Would Vermonters Secede From a Second Vermont Republic?

This isn't exactly what Thomas Naylor, baas of the Second Vermont Republic, had in mind, nor is it the model of "UNTied States" that "Vermont Commons" publisher, Rob Williams, would have Vermonters pursue, that is to say, should the seceshers ever remotely seem to be gaining traction in the sense that the state of Vermont was being seen as even possibly leaving the US, that Vermonters could elect to secede from Vermont to remain in the United States of America.

Why not?

Some Arizonans, you see, think that their own state government is already too far along that secesher path so they're looking at - you guessed it - seceding from Arizona so that they can remain in the United States of America.

Pima County the 51st state?

A political committee comprised of a handful of attorneys, including the former chairman of the Pima County Democratic Party, have established a political committee dedicated to helping Southern Arizona secede from the rest of the state.

Start Our State, which is asking other like-minded counties to join the effort, is hoping to put the question before Pima County voters in 2012.

Co-chair Paul Eckerstrom said it’s not a joke and not a political statement. He said the state legislature has gone too far to the right, particularly with a round of measures to challenge federal supremacy.

“This really does border on them saying they don’t want to be part of the Union any longer,” he said. “Well, I want to be part of the United States.”

He said at a minimum, it will send a message that Pima County doesn’t want to go along with the priorities being outlined in Phoenix. He said Pima County has more land and more people than several other states.

“It’s no longer a laughing matter to me,” Eckerstrom said. “My kids’ futures are at stake because if this continues, the economic ramifications could be very dire. I’m tired of hoping and praying that rationality will come to Phoenix.”

The committee is pressing the Pima County Board of Supervisors to put the measure on the ballot. If that doesn’t happen, Eckerstrom said the group is prepared to circulate petitions.

Arizona Daily Star

At this point, a little "rationality" on the part of Naylor and Williams wouldn't be such a bad idea, either.

(h/t DangererousMinds)

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Second Vermont Republic Uses a Glorified Fortune Teller for Economic Prognostication

Many sesechers from Vermont and elsewhere frequently tout the baas of the
Second Vermont Republic, Thomas Naylor, as an economist, as though "he's an economist, so what he says must be true."

I've been examining some of the "economic" underpinnings of the proposed Second Vermont Republic, an idea that garnered support from fewer than 8/10ths of 1 percent of Vermont's voters when they got a look at Naylor's hand-picked candidate for governor, Connecticut native Dennis Steele.

One I found was Paul Craig Roberts, who, like SVR advisory board member Thomas J. DiLorenzo, has had his writings published in anti-Semetic, Holocaust denying publications. In addition to the anti-Semetic, hate sites VDARE.com, the Institute for Historical Review and American Free Press, Roberts is a contributor at website called Trends Research Institute.

The Trends Research Institute and its journal are cited repeatedly at Naylor's SVR website, as well as at Rob Williams's "Vermont Commons", and is published by Gerald Celente, a longtime Fox News contributor and a Glenn Beck favorite.

You see, Celente specializes in a particularly dark, doom and gloom, fear mongering form of prognostication so favored by seceshers, tea baggers, Beckdroids and others who know the so-called "truth." But, like most fortune telling scams, there's always evidence to undermine the con, if only the mark will look for it. Of course, if the mark did trouble himself to look for it, he'd find ample evidence that would tell him that whole thing is a fraud. Here's just one source.

Consider the Peak Oil theory. Energy shortages and conversions to new sources have been with us for ages. So have hardships, wars, political dominance, you name it. But, as the seceshers would have it, the effect will apocalyptic. Therein lies the scam. Were it true, there'd be no need to seceed; the result will almost certainly be the same as secession - micro communities on their own, Mad Max style. And secession won't prevent the result of their dire post Peak Oil land, so why the hurry?

These types have been there to cry that the sky-is-falling for a very long time. Like all fortune teller swindles, this one relies on the tried and true, "you got a problem, I got the cure," except with an Internet age edge. You buy Celente's publication from the Trends Institute, and he guarantees to scare the shit out of you. He even has an office full of globes so that you get that he has a worldview. Naylor and his crowd then promise to lead the way to salvation, that is, secession.

Fortunately, Vermonters have better sense and are unlikely to become the grifter Naylor's "marks."

Naylor's SVR has always been a con whose aim is political power. And in the end, he only convinced 10 of his Charlotte neighbors to go along with the secesher gubernatorial candidate in 2010.

That's 0.48% of the 2041 votes cast in Charlotte. In Waitsfield, home to "Vermont Commons" publisher and über propagandist for the SVR and Free Vermont crowd, Steele got 9 votes. Perhaps worst of all, Steele got only 5 votes in his present hometown of Kirby, VT.

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A Surprising Admission from a Vermont Commons Blogger, Robert Wagner

Of the baas of the Second Vermont Republic's Thomas Naylor's handpicked candidate for governor, Dennis Steele, and for whom Naylor was the Steele campaign's #1 contributor, Robert Wagner, the utterly failed candidate for the Senate in Addison County says:

"The tired old strategy of running for the 'top spot', the Executive --- is dead. (Vermonters are highly sceptical of single-issue candidates.)"

Ya think? Just ask the folks who headed the short-lived Take back Vermont movement how that all worked out for them.

In case anyone thinks that Wagner is one Vermont secesher who may not have a screw or two loose, he's the guy that has declared Hancock, Vermont to be "the provisional capital of Free Vermont," that I reported on here.

He's also the hypocritcal candidate who took a stand against a community paid for solution to a community identified problem, all the while demanding his own community's place at the VTRANS trough.

Truly, a typical part of the "Vermont Commons" braintrust overseen by VTCommons publisher and Vermont's leading (after the baas, of course) historical revisionist, Rob Williams.

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Thomas Naylor and Sexist Stereotyping

The Second Vermont Republic baas, Thomas Naylor, posted yet another of his tedious essays, this time about Egypt.

As I've said before, his "essays" are an assemblage of shopworn Naylor clichés and codewords devoted to his misrepresentations of the real world that could be reproduced on a few refrigerator magnets and swirled about as needed for an "essay."

But in his utterly predictable "oil-Empire-Internet bad-Obama-Israel" whine, Naylor veered off into a sexual stereotype designed to trivialize and marginalize women.

In a dozen paragraphs of his essay, never once did Naylor offer his snark about the sartorial shortcomings of President Obama, VP Biden, Mubarack, Suleiman, El-Baradei, Lech Walesa, Va’clav Havel, or the predominately male demonstrators at Tahrir Square in Cairo. Yet, when he came to the US Secretary of State, here's how he dismissed her without offering a single example of substance other than a vague accusation of something he engages in all the time, doublespeak:

"With her mindless political doublespeak about Egypt, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton makes one wonder whether she represents the Second Coming of Madeleine Albright."

"She and the former Secretary of State not only sound alike on Egypt, but they dress alike too."

That's a twofer for Naylor - political bullshit and sexism.

It's an important disclosure by the Godfather of the Vermont seceshers about where women will place in his agrarian, male dominated society comparable to that planned by his allies at the League of the South. Unsurprisingly, his SVR advisory board member, Thomas J. DiLorenzo has written about "the phantom nature of the wage gap."

According to,

"Ruth Mandel, director of the Eagleton Institute of Politics at Rutgers University, 'To focus on their attire, the cut of their clothes … is to be in danger of trivializing who they are, the important role they play and the meaning behind women's advancement to positions of power: That is, we're moving to a true democracy of shared leadership.'"

No doubt he'll get strong support for his sexist jab from the expert at sexist doublespeak, that dreaming-of-castration-fantasies, anti-Semitic, lying blogger, Carol Moore, who has the full support of "Vermont Commons" publisher and Vermont historical revisionist, Rob Williams. Here's just one of her threatening comments directed to me when she became, ah, overstimulated by a photo in which a squirrel's testicles were visible:

"(A)ny female - and most men - can guess what my real response to it was. (Hint, where's(sic) the rubber bands - or the anesthetic and the proper tools.)"

Classy, Carol.

The group of them - Naylor, DiLorenzo, Williams & Moore - are a match made in hell.

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Secession Myths & Second Vermont Republic Advisory Board Member Thomas J. DiLorenzo

In a piece by Corey Meyer entitled "Secession: It’s All the Rave These Days", Meyer does a spot on job of refuting some of the historic untruths routinely repeated by secession scholars bullshit artists like Thomas DiLorenzo, Second Vermont Republic baas Thomas Naylor, "Vermont Commons" publisher Rob Williams, Kirkpatrick Sale and their associates at the "old times there are not forgotten," neo-Confederate, Abbeville Institute.


Here's a sample:

“(This) letter is one written by George Washington in 1783 to John Hancock,"

“There are four things, which I humbly conceive are essential to the well being, I may even venture to say, to the existence of the United States, as an Independent Power–

•1st An indissoluble Union of the States under one fœderal Head.
•2dly A sacred regard to public Justice.
•3dly The adoption of a proper Peace Establishment, and
•4thly The prevalence of that pacific and friendly disposition among the People of the United States, which will induce them to forgit their local prejudices and policies, to make those mutual concessions which are requisite to the general prosperity, and in some instances, to sacrafice their individual advantages to the interest of the Community.

These are the Pillars on which the glorious Fabrick of our Independency and National Character must be supported–Liberty is the Basis, and whoever should dare to sap the foundation or overturn the Structure, under whatever specious pretexts he may attempt it, will merit the bitterest execration, and the severest punishment which can be inflicted by his injured Country.”

You can read Meyer's entire piece here. I especially liked the "D'oh!" moment in Meyer's description of his gotcha of Thomas DiLorenzo, the perpetrator of the Lincoln historical revisionist history fraud so loved by VTCommons' (and then SVR co-chair) Williams and his early VTCommons contributor, white supremacist and UVM professor, Robert S. Griffin. (More on that sorry chapter at VTCommons and SVR here.)

(h/t to a regular reader)

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Some Glad Tidings for the Vermont State Archivist, Gregory Sanford...

... and a break, sorta, from the daily wingnuttery of the Vermont seceshers.

There's been so much to write about recently regarding Vermont secessionists and some of their truly despicable allies and (I know that they dread the word) associates, that I thought it time to break for some pleasant news separated by a few (but not too many) degrees from the Second Vermont Republic and "Vermont Commons" seceshers.

Vermont State Archivist, Gregory Sanford, will receive the Vermont Press Association's "Matthew Lyon Award for his lifetime commitment to the First Amendment in Vermont."

Given his commitment to truth it should come a little surprise that Sanford's considerable work on behalf of all Vermonters has, in turn, been a spoiler to the historical revisionists of the Vermont secesher community.

Congrats, Greg!

Vermont Archivist Sanford Honored
Free Press Staff Report
Tuesday, February 15, 2011

MONTPELIER -- Gregory Sanford, the Vermont state archivist since 1982, has been selected to receive the Matthew Lyon Award for his lifetime commitment to the First Amendment in Vermont.

The Vermont Press Association will present the award to Sanford during its annual awards banquet at noon Thursday at the Capitol Plaza Hotel.

VPA President Bethany Dunbar, editor of the Chronicle in Barton, said Sanford has been a leader in efforts for open access to public records and for the proper management of records so people can find out how government operates. Sanford has shown that proper documentation of public issues can provide context in addressing issues, Dunbar said.

"Gregory Sanford is one of the beacons in state government that completely understands the need and the importance of keeping and maintaining public records, especially historic records. He is keeping Vermont's institutional memory intact for the public and the press today and for historians tomorrow," Dunbar said.

The VPA created the award to honor people who uphold the First Amendment.

The First Amendment award is named for the former Vermont congressman, who was jailed in 1798 under the Alien and Sedition Act for sending a letter to the editor criticizing President John Adams. While Lyon was serving his federal sentence in a Vergennes jail, Vermonters re-elected him to the U.S. House of Representatives.

Sanford grew up in Redding, Conn. and graduated from Washington College in Maryland in 1969. He obtained a master's degree in history from the University of Vermont in 1977. At UVM, Sanford served as assistant director of the George D. Aiken Oral History program, named for the former Vermont governor and longtime U.S. senator.

During 1977-78, Sanford was at M.I.T.'s Institute Archives working on, among other things, documenting unfolding dialogues. He returned to Vermont to finish the Aiken project and was named state archivist in 1982...

Previous Matthew Lyon winners include Patrick J. Leahy for his work as a state prosecutor and as a U.S. senator; Edward J. Cashman for his efforts as Chittenden Superior Court clerk, a state prosecutor and a state judge; and Burlington lawyer Robert Hemley, who has battled to open closed courtrooms, unlawfully withheld public records and improper subpoenas served on newspaper reporters.

Source

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Second Vermont Republic Advisory Board Member Thomas J. DiLorenzo Gave A Lecture to Another neo-Confederate Group, That Wasn't the League of the South

Ten days ago, Loyola University Maryland economics professor and a longtime advisory board member to the secessionist group, Second Vermont Republic, Thomas J. DiLorenzo was a guest lecturer on February 5, 2011 for the neo-Confederate organization called the Sons of Confederate Veterans, at their Stephen D. Lee Institute gathering.

The Sons of Confederate Veterans has a checkered history and many members are also present or former members of hate groups such as the League of the South, the white supremacist Council of Conservative Citizens (formerly known as the White Citizens Council), as well as former Klansmen, a Holocaust denial journal editor and neo-Nazis who hold leadership roles in the SCV. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]

"From the Mississippi Division of the SCV, comes this new gem: The group wants the state to issue a special license plate, keyed like the Montgomery march to the 150th anniversary of the Civil War, to honor Confederate Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest — a millionaire Memphis slave trader before the war, an apparent war criminal who presided over the massacre of surrendering black prisoners at Fort Pillow, Tenn., during it, and the first national leader of the Ku Klux Klan afterward..."
Source: Southern Poverty Law Center

DiLorenzo, in addition to lecturing the Lost Cause crowd at SCV, serves as a scholar shill for the neo-Confederate movement at the Abbeville Institute [6] as does the baas of the Second Vermont Republic, Thomas Naylor. [7]

As UVM professor Frank Bryan (who left the SVR advisory board last year) told the SPLC Intelligence Report in 2008,

"You've got to watch whose conference you go to. There's no doubt about it."

DiLorenzo may not have gotten that message - yet.

(h/t: Ed Sebesta, Anti-Neo-Confederate)


An excellent overview of the neo-Confederate movement can be found here.

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A Second Vermont Republic Advisory Board Member's Paean to the Neo-Confederate Cause Was Published in a Holocaust Denial Publication

Before Second Vermont Republic Advisory Board member Thomas J. DiLorenzo seriously started his Lincoln historical revision shtick, he was a denialist for the Confederacy. Little surprise then that in all the coverage surrounding DiLorenzo's dog and pony act for Ron Paul's (R-TX) committee this bit of info came out, thanks to the good folks at the Southern Poverty Law Center:

"DiLorenzo has other extremist connections. He has spoken at events that included other hate group members, and has been published by neo-Confederate outfits. In 1995, he wrote an essay entitled “A Defense of the Confederate Cause” published in the Journal for Historical Review, a Holocaust denial publication. It argues that “slavery was not one of the rationales” for the Civil War. “Since the battle flag represents a fight against high taxes and centralized government, every freedom-loving American should honor it,” DiLorenzo’s essay concludes."

Source

The Southern Poverty Law Center also revealed that DiLorenzo, despite denials, maintains a continuing relationship with the League of the South white supremacists, lecturing for the knuckledraggers as recently as the summer of 2009.

Here's the cover from the Holocaust denial rag:


The entire issue can be seen on this PDF, with DiLorenzo's Confederate love letter starting on page 36. You'll want to wash your eyes when you're done.

And, yes, you'll find that DiLorenzo is considered "essentially reading" according to the seceshers at "Vermont Commons". Dilorenzo's book of Lincoln historical revisionism was pimped by none other than VTCommons publisher, Rob Williams, as well as VTCommons' white supremacist contributor, Robert S. Griffin (See here).

Loyola University is conducting an investigation of DiLorenzo's possible ties to the extremist, white supremacist, hate group called the League of the South.

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Second Vermont Republic Advisory Board Member Under Investigation

BREAKING!

The Baltimore Sun reports tonight (10:24 PM) that Loyola University Maryland is looking into allegations that Second Vermont Republic Advisory Board member Thomas J. DiLorenzo "has ties to" the League of the South.

"Timothy Law Snyder, Loyola vice president for academic affairs, said on Monday that the school "would not support anybody confirmed to be a member of a confirmed hate group. His response has been a denial of having that association."

"Asked if the school believes the League of the South is a confirmed hate group based on the Southern Poverty Law Center's listing, Snyder said, "It's something we would have to look into. And we're certainly aware of the allegations here, and based on the recent conversations that are taking place we are looking into them."

"Professor DiLorenzo has denied any affiliation," Snyder added, "so if we find there's more to this, certainly we would take appropriate action."

The complete story may be found here.

*** More here tomorrow, Tuesday 2/15, on DiLorenzo's past extremist associations. ***

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Another Anti-Semite's Work Has Been Featured Repeatedly at the Second Vermont Republic and VTCommons

As I searched through the braintrust publications of the Vermont secesher community, it struck me the other day that I was finding more and more frequently that I was coming across an increasing reliance on the contributions of known anti-Semites. Last week I wrote about one VTCommons blogger's long, distatsteful history of anti-Semitic writing and activism.

The most recent find was of a woe-is-me, the-sky-is-falling, economic type of article, much favored by the Vermont secesher community, by one Paul Craig Roberts.

Vermonters are supposed to read this stuff, climb into the secesher clown car and head for the nearest cliff. After all, according to "Vermont Commons" publisher, Rob Williams, and Thomas Naylor, baas of the Second Vermont Republic, there is no god but secession and through secession thou shalt be saved. And heck, Naylor's got that whole Israeli Mafia and the possibility of the Mossad running operations here in Vermont running around in his head.

Paul Craig Roberts was once a writer for national publications and
had served in the Reagan administration. No more, for in 2006 Roberts took a very hard turn to the dark side. Now his work is more often published in VDare.com, a white supremacist, anti-Semitic website where his archive of hundreds of pieces may be found among this nation's most virulently anti-Semitic writers.

VDare is designated as a hate site by the Southern Poverty Law Center; more on VDare.com is to be found here, here and here. In addition to his despicable contributions at VDare, Roberts writes for American Free Press, successor to the racist, anti-Semitic, Holocaust denying Willis Cato's earlier hate publication, The Spotlight. Roberts' work on the Jews and Israel has been frequently highlighted at Cato's well known Holocaust denial website, Institute for Historical Review.

The Anti-Defamation League has an extensive report on Roberts promotion of anti-Semitism here

Naylor has featured Roberts' squirrelly February 7 piece, The Official Unemployment Rate; an “Official” Lie at the SVR website. Naylor had earlier published Roberts' stuff here and here. Like Naylor, Roberts has been a repeat visitor to the racist, anti-Semitic, Holocaust denying web radio program, The Political Cesspool. The Political Cesspool's host, hatemonger James Edwards,
polled readers of his blog in late December, 2010 about who some of the first guests of the year should be on his show; among other top vote getters like David Duke and Pat Buchanan was none other than SVR's own Paul Craig Roberts. Roberts got one of the coveted early appearance spots on January 15, 2011.

Thus it was hardly a surprise then when I found that Paul Craig Roberts work had also been featured by no less than VTCommons publisher Rob Williams himself. Why wouldn't Naylor and Williams have their respective toes dipped into the same ideological cesspool? After all, when Naylor's problem with the Israeli Mafia first reared its head, Williams said that he agreed with Naylor about Israelis.

"Since most Americans have been conditioned by years of corporate media training to associate anti-Israeli sentiment with Anti Semitism, talking about the Israeli Mafia smacks of antiSemitism blah blah. Holocaust, SVR are racists, etc ad nauseum. I have spent 4 years defusing the SVR/LOS nonsense and it is finally done, even in the blogosphere. Why go there again?"

"... the thing is I agree with Thomas re Israel."

Fact is, as time goes by, the "small" Vermont secesher crowd more and more resembles the usual bigoted suspects.

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An Open Message to Vermont Commons Publisher Rob Williams

Dear Rob,

Six days ago I revealed to you and our Vermont neighbors that there is a virulently anti-Semitic blogger, Carol Moore, at "Vermont Commons". That she is anti-Semitic is indisputable. And that she continues to post at the VTCommons blog is also indisputable.

My question to you is, why is VTCommons now knowingly making common cause with out-of-state anti-Semites, in addition to racists and homophobes like Long Islander, James Duncan? Or, like racism, is something like anti-Semitism openly expressed by your contributors another thing that you consider to be, "(F)rankly... none of (your) damn business" or as you've said elsewhere, not something that you choose to investigate about secession contributors, even when the facts have been presented to you. As a regular reader of this blog, you are also aware that Moore has fostered the notion that segregation is an acceptable cornerstone for secessionist communties. [1] [2]

It's put up or shut up time, Rob. We are never going to sit in some bar and trade yak puns, as you've invited me to do. That's all really quite irrelevant. As "public conversations" go, we can't get more public than the world wide web, n'est-ce pas?

You're going to renounce anti-Semitism, at least as expressed by your blogger, Carol Moore, or you're not. You'll take segregation off the table for the Vermont community or, again, not. The choice is yours.

I look forward to your response. While a bardate, as you keep suggesting, isn't in the cards for us, a post announcing her departure at VTCommons for expressing such hateful sentiments, that the knowledge of which is detrimental to the conversation you'd like Vermonters to be having, would be good start, but if that doesn't work for you, you've got my email address.

Warmest regards,
Rowley

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Nobel Award Winner Calls the Economic Rhetoric of the Second Vermont Republic Advisory Board Member Thomas J. DiLorenzo "Bizarre"

In a scathing column on Thursday, Paul Krugman, New York Times Op-Ed columnist and winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics (2008), as well as recipient of the prestigious American Economic Association, John Bates Clark Medal (1991), and professor of Economics and International Affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University, ripped Second Vermont Republic advisory board member, Thomas J. DiLorenzo, a new one while touching upon DiLorenzo's obsession with Lincoln historical revisionism and other myths of the Old South:

"Mr. (Ron) Paul’s (R-TX) subcommittee called three witnesses, one of whom was an odd choice: Thomas DiLorenzo, a professor at Loyola University and a senior fellow at the Ludwig von Mises Institute."

"What was odd about that choice? Well, Mr. DiLorenzo hasn’t actually written much about monetary policy, although he has described Fed policy — not just recently, but since the 1960s — as “legalized counterfeiting operations.” His main claim to fame, instead, is as a critic of Lincoln — he’s the author of “Lincoln Unmasked: What You’re Not Supposed to Know About Dishonest Abe” — and as a modern-day secessionist."

"No, really: calls for secession run through many of Mr. DiLorenzo’s writings — for example, in his declaration that “healthcare freedom” won’t be restored until “some states begin seceding from the new American fascialistic state.” Raise the rebel flag!"

"O.K., it’s going to be a while before the G.O.P. as a whole embraces neo-secessionism, and Mr. Paul, although highly visible, is, in fact, a somewhat marginal figure even within his own party. But Mr. (Paul) Ryan (R-WI), who led the other hearing — the one at which Ben Bernanke, the Fed chairman, testified — is a rising Republican star. So it’s worth noting that Mr. Ryan’s hard-money rhetoric was nearly as bizarre as Mr. DiLorenzo’s." (The entire NY Times column may be read here)

Dilorenzo, you may recall, is the Lincoln historical revisionist lauded by "Vermont Commons" publisher, Rob Williams and VTCommons' white supremacist contributor, Robert S. Griffin (See here).

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Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) Invites Second Vermont Republic Advisory Board Member to Congress

Rep. Ron Paul invited Thomas DiLorenzo, a well known Lincoln historical revisionist whackjob, to the first meeting of the House Financial Services Committee's Domestic Monetary Policy and Trade subcommittee and the shit hit the congressional fan:

"At one point, when Paul opened up the hearing to questions from committee members, Rep. Lacy Clay (D-Mo.) directly took on DiLorenzo for his membership in the League of the South, an organization that has been designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a "neo-Confederate" hate group advocating for Southern secession."

"Clay then rattled off a list of some of DiLorenzo's articles, including "More Lies about the Civil War," "In Defense of Sedition," and "The First Dictator-President," which examines "how Lincoln's myth has corrupted America."

"'After reviewing your work and the so-called methods you employ, I still cannot understand you being invited to testify today on the unemployment crisis, but I do know that I have no questions for you,' Clay concluded."

The Washington Post

DiLorenzo is a longtime member of the Second Vermont Republic Advisory Board.

Little surprise then that his work has also been lauded by "Vermont Commons" publisher Rob Williams and VTCommons white supremacist contributor, Robert S. Griffin (See here).

Even less of a surprise is Rep. Paul's own bigoted history documented in The New Republic's piece, Angry White Man, here.

Update 2.11.11, 1:00 PM: DiLorenzo apparently had a hissy fit over what Rep. Clay (D-MO) had to say and, not unlike what I've experienced with Vermont's own seceshers, struck back with what some might call a flat out lie.

He said in his statement that Clay had “lied about my non-existent working relationship with the League of the South” and implied that he'd had no association with the League of the South for the past 13 years. Turns out he was an invited scholar neo-Confederate flack at an August 2009 conference sponsored by the League of the South Summer Institute.

Hopefully, SVR Advisory Board DiLorenzo will drop me a note to clear this, ah, discrepancy up.

(h/t: Southern Poverty Law Center)

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A Vermont Commons Blogger's Anti-Semitic Rant

One thing about a neo-Nazi post like last week's is that you do get email as a result.

One of the email subjects had to do with a certain veteran blogger
for"Vermont Commons" (Full Disclosure: she's also a longtime, virulent critic of this blog.), Carol Moore.

My own investigation has come up with a truly putrid example of the sort of anti-Semitism that paddles along with so much of the fringe movement known as secessionism, as well as the sovereign citizen movement, in America. [1] [2] That's not to say that because one is intrigued with what secession might mean to accomplish, it then follows that they're an anti-Semite. It's just something that as you wade through what's being written by seceshers you'll find anti-Semitism pops up as one of the rationales for why they're failing, over and over again. For instance, Thomas Naylor, baas of the Second Vermont Republic, rants about the Israeli Mafia or he suggests the possibility that this or other blogs might be agents of, or in cahoots with, the Mossad.

Here's what one VTCommons blogger, Carol Moore, a sputtering dingbat if ever there was one, has written in the past at a Yahoo group messageboard:

Re: [libs4peace] U.S. Troops vs. HAMAS?! (click on screen cap to embiggen)

"Sharon would love to have Hamas killing American troops, just like he's delighted to see them killing Jews, since it makes his facist (sic) goals of "leibenstraum" (sic) and grabbing the rest of Israel that much easier by inflaming the public."

"I'm getting tired of turning on the news first thing in the AM and seeing the TOP story is what is going on in Israel. And it disgusts me to have to watch a congressional sub-committee dominated by pro-Zionists reaming Bush for the TINY little bit he is doing to try to keep the Israelis from driving the Arabs out of what little is left of Palestine, which the goyim obviously dare not ask ANY question of the Bush official that might be interpreted as criticism of Israel. And we've seen how Bush is back to Kissing Sharon's Ass. (Plug for Carol Moore products deleted.)"

"And Mr. Sass wonders why this issue keeps coming up here.. If the Israel's (sic) just kept their oppression over there, it would be far less annoying."

"Dealing with the nefarious influence of Israel Firsters on Congress and in the media (which is mostly owned and/or controlled by pro-Zionists, mostly Jews) has got to be a prime goal of the peace movement -- but good luck, with left and right wing pro-Zionists ready to yell anti-semite at the drop of a hat. Even the Buddhist Peace group I went to recently was dominated by pro-Zionist Jews. ARGHGH!!!"

"... Meanwhile Israel keeps building up it's 400 nuke arsenal and can now deliver them any where on earth."

"Anyone else want to concentrate on nonviolent SECESSION from our Special Interest (corporations, labor union, military-industrial, Zionist) controlled government??"

CM

I've only highlighted a few of the vile, anti-Semitic and racist tropes used in Moore's tirade. A more detailed inventory of Moore's anti-Semitic image management can be found here: one example is her characterization (cover) for a Holocaust denier by suggesting that "questions remain" and the Holocaust is "has been exploited shamelessly for political gain" - Ahmadinejad couldn't have said it better. So crazed is Moore's desire for importance and relevance that she outs her perceived "obsession" with Jews at the libs4peace messageboard members here.

Moore's an example of the new anti-Semitism so prevalent in today's fringe groups or on Fox News, which equates Israel with Nazi Germany using "trivializing comparisons" such as (Lebensraum), thus suggesting that Israel is a vastly expanding fascist, neo-Nazi state whose armies of millions are on the move; reiterates the old anti-Semitic myth that Jews control the media and the US government (also called ZOG).

Moore's hateful harangue is as utterly shameful as her assertion that she is being oppressed by Israel is ludicrous.

One need look no further for evidence of Moore's ongoing war against
the Jews than her 400-500 edits in the Wikipedia article, Allegations of Jewish Control of the Media . This anti-Semitic activism caused a firestorm on the Wikipedia Noticeboards last month that has yet to abate. Here's one example, as well as others from a month earlier here and here that also revolve around actions advancing the cause of anti-Semitism. There're many, many more complaints about her anti-Semitic agenda wreaking havoc on Wikipedia articles.

No less an expert on white supremacists, the Klan, anti-Semites and other wingnuts, Chip Berlet of Political Research Associates, has had this to say about Carol Moore and her whitewash of the Branch Davidian murderers and their serial child molester/murderer/cult leader, David Koresh:

"Ah yes, Carol Moore. She wrote one of the worst books on the Branch Davidian tragedy (and there were some real stinkers)."

"She has this great theory that radical protests are tied to sunspots."

Chip Berlet

You'd think that after four years (today's the 4th anniversary for this blog), VTCommons publisher, Rob Williams, would have figured out that as long as he keeps up these sorts of direct associations with racist, white supremacist or anti-Semitic extremists like Duncan, Griffin, Naylor and plain old whackjobs like Moore, as well as his recruiting promoters of loopy sovereign citizen movement legal arguments, his movement is going to remain stopped dead in its tracks as it is.

It's time for Williams to start taking out the trash at the VTCommons blog and in the Free Vermont movement, or is his allowance of anything goes in a Brave New Vermont a not so subtle warning being given to "undesirables" of the treatment they might anticipate when he and the other cowboys (and girls) take over? Certainly Williams' Don't Ask, Don't Care policy isn't going to do (or will it Rob?):

"(S)ome of our secession scholars - Don Livingston, for example - happen to be southerners. Anyone who has met and talked with Don knows the man is thoughtful and well-studied. Is he a racist? I don’t know. And frankly, it is none of my damn business, at a personal level."

Or maybe it'd be simpler if Williams would just accepted the obvious; that the vast majority Vermonters (by last count 99.21%) aren't interested in what his "small community of secessionists" is offering (Actually, 1.21% is the average of spoilt ballots over the past 22 years, so maybe no one really intended to vote for the secesher candidate in the first place).

Update 12:00 PM: Carol Moore's complained of the use of the photo. She isn't very photogenic so I get her point. The parody involved, that of a bigoted fraud who purports to be an advocate for peace and whose hateful t-shirt belies that role, apparently escaped her, but for the sake of comity I've removed the photo and replaced it with an explanatory message. In the future, the parodic use will be clear and unmistakeable, even to her.

Interestingly, Moore did not refudiate any of the above text or the thoughts and views expressed by her in any of messages sent by her this morning. She does, however, appear to be fascinated with googling herself. I hope she's not as confused about that as Marge Simpson was. Moore attached a link that she said comes up first (it doesn't) when she gives herself a googlejob. When I checked the link she provided, it discloses that her "research" relies on the likes of world class nutjob, Jerome Corsi.

Update 2.8.11, 4:00 PM: Carol Moore has written at the VTCommons blog that "The fact he gets no comments attests to the fact he doubtless has few readers, except maybe his employers, who aren't getting their moneys worth." Where to start on that little boatload of crazy?

Site stats refute her readership claims.

All the comments received have been from the very "small community" of secesher supporters and their out-of-state allies. Something about staying on topic escapes them, and I have no intention of providing therapy for what's ailing them - they were not approved for publication. In Moore's case the truth is that in addition to being an anti-Semite, she's a liar; she submitted seven nutty comments.

Comments are now closed.


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Secession Strategies In The Old South and Vermont

An interesting piece by Manisha Sinha, a co-signer of the 2009, 2010, and 2011 letters to President Obama to not send a wreath to the Arlington Confederate Monument, appeared in yesterday's New York Times, entitled "The Strange Victory of the Palmetto State." Well worth the read.

The slaver seceshers of the Old South's strategy bears an interesting resemblance to that of the Second Vermont Republic and its sister organization, "Vermont Commons" - an appeal to base fears that are amped up by allusions to conspiracies and threats to peaceful existence. Similarities abound, right down to language, such as The Old South's "Dis-United States" and VTCommons publisher, Rob Williams', "Untied States of America."

In other words, not so clever bullshit.

(h/t: Ed Sebesta, Anti-Neo-Confederate)

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A Vermont Commons Blogger Blogs From The Hip

I've been trying to make sense of the most recent blog post by Peter Garritano "Injust" Rewards. Garritano was handpicked by Thomas Naylor, baas of the Second Vermont Republic, as his candidate for Lt. Governor, the office for which he too failed to get any traction among Vermont voters (he calls not getting 96% of the vote "coming in third").

Garritano wrote:

VERMONT UNCENSORED: "Injust" Rewards by Peter Garritano on Wed, 02/02/2011 - 12:18pm.
"Why is Michael Dubie getting an honorary degree? Does UVM really need to help the 200 billion dollar a year propaganda machine of the Pentagon by giving General Dubie a degree? It’s bad enough that every minute of every day the public is forced fed, support the troops, they are doing a great job protecting our country and keeping us safe. Really?"

"... All the better for war profiteers like Sandia and Lockheed Martin."

"One thing for sure is that Dubie is a good soldier, because good soldiers don’t ask questions, they obey orders. He’s supported thirty years of illegal invasions by the U.S. including Iraq, and Afghanistan to name a few. Does the pending Lockheed Martin deal being brokered by President Fogel and Bernie Sanders and supported by Dubie somehow have a role in this fake degree?"

"During the 60’s counterculture movement General Dubie would have been refered to as a fascist pig. His degree would have been met with loud massive protest. Hopefully the situation in Egypt will empower people in the U.S. It’s time for the citizens of the world to stand up for each other and promote peace by calling out institutions like UVM who reward bad behavior with honorariums and business contracts."

VTCommons publisher Rob Williams commented:
"Thanks for raising such important questions here, Pete...I am discouraged by a number of recent developments tying the Vermont economy more closely than ever to the US of Empire's military-industrial complex. I appreciate your candor here."
Submitted by Rob Williams on Fri, 02/04/2011 - 4:52pm.

Then it came to me that he's merely playing Renfield to the baas' most recent meme/tirade that can be read here. The tirade sought to twist the responsibilities of the Vermont Adjutant General's Office, an elected position conferred by the Vermont General Assembly, into nothing more than he's guy who locally operates the military sausage grinder for the Pentagon.

Both Garritano and "Poppa" Naylor question why UVM should give
an honorary degree to Dubie and seek to turn the entire matter into another of their conflated conspiracy theories. To their way of thinking, such as it is, there can only be diabolical intent on the part of:

• VT Sen. Bernie Sanders


• UVM Pres. Dan Fogel


• UVM Board of Trustees


• Maj. Gen. Michael Dubie


• Burlington VT Mayor Bob Kiss


• Sandia National Laboratories


• Lockheed Martin


• The Pentagon


• Goldfinger


• The Tooth Fairy?

Okay, maybe not the last two; that'd just be crazy.

"Poppa" Naylor went so far as blatantly misquote a piece from the Burlington Free Press:

BFP: "at a public forum last month (April), Air Guard Maj. Gen. Michael Dubie said the economic impact of a possible loss of a fighter wing at the South Burlington base was not clear cut: The more advanced F-35’s presence at the base actually might shrink the current payroll — but it almost certainly would shrink further if the Guard’s mission morphed exclusively into maintenance, or became a center for unmanned aircraft."

Naylor: "Last April General Dubie expressed the hope that the Vermont National Guard might be morphed into a center for unmanned aircraft, otherwise known as drones."

That's just a flat out lie. Seriously, who's ever heard of any branch of the military expressing hope for a smaller mission and budget - ever?

Fact is both Garritano and "Poppa" Naylor rely on dishonest arguments, such as:

• Questioning the motives of their perceived opponents


• Hearsay


• Citing irrelevant facts or logic


• Playing on widely held fantasies & scapegoating


• False premise


• Straw man


• Innuendo


• Insinuation


• Mopery


• The Tooth Fairy?

The last is also likely true since their argument is so transparently reliant on fooling their reader that they might as well trust their reputations on another fiction.

If either Garritano or "Poppa" Naylor had been honest with their readers, they'd have mentioned that:

• Dubie is a UVM alumnus


• UVM has established honorary degree criteria


• Garritano and "Poppa" Naylor really had no evidence, merely their tinfoil hat speculations


• The Tooth Fairy told them so?

Their assembly of mischaracterizations and falsifications could most certainly be used against them. How about this: one of them has a family member at UVM who has received more than a million dollars in grants from the same government agency that has provided millions to Sandia (True). The other one sells used cars (Also true). Now insert a logical fallacy or loaded question and you'd be suited to be a VTCommons blogger or an internet blowhard emeritus.

Extra credit questions for Rob Williams: in addition to factually identifying "recent developments tying the Vermont economy more closely than ever to the US of Empire's military-industrial complex," WTF is "Injust"? I know I'm having difficult time understanding how Garritano can reconcile
what's happening in Egypt with his statement, "It’s time for the citizens of the world to stand up for each other and promote peace by calling out institutions like UVM who reward bad behavior with honorariums and business contracts." What's presently occurring in Egypt is hardly the Vermont way of "calling out institutions," but I'm sure you can spin the narrative so that'll make sense to the "small" Vermont secesher community, no?

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Vermont Commons Blogger Promotes Sovereign Citizen Legal Premise

For more than a year it has become apparent that as the secession movement in Vermont continued to falter and wane,
culminating in a complete failure to attract any meaningful level of support on election day (0.79% of the vote for the top of the ticket, gubernatorial hopeful Dennis Steele), a move to shake things up and shed their soiled reputation was afoot. Even before this failure to get traction with the Vermont electorate, I was observing signs that the "small community of secessionists" (as it is described by "Vermont Commons"Publisher Emeritus, Ian Baldwin) was resetting the movement to one that its founder, Thomas Naylor, baas of the Second Vermont Republic, had now come to call a "liberation movement":

It’s Time to Liberate Ourselves From the Use of the Word Secession
"...Abraham Lincoln really did a number on us one hundred fifty years ago. He convinced most of us that secession is immoral, illegal, and unconstitutional."

"Secession may very well be the most emotionally charged word in American English. No term is considered to be more politically incorrect. What immediately comes to mind whenever this provocative word is spoken is the Civil War, slavery, violent militias, and racism..."

"...However, there is another perfectly good word which captures the very essence of what it means to secede. That word is liberation."

"Unlike secession, liberation connotes success, not failure..."

"The liberation of Vermont starts now!"
Thomas Naylor
September 13, 2010

Much of what the small Vermont secesher community is now turning to is known nationally as the "sovereign citizen movement." Wikipedia has a concise definition of the sovereign citizen movement that sums up nicely what the legal underpinnings of the movement are about:

The sovereign citizen movement is a loose network of American litigants, commentators and financial scheme promoters.

Self-described "sovereign citizens" believe that they are answerable only to English common law and are not subject to any statutes or proceedings at the federal, state or municipal levels.

They especially reject most forms of taxation as illegitimate.

Participants in the movement argue this concept in opposition to "federal citizens" who, they believe, have unknowingly forfeited their rights by accepting some aspect of federal law.

Now comes a VTCommons blogger, Simha Bode, to slide out onto the thin legal ice of "sovereign citizen" tinfoil hat jurisprudence. In an odd post on the courts (basically he argues some federal courts aren't legally constituted), to which he aptly adds this, "Disclaimer: THIS IS NOT LEGAL ADVICE," he puts forth his argument, based largely on the legal expertise of someone to whom he offers his "(s)pecial thanks to," a "Paul Andrew Mitchell from the Supreme Law Firm, for his generous assistance in helping (Bode to) understand this mind boggling subject." Bode identifies Mitchell as a Private Attorney General(?) and provides a link to Mitchell's Supreme Law Firm but apparently did little other research before swallowing this legal pablum whole. If he had, he would have found that Mitchell has a reputation for filing the frivolous legal actions that sovereign citizen movement types are famous for losing. Here's a website that provides more on Mitchell's history, Who Is Paul Andrew Mitchell?

Bode added later to his piece this bit of commentary on court procedure,

"In all USDC legislative (statute) cases they trick you into submitting to their jurisdiction VOLUNTARILY... You stand up when the judge enters, you are consenting to their jurisdiction, They ask, "Do you do understand (stand-under my jurisdiction)?" you reply,"Yes, I understand." They give you the option with out you knowing it. It is a big POWER game! That is why we have a legal language very few people can really comprehend. You are volunteering to giving up your rights for options!"

Ah yes, here we go now down the rabbit hole of secesher/sovereign citizen/redemptionist legal theory.

For more on the nutty legal theories now emanating from the small Vermont secesher crowd, read this about their newly re-constituted Vermont Council of Censors .

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Second Vermont Republic Advisory Board Member Endorses Violence Against The Government Officials

Not our government at this point - yet.

Second Vermont Republic advisory board member and assistant professor of political science, State University of New York, Buffalo, as well as founder of the floundering New Hampshire Free State Project, Jason Sorens, wrote in a piece he entitled Why Isn't Violence The Answer?:

"U.S. government officials continue to lecture the Egyptian demonstrators on how to go about their business."

"(President Obama) said he had told Mr Mubarak to respect the rights of the Egyptian people and refrain from using violence against peaceful protesters – but he said the protesters also had a responsibility to express themselves peacefully."

"But why?"

"...Surely many of us of feeling around the world recognize that if the protestors find it prudential or useful at some point to storm the presidential palace and dispense street justice to Mubarak and his minions, there is no conceivable ethical reason for them to shrink from the task. Isn’t it on one of our state flags?"

"Sic semper tyrannis."
Why Isn’t Violence the Answer?
January 28, 2011 by Jason Sorens

Whew! Where to start on this one? Probably right there at the end of his piece. While it's true that Sic Semper Tyrannis is on the Commonwealth of Virginia flag, he wasn't writing about flag heraldry, he was writing about "dispen(ing) street justice to Mubarak."

The last time I heard of the words Sic Semper Tyrannis being used
while dispensing "justice" was when an ardent secessionist, John Wilkes Booth, had leapt to the Ford Theatre stage and shouted them at the audience after having just shot President Abraham Lincoln in the back of the head.

Lincoln hatred has a long and deep connection with the Vermont seceshers. Sorens fellow SVR advisory board member is Thomas J. DiLorenzo, a secesher scholar bullshitter with past ties to League of the South's Institute for the Study of Southern Culture and History, and who has worked for Big Tobacco. DiLorenzo, in addition to his disdain for the bedrock of civil rights in America, the 14th Amendment, as well as organized labor, has made a business of pedaling Lincoln hatred for the secesher community.

Similarly, "Vermont Commons" publisher, Rob Williams, has repeatedly echoed the Lincoln hatred of these extremists. Eighteen months ago, in a Slate.com piece Williams was quoted as saying "Abraham Lincoln did a number on us". Since the seceshers Lincoln opposed were the ones who sought to preserve slavery by seceeding, one needs to ask just who Williams' "us" is?

Whatever the circumstances, assassinations and dispensing street justice are illegal acts. This isn't the first time that someone associated with the Vermont secession movement has advocated for or solicited lawbreaking. As recently as this past fall (12.09.10 - 5:21 AM), Vermont secesher and a leader of the Free Vermont group of misfits, Gary Flomenhoft, put out a call for "someone to... hack their websites," a direct violation of Vermont law. Such a solicitation is a felony.

The Free Vermont group, who Thomas Naylor calls his "twenty internet cowboys," have advocated for confiscation of private property, population caps, income and asset caps, making certain acts by legislators capital offenses; the complete list is quite long and equally shocking.

One has to wonder how this squares with Naylor's claim
to be leading a "Genteel Revolution." His repetitive, muddled, demagogic rants about Vermonters who fall short of his secesher ideal (meaning: Everyone in Vermont not named Thomas H. Naylor); his latching onto imagery of a self-proclaimed murderer (which Naylor and his candidate, Dennis Steele, dumped one day after it was revealed on this blog); his paranoid delusions about conspiracies aimed at his "revolution," also another quite long and equally shocking list that has been subject of many posts on this blog. Oddly, an earlier "genteel evolution," so-named nearly 70 years ago by Time magazine, was that of Fulgencio Batista, who was himself overthown in part by the man whose image Naylor co-opted onto the flag that he co-opted from the Vermont National Guard.

In one of Naylor's most recent rants, The Politics of Violence in America, Naylor wrote:

"Since violence is inextricably linked to the Empire, there may be no escape from violence in America... "

Nor, it would seem, will violence or the criminal mindset be escaped in the brave new world of the Second Vermont Republic - they'll just apply it more hubristically.

Yeah, I know, confusing rationales and coincidences from the mind, ravings and actions of the SVR baas, Thomas H. Naylor and his minions.

Will Naylor, Williams, Flomenhoft and the rest of the nutters that comprise the Free Vermont "movement" renounce their advisor Jason Sorens' call for violence?

The more I learn of and hear from these secesher clowns, the more concerned I grow for my fellow Vermonters should these people ever get close to the levers of power.

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