Jobs in Our Town

I’m generally suspicious of prognosticators and gurus, whether they’re predicting the end of books or the end of the world. I don’t worry about things ending, nor do I fear… Read More

UVM’s Challenge & Opportunity

  Listen 3:23   UVM was kind enough to admit me to its junior class in 1966 after I explained my abysmal record at Kenyon College and the life lessons… Read More

You Can’t Have It Both Ways

When my daughter was in kindergarten in the small town of Lincoln, a wave of enthusiasm swept through her small classroom for vegetarianism and, like many of her friends, Anna… Read More

The New Narcissism

Vermont and America have always been inspired and governed by a political spectrum spanning conservative and liberal values. Party names have changed — Whigs, Bull Moose, Tea Party – and… Read More

Deport the Poor and Sell Green Cards to the Rich?

The legal underpinning driving the planned economic renaissance in Northern Vermont is called the “Immigrant Investor Program” or EB-5 program. The federal program offers green cards to wealthy foreigners willing… Read More

Arrogant Species?

Sometimes I worry that we’re at risk of succumbing to our own arrogance as a species. A quick history … In primitive times, just after we lost our prehensile tails,… Read More

The Scourge of Orthodoxy

Orthodoxy has never served mankind well. Like an angry Gorgon, it periodically emerges from its cave and breaths fire into religion, academia or politics, and then retreats in order to… Read More

Should Non-profits Compete or Collaborate?

LISTEN (3:21) MP3 | Download MP3 Competition works pretty well in the business sector if it’s fair and business plays by the rules. Competition in the non-profit arena is a problem, as it… Read More

Freedom of Information, Criminal Records, & Accountability

By way of full disclosure, I’m Chair of the VT Journalism Trust, doing business as VTDigger.org, serve on the Board of the VT ACLU, and am a former Chair of… Read More

The New Civil War

The accords we’ve long used to organize ourselves into a functioning society have traditionally been shared among three sectors: government, business and the non-profit sector. Government has traditionally been the… Read More

Addictive Behavior

“Hi, I’m Bill. I’m a food addict.” Is this a statement of fact, of theory, of wishful thinking, or merely an attempt to avoid responsibility for overeating and being fat?… Read More

Work or exercise?

My friends go to a gym to exercise, I don’t. I really like strenuous activity; I just want something practical or beautiful to come of it. I love doing hard… Read More