7-month program for violent offenders in this same space. There is no room at  Chittenden for this type of facility.
• Many  incarcerated women have a long and tragic history of childhood sexual and physical abuse, and for many that pattern continued into  adulthood. NWSCF has an effective program dealing with these issues. There is no room at Chittenden for this  program.
• Lack  of education is another piece of the recidivism puzzle. At NWSCF there is a separate building run by the Community High School of Vermont with two dedicated staff members and 2 offices, 2 large classrooms, a well equipped  library, 3 smaller classrooms, a computer resource center where women can write resumes and cover letters and learn job interview skills, and a law library. Women can get a GED or they can get either an Adult High School Diploma or, if they’re under 25 they can, by making up missing credits, get a diploma from the high school they would have graduated from had they not dropped out. At Chittenden, Community High school has 2 small rooms and no library, woefully inadequate.

• The  type of staff and skills needed is very different for men and women. You don’t just drop a large population into a correctional facility and just pick up where you left off. At NWSCF there was a long and arduous adjustment period, with much of the new staff being hired specifically for their ability to work with women. It’s taken most of the last two years to incorporate all of the  staff into a smooth working system. The NW DOC staff is hard working and very professional, and I have no doubt they can accomplish the switch, but there will be a long and expensive adjustment period, with much training and staff turnover before the facility is up and running. The same goes for the Chittenden facility. This unacknowledged adjustment period will eat up much of the  overly optimistic saving projections.
  

There is certainly money to be saved in Corrections over the long haul; however, it will require a great deal of planning and collaboration with all parties to make a change to the way we deal with crime in this state. This move, proposed in haste with virtually no thought or planning, will be an enormous step back for everyone involved.  

We are pleased to be able to bring you another segment of expert analysis of the unfolding crisis at Fukushima Daiichi, from Arnie Gundersen of Fairewinds Associates.

Throughout the crisis so far, Arnie’s insights have anticipated new revelations from Tokyo Electric, and explained the underlying science from which he draws his conclusions.

This is an amazing and accessible resource for which we are very grateful.

There were those who argued that there was no difference between the two major presidential candidates in 2000, and many of them will continue to argue, after the disappointments of the Obama administration, that there is no meaningful difference between the Obama who runs for reelection in 2012 and whatever troglodyte the Republican Party selects as its candidate.

One of the popular memes these last few years is that elections have consequences, and in a presidential election, one of those consequences is that the president gets to nominate justices to the Supreme Court.

The guy selected in 2000 got to appoint John Roberts, the current Chief Justice, and Samuel Alito, one of Roberts’ accomplices. The guy elected in 2008 got to appoint Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan.

Obama’s two appointees and Bush’s two appointees were on opposite sides of a case this week in which the Bush majority decided that a man who was convicted, sentenced to death, and served fourteen years on death row because of a fraudulent conspiracy to conceal exculpatory evidence carried out by prosecutor Harry Connick, Sr., and attorneys working under him, was not entitled to compensation.

Do you think things might have come out a little differently in this case if Bush hadn’t been in the White House to appoint Alito and Roberts?

I sure do.

Thanks, Ralph.