First off, congrats to Vermont for successfully overriding Governor Jim Douglas’s veto of the gay marriage bill. It’s now law – officially kicking in on September 1st.

While the clear “winners” in this victory are the gay and lesbian couples who can now get married and – hopefully – aim to do better than the 50% failure rate of man/woman marriages, there were also a number of political winners.

Beth Robinson, for example, the head of VT Freedom to Marry Coalition, was simply superb. She kept her coalition on message and, most impressively, rose above the angry mob of gay marriage opponents who all but taunted them throughout the public hearings. How, for example, they could remain cool, calm and collected while their opponents compared gay love to man/horse love or man/boy love or father/daughter love is beyond me. But they did. And they deserve credit for it.

The other political winner is first-year House Speaker Shap Smith, my representative by the way. Smith and Senate President Peter Shumlin did a masterful job of orchestrating the timing and the logistics of this bill. But Smith’s job was a whole lot more difficult than Shumlin’s since the Vermont Senate is a whole lot more liberal and smaller (read: manageable) than the House.

As you’ll recall, Shumlin and the last House Speaker, Gaye Symington, tried to get bold with their “super-majorities” in the last session on issues like global warming and taxing the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant but Symington failed to deliver the House. The reason she failed became clear when she decided to challenge Governor Douglas for his job: Symington’s a terrible communicator and leader.

Smith, on the other hand, is at least able to both articulate a thought and also be persuasive enough to bring along enough votes to win the day. That’s refreshing. And it’s also exactly what’s needed in this rare time when the Democrats have veto-proof majorities in the legislature.

Now let’s get to the losers. The person put first on every such list so far has been Governor Douglas. And I agree, but for different reasons. The conventional wisdom says that Douglas lost because his veto was overridden. True enough. But, for me, Douglas is a real loser on this issue for doing what he always does with tough issues: Play politics while pretending not to. It’s about as transparent as transparent can get – but it doesn’t stop the Vermont’s lapdog media from regurgitating his dopey proclamations (i.e. “gay marriage is a distraction).

I think Douglas got exactly what he wanted out of this issue. He got it off the legislative radar in a non-election year by having his veto overridden and he got to throw a bone to his right-wing Vermont base and growing national Republican base by issuing his veto. Mission accomplished, indeed.

But he’s still obviously the biggest loser for playing the highest-stakes game of politics with an issue that is truly about civil rights, civil compassion and simply providing some joy in a time of great civil strife.

Remember, Governor Douglas’ primary opposition to the gay marriage bill was based on the fact that it was “a distraction” to the more pressing matters that were facing Vermont, particularly the economy. But let’s see if he speaks up to scold the right-wing gay-bashers who are now frothing at the bit over their calls for “revenge,” “constitutional amendments,” and promises to “repeal and revolt” over the legislature’s actions.

Speaking of the gay-bashers, let’s delve deeper into the loser list. Next up, Steve Cable of Rutland, the self-anointed leader of the “oh-my-god-we’ll-die-if-gay’s-are-legitimized” crowd. Here’s how Cable described the mood of his shrinking number of followers to the Vermont Press Bureau after finding out – once again – that they were losers:

“[They’re] blood shooting out of their eyes mad.”

Wow. That’s dramatic. But the real question is: Will Cable continue to quote the Bible in defeat as he did during the entire time during the battle? I guess not:

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

I guess Cable’s Bible doesn’t include that whole “turn the other cheek” reference.

Speaking of the Bible, the other major loser in this fight was the “Rev.” Craig Benson, another Rutland man who apparently loves to spew hate in the name of the Bible. Please, can someone find the passage in the Bible that glorifies hate, paranoia, false-judgment, and mean-spirited revenge? Because the “Rev.” Benson can’t.

Instead, the “Rev.” Benson joins his fire-breathing hate-monger, Steve Cable, in declaring a massive miscarriage of justice by those seeking love and justice. Go figure. Specifically, Benson mashed his sour grapes with this nonsense:

“Our side was outspent 20-1…and, given that, we were lucky the vote was so close.”

Proof on the spending? None. And for those of us who were “lucky” enough to receive all those calls from the out of state gay-bashers, I’d seriously question his spending accusation.

But what’s easy to dispute is Benson’s laughable claim that the votes were “close.” Since when did votes of 23-5 in the Senate and 100-49 in the House get considered to be “close”? Those votes are what the sports world would call “blow-outs.” And they were.

We can only hope that in the election season of 2010 Jim Douglas will be forced to join Cable and Benson in their caves of irrelevance. There may not be term limits in Vermont but there are limits on how long bigots can swim against the stream of justice – just ask all those Republicans in the 1950’s and ‘60’s who opposed giving civil rights to African-Americans. Yes, indeed, Jim Douglas is our George Wallace.

But let’s end on the positive note: Vermont rose to the occasion and, like its stand against slavery in the 18th Century, Vermont will be forever recognized for its courageous stand. Congrats.

I’ve been homebound a bit more than I’d like lately. First, with a hideous chest cold and now to avoid the soggy ground and attempt to get some inside work done. And being inside for me usually means being a slave to the radio – talk radio to be precise.

In Central Vermont, local talk radio means WDEV to me. But I’m not sure how much more I can take – especially in the morning – as Mark Johnson of the not-so-cleverly-named “Mark Johnson Show” seems hell-bent in his milquetoast pursuit of playing the media lapdog to Vermont’s power elite.

If you’ve ever listened to Johnson, you’ll know what I’m talking about: He approaches his media role not like a probing reporter but more like a member – if not a leading member – of an insider’s club of Vermont’s media, economic and political elite. In other words, Johnson takes the exact opposite path of what the late, great Joseph Pulitzer saw as the true goal of the “fourth estate’: To have no friends.

For two hours a day, five days a week, Johnson brings forth a steady stream of his fellow club members, exchanging pleasant guffaws with them and lobbing softballs in their general direction, seemingly not bothered by the shallowness of it all. It is, after all, what maintains his membership to the “club.” Because we all know the quickest way to get kicked out of the Vermont media and political elite is to actually ask some tough questions of your fellow members. Bye-bye invites to “Vermont This Week,” for sure. And so long to those 15-minute puff-pieces with Leahy/Sanders/Welch/Douglas where allowing them to regurgitate their talking points masquerades as an “interview.”

If Johnson ever does demonstrate disdain for anyone, it’s usually the poor fool who dares to call into his show and criticize the media. Johnson will not tolerate it. Never mind that the Vermont media is an atrophied shadow of what the media really should be (and getting worse by the week given the layoffs and cutbacks), Johnson will not let even the mildest media critique get by without either a hang-up and/or a stern rebuke.

Most recently, for example, the leader of the Vermont Senate, Peter Shumlin, was a guest on Johnson’s show to discuss the Democratic leadership’s decision to put gay marriage on its priority list for this current session. The all-too-frequent and curmudgeonly old-guy callers (do these guys ever work?) to his show bombarded Shumlin with the Republican talking points, declaring that the gay marriage issue was a “distraction” to the real matters (read: economic) facing the state.

Shumlin hung in there quite admirably, trying – time and time again – to point out that the gay marriage bill wasn’t really taking up much time and, nevertheless, was merely one bill among dozens and dozens that the legislature was more than capable of considering.

But Shumlin crossed the Johnson line when he dared to venture into even the mildest of mild media criticism. “Well,” declared an almost exasperated Shumlin, “we held a press conference yesterday about our latest economic plan but you wouldn’t know it because the media didn’t cover it.”

“Wait, wait, wait,” interjected Johnson, “before you start criticizing the media…”

And Shumlin, being the good club member himself, knew that he had to back down, allowing Johnson’s rebuke to stand while shelving his very reasonable critique of the Vermont media and allowing its embarrassingly shallow coverage of the Statehouse go unchecked.

But Johnson’s at his all-time worst when he’s interviewing a fellow media club member. Take, for example, his interview today with WCAX’s Marselis Parsons. Johnson invited Parsons on after he read the news that Vermont’s own media dinosaur was considering retiring. The ensuing interview was little more than a mutual admiration love-fest: “Don’t you love what you do?”

Um, excuse me fellas, but you’re members of the media. So why don’t you loosen up your lover’s embrace long enough to ask a hard question in these incredibly hard times. You know, something like: How did the Vermont media completely blow it when it comes to the economic crisis? And why don’t we hold some of our life-long political figures accountable for fiddling while our economy burned?

Instead, we got things like: “Wow, you’ve been there for 42 years?” “I’ve only been around for half that time.” “Does it feel like it’s been that long?” “Tell me about your favorite interview?”

That, my friends, is how you remain in the club: lob softballs at your fellow club members, make no waves, and fantasize about all the accolades that might come your way after 42-years of doing little but shilling for the power elite. Oh yeah, Mark, you’re halfway there…

If Johnson ever does show disdain, it’s almost always for those who dare to criticize the media or hold Vermont politicians accountable. Instead of probing the power elite, Johnson acts as a firewall to seemingly protect them – thus assuring more bland interviews with his clubmates. “Tell me, Senator Leahy, how does it feel to be so powerful?” Yawn.

The only disdain Johnson ever shows is almost exclusively for those who dare to put a spotlight on the miserable state of the Vermont media. He simply won’t tolerate it. Much like he won’t tolerate any true people-based attempt to hold his poltical friends accountable for their dithering and/or outright assistance in bringing about the mess we’re currently in as a state and a nation.

Sadly, Johnson’s a proud member of the insider’s club and he’s not going to risk his next attempt to crawl into the laps of fellow members by – gasp! – asking some uncomfortable questions of them. There are rules, you know.

Johnson, of course, is no different than almost all of his fellow Vermont media brethren. They know how to keep buttering their bread, even if it means totally and completely bastardizing the real role of the media: Standing outside of the club so as to ask the tough questions and demand the real answers.

But one thing is for sure: Johnson gets his phone calls returned, especially when those on the other end know that little more than lobs will be coming their way. “Tell me, Senator Sanders, how does it feel to be so popular?”

Or maybe he’s just being honest because, after all, it is called the “Mark Johnson Show.” And it is, indeed, all about Mark Johnson and his cozy friendships with those who are willing to trade back-scratches and belly-rubs. Anything, that is, but make waves….

Sorry, Mr. Pulitzer, it’s a whole different era.

Oh my, it’s nice to see Vermont’s liberal elite finally catch up to the obvious conclusions reached years ago here: Anthony Pollina is a loser. Duh. I mean, how many elections does he have to lose or otherwise foul with his disastrous decision-making before the scarlet “L” is permanently attached to his political being? Well, this is his fourth and, let’s hope, his last.

Pollina, as news reading Vermonters know by now, is in the middle of yet another one of his bizarre political tantrums, whereby he proves that the only “p” that matters to him is the “p” in “Pollina,” not principles. This time Pollina is once again shit-canning his “Mr. Campaign Finance Reform” label to – say what? – obliterate any and all of Vermont’s campaign finance laws. In other words, if he’s going to lose, he’s going to make sure all of Vermont loses, too. Oh boy, that’ll show ‘em!

This latest Pollina mess was created when he made the me, myself and I-based decision to turn his back on his Progressive Party and, instead, run as an “independent” for governor. But, much like he bungled the management of his Vermont Milk Company, Pollina botched this move, too, by failing to note that the fundraising rules were a whole lot different for so-called independents. Specifically, according to the Secretary of State’s interpretation of the rules, independents can raise $1,000 per contributor/per election and major party candidates get to raise $2,000.

Pollina stepped in the campaign finance doo-doo when he began his race for governor as a major party candidate, thus begging for the $2,000 checks, but then dissed that party for a run on his own. But wait. What about the thirty-some-odd folks who ponied up more than $1,000 to his campaign? Send the money back, says the Secretary of State. No way, says Pollina. And let the mess begin.

While Pollina certainly has a legitimate grief that the law as interpreted by the state is unfair to independents, he also should have made sure he knew the rules before playing the game. But that kind of sloppiness is par for the course for Pollina’s political career (quick, name something he’s actually succeeded at…time’s up).

But there are far bigger issues here than Pollina’s latest tantrum. By declaring that the Secretary of State’s interpretation of the rules are not accurate, Pollina is saying that there are no campaign finance rules due to the fact that – buckle your seatbelts, folks – the U.S. Supreme Court threw out Vermont’s campaign finance law and Governor Jim Douglas vetoed the Vermont legislature’s attempts to remedy them.

The result? Pollina thinks anarchy should rule, as in: There are no rules. But the Secretary of State’s office thinks that the previously enacted rules should be enforced, as in: $2,000 contribution limits for major party candidates and $1,000 limits for independents.

The supreme irony in Pollina’s current self-serving position is that he’s taking one, big almighty dump on his previously proclaimed principles by now declaring that there are no rules when it comes to raising political capital. Hmm, let’s think for a second: Whom might that help most? The rich? The powerful? The well connected? Yes. Yes. And yes. But, to Pollina, there’s nothing as easily dispensable as a principle in the path of his quixotic pursuits of (said with frustration and clenched teeth): Just. Winning. One. God. Damned. Race.

So, in other words, if Pollina fails to read the rules before making a decision, to hell with the rules! Worse, if his challenge to those rules means empowering those with all the power already, so be it. Because this is about the big “P”: Pollina, and only Pollina.

Shame on him.

And shame on the Attorney General’s office, too, for repeatedly making public comments that they would need to “receive a complaint” before looking into this matter. You’d think that an official declaration by the Secretary of State’s office would trigger an investigation. Hello? Do you folks ever talk?

But, worse, while speaking with the Attorney General’s office this morning, Assistant Attorney General, Mike McShane, admitted to me that due to the “increased attention” this matter was getting that they may be looking into it “eventually” anyway. In other words, unless the press and the blogs pay enough attention to an opinion issued by the Secretary of State’s office, the Attorney General’s office will ignore it? Give me a break.

So, in order to put an end to the nonsense between these two state agencies, my partner in crime (or, in this instance, my partner in crime prevention), Boots Wardinski, submitted the letter below to the Attorney General’s office. At the time the letter was faxed, I was informed that it – the letter – would be the official “trigger” to an investigation of this matter. Pathetic? Sure. But, oddly enough, necessary as well.

The letter:

August 20, 2008

Mike McShane
Assistant Attorney General
State of Vermont
109 State Street
Montpelier, VT 05609-1001

Dear Mr. McShane,

Please consider this letter an official citizens’ complaint regarding the political fundraising of Anthony Pollina, a publicly declared “independent” candidate for governor of Vermont.

As you know, the Secretary of State’s office has requested that the Pollina campaign return all contributions of more than $1,000 in order to comply with what it considers to be the current law. To date, the Pollina campaign is refusing to return the money.

As concerned citizens of the State of Vermont, we offer this citizens’ complaint regarding the fundraising actions of the Pollina campaign and its apparent disregard for the law as interpreted by the Secretary of State’s office.

We look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Michael Colby & Boots Wardinski

It’s all the rage to talk about money and politics. But I think we’re focusing on the wrong end. Sure, we should keep track of the donors to political campaigns. But I think it’s just as important that we begin to ponder the wealth of those seeking our publicly-funded political offices.

Take Vermont’s campaign for governor, for example. Our sitting – and I do mean sitting – Governor, Jim Douglas, recently announced that he and his wife, a dental assistant, are worth more than $2 million and have no debt. The peculiar thing about this Republican’s amassing of wealth is that he’s spent his entire professional career as a “public servant,” working in various elected government jobs since he graduated from Middlebury College 30-some years ago. So you have to wonder how seriously we have to take Douglas when he spills forth with his “big, bad government” mantra. I guess what he really means is that government is “bad for thee, but not for me!” Two million dollars worth – and counting.

Douglas’ Democrat opponent, Gaye Symington, is also a millionaire many times over. She’s just trying to be coy by not including her husband’s wealth in the financial filings she recently handed over to the Vermont press. Her husband, Chuck Lacy, was one of the original honchos at Ben & Jerry’s back when the company’s stock was being handed out like candy and those at the top – like Lacy — walked away with more loot than they knew what to do with. So much loot, in fact, that folks like Lacy started their own charitable foundations to give gobs of it away. Nice work if you can get it.

Without her hubby’s millions, Symington declared a personal worth of close to $400,000. But you’ve got to be more than a hypocritical fool (or, for that matter, drinking way too much Dem Kool-Aid) to buy her argument against releasing their joint financial information.

“I’m running for office,” Symington declares, “not my family.”

Okay, Gaye, fan the flames of interest all you want but that kind of lameness isn’t going to make the issue – or the millions of dollars — go away. Besides, I’ll bet you won’t be distancing yourself from “the family” when the photo-ops, the door knocking, the advertisements, the advice, and the support come into play, huh? Of course not.

The simmering issue of Symington taking Vermonters for fools by refusing to release her joint financial picture should be dispensed with by two recent political examples: Hillary Clinton released joint financial statements in her run for president; and national Democrats made a huge issue of the McCains’ refusal to release joint financial statements. Checkmate, Gaye. Release them or prepare yourself for more questions.

Speaking of spousal wealth, the newly declared “Independent” in this campaign, Anthony Pollina, announced that he and his wife (emphasis on “wife”) are worth around $800,000. But if you look more closely at the filing you’ll see that there’s a pot of gold on his wife’s side that is just waiting to be handed over whenever it’s needed. Their joint income of around $90,000 last year included $30,000 in income derived from her family’s Maryland-based businesses. Hmm. Again, a nice job if you can get it. Or, in Anthony’s case, marry into it.

But the bigger issue here – for me, at least – is the wealth of these three media-appointed “leaders” in the campaign for governor. Compared to the average Vermont family, these folks are financial kings and queens. And the same is true when you take a gander at the financial pictures of our federally-elected threesome – Senators Patrick Leahy and Bernie Sanders and Congressman Peter Welch (all are millionaires).

When, exactly, will the comparatively extreme wealth of our elected officials and mainstream challengers become an issue? How long will we kid ourselves into thinking and believing that people with such wealth, and, as a result, a built-in disconnect with the economic pains that the rest of us are feeling, will do anything of substance to “change” the system? Hey, it’s worked for them.

None of the aforementioned politicians – or, in the case of Pollina, a wannabe politician – ever have to worry about that pit in their stomach when they go to the mailbox and are greeted by bills that they don’t have the money for. They don’t have to fret about health insurance or even trying to get an appointment to see a doctor (tried that lately?). They don’t sweat with the mental calculations that the rest of us sweat over as we shop for such extravagances as, say, food. They don’t stop filling their gas tank at half-full because that’s all they can afford. And they don’t worry about their retirement, unless, of course, you don’t count the worry of “which house?” or “which boat?”

But yet we continue to elect one wealthy person after another to help us deal with the issues that have made them wealthy and made the rest of us struggle. Nail, meet the hammer, and enjoy the pain.

Personally, I’ve had enough of the crocodile tears from the millionaire politicians. They can’t “feel” our pain. They’ve only been profiting from it.

Sure, let’s get money out of politics, as they say. And we can start by getting the moneyed-elite out of our political offices. Enough already.

Yikes. Given the recent financial disclosure submitted by one-time Democrat, one-time Rainbow Party, two-and-a-half-time Progressive Party and now half-time Independent candidate, Anthony Pollina, we now know why he put his silly little credit card idea so front and center in his campaign for governor: The poor lad is out of cash. Yo Tony, credit or debit?

Yesterday marked the financial disclosure-filing deadline for any statewide candidate who has spent or raised more than $500. And the paperwork submitted by the mainstream media’s top three gubernatorial candidates – Pollina, Gaye Symington and Jim Douglas – looked remarkably like the candidates themselves. Pollina’s was pathetic (only $20,000 left), Symington’s was bland, and Douglas’ was what one would expect from a spoiled incumbent Republican (loaded).

Other than the fact that it looks like another cakewalk for an incumbent in this election, the news from the filings should focus on what losers the left is putting up against Douglas – especially in a year in which St. Obama is expected to mop up in Vermont. Pollina, for example, was a distant third in the race for the cash, despite the fact that he was the first to announce his candidacy, didn’t have a job to distract him from his run, and had made the claim last January that he had raised more than $100,000 at that point. If we take his $100,000 claim to be true, that means Pollina only raised about $60,000 in the seven months since then. Ouch. So he either lied back then or he’s been pathetic since then – choose one.

Now that he’s losing the campaign cash war, Pollina will soon be playing the campaign finance reform card. And while I’m all in favor of reining in the money chase, I think it’s more than ironic that it was Pollina who was (falsely?) thumping his campaign war chest last December while trying to scare away any Democratic Party challenger. Way back then, amassing and trumpeting great campaign wealth was essential for Pollina. But now that he’s getting his financial clock cleaned by both of his main opponents, money is bad, bad, bad for politics. In Pollina’s Hypocrisy We Trust.

My guess is that Pollina will seek to stop the bleeding to his already seriously damaged political reputation and drop out of this race before he has to officially file as an Independent in September. Between now and then the writing will be on the wall: The money will be drying up, the polls will be dismal, and he’ll get all kinds of pressure from the liberal elite to bag it or never come calling again. From my perspective, his new and phony “Independent” label was his first step out of the race. And it will make his last step – an endorsement of Symington – much easier in September. Remember, Pollina is pals with – and a financial grantee of – Symington’s husband, Chuck Lacy. We shall see.

—

Speaking of Pollina, congrats to Shay Totten of Seven Days for being the first Vermont journalist to jump into the smarmy waters of Pollina’s Vermont Milk Company. Via Blurt, Totten reported on the latest round of layoffs at the company and the dairy company’s continued financial strain. Totten also made note of the fact that Pollina changed his official campaign biography with regard to his relationship to the company after news of its failure to pay farmers came to light. Pollina’s original bio declared that he “ran the company.” But after the financial shit hit the fan, Pollina changed his bio to read that he was merely on the board of the company. Nice.

Louis Porter of the Vermont Press Bureau tried to follow Totten’s lead with his own version of the story in the Time Argus/Rutland Herald. But Porter – not surprisingly – took the tepid route and ignored Pollina’s biography fudging and, instead, let Pollina’s mismanagement be explained away by the tough financial times for everyone. Well, that ignores the fact that there are many food/ag entrepreneurs in the Vermont Milk Company’s Hardwick region who are flourishing (and growing) in these tough economic times. Look, for example, at Vermont Soy, Jasper Hill, High Mowing Seeds and the Food Venture Center – they’re all booming.

Sorry, but the problem with the Vermont Milk Company was that it had a dinosaur-like business plan being “run” by a political debutante with no business experience. Remember, it shunned organic in a time when organic is king in the marketplace. And its first big product was an overly plasticized “single-serving” shot of a – say what? – creamie. Yes, I just wrote about the Vermont Milk Company in the past tense. Because, it’s over up there. The only thing keeping the doors open for now are the secret Pollina contributors who were rushed in to keep it open until after the election.

Let’s hope one of those more competent and visionary Hardwick-area foodies can at least take over the facility once the Vermont Milk Company officially becomes another casualty of the Pollina touch.