Op/Ed

Before releasing your pets via a “Free to good home” ad, please do some research on this problem and arrange a follow up plan so you can see that your beloved pets DO recieve the care and love they deserve.  You can begin by typing “Free to good home” in Google and see the extent of risk of doing this.  Pet-abuse.com has some great articles on this.

Vermont is once again ranked as the least religious state in the country. Over half the people in our state are less likely to believe in God than the rest of the country. However, being the least religious state doesn’t stop the sectarian denominations from their power struggles for domain over man, land and beast. The upshot is that our state is a target for overt religious proselytizing.

Dear President Maduro, slanderous Western media, promoting war and violence for capital gains of the mercilessly amoral automaton functioning speculative interest banking industry, has put you in their spotlight to better target you with defamation. This is then your opportunity to be heard a bit world-wide. In telling the truth about the USA, you will be protecting all of us, Venezuela included.

The issue that needs to be examined is the ‘claw back’ provision of Medicaid. Unfortunately, even many legislators are unaware of this problem. This provision in the law is punitive and prejudicial. It will be imposed only on the very poor – those who qualify for Medicaid. This is a death tax that will be imposed only on the very poor. Will poor unmarried citizens be ‘penalized’ for their low income and also for not having a spouse? Those who are dirt poor will now even have their dirt taxed away from any heirs. Of course, those with accountants, lawyers, financial planners can avoid this unfair tax – but poor people do not have that kind of support system.

An open letter to Governor Shumlin and to our federal and state delegations:

This winter Route 9/Western Avenue off of Interstate 91 Exit 2 in Brattleboro has been in abominable shape.  Despite the best efforts of the Brattleboro Department of Public Works to keep ahead of new pot holes through patching, both new-timers and old-timers in town say this is the worst shape they have ever seen the road.

Traffic has slowed to a crawl as everyone tries to avoid flat tires or damage to their undercarriages. 
Drivers bob and weave like prize fighters, hopefully not into the fists of oncoming traffic.  (Of just the
drivers the DPW has heard from, department head Steve Barrett reports well over 20 blown tires.)  This focus on the decrepit road condition distracts drivers from watching for bicyclists and pedestrians.

Humans are not like penguins. We are not designed to walk on the ice. My father, who is in his 70’s, was walking in his hometown. The sidwalk was not cleared, and he slipped and fell on his side with a sickening cracking and terrible pain.This simple fall resulted in 6 broken ribs. He is in much pain, can hardly move, and even breathing is hard for him.

On my street, here in Brattleboro, I have noticed that again and again and again, some people clear their sidewalks, and some do not. South Main should be passable all the way from one end to the other.

Right now, there is slush, and tonight, the slush may well freeze, bumpy and slippery.

Sixteen Senators and what do you get? “Another day older and deeper in debt. Senators Sanders and Leahy don’t you call me cause I can’t go. I owe my soul to the company (stole).”

We spend a broken record’s worth of time in repetitive cadence about the vagaries of entitlements, the disabled, the plight of the elder poor, the kids, and then just your general poor people, not to mention the downtrodden middleclass.

Here’s what I got out of the budget discussion at Tuesday’s Selectboard meeting:  “We’re broke.  Must close library, sell parks.”  Now I know that they didn’t actually advocate for any of these draconian changes, but these items were mentioned, and somehow that became my takeaway from the meeting.  Unnecessary frills may have to be eliminated because important things like police and fire facilities must be built and next year we’ll need a new grader.

Welcome to the new reality, folks: Towns can no longer afford themselves.  

DESCRIPTION:
Eminent historian Prof. Noam Chomsky, has said over and over again, without provoking much negative outcry, “If the Nuremberg laws were applied, then every post-war American president would have been hanged.” US Chief Prosecutor Robert Jackson at the Nuremberg trials of Germans in 1945, felt obliged to point out that “these laws are not meant only for Germans, but for the citizens of all nations.” Why do Americans not get it?

TEXT:
Eminent historian Prof. Noam Chomsky of M.I.T., various times voted world’s most famous intellectual in international polls, has said over and over again, without provoking much negative outcry, “If the Nuremberg laws were applied, then every post-war American president would have been hanged.”

Every morning, my room-mate Jake and I go for a walk.

Sometimes, we witness behavior that seems suspicious. For example, a carful of people pulls up to a house, a person gets out, knocks on the door and is admitted. Within about a minute, the person exits, gets in the car, and the gang drives away.

When we see this happening frequently, it appears that something is going on. Maybe they’re borrowing a few eggs for breakfast, but I think it’s drugs.

After a few days, this seems to stop happening, only to begin again in a few weeks.

Was hemp, not marijuana, the real target? As a member of the cannabis sativa family, it is the botanical cousin of marijuana. Harmless, yet extremely valuable as a ready source of natural, biomass fiber, it paid a dear price for being competitive in the fiber products market of the 1930’s, and it brought its cousin marijuana down with it.

When corporate DuPont sought to diversify out of explosive munitions in 1910 it turned its attention to the textile fibers market. By the early Thirties, DuPont had significant investment in synthetic fiber research and development. Nylon was introduced in 1938 as the “first true synthetic fiber created wholly out of chemicals.”

My original film “deceptions” has now become part of a Deceptions Trilogy. That first film was released in 2010 and the second, deceptionsTwo, “Lest We Forget” was uploaded to my You Tube Channel last week and the third, deceptionsThree,”What Can I Do?,” is in gestation. This channel has now received over 180,000 views, not viral but very respectable.

My latest work, “Lest We Forget,” is a grim documentary that chronicles American war crimes and atrocities that compare if not EXCEED those carried out by Hitler and his fellow Nazi’s and the exaggerated hype that surrounds the War on Terror. Please take 28 minutes to watch these war clips and investigative reports. In 6 days well over 8,000 others have.

At 5pm on September 11, 2001 World Trade Center Towers 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 were damaged but still standing. Nevertheless, earlier that morning the lower Manhattan skyline had changed forever. The smoke, fumes and dust of Towers 1 and 2 had already firmly established in American minds the smoke and mirrors affect designed and desired by the brainchildren of the attackers.

The two main objectives of any building demolition in populated areas are, one, to break up and pulverize the building into small manageable pieces of dust and debris, and, two, to put the building debris into its footprint. That’s why demolition experts can pull down buildings that stand close to other buildings without damaging them.

If there’s one single thing we as humans absolutely know about the weather, it is that we don’t know the weather. I keep hearing this trendy-phrase: “the new normal,” which I find both annoying and silly because can anyone actually say what normal is on a grand scale regarding the weather? The word normal is so ambiguous as to render it meaningless in this context.

It is with a sense of gladness that more people are increasingly not buying into the theory of global warming and Climate Change. I have always been someone to question things – to question what I am told. It is encouraging that more people are questioning and doubting the notion of Climate Change/global warming for the dubious and flawed theory that it is.

On War-Promoting Media’s Snow Job and King’s Condemning US Wars for Predatory Investments

DESCRIPTION:

Mainstream media vilification of King as a traitor followed his world shaking sermon “Beyond Vietnam – a Time to Break Silence.” Media calumny only halted with the assassination that would protect a safe return on trillions of dollars invested in wars from a charismatic leader determined to stop these massive crimes against humanity for overseas as he had led the halting of horrific unprosecutable racist crimes at home.

TEXT:

DESCRIPTION: 1/12/2014″Iraq: “Devastating” Dossier Alleging British War Crimes Lodged with the International Criminal Court.”  Americans reading this might be compelled to wonder when a headline will read: ‘Alleging US War Crimes.’ Nuremberg, Trial Chief Prosecutor Robert Jackson noted that the laws regarding genocide were not just for Germans  but for citizens of all nations. King held all Americans responsible not the gov. he dismissed 

DESCRIPTION:

On TV, the week-end before the MKJjr’ birthday holiday, see all the celebrities, black, white, asian, latino. They will come to praise King and bury again King’s condemnation of US atrocity “wars meant to maintain unjust predatory investments on three continents.” They will hail King to heaven, loudly, to drown out anyone whispering that King called their dirty government “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world.”

The town of Brattleboro seems to be reaching a point where we can barely afford our expenses. Much like a person who has fallen behind, Brattleboro must now make decisions in a different way.

When there is money, something broken gets fixed. When there is money, it is easy to go to the store to get a new widget if the old one fails. It’s easy to go buy a new time-saving accessory like a snowblower, or install energy-saving devices like new windows or more efficient appliances. It’s not a problem if someone stops over for dinner, and it is easy to part with some extra food, beverage or even cash.

New Jersey has been known for its culture of mobsters, hooligans, and political dirty tricks for many decades. When I was a kid, anytime the topic of New Jersey was discussed, my Dad would smile and say – “Yep, that’s where all the crooks are”. He always had a twinkle in his eye when he said that. Naturally, it made me want to move to New Jersey as soon as I was old enough. New Jersey sounded really cool, like a land of fun and excitement…especially, while growing up in the coal mine region of Pennsylvania.

I dropped by the new ALDI supermarket on Putney Road today. The place was buzzing with people checking out products and prices, and staff were getting used to working in a new building. I had two immediate impressions of the supermarket.

First, the prices were low. Very low. Other supermarkets in the area should be worried about losing people looking for lowest prices. ALDI means business and appears ready to compete.

How low? Can of black beans was 59 cents. Bottles of wine under $5. Chicken breasts for $2.69 a pound. Pineapples for $1.29 each. Milk was $2.29 a gallon. And so on. Anyone looking to pay less will be in here.