Dubie Scheduled to Ride the Tiger

The promo for the Vermont Tiger event called Crunch Time notes that:

“He [Dubie] has long been interested in new ideas and innovative policies to promote economic growth in Vermont and was a panelist at last year's ‘Compete or Retreat’ symposium.”

Compete or Retreat indeed.

During the recent budget debate Dubie has been absent and hasn’t presided over the State Senate for two days. Earlier it was reported he had canceled a scheduled candidate debate appearance for April 28 at a debate featuring 7th and 8th graders questions. The debate had already been rescheduled once to accommodate him.
But the man who could be the Where’s Waldo of Vermont gubernatorial campaigns will ride the friendly Vermont Tiger on May 25th.

The event promises to be mostly free from the probing questions of 7th and 8th graders.
Dubie will deliver the morning address at the symposium which will deal with the very serious and immediate economic challenges facing the state and discuss reforms and routes to prosperity. That Dubie actually missed a chance this week to practice governing and deal with the very problems under discussion at the symposium is significant of notice.

If it is true, as the overworked saying goes that 80% of life is just showing up how should we rate Lite Gov. Brian Dubie’s campaign?

Junk Food Obesity and Recruits

Food is in the news again, or still, but this time it is a matter of National Security.
Mission:Readiness a non-profit group of retired military officers including retired generals and admirals have expressed concern that 9 million young adults, or 27 percent of all Americans ages 17 to 24, are too fat to join the military.
"When over a quarter of young adults are too fat to fight, we need to take notice,” said, retired Navy Rear Adm. James Barnett Jr... He noted that national security in the year 2030 is "absolutely dependent" on reversing child obesity rates.
The group,Mission:Readiness is urging Congress in a recent report(PDF) to eliminate junk food and high-calorie beverages from schools, put more money into the school lunch program and develop new strategies that help children develop healthier habits.
The group referred to similar push military leaders made in 1945, when concerns about poor health and malnutrition resulted in the creation of National School Lunch Program.

Fast Food Insurance

A new study (found here) highlights the extent to which life and health insurance companies are invested in the fast food industry. Even as the recent health care bill increases, by mandates the number of people covered by private health care U.S., Canadian and European-based insurance firms own nearly $2 billion in fast food stocks. The study points out that fast food can be consumed responsibly but that consumption is linked to obesity, cardiovascular disease and some childhood health issues.

These are for profit companies so what would you expect? It’s sort of a life insurance profitability hedge fund perhaps.

The researchers, affiliated with Physicians for a National Health Program say this highlights the conflicts that may exist between maximizing profit and the expanding public health role of private health insurers. They state: “If insurers are to play a greater part in the health care delivery system they ought to be held to a higher standard of corporate responsibility."

U.S.-based Northwestern Mutual and Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company both offer life insurance as well as disability and long-term care insurance. Northwestern Mutual owns $422.2 million of fast-food stock, with $318.1 million of McDonald's. Mass Mutual owns $366.5 million of fast-food stock, including $267.2 in McDonald's.

New Jersey-based Prudential Financial Inc. sells life insurance and long-term disability coverage. With total fast-food holdings of $355.5 million, Prudential Financial owns $197.2 of stock in McDonald's and also has significant stakes in Burger King, Jack-in-the-Box, and Yum! Brands (owner of Pizza Hut, KFC and Taco Bell) stock.

Climate Research Unit “Dedicated if slightly disorganized”

It is reported in the GuardianUK that climate scientists were found to be “disorganized but did not fudge [their] results” So says the second of three planned high level inquiries into the recent media fed issue of emails between East Anglia University Climate Research Unit scientists discussing global warming has been released .

The inquiry, the second of three set up in the wake of the controversy, found "absolutely no evidence of any impropriety whatsoever", according to Lord Oxburgh, who led the investigation.

Instead, Oxburgh said, many of the criticisms and assertions of scientific misconduct were likely made by people "who do not like the implications of some the conclusions" reached by the climate experts

One fiery Vermont climate change denier John McClaughry may want to re-think or amend his heated declaration of mission accomplished over what he calls the “warming zealots”, socialists and mysterious special interests.
Last December after the email dust-up McClaughry wrote far and wide of what he called the collapse of the global warming scam:

It also fatally undermines the political pressure for supranational controls over energy and economies so long urged by socialists and special interests of various stripes.
This is very bad news for the global warming crowd, from President Obama to Sen. Sanders, the big business Climate Action Group, Vermont Senate President Peter Shumlin, VPIRG, propagandist Bill McKibben, and the nuts in polar bear suits roaming the Statehouse lawn.

I Googled far and wide for reports or images of McClaughry’s intriguing reference to "nuts in polar bear suits roaming the [Vermont] Statehouse lawn" but sadly was unable to find any record of this.
It may be some strange fantasy of his that requires further investigation or treatment.

Alan Greenspan Only 30% Wrong!

Frank Rich scores 100% commenting today on Alan Greenpsan's personal responsibility matrix.

“I was right 70 percent of the time, but I was wrong 30 percent of the time,” said Alan Greenspan as he testified last week on Capitol Hill. Greenspan — a k a the Oracle during his 18-year-plus tenure as Fed chairman — could not have more vividly illustrated how and why geniuses of his stature were out to lunch while Wall Street imploded. No doubt he applied his full brain power to that 70-30 calculation. But the big picture eludes him. If the captain of the Titanic followed the Greenspan model, he could claim he was on course at least 70 percent of the time too.

New Vt State Fish,Wildlife and Lottery Commission

The Times Argus online unscientific poll asks: Do you understand Challenges for Change? Yes or No, this troubled me. Like Challenges for Change itself the poll limited its possible answers. As of early today the poll results show not surprisingly that just about a quarter of 300+ respondents say yes, they actually understand C for C.

Do those roughly 75 people that understand all work for Public Strategies Group or are some in the legislature?
Although sick of the race to the bottom aspect of the C for C I checked out the 47 page C for C pdf Progress Report.

The report details seven “First Wave” charter units, think of them as the shock troops for the CforC program.

What follows are some notes on Vermont's robust alternative planning:

Listed among three Challenge Outcomes and Proposed Measures for all “First Wave “ departments are these nuggets of managerial guidance and brilliance : Increase employees’ engagement in their work. After years of layoffs and threatened layoffs by Governor Douglas this could be a stand alone challenge.

Some specifics worth highlighting by dept. include
the Department of Liquor Control getting additional revenue for the general fund through increased sales. And a gift card program generating $50,000 in new revenue the first year of sales.

The Dept of Fish and Wildlife initiatives include Generate additional revenues by promoting the sale of Department merchandise such as t-shirts, mugs, hats, books, posters, patches and stamps
And finally this, which boggles the entrepreneurial imagination: if feasible, Fish and Wildlife should collaborate with VT Lottery Commission to develop new mutually beneficial products

An Aged Vermont Whine

S.117 becomes law with Gubernatorial Whining Statement

Governor Douglas allowed S.117, an act changing the date of Vermont’s Primary Election to become law yesterday without his signature. This new law which moves the primary to August 24th brings Vermont into compliance with a Federal requirement regarding a minimum of 45 days for overseas voters (mostly service members) to return their absentee ballots.

Other states that faced this issue include Minnesota which made similar changes months ago. Republican Governor Tim Pawlenty signed it with Minnesota National guard troops present at the ceremony.
However Governor Douglas opposed the change, and until today’s acquiescence had been coy about whether he would veto the bill.

Characteristically he did not miss the opportunity to restate his well known objections including his concern that “Vermonters often enjoy their hard-earned vacations and surely are not focused on an election…”
Accompanying his press release with his own petulant version of a presidential signing statement, Douglas offered up a sort of gubernatorial whining statement that lamented ;

“But now, in the guise of assuring that the votes of our brave men and women in the military are counted, as of course they should be, the Legislature has passed S. 117, which in all likelihood will discourage voter participation.

Vermont Springtime Heat Record Broken for Second Day!

Burlington Vermont

Saturday, the temperature recorded at Burlington International Airport was 79 degrees, six degrees higher than the previous record for April 3 that was set in 1981.
Montpelier had a temperature of 83, breaking its 1981 record by 12 degrees. St. Johnsbury had heated up to 80 degrees, five degrees above its 1981 record.

Senators DeMint, Inhofe any comments?


The difference between weather and climate is a measure of time. Weather is what conditions of the atmosphere are over a short period of time, and climate is how the atmosphere "behaves" over relatively long periods of time.

This past winter climate skeptics seized on the blizzard in Washington ,snowmaggedon,as proof that global warming was a hoax .A hoax promoted by the global warming industry to use George Will’s term . The fact that it was cold outside and Washington had a blizzard proves there is no global Warming.
Climate skeptic Sen. James Inhofe even built himself an igloo and cleverly placed a sign a top reading Al Gore’s new home. Not to be outdone Senator Jim DeMint found himself twittering “It’s going to keep snowing in D.C. until Al Gore cries ‘uncle.'"


So I wondered what the National Republican climate brain-trust would make of the weather as I sat here in Vermont yesterday with the record breaking Springtime 80 degree temps.
Someone should call Republican Senators Inhofe and DeMint; they’d know what’s up with the weather around here.

Dubie Emission Standards or “The General turned to me and said, ‘Brian…’ ”

Jobs tour completed, Vermont gubernatorial candidate Brian Dubie recently opted out of a televised union-sponsored debate in Barre that might have proved a useful venue to discuss his insights on the state job situation. His absence and low key campaign style gives added significance to all the appearances he does make and utterances he does utter.

Years ago, Vermont joined thirteen other states in court to tighten standards for new car fuel emissions. Now those standards have been adapted by the Obama administration.
Certainly there were generous cheers and credit was shared liberally at the ceremony in Montpelier. At the event, gubernatorial hopeful Lt. Gov. Brian Dubie readily weighed in, happily recalling a special evening on a rooftop in Baghdad and also declaring that “Green really is green,” while brandishing a dollar bill.

Dubie reflected on a conversation he had with a U.S. military general on a Baghdad roof in Iraq last year. That general, looking over an evening skyline in the war-torn country, pressed for the need to move off of foreign oil coming from "dangerous parts of the world."

He said clean energy and reducing car emissions are essential to the country's environmental and economic health and safety.

"Green really is green," Dubie said, holding up a dollar bill he took from his pocket.Times Argus

Last year in Iraq?
Unless this is a regular occurrence in the life of Brian, he seems confused about when he shared a memorable evening on a rooftop in Baghdad with a U.S. military general.

From an article Dubie wrote for Aerospace States Association October, 2007

On a mid-September evening in 2006, I stood on a rooftop overlooking the city of Baghdad with a U.S. Air Force Commanding General. I was deployed to Iraq as an Air Force reservist and member of an Air Force field assessment team. The city was beautiful at night, but it was not peaceful.
The General turned to me and said, “Brian, America has to find ways to use less oil — especially oil that comes from dangerous parts of the world.”