Freyne Land

Of course you do!

So go ahead and watch Vermont Congressman Peter Welch show his lawyerly experience as he cross-examines former oil industry lobbyist Philip Cooney who left the American Petroleum Institute to become chief of the Bush White House Council on Environmental Quality!

I’m not making this up. Who would believe it?

And the dude could sure edit! Especially if it was a document produced by our top climate-change scientists warning us about the inevitable.

Watch for yourself right here.

What this guy did was....criminal!

It looks like an airport, I know, but it's the lobby of the new Renaissance Center at the Mary Fanny (FAHC), the one Bill Boettcher went to jail for getting built.

I'm heading up in a few minutes. It's a Freyne Chemotherapy Day. That means 4-5 hours of five different chemicals going into the old vein. Kills the cancer cells and a few others, too.

Amazing.

Noticed the story in the Times Argus about State Sen. Peter Shumlin (D-Windham) saying the Bush Impeachment Resolution currently stalled in Speaker Gaye Symington's House of Representatives would have not been delayed flying through the Vermont Senate.

Yes, she is a Democrat, too, but what she's doing in politics remains an unanswered question in some minds.

Did a piece in the "Inside Track" column out today about that fundamental question: Why is Gaye Symington in politics if she doesn't want to play the game?

The Democratic Speaker's refusal - at a time like this - to take up the Bush Impeachment Resolution is just another example.

Yes, there are still "newspapers" made out of paper. Seven Days is one of them.  There's an "Inside Track" column to be written. And I've got several balls up in the air this sunny Tuesday morning as the world, including the Vermont world,  continues to turn.

Did want to post the adjacent photo we snapped last Thursday at the Statehouse. That's Burlington developer extraordnaire Ernie Pomerleau, son of Tony, enjoying a light moment with the Democratic state senator from Putney, Peter Shumlin, the man who would be governor.

Hasn't Ernie been a Douglas supporter?

That's Tom Torti, former Douglas environmental secretary and current head of the Lake Champlain Chamber of Commerce, over Ernie's shoulder. Tom's having a chat with Chittenden County State Sen. Jim Condos (D). The gang was heading out for some lunch.

If you get this Tuesday morning and can catch the U.S. Senate on C-SPAN, it's quite a show. The floor debate over outrageous Patriot Act powers granted the Attorney General last year to appoint USAs without  Senate approval is being led by Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy.

Looks like the tide is finally turning!

"Prevailing in Iraq is not going to be easy.  General Petraeus says thatthe environment in Iraq is the most challenging that he has seen in hismore than 32 years of service. He also says that he has been impressedby the professionalism and the skill and determination of our men andwomen in uniform.  He sees in our troops 'a true will to win and asincere desire to help our Iraqi partners achieve success.'

"Four years after this war began, the fight is difficult, but it can bewon.  It will be won if we have the courage and resolve to see itthrough.  I'm grateful to our servicemen and women for all they've doneand for the honor they brought to their uniform and their country.  I'mgrateful to our military families for all the sacrifices they have madefor our country.  We also hold in our hearts the good men and womenwho've given their lives in this struggle.  We pray for the loved onesthey have left behind.

"The United States military is the most capable and courageous fightingforce in the world.  And whatever our differences in Washington, ourtroops and their families deserve the appreciation and the support ofour entire nation.

"Thank you."

Above the words of lame duck President George "WMD" Bush from the closing of an eight minute script he read at 11:30 a.m. this morning in the White House - the 4th Anniversary of the U.S. Invasion of Iraq - the invasion based on lies, the invasion that he, a Vietnam War draft-dodger, ordered.

These photos were taken at the top of Burlington's Church Street wherea half-hour-long antiwar protest took place between 5 and 5:30 p.m. Mondayevening.

I counted 75 Vermonters lining the sidewalk in front of the Unitarian Church. The regular once-a-week antiwar vigils on Fridays normally attract only between five and a dozen stouthearted lovers of truth.

Happy anniversary.

What saith Vermont new and only member of the U.S. House of Representatives on this war anniversary day?

This from Vermont Congressman Peter Welch:

"The Iraq war is already longer than U.S. participation in World War II, World War I, the Korean War, or the Civil War, yet the President continues to disregard sensible advice even from top generals and clings to a failed policy.  The need for a change of direction has never been clearer. 

The Pentagon now acknowledges that Iraq is in a civil war.  The war has strained our military, challenging our ability to respond to new threats.  The human cost of the war has been high, with more than 3,100 U.S. casualties and tens of thousands more wounded.  And the cost to the American taxpayer is over $600 billion.

"The President has stubbornly said he will veto any measure that calls for a timetable for ending the war.  I will not support any legislation without a timetable to end the war.

"Congress must require accountability from the President and Iraq's leaders and provide the leadership necessary to end this war.  Four years into this war, it's time for Congress to challenge the President's open-ended commitment of U.S. troops to referee a civil war and provide a new course in Iraq.  We must end this war."

Before visiting the peace vigil at the top of Church Street, yours truly indulged the caffeine addiction at Uncommon Grounds. Read real newspapers, too. Two college students at the next table. Fine young men. Studying psychology.

Couldn't help but think they'd be somewhere else if the United States had a draft. In fact, the absence of the college-aged generation at the antiwar protest stuck out like a sore thumb.

Busy getting an "education," eh?

Up bright and early and I notice the "hot one"  The Burlington Free Press' all-girl Statehouse team of Nancy Remsen (l) and Terri Hallenbeck (r) have in the Monday edition called: "To understand the Douglas agenda, you need a glossary."

Amen, sisters!

I even had this nice shot in the can of the two Freeps' political reporters as they were teaming up on the loquacious gubernatorial spokesman Jason Gibbs last Thursday, right after Gov. Jim Douglas' weekly presser.

So this is what that was about, eh?

Cool.

By the way, that's the late, great Republican Gov. Deane Davis (1969-1973) on the wall between them. Deane Davis - the Republican who brought Vermont the sales tax and Act 250.

Can't imagine Republican Gov. Jim Douglas championing either, can you?

As Hallenbeck and Remsen put it:

Douglas speaks a special language when he talks about his political vision; he has names for everything. Jason Gibbs, his spokesman, said the terms often develop spontaneously during policy discussions. Gibbs described several "ah-ha" moments when a group of words suddenly became a useful way to describe a policy.

Ah, yes, the lifelong professional pol has clearly mastered the art of propaganda.  His words paint the nicest pictures - just ask Democrats Douglas Racine, Peter Clavelle and Scudder Parker.

"The Agenda of Affordability"

"Promise Scholarships"

"Global Commitment to Health"

I even put a line in there about how some readers might wonder about the Freyne Brain's health, what with yours truly writing something complimentary about my favorite Gannett-owned chain newspaper!

Which is when my right hand jumped from the mouse to the keyboard and, en route, knocked over the fricken' coffee cup. And you guessed it. Keyboard meet coffee!

I had a Kensington wireless for six months. Liked it. I work in a reclining position (the way the Romans would have) with the keyboard on my lap.

Life, you know, is not so much about what happens, as it is about how you handle what happens.

I certainly felt an inner urge to go completely nuts. Why?

Because my keyboard is the window into my computer and unable to make that connection, life is utterly useless! A complete waste of time!

Did I really say that?

I also realized life is full of challenges, and this was one of them. Don't panic. Make another coffee. Small Dog Electronics on Dorset Street opens at 10.

I was there 10 minutes early. In time to get this shot of Jane Murphy of Burlington, a retired nurse, who was there for the store opening. She was after some kind of doo-hickey for a flash-based drive transfer.

Beyond me.

But she did smile knowingly when I told her why I was there - her daughter had done  the cereal-and-milk  version of my coffee cup keyboard encounter, she told me. Turned the board upside down, got the hair dryer.

Same result - a trip to the computer store!

Now I've got a Made-in-China Logitech wireless. Eighty bucks.

Expensive coffee, eh?

*Freyne Brain Update:

As for the Sunday afternoon brain scan at the Mary Fanny (FAHC), behold the Philips MRI 3T  - the latest in big German-made magnets that are used to see inside the human brain and body. Cutting edge technology, as they say, and this one is the first 3T in Vermont.

That's MRI Technologist Marcia Ryan, and yes I did go in and stick my head in a little cage and most of my body got slid into that little hole in the MRI machine in the next room

Since writing about my first MRI a couple weeks ago, I've heard from folks who've been there. Several asked about music.

The first MRI machine that checked the Freyne Brain - a mobile unit out at Fanny Allen - had no musical option. This one did, and Marcia got me the headphones (hadn't been much demand.)

Unfortunately, she didn't have the classical cd and the jazz one just wasn't my kind of jazz. So I winged it with the ear plugs. Took 40 minutes. Less noisy that the first MRI.  Better ear plugs. Almost dozed off halfway through.

Next time, I'm bringing my own music.

This MRI was for checking chemical levels in the brain. Comparing my slightly shiny left-front temporal, language-center lobe with another spot.

I trust all the LSD from 1970-72 is gone, eh?

Lovely white St. Paddy's Day in Vermont. I know, the designated color is green not white, but it's not up to us, is it?

It's not like one can subpoena the Weather Goddess and put her under oath.

But Patrick J. Leahy, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee made it perfectly clear Sunday morning to George Stephanopoulos and those watching "This Week" on ABC-TV that he will subpoena the president's political guru Karl Rove and any White House official he has to in order to get to the truth that explains why eight United States Attorneys were fired by the Bush White House. We're supposed to be a "nation of laws," not a "nation of political paybacks."

Once the chief law enforcement officer in Chittenden County, Vermont, Leahy, a former state's attorney, appeared with a leading Texas Republican on the Judiciary Committee, one who has long had a close relationship with George W. Bush, and that would be former Texas Supreme Court Justice and Attorney General John Cornyn. Cornyn is also part of the Senate GOP Leadership Team.

Here's a taste:

Sen. Cornyn: "The problem is, and I’ve joined Sen, Leahy in this in saying the explanation was botched from the outset...

"I don’t believe there was any evidence these individuals were relieved of their responsibilities for any inappropriate reason. Having said that, I’ve told the attorney general that I think this has been mishandled, that by giving inaccurate information, by not giving complete information to Sen. Leahy and the Judiciary Committee on which I serve at the outset, has caused a real firestorm and he better get the facts out there."

Sen. Leahy: "The problem, George, goes beyond that. He has, ah, you hear one statement and the next day in the press it’s something else. Then the attorney general or somebody else from the administration comes up and  [says] ‘I’ll brief all of you and now you have the whole story.'

"Next day, we pick up the paper and it’s changed. yet again. That’s why I intend to have these people come up, testify under oath  before the Judiciary Committee which has both Republicans and Democrats on it. Let’s us ask them the questions and find out what’s going on. I am sick and tired of getting a briefing one day and being told, ‘Mr. Chairman, that’s the whole statement,’ and [reading something different in the paper the next day.]

Sen. Cornyn: "The kinds of questions Sen. Leahy wants answered, I think are legitimate questions. I want the answers to those questions, too. But I think we have to be careful here. When the leader of the effort is the chairman of the Democrats Senatorial Campaign Committee, Sen. Chuck Schumer, I think it undermines the apparent legitimacy of what is a legitimate inquiry."

Sen. Cornyn noted the DSCC was using the US Attorneys Firing Scandal to raise money on their website.

Shocking!

A little more of an issue of substance than, shall we say, that of presidential fellatio?

Sen. Leahy: "George, I’ve been on the Republican Senate Campaign Committee’swebsite a lot of times, and they’ve raised a lot of money on me. And,you know, it kept me down to 74 percent of the vote in my last election!

"The fact is Chuck Schumer has asked very legitimate questions. Butultimately, I’m the chairman of the committee. I intend to have thesesubpoenas."

George then asked Sen. Cornyn if he has a problem with issuing Rove a subpoena to testify under oath.

Sen. Cornyn: "We have issued subpoenas and I agree with that for theDepartment of Justice officials. Let’s get the information from them.

"You know, they want to cut to the chase and let’s get Karl Rove there and have a political circus. I don’t think that helps."

Sen. Leahy: "You understand, what we’re talking about is theauthorization for the subpoenas. I issue them only if we don’t getcooperation."

Kind of nice to have a guy, a guy who's eaten at Burlap's Oasis Diner for decades, calling the shots, eh?  Exercising the constitutional checks and balances?

Democracy.

A beautiful thing when it's working.

Got our 'tis the eve of St. Paddy's Day reminder this morning at the Williston Rest Area coffee stop. The hard-working woman pictured at left pulled in just after me with an interesting commodity in the back of her pickup truck - newspapers. And they were newspapers we'd never seen before.

The "Vermont Shopper." Comes out of Barre twice-a-month. Front page story on drunk driving, Struck up a little chit-chat.  She was going to drop off a bundle at the rest stop. Also is a sales rep for the Shopper. Hey, competition for Seven Days...and The Burlington Free Press, eh?

Introduced ourselves. Ladies and gentlemen, meet Judy Collins of Montpelier (not the singer).

"That's not an Irish name?" we asked jokingly.

Oh, yes it is. And she told us she did see "Michael Collins" the movie with Liam Neeson in the lead role.

Told Judy about how dear old dad and Uncle Peter had worked for Mick Collins back in 1920-21. The original Irish Republican Army - Second Battalion Dublin Brigade.  The "Collins" name has always grabbed our attention - more than just a summertime cocktail aka "Tom Collins" in the Freyne home on Maple Street in the 1950s and 1960s.

Speaking of St. Patrick's Day, we have it from a reliable source that Finnegan's Pub on College Street in Beautiful downtown Burlap will open at 8 a.m. on Saturday morning. The doorman's not due until 10. Best wishes.

Even when I was drinking, I made a point of taking St. Patrick's Day off. Green beer?

Disgusting.

Then there's the predicted St. Patrick's Day Snowstorm that the press and city officials are going ga-ga over. Burlington's Commander Tow-and-Ticket (or is is Ticket-and-Tow?)  has already sent out his email declaring street-parking bans on both Friday AND Saturday nights in Vermont's largest city:

And, yes, we did make it to the Statehouse for Speaker Gaye Symington's "Brown Bag Lunch" at noon with the press - you know, the gathering in the Speaker's Office at which coffee cups, but no brown bags, are seen.

Today Speaker Gaye the Democrat (shown above) blabbed on and on for almost an hour with seven Statehouse reporter types: two from the Freeps, two from the Vermont Press Bureau, one from VPR, one from the Associated Press, and me. No Ch. 3 and no Ch.5.

Her political adviser, Bill Lofy, and executive assistant, Alexandra MacLean, also sat in.

Don't know what the rest of the gang will glean from the "Crossover Day" Symington Hour, but yours truly left the room once occupied by Walt Freed (R), Mike Obuchowski (D), and the legendary Ralph Wright (D) with the inescapable question spelled out in neon lights inside the Freyne Brain:

"Why did this nice, caring, good-hearted person strive for and win a quarterback position in a contact sport she refuses to play - a game called politics?"

P.S. Speaking of the Freyne Brain, Dr. Paul Penar the neurosurgeon called this morning to let us know that, after consultation with other docs, there was agreement that there was no evidence of a tumor inside the Freyne Brain.  The shiny area on the brain scan could be something that's been cooking in  the old columnist's language center for many years. Just to be sure, however, the Doc  wanted us to take one more high-tech test - a magnetic resonance (MR) spectroscopy. This afternoon, his assistant called to see if we could do one on Sunday.

Short notice.

Only have one brain - no problemo.

What is MR spectroscopy?

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) uses radio waves and a strong magnetic field instead of X-rays to provide pictures of the brain. MR spectroscopy uses graphs to study abnormalities of the brain.
How does the exam work?

MRI is a unique exam. Unlike standard X-rays, radioisotope studies, and even CT scanning, it does not rely on radiation. Instead, MRI uses radio waves and a strong magnetic field to create sharp pictures – even different types of tissue within the same organ can be seen. An MRI exam most often consists of two to six sets of pictures, each lasting 2 to 15 minutes.

Look, a number of folks have been telling me my brain is "abnormal " since childhood.

Runs in the family.

Yes, indeed. That’s Vermont's Sen. Patrick Leahy this morning, presenting Tom Curley, head honcho at the Associated Press, with a copy of the Green Mountain State's political best-seller  “Dateline Vermont” by Christopher Graff.

And, yes, that’s the same Chris Graff who was Vermont’s AP bureau chief one year ago when Mr. Curley, a former president and publisher of USA Today, fired him because he distributed St. Patrick’s “Sunshine Week” column to subscribers of the Vermont Associated Press wire.

In response to a "Freyne Land" request, Leahy's Capitol Hill office provided a copy of the brief exchange between Pat and Tom over events of one year ago that occurred Wednesday morning in Leahy's Judiciary Committee. The topic?

"Open Government: Reinvigorating the Freedom of Information Act."

LEAHY:  "Mr. Curley, about a year ago, during Sunshine Week, I wrote an op-ed piece, I don’t know if you had a chance to read it or not, on FOIA.  Would you agree or disagree with a conclusion I reached that in the last six years it has been more and more difficult under FOIA?"

CURLEY:  "I . . . absolutely, and there are many facts to support that, sir."

LEAHY:  "Thank you.  I’ve been asked to give you a copy of a book written by a former AP reporter. I won’t elaborate further on it, but you may want to glance at it, from Vermont.  If you want to add a book review for the record, feel free."

CURLEY:  "All news is local and understood."

LEAHY:  "Well, you know it’s especially important in Vermont where you are, where the Associated Press, not only in Vermont but in many states, has become the overriding wire service.  And we have to rely on you.
    "But I also, and I’ll close with this, I’ve said over and over again, we, we Americans, are not here to serve the government.  It’s the other way around; the government’s here to serve us.  And the government, no matter what administration it is, will always tell you everything they’re doing that they’re proud of.  I want to make sure we know those things where they make mistakes.  And so we can correct them.  Not so we can play ‘gotcha,’ but so we can correct them.  And I think FOIA can be one of the greatest tools Americans have, but it can be awful if we don’t use it."

Here’s how St. Patrick ended his 2006 Sunshine Week column - the one that got Chris Graff sacked:

“Sunshine Week invites an inventory check on tools like the Freedom of Information Act that make real the public's right to know. Attacks on these tools only erode that right. A free, open and accountable democracy is what our forefathers fought and died for, and it is the duty of each new generation to protect this vital heritage and inheritance.”

Yes, indeed, and don't ever forget it!

UPDATED at NOON*

And

UPDATED at 4 P.M.*

(scroll down)

Kind of a cloudy, dreary, damp Wednesday morning in beautiful Burlington Vermont.

In D.C., Sen. Patrick Leahy's Judiciary Committee is holding a hearing on "Sunshine Week" and "open government."  His 10 a.m. panel includes Brattleboro Reformer Editor Sabina Haskell and the President & CEO of the Associated Press Tom Curley. That's the same Tom Curley who had Vermont's veteran A.P. bureau chief fired for distributing a Patrick Leahy column for Sunshine Week last year.

Yours truly has a 9 a.m. appointment on Hospital Hill - our third round of R-CHOP chemotherapy to kill off the abdominal cancer we discovered in January. So far, so good. At present, six rounds, every three weeks, are planned to beat this sucker making today's dosage the halfway point (we hope).

The pic was taken Friday night out at the Fanny Allen where we went for an MRI. I spent an hour inside that tube with my brain getting one heck of a good going over.

Hope it's all there, eh?

**************************************************

Noon Update:

Life's full of surprises, eh?

The chemo was cancelled. It was something in the MRI. Something in the Ol' Freyne Brain that needs closer inspection.

So, we're seeing a distinguished neurosurgeon in an hour. The words "brain biopsy" were mentioned by the oncologist.

Cool.

One day at a time, gang.

Sure hope it's not the spot of my brain that comes up with all the nicknames?

So yours truly came home and had the good fortune of catching the U.S. Senate debate the need to debate the Bush-Cheney Iraq War madness.

And then we had the good fortune of watching the United States Senate vote 89-9 to allow that debate to continue. Only 60 votes were needed to let discussion of the Reid Resolution proceed. This time the Republicans were onboard. They're accepting reality.

Hey. Isn't that the former socialist mayor of Burlington, Vermont, the guy with the striped tie, standing in the middle of the pack on the senate floor?

Whatshisname?

Oh, yeah - U.S. Senator Bernard Sanders.

The times, they are a changin'.

*************************************************************

Four O'Clock Update

Back to the Mary Fanny for a 12:30 p.m. appointment with Dr. Paul Penar, a neurosurgeon-type. That's Doc Penar at left, looking at the Freyne Brain on screen.

Had time to Google him before I left. A Wolverine, i.e graduated University of Michigan Medical School (undergrad, too). Did a five-year residency at Yale-New Haven. Also learned his “research interests include the mechanisms and modulation of malignant brain tumor invasion and mathematical modeling of the intracranial compartment. Malignant primary brain tumors have a propensity to not only grow expansively as a solid mass, but also to aggressively infiltrate into brain tissue, which allows them to circumvent surgical treatment.”

Also Googled “brain biopsy.”

Yuck.

Okay, so I was a little shaky going back up Hospital Hill for doctor’s appointment #2. Prepared myself mentally to hear my little inside-the-skull abnormality on the EEG and MRI didn’t look good and absolutely required a biopsy be performed on my fricken' brain!

Damn! I’d be missing an anticipated Thursday swing through the Statehouse in Montpeculiar and a gubernatorial press conference with the one and only Jim Douglas.

I considered calling Paula the Publisher and letting her know I might not have an “Inside Track” column for next week’s Seven Days. But I didn’t.  Why?

Because I didn’t know what was going to happen and I'm old enough to know anything can.

Dr. Penar impressed quickly. The appointment had been scheduled fast. He hadn’t seen my whole chart. But the old surgical nursing assistant in me picked up from his line of questioning that this was no neurosurgeon in a hurry to perform surgery. Penar was focused and curious like a good detective. He was on a mission to crack the Freyne Brain Case.

Turns out the little abnormal spot, or "lesion,"  is the spot where the political nicknames are born and stored after all.  It’s the spot in my brain, he said, “where language and verbal memory” are kept. Valuable brain real estate, so to speak,

Penar was in no rush to biopsy. Why not?

Because a brain biopsy procedure does have risks even though general anesthesia is no longer required. Such a small number of brain cells can be gathered, said Penar, that the results are not always so valuable. Plus, he said, a lymphoma cancer tumor in that particular spot was “not typical.”

The abnormality, he said, which is the likely cause of our recent first-ever seizure, ”could be something you were born with.”

Something I was born with?

Finally, that explains it! I knew it was just an Irish thing.

Paul the Doctor and Peter the Columnist also remininsced a wee bit about our Midwestern connection. His in Michigan, mine at Hennepin County General Hospital in Minneapolis, Minnesota doing alternative service as a draftee in the early 1970s. I worked in the surgery ward. Times have sure changed in Hospital Land.

Nowadays, I said, everything looks like it's high-tech and done by computer.

Indeed. Back in the 1970s when he was still in medical school in Ann Arbor, he said, "exploratory" surgery was routinely performed.

These days, said Paul the Doctor and faculty member at UVM's College of Medicine, "exploratory surgery" doesn't exist.

"We wouldn't even think of it," said Doc Penar the brain surgeon.

Amazing.

As for Peter the Patient, Paul the Doc is going to have the PET-Scanner experts take a closer look at their films. The search is to find as reason to justify a biopsy of the cranial word zone of a wordsmith. Otherwise "watchful waiting" will be the approach to the Freyne Brain lesion for now.

And the chemotherapy treatment that was cancelled today because of headier matters has been rescheduled for next Wednesday.

Every day a gift, eh?

The "simple fact,"  testified dairy farmer John Roberts of Cornwall, is dairy farmers need a greater share of the retail dollar. Where once upon a time, 50 cents of the almighty dollar came back to the Vermont farm, now less than 30 cents does.

"The ability to recover the cost of production," the milker of about 200 Brown Swiss Cows told the Vermont congressional delegation, "is almost non-existent.”

All of the farmers testifying at Monday's hearing in the House chamber before Sens. Patrick Leahy (center) and Bernie Sanders (left) and Congressman Peter Welch (right), expressed their support for a reinstitution of a Northeast Dairy Compact and regional pricing. Sen. Leahy, the #2 Dem on Senate Agriculture who chaired the hearing, said regional dairy compacts would clearly be the best way to go. But he noted President Bush had promised while running for president he would veto any dairy compact legislation.

Sen. Sanders warned us during a break that the farm bill currently being written will definitely have an impact on the Vermont way of life.

"We are struggling, here in Vermont and in Washington, to preservefamily-based agriculture," said Ol' Bernardo. "Dairy farmers are up against the wall and ifwe continue to lose dairy farms, Vermont will be a very differentstate, and I think a less beautiful state. Our economy will suffer aswell. So, this is a huge issue for our way of life, for the environmentfor our economy.”

It sounds like an uphill fight?

"It is an uphill fight," conceded Sanders. "Small family-based farmers all over thiscountry in every commodity are struggling for their existence againstlarge agribusiness corporations. I hope that [in] this Farm Bill wecan make some impact in protecting little guys against these verypowerful, well-heeled big corporate interests.”

And the change in power in Congress from Republicans setting the agenda to Democrats doing it, means the Ag Committee hearings on the new farm bill will be held outside the Beltway in farm country.

"The importance of these hearings," said St. Patrick (enjoying a light moment at left with Ch. 3's Kristin Carlson), "is that they’re going to be held all over thecountry. You get a record you wouldn’t get just listening to themillion lobbyists who come through Washington."

Leahy wasn't making any guarantees for this current Congress, suggesting the picture might improve after the November 2008 Election. But he did make one little promise when we asked if the special interest and agribusiness powers will even listen to talk of dairy compacts?

"They’re going to have to listen [to us]." promised Sen. Leahy, "because we’re going to keep on talking about it!"

P.S. So with all this wailing and moaning over the inevitable end of Vermont's "way of life" as dairy farms fade into the sunset, how come no member of the delegation had a carton or bottle of milk in front of him?

In fact, how much milk have you had to drink today?

Funny thing, when I gave up the booze a couple years ago, I also gave up milk. The milk, unlike the John Power's Irish, was not deliberate. It just happened as my diet shifted to fruits, vegetables and salad.

You don't think giving up milk caused the cancer, do you?

Nah, it was probably giving up the booze.

Anyway, the congressional delegation has a good excuse for not having milk in front of them in the House Chamber at Monday's hearing.

Under the Rules of the House, only water is allowed on the floor of the House.

No coffee. No whiskey. No milk.

By the way, I'm back on milk. A quart a day.

Feeling pretty good, too.