If there’s one thing everyone agrees on, it’s that the gubernatorial election in Vermont is going to be a squeaker, and could well be decided by a margin less than one percentage point.

The last three times Vermont had an Election Day without a presidential race on the same ballot, turnout has averaged in the neighborhood of 235,000 voters – sometimes higher, sometimes lower. If that total holds this year, your individual vote will account for a more than .0004% of the election total. You and your significant other, then, could count for .0009%.

Sound like a middling amount? Take a look at this election result right in our own backyard:

1974, New Hampshire: The election for US Senator concludes with a margin of .0009% – that’s two votes.

Want more two vote margins?

In 1839, the election for Governor of Massachusetts was won by Marcus Morton – by two votes.

Got a couple grown kids or friends that may or may not vote as well? The 1974 election in Indiana’s 8th US. House District was decided by four votes.

Or maybe its just you – no partner, no friends, no nuthin. One vote doesn’t matter, right?

Going right back to our own backyard, elections in Quebec to their National Assembly in 1994 and 2003 were tied.

Anyway you slice it, this election could turn on every single vote. If that vote is yours, wouldn’t you rather it turned on the fact that you showed up, rather than the fact that you didn’t?

(Take the pledge at votegreengov.org)

Giving new meaning to the word "Free" Vermont, independent gubernatorial candidate Dennis Steele, who has a commanding negative 40-something percent lead over Pete Shumlin and Brian Dubie, has a bit of a donor problem that stands in stark contrast to his folksy demeanor and emphasis on "freedom". As Rowley over at VT Secession has just pointed out, one of Steele’s largest out-of-state contributors, a man named James Duncan, had this to say in one of his contributions to the Free Vermont listserv that Odum blogged about here a few weeks ago:

“As with all our problems in America, good people keep hacking at the branches instead of getting to the root of the evil that plagues us. Hence the cycles of war, economic depression, cultural Marxism, etc. continue. I just had a perfectly pleasant day ruined by reading Vermont Magazine. In the Letters to the Editor column, an obnoxiously militant lesbian threatens to cancel her subscription unless they include gay weddings in their next Weddings issue. The individual is a public relations professor and chairperson at a university. How unfortunate that such a rude individual has a position of influence over young people. I guess everyone has their unique perversions but society would be best served if they kept them to themselves and their private circle. I resent having someone else’s shoved in my face. At any rate, bandaids will be the order of the day until someone amputates the entire system.”

One can only wonder what else Duncan would like to amputate. No word yet from Steele as to whether or not he agrees with Duncan, or if he plans on returning the contribution.

I know that most of us don’t take these people seriously. However, there are some who might support Steele as some sort of “protest vote”. Just make sure you keep these things in mind if you do. Steele’s tied with perennial anti-Semitic candidate Chris Ericsson from the CAPSLOCK party, so he’s already in good company.

Sometimes we feel a little lonely around here, thinking, “Doesn't anyone else see what we're seeing?” Today, someone else sees it. The title of this morning's Burlington Free Press editorial speaks for itself: “Regulator's partisanship chips away at credibility”.

I could quibble, pointing out that Dave O'Brien didn't have much credibility to begin with, but the key is that the whole world is now seeing that Dave O'Brien's loyalties are to the Douglas/Dubie administration and their wealthy friends, and not with the people of Vermont. Here's a sampling:

Public Service Commissioner David O'Brien's decision to inject himself into electoral politics strains his integrity as a state regulator who will pursue the public interest free of partisan prejudices.

To dismiss legitimate concerns about a radiation leak at Vermont Yankee with a “It's how many days from Election Day?” shows a lack of respect for those who treat problems at the nuclear power plant with the seriousness they deserve, and are working hard to ensure the safety of Vermonters.

You should read the whole editorial. I'll just say that I'm very pleased that one of our leading daily newspapers is saying what we've been saying all along: We need someone who will be an independent defender of the health and safety of all Vermonters.

This is exactly what I was talking about.

Recently, I penned an uncharacteristically esoteric piece for the Huffington Post, discussing the need for a politics that promotes “fault tolerance” in our society. My basic thesis was this: people (individually and culturally) learn by adapting to crises, either those externally imposed, or those we bring about ourselves. The problem comes now that we have harnessed so many powerful technologies on such a grand scale that we can no longer afford to wait to learn from our mistakes, because of the scale of the consequences that arise from those mistakes. Climate change is the marquee example – we can’t simply learn our lesson after we do irreparable damage to our planet.

But for an example that hits more close to home, Vermont Yankee is a beaut. In case you haven’t heard, it’s leaking again. This time its radioactive steam into the air to go along with the tritium that’s hit the water table.

Does anybody seriously think this is going to get better? That an aging plant leaking and collapsing and belching toxins is going to stop aging? If common sense doesn’t answer that question, the second law of thermodynamics should.

There is no fault tolerance with this plant, and with our associated energy policy right here in Vermont. If we follow our pattern as a species, we won’t collectively get that lesson through our heads until we do serious damage – and the damage that will be done by our mistakes in not dealing with the danger of this plant is simply too high to absorb and casually walk away from.

We in Vermont need to approach our ballots this November with an eye towards breaking this cycle. We need to ask ourselves which candidates will look to preventing environmental disasters rather than waiting to deal with them after the fact. We need candidates who can build fault tolerance into our public institutions, because the cost of some faults is simply intolerable.

(Take the pledge at votegreengov.org)

VPR reports Vermont Yankee has another leak in addition to the latest tritium issue. A high pressure emergency coolant system is leaking small puffs of steam, mild levels of radioactive steam. If it’s not exactly the same as many other times, it’s at least a very familiar chain of events.  

"We're talking about relatively mild levels of radioactivity coming out of here. This is a system connected to the reactor obviously but any radioactive liquid flowing out of here would be at low levels."

   

There was a notable delay in reporting the news to the public as often is the case. Probably unimportant but remember PSD Commissioner David O’Brien recently wondered publicly “How many days until the election?”

The leak (called minor by the NRC) was discovered almost a month ago, September 24th and reported to the NRC.    

"Our maintenance department put a maintenance patch on this drain line to make temporary repairs and we have permanent repairs that will be made sometime in the future. But the high pressure injection coolant system is operable. We have no issues whatsoever with the operation of the system and we're considering this routine maintenance that our maintenance department would perform at a nuclear plant on a day to day basis."

 

Tuesday VPR reported poll results showing that statewide 44 percent of those surveyed said they want the plant to close, 39 percent supported re-licensing and 17 percent undecided with an error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.  

A couple days ago I wrote about AOT contract recipient flacking for Dubie and getting paid by the state while doing so.

I just got this e-mail from someone who would like to remain anonymous.  I consider this to be a well trusted source whom I’m sure knows extremely well that to feed me false info would be a huge mistake, so I’m taking this as fact until proven otherwise.  Among the information included were the facts that:

1. Dubie has taken at least $9,593 from Debra Ricker, her husband and their businesses;
2. The Rickers’ businesses have been awarded six contracts to do road work for the Agency of Transportation since Jan. 2009, for a total of $2,314,897 in contract money;
3. Governor Douglas appointed Debra Ricker to the Council of Economic Advisers;
4. Governor Douglas appointed William Ricker to the Public Oversight Commission.

I offer the the following:

Dubie… hit Shumlin again when asked about an issue in the news Tuesday morning: that Shumlin had appointed supporter David Blittersdorf to the state’s Clean Energy Development Fund board, which went on to award Blittersdorf more than $4 million in tax credits for solar projects. Dubie said Shumlin should return the $8,000 that Blittersdorf and various companies he’s associated with contributed to Shumlin’s campaign.

Shumlin asked Blittserdorf to resign from that board, and he did.  Did Dubie ask the Rickers to resign from their seats of power?  Did Dubie think that he should return their money?

In one case, we have a Democrat who asked a man to resign from a board in order to avoid conflict of interest.  On the other hand, we have a Republican who is being actively supported by someone who benefits directly from his administration and hasn’t said a word about it.

Is it any surprise that no one is covering this but us?

 Six months ago Governor Douglas, without scissors but nonetheless with great media fanfare opened a shiny new computerized clearing house for government assistance that included the 3SquaresVT food assistance program (formerly food stamps).  

Mission accomplished! Almost before the paint was dry Vermont Chief Technology Officer Tom Evslin, self-described government handyman (who left the administration in September) declared the Benefit Service Center a possible template for state government reorganization saying:

“We can move quickly to replicate it in other parts of state government”

Can more be done with less? The goal was a new streamlined system for the 180,000 Vermonters who rely on these programs. Consolidation was key as the center was formed. Economic Services Department cut back on staffing, 30 positions were cut. The state was to rely on community action councils to take up the slack for “customers”.  

Fast forward: Community advocates from the Hunger Council call the situation a “crisis”  

The online application form wasn’t available until Oct. 4. Wait times for the 1-800 number average 5 minutes, but in some cases can take as long as 20 minutes, according to Steve Dale, commissioner of the Department of Children and Families.

Vermonters have had to make repeated calls to the center in order to file an application or find out whether their information has been processed. (The new “paperless” system doesn’t have a notification system letting applicants know where their virtual paperwork is in the process.)

Dale said in an interview with Vtdigger.com that 40 percent of Vermonters who have applied had seen a delay in food stamps eligibility determination of more than 30 days. He said the total number of applicants affected by the glitches in the new system numbered in the “hundreds.”

The Central Vermont Council on Aging released a statement saying the Douglas/Dubie administration’s “lack of planning and foresight has negatively affected both our staff and our clients.”

Governor Douglas is currently touring Asia on a 14 day trip drumming up EB-5 investments for Vermont businesses.

As chair of the Governor’s Commission on Healthy Aging Lt.Gov.Brian Dubie (now acting governor?) hasn’t had any comment on the current difficulties the elderly are now having with access to benefits.

Is Dubie now listening?  This summer after a well publicized statewide listening tour focused on healthy aging issues he declared:“I have made it a priority to make our state a place where all older Vermonters can enjoy a good quality of life.”  

I never, in my whole life, thought I would say this, but I need to give a hat tip to Art Woolf at Vermont Tiger for this one.  He notes that the poll done by VPR significantly oversamples people over 50.

Here’s the breakdown from VPR:

(Admittedly, it was just 65+, but I couldn’t help myself).

Since this is an off year election without Obama driving the youth vote, I’m not inclined to compare this to 2008.  I’d be much more interested in seeing how this distribution stacks up against 2006.

Unfortunately, the statistics I could find about 2006 didn’t break down the ages in the same fashion as this survey did, so this makes it all extremely complicated to do a proper analysis.  I.e., 18-24 is one Census block, 25-44 another.  You can’t draw an inference from one to the other since they don’t map along the same lines.

But  

(promoted, with an image adjustment so as not to bust the margins. Check out the full graphic analysis at http://elections.nytimes.com/2010/forecasts/governor/vermont. – promoted by odum)

As I always say, “with great bandwidth comes great responsibility,” and as such, I’m delighted to be partnering with the Vermont League of Conservation Voters to help pump up excitement and turn out voters through the votegreengov.org project (Yup… I’m consulting for ’em… full blogger disclosure). Over the next couple days, you should start seeing us all over the web. I’ll be collecting stories and testimonials from early voters and clerks… I should be tweeting and blogging and… vlogging again – and that means the return of my zannel channel, resurrected from days of covering the Democratic National Convention, lo those many (two) years past! Here’s the first installment.

How can you get involved? First off, check out our Facebook page. Did you send in your early vote ballot today? Did you talk to someone about the election? Encourage them to vote? Let us know about it on FB, or drop me an email at vtgreenvoter@gmail.com. Have your own video? Drop me a line at that email and we’ll get it posted on the zannel channel.

And head over to votegreengov.org and take the voter pledge! Over the next few days, the site is going to change dramatically and become more interactive (not to mention the daily new vlog posts from me and Zane), so check back often – particularly next week when some great new opportunities for you to help get out the vote should become available.

So – keep in touch and VOTE! VOTE! VOTE! (not three times, but. you know what I mean).