From a Rutland Herald piece by Dan Barlow, first quoting Jim Douglas:

“This is not a time for congratulations,” said Douglas, who added he believes the debate has been divisive and a distraction for lawmakers. “This is a time to move on.”

There are, obviously, some appropriate responses that can be made here.  Instead of going for the visceral reaction, however, I’d like to focus on the logical, with a little bit of clear-headed outrage mixed in.

Our governor’s reaction here is one that is basically disingenuous and self-serving.  It’s designed to continue with the same framework he’s been using all along– calling something a “distraction” while actively prolonging it.  

Part of the same piece, Odum quotes below:

Steve Cable of Rutland, a founder of the group Vermont Renewal, said same-sex marriage opponents across the state are “blood shooting out of their eyes mad” about the veto override vote.

Cable said he has already attended two organizational meetings this afternoon to discuss follow-up steps, but he said it is too early to discuss what those might look like.

“This isn’t about moving on,” Cable said. “This is about getting even.”

So we have one same sex marriage opponent talking about the “distraction” it causes, with another wanting to make this an ongoing issue (and framing it in terms of revenge).  Now, here’s my question: when is Douglas going to come out and condemn Cable for trying to distract the legislature?

Of course, there are other perspectives (again, from Barlow’s piece):

Larry and Elizabeth Messier of Lyndonville walked around the Statehouse Tuesday with their Bibles in their hands. They said they were “standing on the side of God” in opposing same-sex marriage and believe that its passage was a sign of the end of the world.

“God let this happen today for a reason,” Elizabeth Messier said. “And I believe it is because the rapture is coming.”

Now that would be distracting.  

Oh, and apparently we’ve got the robocaller people a bit scared (hat tip to Daily Kos for this one:

And no, that is not a parody.

UPDATE.  It gets better.  Someone decided to put up the audition tapes on youtube (hat tip to Pam’s House Blend:

Oh, and apparently for Vermont Daily Briefing, it’s April Fool’s Day All Over Again.  Great job, Phillip.

From the coverage of yesterday:

Steve Cable of Rutland, a founder of the group Vermont Renewal, said same-sex marriage opponents across the state are “blood shooting out of their eyes mad” about the veto override vote…

“This isn’t about moving on,” Cable said. “This is about getting even.”

Forget “religious right” or “evangelical wing of the Republican Party,” I believe Mr. Cable (who himself is about to slip back into obscurity) has just offered us a new term for his demographic: the Blood-shooting-out-of-their-eyes Right. Nice imagery.

Think about it for a while.

Ever since the advent of Ronald Reagan I’ve been loathe to vote for any Republican. As far as I’m concerned the Republican Party had turned into and still is the single greatest threat to our democracy and freedoms bar nothing foreign or domestic (although I gotta say the Dems keep showing signs of catching up).

And I mean that in the literal sense.

When Republican Marion Milne broke with her Republican Party buddies to vote for civil unions back in 2000 I knew a mere phone call wasn’t enough. My thanks had to be meaningful and palpable … so I did what I never ever do … I voted for Republican Milne.

Some issues are that important.

So what are YOU going to do to express your thanks to those who bucked the party trends and voted to make sure more families have access to legal marriage?

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It's a brave new world, thanks to a coalition of lawmakers across the party spectra. Some thoughts on the politics of it all:

• SuperShap. Speaker Smith didn't have a lot to lose on this, despite the Governor's taunting. Douglas never gets his vetoes overridden in the House, how would the spankin' new Speaker pull it off given the under-the-two-thirds-bar on the original votes? People would have been glum, but unsurprised. Of course, he did pull it off, and you could hear the sound of jaws dropping statewide from folks who were not so closely following the vote count. If reality follows perception (which of course in politics, it does), Smith just became the 800 lb gorilla in the policy arena in Vermont in a way Symington never was, and that may well mark the fastest ascension I've ever seen.

• Smith's gain is Shumlin's gain. Shumlin has had a Senate supermajority for some time, but its full potential power has always been stymied by the lack of same in the House. Shumlin, too, has graduated to 800 lb gorilla status – and with his high-profile work on this issue, may have just locked up some important alliances and goodwill going into a potential Democratic gubernatorial primary.

• Do we owe Emerson Lynn a big chunk of credit, here? St. Albans Rep Jeff Young provided the key vote, after Sonny Audette was reportedly a no-show for health reasons (hmmm…). Young, of course, voted against the bill initially and surprised a lot of people by voting for the override. In socially conservative St. Albans, one wonders if the surprise St. Albans Messenger editorial from editor and conservative standard bearer Emerson Lynn – where he actually endorsed same-sex marriage – may have provided Young enough psychological wiggle room to do the right thing. I guess we'll never know.

• As for Young, we should show him some love, as his stated reason for making the last minute change is an… odd… one at best, and isn't going to help take any of the pressure off him:

He said he continued to be philosophically opposed to gay marriage, but decided that voting with his fellow Democrats would help him be an effective legislator in the future.

• Lots of folks seem to be worried that this will all play well for Douglas, with some even going so far as to suggest this is all part of his master plan. Heh. No way. Douglas is a manipulator, but in a…shall we say…. macro way. He's not a fine-tuned kinda puppet master. And sure, this, to large extent, takes the matter off the table for next year's election, but considering how energized and empowered the Dems and Progs are feeling on this, as well as the public perception that the opposition is now a force to be reckoned with, its easily a net loss for Douglas – who brought this on himself with the strangely timed veto announcement that provided rhetorical cover for no-voting Democrats to switch their votes. Thanks, Jim.

• Will there be consequences? And no, I don't mean to yes voters, I mean to no voters. Douglas announced his intention to veto based on the historic truism that this issue has never been a litmus test for moderate and left voters the way it is for right-wing voters – but given the changing political dynamic is, that really true for everyone anymore, particularly Representatives Atkins and Bissonnette in Winooski? Sure Winooski has a more conservative demographic than Burlington, and Atkins and Bissonnette are institutions, but there are plenty of signs that the city has been steadily turning more to the left in recent years, so I wonder if its not out of the question that this may come back to haunt them. What do you folks think? Will it? Should it?

• Cynthia Browning Whining. No-vote Dem Cynthia Browning of Arlington complained to the press about the pressure she was receiving to change her vote. Yeah, that'll help your relations with the caucus and the leadership even more. A tip: when you're stuck in a hole, first rule is to stop digging.

Montpelier:  April 7, 2009

Vermont Senate 23-5 in favor of equal rights



Vermont House 100 – 49 in favor of equal rights

Final override 100-49 in the House, and 23-5 in the Senate.

Wow.

(Check below the fold for the email that went out from VT Freedom to Marry, as well as a statement from Senate President Pro Tem Peter Shumlin)

Update —

House Roll Call – HERE

Senate Roll Call – HERE  

(From VT Freedom to Marry:

So say we all. -odum)

UPDATE: For those who have not read it, here is the new law, 15 V.S.A. § 8 which now reads:  

§ 8. MARRIAGE DEFINITION

Marriage is the legally recognized union of two people. When used in this chapter or in any other statute, the word “marriage” shall mean a civil marriage.

Full text, here.

Seems pretty unlikely, but there’s a report of a radio ad that sounds suspiciously like a campaign commercial.

The word comes from right-wing blogger Christopher Stewart (formerly of the Martha Rainville Congressional campaign and the Rich Tarrant Senate campaign, but who now does consulting in the DC area while continuing to blog under the moniker Monday Morning Clacker) who simply says “I got word this morning that a Rich Tarrant radio ad of some sort is running in the Rutland, Vermont area.”

Now he seems to know better than to put anything more out there, and this may well fall under the category of Champ sightings, or be a spot for an unrelated, nonpolitical matter – except that the one comment at Stewart’s site makes one wonder:

An ad ran this morning on Q106 in Claremont NH. It sounded like it was from 2006, but it was there big as life in 2009.

#1

Written By Will Hunter on April 6th, 2009 @ 3:30 pm

Hmmmm. Still probably nothing, but enough to make me curious. Has anybody heard such an ad…?

Douglas vetoed the bill at 5:38pm.

The Senate has adjusted their Marriage Equality bill to match the House’s and sent it to the Governor, who should veto it any moment now. With the override vote expected tomorrow morning, here’s an update on the numbers – and who needs to hear from their constituents.

If the pro-equality Republicans hold – and that is a big if (when it comes to Republicans, I am generally highly cynical these days… hopefully I’ll be proven wrong), given that Rep. Westman joined their number, that would leave pro-equality 4 votes short, assuming everyone is there (and I’m still hopeful that some of the no-voting Dems will get the – ah – blue flu).

One vote, as has been pointed out already, could come from the Speaker. And the other three may already have lined up. It’s already out there that no-voting Democratic Representatives Sonny Audette (South Burlington) and Debbie Evans (Essex) are indicating they will vote for the override as a matter of respect for the process, if not a change of heart on the bill itself. Word from the Statehouse is that Representative Bob South (St. Johnsbury) may be the 4th vote that puts the override over. No word on the other no votes – including Winooski’s two Democratic Representatives, who could well find themselves primaried from their intransigence on this issue.

At any rate, these three Democrats – as well as the Republican “yes” votes – need to hear supportive things from their constituents. Be supportive and positive. And that support probably should applaud them for standing up for the process and against gubernatorial intimidation, rather than for equality itself. Here is contact info:

Rep. Bob South: rsouth@leg.state.vt.us, vtrepsouth@gmail.com

Rep. Sonny Audette: (no email, and I hesitate to give out home phone numbers)

Rep. Debbie Evans: devans@leg.state.vt.us, ekevans@aol.com

Messages can also be left for them – as well as Republican yes votes Westman of Stowe as well as Donahue (Washington 2), Wright (Chittenden 3-1), Hube (Windham-Bennington-Windsor 1), Komline (Bennngton-Rutland 1) and Scheuermann (Lamoille 1) – at the Sergeant-at-arms number: 828-2228. Further contact info can be found at the legislative website here.

Update by Julie Waters: Douglas vetoed the bill at 5:38pm.

The Creators of Goodnight Bush: A Parody have done it again with their creation of The Official George W. Bush Presidential Librarium.

My still photo below cannot do justice to this site, so go here for the interactive version:

http://www.goodnightbush.com/librarium/

Let me backtrack for a minute.  Many of us either read the American childrens book classic Goodnight Moon by ourselves and/or to our children.  Check out the authors’ book and new website.  

I don’t know about you, but humor helps me deal with the ongoing trauma and tragedy of the Bush years.  More below the fold about Goodnight Moon and Goodnight Bush.

First published in 1947, Goodnight Moon was written by Margaret Wise Brown and illustrated by Clement Hurd. This simple bedtime story features the process of a child saying goodnight to everything around:

“Goodnight room. Goodnight moon. Goodnight cow jumping over the moon. Goodnight light, and the red balloon…”

Goodnight Bush: A Parody was created by Gan Golan and Erich Origen, who according to Wikipedia are former employees of Donald Rumsfeld. Published on May 27, 2008, Goodnight Bush

takes a satirical look back at the presidency of George W. Bush, using the popular children’s book Goodnight Moon as a jumping off point. Described as a “traumedy” by its authors, the book touches on issues including torture, war for profit, the government’s response to Hurricane Katrina, and the hunt for Osama bin Laden.