Rob's note: From the e-letter mailbox. Happy Labor Day.

Editor, Vermont Commons:

I am a former resident of Maine (or, as I prefer, a Mainer in exile) who is very supportive of the noble independence campaign to liberate Vermont from the soulless corporate wasteland that has conquered America. I hope that such a movement will take hold in my beloved home state.

It is also pleasing to hear that a varying double-digit percent of Vermonters now favor reclaiming the original intent of the founding constitutional patriots of Vermont – a Republic that has more control over its own destiny than a faceless federal bureaucracy. I believe it is important to approach all members of society on your venerable proposal, religious and secular. In general, both sides tend to agree on one neutral philosophy: ethics.

I recently attended a conference at a Tennessee university on the deadly aspects of Depleted Uranium. Various experts (including a military veteran who tested D.U. effects on military vehicles, Major Doug Rokke) explained the hazards and consequences of exposure to D.U. An Afghani citizen and journalist, who is also the son of a general in that nation, produced a heartening photographic journal/book called Afghanistan After “Democracy” (quotations for very germane reasons); the most horrific pictures showed newborn babies whose DNA were so viciously maligned by the D.U. infestation that some had their internal organs on the exterior of their lifeless bodies, some had three eyes, some had massive craniums, and other pictures that made me cry for the first time in quite a while. A vast majority of those children never make it.

The point is – and I fully endorse your efforts here – use such materials and vital information for your advantage. Show the photos, because people must see the crimes committed by this government! Our taxes are utilized by the Military/Industrial Complex to support the manufacture of these biological weapons of mass destruction. Our government's sinister production and deployment of these chemical terrors have inflicted not only genetic mutilation in numerous children of Bosnia and Kosovo, Afghanistan and Iraq, but in our own United States military personnel! We have poisoned our fellow citizens, and I bet that some fine members of Vermont society have been affected. I would suggest that you tie the secession of Vermont to the taxes that even avowed peace and anti-war activists pay to the disgraceful foreign and domestic policies of the Military/Industrial Complex. No matter how opposed to war they are, they are just as liable for the slaughter of innocent civilians because they still belong to this corrupt system.

Please Vermont, take the initiative. The current empire is going to crumble, and I pray God that you evade this forthcoming but just downfall. We are in a post-unity stage, and it is time to revive the heritage of the American Revolution and Constitutional liberty under peaceful means.

Benjamin R. Holmes
Mocksville, North Carolina (formerly Portland, Maine)