Conservative Ethan Allen Institute, in report, says school choice could save state millions
headline, Time Argus, December 1.
No doubt readers of the paper appreciated that warning. We just wonder if we'll ever see a headline that reads:
Liberal Vermont Public Interest Research Group,' [...]
They say you never really know someone and evidently this is true. Three years now, Art Woolf and I have been working on this website together. We talk or exchange e-mails almost every day and sometimes talk several times during the day. I'm always' [...]
Vermont has problems. There is a shortage of money; a surplus of commitments. The gap between the two will, inevitably, be shrunk. One way or another. It would be difficult to find anyone in the state who would deny this. Even senior members of the legislature [...]
I try to be optimistic about the fiscal problems facing our state and nation. But the news continues to be bad. Last week, we learned that mortgage delinquencies continue to soar, with nearly one in ten homeowners having trouble making their monthly [...]
Two weeks ago, Sen. Bernie Sanders demanded that the Treasury Secretary identify financial giants – enterprises that were considered too big to fail -- and break them up. He proposed a bill to dismantle giant banks, insurance companies, and hedge funds that could wreck [...]
This is the game President Obama has been playing and he is using our (yours and mine) money to increase the anti.
AARP was originally against this Healthcare until they [...]
Much of what the public “knows” about the bill is inaccurate, fed by distortions, and worse, by defenders of the status quo.
So says our senior senator, speaking to the Burlington Free Press. And he may be correct in the limited sense that most people [...]
Senator Mary Landrieu has those good Louisiana political genes. Like the Kingfish, Eddie Edwards, and her father, Moon – who served as mayor of New Orleans – Senator Landrieu gets it that politics is about making the best deal you can for your people. As for [...]
Who Can Help & How
by
Hugh Kemper
Last Thursday’s article addressed the imperative need to reduce K-12 education spending to levels consistent with providing a quality education and restoring Vermont’s financial viability. This piece addresses what voters can do to help reduce education spending by doing their [...]
Illinois Democratic Rep. Danny Davis, a member of the Congressional subcommittee that oversees the Postal Service (and, until recently, its chairman), told CBSNews.com in an interview that the agency "is between a rock and a hard place."
Ah, yes. The felicity of the phrasing could come only from a member of the [...]
So says Susan Bartlett, member of the Vermont Senate and candidate for the job of governor, one of five who appeared at a meeting in Burlington last night where:
Two of the candidates, Racine and Bartlett, pointedly talked about the importance of protecting the environment, then about [...]We made a mistake.
It happens (every couple of hours or so, it sometimes seems) and we try to admit them and learn from them.
In this case, our mistake was pointed out to us by one of our friends in the Vermont press. We have some and we sympathize [...]By Montpelier standards, Education Commissioner Vilaseca’s letter to school administrators and board members regarding FY11 budgets was a breath of fresh air, a welcome first step. Its call for fiscal responsibility, however, could have achieved clarion heights had the letter:
(1) made much [...]The associations asked for a 5 [...]
by Tom Licata
Why is the re-licensing of a safe Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant necessary? Just ask President Obama and his Energy Information Agency (EIA).
At an October 15 New Orleans town-hall meeting, President Obama said this: "We need to increase domestic energy production, employ safe nuclear energy like France," [...]
Not quite three weeks ago, Anne Galloway took one for the team. Ms. Galloway spent what had to be a long day recording, by video, the remarks of several people who would like to be the next governor of Vermont. They were in Randolph, speaking to [...]
So, the public is assured that the stimulus is working just fine and for proof the government provides
data showing hundreds of created jobs and millions of dollars spent in congressional districts that don't exist
One congressman characterizes them as "ludicrous mistakes" and "administration officials" blame "unrealistic data."
If you did this' [...]
Government-run health care means government panels making decisions like this.
"Tens of thousands of lives are being saved by mammography screening, and these idiots want to do away with it," said Daniel B. Kopans, a radiology professor at Harvard Medical School. "It's crazy -- unethical, really."
Why not let' [...]
The bigdeal Burlington Telecom deal seems to leave many questions unanswered. Not least, if laws were violated when $17 million in city money was secretly ... er, loaned to BT to cover expenses while additional financing was being secured. This, of course, did not happen in [...]
Windham County Democratic Senator Peter Shumlin announced this week to no one’s surprise that he is running for Governor. In doing so he took pains to declare that he was a mighty tight fiscal conservative. Well, let’s see.
Two years ago, he told everybody that [...]
An interesting column in Barron’s spotlighted a problem which should concern all Vermonters. States with high taxes are experiencing an exodus of citizens, a significant number of whom are “…productive and wealthy people who don’t believe the services associated with high [...]
unemployment in Vermont is expected to get even worse-- perhaps rising to 8 percent next year. Consumer confidence is still low, so companies are unlikely to hire new workers. And the decline in income tax revenues is going to be tough on state budgets. Jeff Carr, economist
"The news" [...]
The winds are howling, the creek is rising and the roof just sprung a leak. Normally this would be a call to action; fix the things you can and brace for those you can’t. If you hadn’t noticed pretty much everything is [...]
The Vermont Department of Education sent out a letter dated November 10th, addressed to: School Superintendents, Principals, Business Managers and School Board Members. The letter detailed the department's 2011 budget recommendations and could be summed up in the phrase ... please try to spend less money.
The letter does a' [...]
Peter Galbraith thought about running last time, telling VPR that
The Legislature and this caucus have worked hard to promote progressive change in health care, climate protection in clean government and campaign finance reform - only to be stymied by the current administration in the Statehouse.''
In what is a [...]
It's so bad, I ordered a burger at McDonalds and the kid behind the counter asked, "Can you afford fries with that?"
The economy is so bad if the bank returns your check marked "Insufficient Funds," you call them' [...]
What government wants; government gets. If it decides, later on, that it really didn't want what it took ... well, hard cheese.
So what can we expect from the government now that it (almost) owns health care.
' [...]There seems to be no relief in sight as the worst economic slump (all together now) since the Great Depression, continues grinding people – and their hopes – into dust. Unemployment has grown to more than 10% by official measurement and much more than that when you throw [...]
Less Heat; More Light
by
P.G. Behr
After the last session of the Legislature, I decried the passage of H.446, which decreed purchase of high-priced energy from “renewable” sources, to be paid for by Vermont’s utility customers, already burdened with the cost of “Efficiency Vermont.” Our Democrats and Liberals [...]
Delay has a way of claiming its victims.
Last legislative session the Senate made the long-discussed move to change the date of the Vermont primary – always held the second Tuesday in September. But the House could not be bothered. It wasn’t a [...]
The unemployment rate, nationally, is now at 10.2% and will, according to some experts, go higher. (Vermont's number is not yet known and will probably be somewhat lower and distorted, on the high side, by the deployment of our 1,500 Guardsmen to Afghanistan. Whatever the Vermont number, it will' [...]
In the tech sector of Vermont and New Hampshire.
Are you kidding? We do it our way.
(of course, you got the real goods on this lottery by reading it here, first)
[...]
