STATE CONDUCTS LISTENING SESSION AS VERMONT WORKERS’ CENTER HITS ITS STRIDE

In a crowded hall of the Rutland Free Library, a mass of people are huddled together. They are speaking excitedly and directly on this cold Tuesday night in December. This is the health care Listening Session put on by the State to help determine how to finance the upcoming Green Mountain health care program following Governor Shumlin’s signing of the bill into law earlier this year.

Photo by Dylan Kelley

In its journey towards universally affordable health care the state is conducting these listening sessions (part educational slideshow, part discussion) in an awkward but important attempt to gauge how and from where to fund the landmark bill. “This is not the time to re-hash old arguments about the bill’s passage” said Michael Costa, Special Council for the Vermont Department of Taxes as he addressed the murmuring crowd in front of him. “This is the time to discuss how we’re planning to put all this together in time for 2013.”

After Costa’s presentation to those assembled at the library, the crowd divided into small discussion groups to talk about where from and how GMHC should be funded. While most participants eagerly (and even emphatically) engaged in constructive debate, some of those present were bitterly opposed to GMHC at the time of its passage and clearly expressed their continuing malcontent by ripping up the provided discussion materials and refusing to shake hands with other participants at the conclusion of the evening.

While billed as a “listening session” by its organizers, this evening, and others like it, are in actuality much more of a poll of those in attendance about where “the money” should come from to pay for Vermont’s bold plan to ensure affordable access to health care for all. Indeed, several legislators were seen drifting about from one group to the next, but the crux of the night was the distribution of tiny photo-copied dollar bills into various boxes labeled “Property Tax”, “Businesses”, “[Federal] Government” “State” and “Other”. Participants were asked to distribute each of their ten dollar bills into whichever box they felt most appropriate in order to pay for GMHC.

Remarkably, the big winner for the night was the box marked “other”, in which a brief description of the participants’ ideas were written on the reverse side of the bills. Disregarding the tattered pieces of paper that the previously mentioned attendee stuffed into their envelop, the most vocal participants of the night were supporters of the Vermont Workers’ Center whose familiar, and seemingly omnipresent, red “Rosie the Riveter/PUT PEOPLE FIRST” t-shirts were impossible to miss.

With the launch of the “Put People First” campaign, the VWC is championing the goal of the passage of a “People’s Budget” in Montpelier. This goal of part budget, part human rights initiative is designed to place the fulfillment of human and civil rights at the top of Montpelier’s priorities, thereby ensuring that the rest of the state’s business is arrayed to either uphold these rights or prevent their violation. A lofty goal to be sure, but one that is not so improbable as it may have seemed not so long ago.

Photo by Dylan Kelley

The global arrival of the Occupy movement, as well as its significant presence in Vermont has shone a new and powerful spotlight upon inequities and the substantial lost opportunities in the lives of working and middle class Vermonters. In addition to standing in solidarity with Occupy Burlington as well as Occupy encampments around the world, they’re also examining the dangerous situation of Vermont Yankee (a case likely to end up before the Supreme Court) as well as backing Sen. Bernie Sanders’ introduction of a Constitutional Amendment to eliminate corporate personhood in America.

How likely are these? Bernie’s bill will almost certainly fail in an increasingly corrupt Washington, but its worth noting that at their annual conference on December 10th, the VWC, in conjunction with UVM’s stellar Students Stand Up group drew as many as 500 people from across the country. The last time the VWC gather that many of its closest friends it managed to achieve the passage of a bill of Universal health care for all Vermonters at a time when the rest of the nation was mired in Washington brinkmanship and mudslinging.

If these stories from recent memory are anything to go by, and with more and more residents rising with the occasion that is piled so high with difficulty, the Vermont Workers’ Center is not only poised to become a game-changer in the name of Human Rights, not just for tiny Vermont, but for an entire nation.

Bottom of the Barrel

Occupy Burlington members march on Main Street

The Occupation is being smeared.

From it's beginning just a few months ago; to the tragic suicide in Burlington's City Hall Park; to the tearing down and destruction of the community of Liberty Plaza; there have been continual and coordinated efforts on the part of the powers that be to smear the occupiers as everything from dirty hippies, to criminals, and (now that NDAA is safely through the Senate) as would-be terrorists. The powers that be are both relentless in their struggle to defeat the Occupy Movement, and infinite in the depths of moral deficiency to which they're willing to slither.

It was no surprise a few months ago, when all of this started, that Occupiers were hearing shouts of "get a job", "take a shower", and the wide variety of other smelly slurs that have been repeatedly slung their way in numerous attempts to de-legitimize and undermine the ever-increasing population that proudly refer to themselves as "The 99 Percent". We were, after all, living outside in tents. Neither the occupiers, the slur-hurlers, nor the passive public were impressed or caught unawares at the mass media equivalent of one 3rd grader point at another and shouting "Oh yeah? Well you smell funny!"

It was no surprise when the mass media; the pundits; and the talking heads immediately pointed to the Occupy movement's lack of demands. Admit it, we all thought (and many of you out there continue to think) that the movement was a tad bit rudderless. But time and some careful research has shown that a lack of hyper-specific demands is actually effective. General demands can't be co-opted, watered down, or made to dance on the puppet string for the pretty politicians as they stoop over the macabre stage of national burlesque that they've always longed to dominate. General demands like "END CORPORATE GREED" are the contemporary descendants of "I AM MAN" that were seen across the country as civil rights protesters and activists struggled for equality and dignity. "END CORPORATE GREED", like all of the other demands that have surfaced and subsequently been criticized for being to vague and unrealistic is monumental in it's demand as well as it's force. One can't partially end corporate greed. To quote Robin Williams, this is like partially circumcising somebody. You either go all the way or you forget it.

The 99 Percent is unlikely to forget. Understanding this, the mass media, in a genuine reflection of those that write their checks and pay for their suits, continue to ham-handedly beat away on the dead horse of granite... desperately hoping, to no avail, the damn thing moves at least a little.

The Occupy movement has not been surprised by these things that have transpired. They even expected, and mischievously welcomed a few of them. There are some things however that have been a bit of a surprise. Not in recent memory have we seen the vast machine of corporate journalism so lowly conduct their business. Not in recent memory have we seen so a blatant dereliction of duty on the part of those whose very job description is to inform us about what is happening in the world around us. Not in recent memory have we seen such a flagrant disregard, amongst professionals, of the facts they were once dedicated to reporting.

In Burlington, several media outlets reported that Joshua Pfenning committed suicide after heavy alcohol consumption. This is an error. According to both eyewitness accounts as well as toxicology reports, which the well meaning journalists took it upon themselves to comment on before the tests were even run, Pfenning was NOT under the influence of alcohol at the time of his suicide.

A occupier at the vigil for Joshua Pfenning

In another story of journalistic "fairness", one media outlet reported on the "tremendous waste" of tax payer dollars that the Occupation of City Hall Park has inflicted upon the city of Burlington. During the story which aired only this week, the reported approached people on the streets of Burlington and asked "How do you feel about the outrageous waste of $9,000 that the City spent on cleaning up after the Occupiers?"

Oh, well now... so much for context. Records show that the majority of this was spent in police overtime. Police, fellow members of the 99 Percent, should never have overtime after all, that would be too expensive.

This story is looking at the tiniest possible piece of the great systemic pie. If the corporate news outlets would like to talk about tax payer waste maybe they should start talking, at long last, about the $14.5 million that mayoral candidate Miro Weinberger, loyal democrat, spent without any plans of repayment on the BTV parking garage. But hold on, that's just one candidate who made a bad decision... there's always that other guy right? Not really.

Tim Ashe, also hoping to be Burlington's next top dog, served on Burlington's Board of Finance just a few years back, during the period when that body approved of the $17 million loan to Burlington Telecom. And, as we all know, that totally worked out (FBI investigations aside). That's over $31 million wasted by just two guys who've now positioned themselves to charge headlong into the mayor's office. Go team.

A homeless protester makes an appearance at the Burlington Democratic Caucus

At the national level, Occupy Boston has been accused by the Boston Police Department of "significantly increasing drug traffic in the downtown area". Their evidence to back this up? A single arrest report in which one individual was arrested for selling medication for high blood pressure. There does appear to be some blood flow problems... but it seems to me like the BPD could use that medication more than those pesky tent-monsters.

All this goes well beyond the pot calling the kettle black. All this is frantic digging on the part of the corporate media to smear, undermine, and de-legitimize a movement that is beginning to genuinely threaten the status quo. To the 1 Percent'ers: if you continue to scrape the bottom of the barrel so vigorously you're going to get splinters under your fingernails.