The Selectboard was reviewing and adding to their goals at their most recent meeting. There are a few more items they should take up:
End Weigher of Coal Position
This is just embarrassing in 2021. Brattleboro should rid itself of any mention of coal. It’s such an easy thing to do. Town Managers since Barb Sondag have promised to get this done. All it takes is sending an article to Representative Town Meeting.
The events of January 6 at the U.S. Capitol were inevitable. The stage was set years ago. When this country elected a mentally ill criminal to become president the drama intensified. As the weeks after the election unfolded I was sure that even Republicans would find a way to throw this madman under the bus and allow our country to move on quickly from its biggest mistake.
Instead, what happened was a four year period of enabling Trump to become intoxicated with power and providing him the license to do whatever he wanted. The Washington Republicans are mostly to blame, but both parties have proven to be too tame in their treatment of an incompetent and dangerous president and that is why things have finally gotten out of control.
At the last two meetings of the Brattleboro Selectboard, members of the board and the Chief of Police implored people NOT to use social media for official business, such as reporting crimes.
“Don’t rely on social media,” said board member Tim Wessel. “Social media has never been a form of reporting things,” added Chair Brandie Starr.
Where could the public have gotten such a crazy idea as to use social media for town business? Perhaps from members of the Selectboard?
Your friends and family will ultimately thank you. Take a few moments and quit Facebook.
Yes, go ahead and quit.
I’ve done an informal survey of this summer and it seems many people who use Facebook don’t like that they use it. They know it is a crappy platform that is in the business of selling personal information to the highest bidder. They know Mark Zuckerberg is using them. They know the site is undermining democracy and is weaponized by political parties to sway voters. They know there are privacy problems. They are tired of being a commodity and tired of supplying personal data for free.
You may have read that courts ruled that Trump, using a Twitter account for official, open government purposes, cannot block people based on the views they express. This applies to all public officials, not just Trump. It’s a first amendment issue.
Members of the Selectboard and elected Representative Town Meeting reps should take notice and proceed with caution.
Everyone knows Facebook is evil. After all, they single-handedly gave the election to Trump through their nefarious dealings with the Russians… Or at least, that’s what I hear. Whether or not Trump won because of targeted Facebook ads, Facebook did give up data on 85+ million people which is a lot. Moreover, their practice of making deals with “research companies” for Facebook data seems wide open for abuse. Who are these companies and what are they researching? Oh, right. Us.
Given how rotten and disgusting this whole episode was, you’d think some kind of slap on the wrist might be forthcoming for our favorite time suck. I’m going to go out on a limb here and say the opposite — not only is Facebook going to get away with their crummy business practices, but they’re actually going to get stronger as a result. Why, you might ask? Think about it — Congresscritters are not going to regulate the golden goose of voter targeting.
