Kathryn Flagg's blog
I took off for New York earlier this month, cutting out of work a bit early on a Friday afternoon to make the trip. Almost all of my dearest college friends flocked to the city after graduation, so an outing to New York is a bit like one-stop shopping at a big-box store: Somewhere, in a city of 8 million some odd people, are a half-dozen friends waiting for me; I just have to elbow my way through never-ending aisles of strangers, knick-knacks and two-for-the-price-of-one deals to find them.
While Congress is up to its neck wrangling with health care reform, the financial wizards of Wall Street are greasing the skids for a return to the high profits seen before last year’s financial meltdown, highlighted by the failure of Lehman Brothers a year ago this week. President Obama went into the den of Wall Street on Monday with the warning that the public would not stand for more reckless behavior.
The pertinent facts about the status of health care in this country should have been ample evidence to persuade Congress and the American people that ‘kicking the can down the road’ for another few years is not befitting, as President Barack Obama told the nation in a joint speech to Congress last Thursday, of our national character.
It is in the American character, the president reminded us all, to address the tough issues and to rally around those in need.
Suddenly, I’m a fan of Sarah Palin’s. No, not because she bailed on her job as governor of Alaska midway through her term and put her political career in jeopardy. But precisely because she didn’t care — other things, she said, were more important.
While the former vice-presidential candidate for the Republican Party tried to put a positive spin on her decision to quit the governorship at the end of the month, the news didn’t sit well with many Republicans and conservative radio shock-jocks and columnists around the country.
In Ferrisburgh last week, about 100 residents attended a zoning board meeting to question a proposal that would build a large gasoline/diesel service station that would also include a restaurant and convenience store. The crucial issues here are the scale of the project and the “undue and adverse” aesthetic effect the project would have on the community.
If Vermonters had a vote, just how many Green Mountain residents — and we’re a generous lot for the most part — do you think would agree to use their tax dollars to bail out California?
None was my answer, too.
That 250 avid ATV riders showed up at a Agency of Natural Resources hearing in Montpelier on Tuesday to lobby for access to state lands for trail riding is a testament to those particular individuals’ passion for the sport, not public support of the idea. Nor did the 250 riders represent an unusually large number, considering there are16,000 registered ATVs in Vermont and another 32,000 that are illegally unregistered.
