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Guest Editorial: The high cost of obesity

Posted on May 17, 2012 |
By Emerson K. Lynn



In 1986, it was estimated that the cost of obesity in the United States amounted to about 5 percent of total health care spending. Today, that figure has more than tripled to 15 percent, meaning it costs us $350 billion a year to treat.

That’s bad enough. Worse is the prospect that the costs will continue to escalate and that Type 2 diabetes is becoming prevalent among children and teens.

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Guest Editorial: Ms. Miller, utilities are right to stand up to demagoguery

Posted on April 12, 2012 |
By Emerson K. Lynn



In testimony before the full Senate, Department of Public Service Commissioner Elizabeth Miller Thursday experienced the power of political demagoguery and learned how the appeal of writing checks to a few trumps policy that benefits the many. She must have walked away dispirited.

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Guest Editorial: Even basketball is about the power of markets

Posted on April 9, 2012 |
By Emerson K. Lynn



John Calipari sits at the center of the sports world today. He’s the coach of the University of Kentucky basketball team that won the NCAA title last night against the Kansas Jayhawks.

His team was not only the better team, but it was a team made up of sophomores and freshmen, and Mr. Calipari expects that most of them will not play for the university another season. They will be top draft picks for the NBA.

It’s about the money. Tons of it.

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Guest Editorial: Give students a good reason to graduate

Posted on February 2, 2012 |
By Emerson K. Lynn



When schools lose a student to the streets it’s a compounded loss that multiplies its way through society. When students drop out, they limit their potentials and fall prey to higher divorce rates, lower incomes and fewer opportunities. They often become part of the cycle of poverty, which then traps their children. The challenge is to figure out how to keep the students in school.

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Guest Editorial: Legislature should back its university

Posted on January 30, 2012 |
By Emerson K. Lynn



The University of Vermont is midway in the process of introducing its five finalists for president to the campus, to its faculty and to the state of Vermont.

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Editorial: Real healthcare reform

Posted on November 3, 2011 |
By Emerson K. Lynn



Vermont could save as much as $1.5 billion annually through its health care reform efforts, or as little as a half billion a year, according to a report released yesterday by the Joint Fiscal Office and the Department of Banking, Insurance, Securities and Health Care Administration.

The variation between $1.5 billion and a half-billion in savings makes the estimate almost meaningless. It means they don’t know what the savings will be, because the circumstances can vary so dramatically. 

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Guest editorial: A daunting task requires action equal to the challenge

Posted on September 22, 2011 |
By Emerson K. Lynn



There are countless benefits being conducted in Vermont on behalf of those affected by Tropical Storm Irene, and they are raising significant amounts of money. Last weekend’s Phish concert in Essex Junction raised $1.2 million on behalf of the state’s disaster relief fund. In Waitsfield, a solo concert by Grace Potter being hosted by Sugarbush Resort is expected to raise $350,000 for a local relief effort in the Mad River Valley. Similar events are happening in central and southern Vermont with each passing week.

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Editorial: Gov. scores points but loses university's trust: a poor bargain for Vt.

Posted on August 18, 2011 |
By Emerson K. Lynn



If you were the next president of the University of Vermont, would you take a phone call from Gov. Peter Shumlin?

Not without reservation.

You would not know how your words would be used. You would not know whether the conversation was private or public. You would not know whether the motive for the call was for the good of the university, or the good of the governor.

That’s a problem.

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Editorial: Europe's cities take different view of cars

Posted on August 1, 2011 |
By Emerson K. Lynn



Europe’s big cities have declared war on the car. The goal is to make car use increasingly expensive and driving in the city so frustrating that car owners will gladly leave their vehicles at home and take the train to work, to shop or to have a night on the town.

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Guest editorial: No taxes on Amazon deals costs our state

Posted on July 25, 2011 |
By Emerson K. Lynn



OK, under the “cone of silence,” how many of you use Amazon to buy a book? How many of you send a check to the state of Vermont for what you owe in use taxes? How many of you would stop buying your books on Amazon if the company collected that tax for you and sent it to Montpelier?

Our guess is that a bunch of you buy books from the online giant, that virtually none of you pony up and send a check to Montpelier for what you owe, and that only a tiny percentage of you would stop shopping on Amazon if the company did collect the tax.

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