Op/Ed

The Op/Ed opinion section

Outrage! Vermonters Forced To Pay Electricity for Marijuana Grow Operations!

by CrisEricson2016 | Op/Ed

“As Vermont edges toward a legal recreational cannabis market, everyone paying a power bill is indirectly subsidizing the indoor cultivation of marijuana.
Efficiency Vermont, established by lawmakers in 1999 and funded through charges on residential and commercial power bills, is working to blunt the power demand of the energy-intensive cannabis businesses taking root.”

Why is this an outrage? Because we shouldn’t be forced to pay the electricity bill for any profit making business! No doubt about it, the marijuana / cannabis businesses expect to make millions in profits.

VT Digger Excludes Independents From Debate; Candidate Offers To Donate Salary

by CrisEricson2016 | Op/Ed

WHAT IS THE DEFINITION OF ELECTION FRAUD?

It happens many different ways in Vermont!

VtDigger.org is an online news source in Vermont which claims to be a non-profit and may receive funding from the State of Vermont. They are holding a series of political candidate debates which ONLY INCLUDE the Democrats and Republicans and exclude all others.

The King Of Criminals

by RDavis | Op/Ed

The last U.S. president has left a trail of crimes that are unprecedented in American history. A reasonable person would expect that such a high level criminal would have already been prosecuted for a few of the more egregious crimes, yet the man who may prove to be the most immoral and unethical person to live in the White House is free and has not yet been charged with a crime.

The American people need some degree of closure. We also need to have hope that Trump never again holds the office of President. The ball is in the court of the Justice Department and it will be up to Attorney General Merrick Garland to make sure that our legal system does not become another casualty in the Trump wars. It will be up to voters to destroy Trump’s political ambitions.

Nasty Behaviour

by Dfk-b | Op/Ed

To the woman in front of me, with what appeared to be her partner and two daughters on the Edible Brattleboro farmstand line this morning: Your gratuitous nastiness was not appreciated. It looks like you wished to pass on ugliness to the world. Insulting and unkind behaviour is not in the spirit of the gift/sharing economy.

“Global Warming” As A Political Issue Fails To Take Into Account That Some Hot Days Are Caused By The Sun!

by CrisEricson2016 | Op/Ed

How much of what people call “global warming” is NOT man made? It’s just another hot day brought to us by our Sun!

Dr. Tamitha Skove, a space weather physicist, posted on twitter that a filament of a solar storm on the Sun would arrive on Earth early July 19th.

Well, we can look at the weather forecast and see it will be warm tomorrow.

That Electric Trolley Idea… I Like It

by cgrotke | Op/Ed

Django Grace brought up a fun idea at the most recent Brattleboro Selectboard meeting – a return to the electric trolley.

Now, I’d advocate for a trolley-monorail hybrid, of course, but the trolley alone is interesting. I like transportation that is fun.

It would be cost prohibitive to get one custom built and installed.  Recent trolley projects have costs cities between $4-14 million dollars per mile. There are Federal funds available, but they are calculated on ridership estimates and larger locations would certainly win out over Brattleboro.

What could be done, though, is to build something locally.

Some Thoughts On Being In The Spotlight

by cgrotke | Op/Ed

It surprised many that Town Manager Yoshi Manale resigned after just a few months. But it isn’t that surprising.

Brattleboro is unusual. For a small town, there is a tremendous amount of media. Two newspapers, three radio stations, citizen journalists, and others pay close attention to what goes on in town government. Add in social media, discussions in offices, and conversations on the street and you end up with a rather active core population that follow the details of town government.

There are big cities with less coverage of their municipal governments and fewer news outlets. And big city news is often dominated by crimes, fires, and other distractions, making municipal news a smaller piece of the overall newscast or front page headlines.

It’s The End Of The World As We Know It

by Lise | Op/Ed
Hiroshima 1945

There’s a funny skit on the Don’t Crush That Dwarf album by Firesign Theatre in which two tv news anchors banter about the apocalypse.  “Last year, Patty, you and the viewers will be interested in noting that the world ended.”  To which his partner replies, “As we know it, Hugh!”

This is kind of what’s happened to us.  The world, as we knew it, has ended and now we’re in a new world, feeling less than brave, and facing all four Horseman of the Apocalypse at the same time.  For people who’ve been living in the virtual world for most of the last two decades, waking up and discovering that the real world that we were counting on is going, going, gone, the whole flaming mess we’re in must seem like a bridge too far.  How could we have gotten to this?

What Time Is It?

by RDavis | Op/Ed

How do you stop a deranged dictator from creating his own image of the world while he kills people and terrorizes an entire planet? I don’t have the answer to that question and it looks like world leaders are having a hard time slowing the juggernaut of death and destruction that Putin is causing.

Sensible and humane people see war as an option only after all other methods of diplomacy have failed. In Putin’s world, diplomacy is a tool for weak nations. He knows that he can use bombs and bullets whenever he wants because he has no regard for human life. When a leader is of that mindset, diplomacy and the gentler methods of compromise and conciliation will never succeed.

Super Bowl USA Murders Afghani Children Stealing Their Food Money After 20 Year Defeat by Taliban Gov.

by jay janson | Op/Ed

Before kick off at the Super Bowl, a moment of silence for the Afghani children that have been starved to death by the American government impounding their food money would have been appropriate. It would have shown that Americans care and wish their government would unfreeze the more than 9 $billion so Afghani children can be fed and go on living. Some US Congressmen and women spoken out.

Finding Common Ground

by Lise | Op/Ed, Opinion

My father was always conservative. Although never a registered Republican — he preferred to see himself as an Independent — his views were decidedly to the right. For my part, I too saw myself as independent but took the opposite road politically, becoming what he would call “a liberal.” Consequently, we rarely saw eye to eye about political matters, although it never came to blows.

But somewhere in the early 21st century, my dad retired from his job and began to have more time on his hands. Having moved to rural Rhode Island and having no friends in the area or work to keep him occupied, he acquired the unfortunate habit of listening to talk radio. Rush Limbaugh was his favorite show. As a frequent visitor to the new family homestead, I became the target of his right-wing ire. After all, it’s no fun being angry if you have no one to attack over it.

IFOs – Identified Flying Objects

by tomaidh | Op/Ed

Identified Flying Objects

I spent much of yesterday devouring UFO stuff. In this morning’s reverie, it all came together.

Why have governments devoted enormous resources to denying their existence?

• They are afraid that we’d “panic”. Yeah, right!

If USA Were Reminded of 1967 Headlines! King Calls U.S.“Greatest Purveyor Of Violence In The World”

by jay janson | Op/Ed

If, during the three day Martin Luther King birthday holiday, a world attention getting source, for example, a Chinese government spokesperson, would point out that the government of the United States of America was condemned as the most violent in the world by America’s own idol, this writer believes it would be a sensation, and a most difficult moment for the U.S. government and America’s wars supporting mainstream media.

“What If It Was Your Family Starving To Death?” UN World Food Program Director Asked Musk and Bezo

by jay janson | Op/Ed

“Our lives are now shaped by the pursuits, products and priorities of the world’s wealthiest people.” … “Like it or not, we are now in Musk’s world.”

TIME Magazine’s Editor-in-Chief

TIME Magazine’s Editor-in-Chief in his explanation of why Elon Musk was chosen as TIME’s 2021 Person of the Year mentions quite insightfully that to Musk

“steering capital allocation away from the government to those who will be good stewards of it, is progress.

No USA Christmas Charity for Afghani Venezuelans Cubans Syrians Iranians North Koreans

by jay janson | Op/Ed

This Christmas season, as always, CIA controlled mainstream media is filled with unctuous images of the hungry homeless in America being charitably served food by private citizens and institutions. It has long become an American tradition of kindness during the season celebrating the birth of all loving Jesus along with gift giving Santa Claus, and along with the encouragement and participation of churches, this tradition often receives government support .

The Christmas time Christian tradition of charitable feeding of the hungry homeless in capitalist USA never extends to include those millions of men, women and children made hungry by heartless US sanctions on countries overseas. The hard hearted Deep State investors in war of the Military Industrial Complex would never allow any of its captive US presidents to be gracious to the hungry in sanctioned nations at Christmas time.

The Campaign Season Has Begun

by RDavis | Op/Ed

When Senator Patrick Leahy announced his retirement recently he set off a political chain of events that marked the start of the campaign season. Leahy served almost 50 years in the Senate and he proved to be one of Vermont’s best political assets.

Rep. Peter Welch has served Vermont in Washington since 2007. He is the heir apparent to Leahy’s seat. There will be contenders for the office but it is clear that Welch will be the frontrunner and the person most prepared to represent Vermont in the Senate.