IBM:big,blue and chips on its shoulders

IBM in Vermont is again crying crocodile tears and threatening to hold its breath until it turns blue. Well it isn’t IBM precisely but a surrogate croc. Leave it to Vermont millionaire businessman Jack McMullen’s fine tuned political instincts to pen an op-ed regurgitating the time worn “ IBM- may- leave- Vermont- if…” line at the very moment the Occupy Wall Street movement seems to be peaking.


59 percent of adults either completely or mostly agree with the OWS protesters according to an October National Journal survey reported by Atlantic Magazine. Also sympathy toward corporations is low as shown by a Sept. 2011 Gallup poll indicating 70 percent of respondents favor hiking taxes on corporations by eliminating tax deductions.


But with bullet point efficiency McMullen sobs out the alleged historic wrongs inflicted on poor IBM by mean old Vermont.

• you never gave us the circ highway you promised,
• you never got us the low power rate we wanted,
• you never gave us relief from act 250 ,
• you never gave us assistance in training insufficiently prepared new workers

Ah, but it’s his justification for an emotional tender spot that long ago bruised the fragile corporate heart that dredges up the grandest crocodile tears. Millionaire and failed US Senate candidate McMullen recalls the time Bernie Sanders actually *gasp* publicly criticized IBM.

Says McMullen:

Its eventual extinction will have been caused in large part by the failure of political leaders to respond to clear signals from the largest private, taxpaying employer our state is ever likely to have.

In the 1990s, then-Congressman Sanders launched a very public campaign [supporting IBM workers who were] criticizing IBM for [unilaterally] changing its 1960s-era pension plan to remain competitive with nimbler, newer entrants into the semiconductor business.
I am told by the same source [an unnamed most senior IBM corporate executive] that IBM’s then-CEO, Louis Gerstner, reacted to Sanders demagoguery with a statement something like: “Don’t the politicians in Vermont realize there are more than a dozen other states vying for our business?”

So take it from businessman Jack McMullen, the man who lost a shoo-in Republican primary to Vermont farmer Fred Tuttle, that IBM feels pain at not getting what they want.


Who doesn’t, eh Jack? On the other hand, many go forward to other goals or find ways to compromise for the mutual good of the community, while others clutch old grudges, keep crying and holding their breath to get attention.

The Eye of the Dubie Campaign

Vermont Lt.Gov.Brian Dubie has been out touring Vermont. As his campaign takes shape he is more often seen standing alongside the Governor at photo ops and his press releases seem to be a regular feature on the Vermont.gov webpage. All this perhaps is trying to alleviate the image from past campaigns where he has campaigned lightly, and ducked debates.
He is also just wrapping up a lengthy statewide“jobs” tour in Chittenden County but from the Burlington Free Press reports it might more accurately be named the look-‘em-in-the-eye tour.

Dubie listened respectfully, accepted the position and added: "I vowed to look you in the eye."
It was like this between the lieutenant governor and the chorus of outspoken doubters. Dubie did look everyone in the eye.

It is unclear what magic this vow to look-‘em-in-the-eye may accomplish but it appears the Lt. Gov. is convinced it may work some magic on the self described “grumpy” titans of Vermont business he encountered. The “grumpy” yet “sage” manager of political relations for IBM gave Brian an earful.

“The business community has been talking about the same issues for two decades." To come to business at this time to ask about our perspective, O'Kane said "seems ingenuous ... it is too costly to do business in Vermont ... it is too hard to do business,"

Sounds like more whine than grump but you’d have to look ‘em in eye to know.
Perhaps taken aback by what were described as the business people’s “edgy” comments and questions, the Lt. Governor did raise the specter of revolt in classic Tea Party rhetoric

In response to increasing taxes and controlling expenses, Dubie offered this prediction, "We're looking at a taxpayer revolt."