Archive

In a time of widespread citizen mistrust of their government institutions, what could be more important than re-building that trust? The recent reversal from VT’s largely symbolic Ethics Commission (VEC)… Read More

Since the national opinion writers have thoroughly covered the President’s role in stoking the violence we experienced this weekend we can agree that the next election offers us all the… Read More

VTDigger column May 29,2019 S.169, mandates a 24-hour waiting period for the purchase of a handgun in Vermont It’s sitting on the Governor’s desk awaiting his signature… or not. The… Read More

Astonishing what we learn from others when we listen… I was talking with a friend only a few years younger who offered a suggestion that in my self-absorption had never… Read More

The nation was appalled by televised scenes on America’s southern border of ICE forcibly separating children from their parents after a Justice Department ruling that to do so was legal… Read More

Thanks to the VT Council on World Affairs and the Open World Leadership Program, we just hosted two young women who are journalists in Yaroslava, Russia. And I’m struck by how similar the… Read More

Neighbors in an upscale condo development were speculating about what the guy in the end-unit must do for a living to afford a sailboat, motorcycle, and camper. Curious, one strolled… Read More

An epiphany is a spontaneous event that inexplicably alters one’s life, a​ manifestation​ of some force in the universe greater than oneself. ​ My wife and I both experienced this… Read More

Without notice or comment, The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (UCIS) recently removed from its mission statement a century-old introductory phrase… “America’s promise as a nation of immigrants…” At the… Read More

I’ve recently learned I’m a “privileged, cisgendered, white male.” This feels somewhat alien to me still – but it’s new so I’m willing to try it on and figure out… Read More

While most of the civilized world has abandoned execution for moral as well as practical reasons, President Trump is now proposing an expanded application of the death penalty – traditionally… Read More

“Build it and they will come” is the oft-misquoted meme from the classic movie Field of Dreams. And in the case of the proposal by CoreCivic, a private prison firm,… Read More