Safe, Clean, Reliable – Not! The “Replace Vermont Yankee” 2009 Town Meeting Initiative
by Dan Dewalt

Find out more at www.replaceVY.org

“Shall the voters of the town of ___________request the Vermont legislature to:    

The budget should be balanced, the treasury should be refilled, public
debt should be reduced, the arrogance of officialdom should be tempered
and controlled, and the assistance to foreign lands should be curtailed
lest Rome become bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance. - Marcus Tullius Cicero, 55 B.C. –

People should not fear their governments. Governments should fear their people.
- V for Vendetta, 2005 -

Author’s note: I had planned to write a follow-up to Exponential Money in a Finite World (published in Vermont Commons,
Fall 2008), where I would continue to make the case that our financial
system is incompatible with reality and is due either for collapse or a
major overhaul over the next 20 years – max. National events have
obviously overtaken the publication schedule, so I will instead focus
on the recent bailout and what this means to each of us over the next
one-to-two years.

Editor’s note: Christopher Ketcham contributes to GQ, Vanity Fair,
Harper's and many online publications. He is writing a book on American
secessionism. This letter first appeared in the Los Angeles Times on
September 10, 2008, and is reprinted here with the author’s permission.

Editor, Vermont Commons:

Sarah Palin's secessionist sympathies sparked minor hysteria last week.

To learn more, get involved, receive a free newsletter, and to sign a
petition calling for random audits in Vermont, visit the Vermonters for
Voting Integrity website. 

Begin by asking yourself this simple question: Who counts the votes?

The following interview considers the feasibility of wood being a
primary heating-fuel source for Vermont. New wood stove technology,
combined with sustainable forestry, offers a real opportunity for
Vermont to become more energy independent. According to the Vermont
Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation, Vermont’s landmass is 78
percent forest with 4.5 million acres of woodland and an average of 26
cord of standing wood per acre, for 117 million cord of total standing
wood.

"Money alone sets all the world in motion."
-    Publius Syrus, 42 B. C.

“Yet habit -- strange thing! What cannot habit accomplish?”

So wrote Herman Melville in his epic novel Moby-Dick. More than 150
years later his face would appear on  currency near his home in
Pittsfield, Massachusetts, and his quote would become relevant not only
for describing a captain in search of an elusive whale, but also for a
group of citizens searching for an elusive economic vision.

Damn it! 

Our tomato crop is way down this year from
last.  In 2007 our garden produced more than 230 pounds of
tomatoes that we canned, dried and froze, and enjoyed all the way up
through the middle of July of this year.  But with less than a
measly 125 pounds from this year’s garden, I was starting to
panic.  How would I fill the gap?  Would I have to resort to
buying canned tomatoes in the grocery store?  

Even though 77 percent of the eligible voters in Vermont believe the U.S. government has lost its moral authority and 49 percent think the United States has become unsustainable politically, economically, militarily, and environmentally, only 11.5 percent are in favor of Vermont seceding from the Union and becoming an independent republic. Secession is one of the few subjects about which liberals and conservatives agree: it is an anathema.