Freyne Land

Did downtown Burlington today.

So did a lot of people, and French was still being spoken.

People were dancing, too.

Dancing on their heads.

Literally.

Kinda reflects the current condition of the political system here in the United States of America, eh?

Which made it all the more encouraging to find one United States Senator making a book run. 

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, a U.S. Senator who does his own reading!

Bumped into Sen. Bernie Sanders at Borders. He was after the latest hot Blackwater book that's climbing the charts. Yes, indeed - The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army!

Encouraging sign, eh?

An information-gathering member of the U.S. Senate working on the weekend.

Yes!

Then strolling down the street, I bumped into this "power couple" on the city-hall block.

The Vermont career cop and the Vermont career anchor-babe!

The professional law enforcement official and the television journalist.

Lt. Helrich of BPD and Anchorwoman Kelly of WCAX-TV.

Emmet and Kristin.

Recently wed.

Legit at last!

Couple cuties.

There's a TV series there, folks....

Gov. Jim Douglas was in great form for his weekly presser at 11 a.m. this fine morning. Had his successor as state treasurer [and perhaps as governor?], Democrat Jeb Spaulding with him for the "dog & pony" opening.  About how we better all start figuring out how to plan to pay for our "Baby Boom Generation" retirement.

Buy lottery tickets.

Just kidding.

The "mainstream" press will have that one.

Yours truly went for the political jugular and the Guv's absence from the Tree-Hugger Wind Power Crowd's big conference at the Sheraton put on by Renewable Energy Vermont.

Q. A big crowd at the Sheraton and you’re usually at those conferences. They say a picture’s worth a thousand words. Does your absence from the picture tell an accurate picture that the Governor of Vermont is perhaps the leading opponent of wind energy development in the state?

DOUGLAS: I think the director of that organization indicated that he hadn’t invited me.

Q. But the fact they wouldn’t even think to invite you? How distant? What another world you’re in when it comes to the energy picture, whereas wind-energy seems to be growing in popularity. But you are the No. 1 opponent of wind power, are you not?

DOUGLAS: I was disappointed that I wasn’t invited, frankly. They invite me in election years to appear with the candidate they’ve already anointed, so I was disappointed and certainly would be pleased to participate. It’s too bad that it was politicized.

But frankly, other than wind, I think that we’re really on the same page. I’ve been a strong supporter of methane, of bio-diesel, of the grants through our Clean Energy Fund, of small-scale hydro, of the renewable and clean sources of power we have for base load generation of electricity for our state. The pellet and switchgrass development and hydrogen fuel-cell research that’s underway. I’m a strong supporter of alternative energy, and with the one exception of industrializing our ridge lines, I agree with them.

What a guy!

Q. So primarily it’s an aesthetic issue with you, Governor?

DOUGLAS: Well, largely. It’s a matter of weighing the benefit versus the cost. I’ve told you this before, you know, people come up to me and say, 'Put up wind turbines, so we can close Vermont Yankee.’

And they really think we could generate an equivalent amount of electricity from wind turbines as we get from the nuclear power plant and, of course, it isn’t even close.

If it were, maybe we’d be having a different discussion, but to get maybe 6 percent of our electricity from the maximum number of towers that have been proposed, I really think the clear-cutting, the impact on wildlife, the aesthetic impact really doesn’t justify it.

Q. But you’ve seen the polling data or the survey data. Is this the first issue of the ‘08 campaign right here?

DOUGLAS: Well, Stewart, I can’t answer that...I don’t make my decisions based on polls and never will. I’ll tell you how I feel about something. But I respect the process. The Public Service Board has made a decision [on Sheffield] and I certainly respect that.

Republican Lt. Gov. Brian Dubie [right] gave some lively opening remarks at the packed Renewable Energy Conference at the Sheraton-Burlington this morning. "Wind power " and photovoltaics were gospel and Doobie-Doo expressed an open-mindedness on the issue not shared with his running mate - Gov. Jim Douglas.

As morning keynote speaker Paul Gipe put it later, "Vermont is resting on its laurels" when it comes to its environmental reputation. Wind energy in the Green Mountain state is sorely lagging.

"These things we can do together and these things we should do together, and from the perspective where I sit, although there are differences between our governor and our legislature and individuals," said Dubie, "we’re gonna work through those differences and we’re gonna find solutions and we’re gonna continue to move this state forward. Together.

"I’m gonna close with a conversation I had a year ago on a roof-top in Iraq," said Brian. "On a Baghdad evening, while I looked over the skyline, it was a beautiful night, but it wasn’t peaceful. And I was sitting next to a commanding general and he turned to me and he said ‘We need to find ways to make America less dependent on oil from dangerous parts of the world.'

"It is my belief that the work that you do is really carrying on the challenge that that general gave to me," Dubie told the green energy crowd.

"So I applaud you. We need you. We need you to inspire the next generation. We need you to help us train and retain the next workforce. We need you to enhance our moral authority around the world and we can do that by having a more energy-independent nation.

"I want to repeat that: Your work will enhance our moral authority around the world. Think about that for a while. I’ve heard people say that," said our GOP Lite-Gov, " and it makes sense to me."

Yes. He really said that.

I'm heading back for the afternoon session....

It was inevitable, wasn't it?

This fromThe Hollywood Reporter:

Two of Hollywood's most politically active stars are teaming for a political thriller.

George Clooney and Leonardo DiCaprio are indiscussions to partner for "Farragut North," based on the upcomingBroadway play by Beau Willimon. Clooney would direct and produce theadaptation, which is set up at Warner Bros., while DiCaprio would starand produce.

Titled after the Washington Metro station that islocated near many lobbyists' offices, the play is loosely based onHoward Dean's 2004 presidential election campaign, during whichWillimon worked for the Democrat.

The story follows a young, idealistic communicationsdirector who works for an inspiring, though unorthodox, presidentialcandidate. During the campaign, his career is done in by more seasonedpoliticos who thrive on poisonous partisan politics, dirty tricks andback-stabbing.

The buzz is that Leonard DiCaprio will play Ho-Ho and Clooney will play Joe Trippi.

Cool.

Wonder who'll play yours truly in those Sunday-night, off-the-record, Trippi-Freyne rendezvouses at Finnigan's Pub on College Street?

Joe needed someone to vent to - in confidence, of course.

Someone who "understood" Howard Dean.

Yes, indeed.

Burlington Old-North-Ender Marc Estrin has notified us about his latest book - out this week!

It's a novel titled The Lamentations of Judith Marantz.

Marc forwarded the first review

Here's Estrin's website.

Cool.

Fred Lane is one of those wireless-laptop-in-the-coffee-shop guys. Southend of Burlington. Speeder's.

Some do homework or write mail - Fred writes books!

The other day he completed his latest [4th, I think]. He's also an expert witness and serves on the school board. More here.

Lane's latest, which will be published by Beacon Press in Boston, is titled:

The Court and the Cross: the Religious Right's Crusade to Reshape the Supreme Court.

It'll hit the streets next May, Fred tells us. He began writing it in early July.

Cool.

Can't wait.

Republican State Sen. Vince Illuzzi (Essex-Orleans) returns to Vermonttoday from a week-long diplomatic trade mission to the Republic of China,a.k.a. Taiwan. Illuzzi chairs the Senate Economic DevelopmentCommittee. After Canada, Taiwan is Vermont  No. 2 trading partner.

Ol' Vincenzo, first elected to the Vermont Senate in 1980 at the age of 27, wasVermont's rep on a New England delegation that included Rhode Island'slieutenant governor and legislative leaders from Maine, Rhode Island,Massachusetts and New Hampshire.

"You come to a country like Taiwan with certain preconceived notions,"said Illuzzi in a phone interview from Taipei on Thursday night. "WhenI was a kid you’d get these cheap little toys with a sticker that said'Made in Taiwan.' So I’d thought I’d come here and find a Third World-like country," he told Freyne Land, "and it’s really anything but that."

He was surprised, he told us, to find that "the standard of living hereis almost equal to the United States." Plus, "they all speak English,which says something about society here. They’re all bilingual.

"In fact we’ve been joking today that in the next 20-25 years Chineseshould be our first language in America.  That’s the way things seem tobe developing."

The U.S. does not recognize Taiwan as a soverign nation. That is why, explained Vince, the U.S. rep there [we don't have an ambassador] "skipped town duringtheir Independence Day celebration" the other day. "There were representatives here fromthe countries that do recognize Taiwan as an independent and sovereignnation, and not a renegade province as does the People's Republic ofChina (mainland China).

Vermont's King of the Northeast Kingdom told Freyne Land he was interviewed by two television stations in Taipei about theobvious slight by the Bush Administration.

"As I recall it, said Vince, "I basicallysaid that I think most Americans know that the Taiwanese people arehard working and industrious, and that Vermonters appreciate Taiwanesecompanies because those companies purchase many of the chips producedat IBM Essex, Vermont's largest private employer."

"Made in Taiwan" no longer means what it did 35 years ago, said Illuzzi. "Thiscountry has transformed itself into a high technology R & D nationand it is moving fast forward to take the lead in the area ofbiotechnology development and manufacture, which they consider the nextfrontier."

And, yes, said Vince, they have heard of Vermont.

"Most are familiar with the changing seasons in Vermontand some have actually attended schools in Boston of New York and theyhave skied or at least visited Vermont," he said.

Have they heard, we asked, of our distinguished senators, Patrick Leahy and Bernie Sanders?

"Sanders' name has come up a couple of times," said Illuzzi. "They’ve heard of Sandersand find it intriguing that a person who’s declared himself a socialistat some point is in the United States Congress, and they ask questions."

How's your Chinese, eh?

Maybe the decade...or the millenium?

In Dan Barlow's piece this morning on the first public hearing of the House Speaker's gay-marriage commission, officially known as the Vermont Commission on Family Recognition and Protection, that was held in Johnson.

Ellen Hill began to cry Wednesday night as she remembered how her conservative father – who once shunned her when she came out as a lesbian – later accepted her partner into their family at their 2000 civil union.

“I could see happy tears in his eyes,” said Hill, a resident of Jeffersonville. “He said that it is not who we love or how we love, but that we love."

Food for thought, eh?

"Not who we love or how...but that we love"

Ultimately, mes amis, we are truly in the same boat, eh?

Together.

I first caught Democratic Party activist Laura Cary of Shelburne in action out on Burlington's Church Street Marketplace last spring. She was an early and, as she described herself, an "enthusiastic" supporter of Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois for president. His opposition to Bush's war in Iraq is what drew her to him more than anything.

Laura was a weekly regular on the Church Street bricks, gathering signatures to put Obama's name on the Vermont Presidential Primary Ballot.

But a couple weeks ago, Laura was noticeably absent from the Obama rally that drew more than 100 supporters to Nectar's.

Now we know why.

Laura Carey no longer supports Barack Obama. In fact, she's positively disgusted with him.

Ran into Laura at Sen. Bernie Sanders' Sunday morning town meeting at South Burlington High School. Darted after her when the event broke up. Wanted to know why I hadn't seen her in the usual places of late?

“All three major candidates [Hillary, Obama and Edwards], can’t commit to getting the troops out of Iraq by 2013," said Cary, "and so I asked myself, what am I doing  this for? I passionately think we need to bring the troops home, and I’ve heard the excuses and I don’t buy them."

The final straw came on September 26 when the U.S. Senate overwhelmingly adopted the Kyle-Lieberman Amendment, 76-22. It "expresses the sense of the Senate regarding Iran." Among other things, it opens the door for a Bush-ordered attack on Iran, declaring their Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization.

Vermont's two senators, Leahy and Sanders, voted  "no."

"Obama, who’s always made a big point of being against the Iraq War, and criticizing everyone else for their vote, ducked the vote," noted Cary. "He wasn’t there," she told us, disillusion dripping from her tongue.

"Obama’s whole thing has been he stood up against the Iraq War," she said. "He’s not standing up against the Iran War, which I believe is coming. If you read Seymour Hersh [in the New Yorker], it’s coming. And Seymour Hersh hasn’t been wrong yet."

"So, I can’t support him anymore."

Who do you support now?

"In all good conscience, I’m going to support Bill Richardson," she replied, "because he says he can get the troops out by 2013 and he’s against going to war with Iran."

Obama, she said dejectedly, "is wimping out. I think he’s got too many handlers. Ithink he’s taking the safe road. I don’t like that."

And it gets worse...

The Obama Campaign, she said, called her from Boston and told her that "the reasonObama couldn’t vote on the Kyle-Lieberman Amendment was beccause he had togo to New York that day for that 24,000-person rally, so he couldn’tdo it.

"So I just Googled it - The vote on Kyle-Lieberman was September 26. The 24,000-man rally was on September 27.

"So," said the former Obama supporter, "I now have the Obama campaign calling up and lying to me about whyhe didn’t vote on that bill. Soit’s just outrageous!"

Freyne Land double-checked - Cary's right about the dates. The NYC rally, where the photo [left] was taken, was on the 27th.

The Kyle-Lieberman amendment vote was during the noon-hour on the 26th.

Bummer.

Did not have room for it in this week's "Inside Track" which we pumped out today. Lot of balls in the air. 

Last week in "Track,"  I wrote about Sen. Bernie Sanders' visit to Costa Rica and his opposition to Costa Rica voting in favor of the Central American Free Trade Agreement [CAFTA}.

No other press interest in Vermont.

The pro-CAFTA side even aired a TV commercial attacking Ol' Bernardo and The Wall Street Journal went after him in two lovely articles.

The vote was Sunday and Bernie's side lost, though they made a strong showing with 48 percent of the popular vote. Tuesday. I requested a statement from the Vermonter on the losing side. This is what I received from Ol' Bernardo:

“The Costa Rican anti-CAFTA movement – made up of unions, environmentalists, students and religious organizations – was heavily outspent, took on the entire economic and political Establishment, a hostile media and the president of the United States.  Nonetheless, they managed to receive 48 percent of the vote, a very strong showing.  The Costa Rican anti-CAFTA coalition is part of a growing, worldwide movement, including in the United States, which understands that unfettered free trade policies are designed to represent the interests of multi-national corporations and the wealthy and not ordinary working people.”

Can't win 'em all, eh?