Eye On "The 30" - Michael Patno

You might ask, as I did, who the hell is this guy, Michael Patno, who's running for one of the Vermont Senate seats in Addison County?

According to the Dixie singin', Magnolia Vermonter, Thomas Naylor, Patno's a founder of the Second Vermont Republic whose involvement with secessionist groups goes back to the failed New England Confederation:

"(T)he New England Confederation('s)... objective was to have New England split away from the United States and establish itself as an independent nation-state. Unfortunately, the Confederation turned out to be mostly an Internet website rather than a real political organization. However, its website survived several years after the demise of the Confederation itself under the leadership of Bristol, Vermont resident Michael Patno."

"On March 4, 2003, two weeks before the second war with Iraq began, Michael Patno and I met for lunch in Burlington to discuss the possibility of organizing a serious, peaceful, participatory independence movement in Vermont opposed to the tyranny of the U.S. government, Corporate America, and globalization..."

"The following day I spoke at an anti-war rally at Johnson State College and decided to test-market the idea of an independent Vermont."

"Basically my pitch to the students was, “If you want to prevent future wars in places such as Afghanistan and Iraq, we have no choice but to break up the United States into smaller regions, and that process should begin with Vermont declaring its independence from the United States.” They were stunned, but they got it. Their positive response literally provided the energy for Michael Patno and I to launch the Second Vermont Republic."

Thomas Naylor, August 1, 2011

It's hard to resist at this point asking Patno and Naylor, "How's that workin' out for ya?"

Since there is no evidence from that time to today of any popular campus organizing on behalf of secession, it's fair to say that they're doing as well with their newest iteration, SVR, as they did with the New England Confederation, with both now being "mostly an Internet website rather than a real political organization." Sure, there are a couple of local professors with connections to white supremacy and some League of the South racist ideologues also involved with SVR but as a campus movement this one has all the less appeal than the Stamp Club.

In addition to his involvement in ineffectual secesher websites like the New England Confederation and SVR, Patno's served as a corporate officer for the secesher propaganda rag, "Vermont Commons" and was a participant at the ludicrous ceremony establishing the secesher provisional capital in Hancock, VT, on Dec. 13, 2010:

"Finally Michael Patno, a founder of the Second Vermont Republic, closed the conference with a brief note on the importance of accountability."

Source

Honestly, if you made this stuff up and proposed writing an article about it to an editor, you'd get thrown out of the office.

What I can't find on Patno is any record of public service. Nothing at the Secretary of State's website. Nothing at any of the voter education sites, like Project Vote Smart. Unlike his probable opponents for the Addison County Senate seats, he doesn't seem to have done any work for, say, his local school board. I checked his hometown selectboard minutes in Bristol, VT, going back for a year and found no contribution there or at Bristol's Town Meeting. Remember, seceshers everywhere clamor for the return of the fairytale of Town Meeting as the fount of state governance, something that's been ruled unconstitutional, by the way, so why hasn't he been involved at his own Town Meeting of late?

Even the link to Patno's webpage from "Senator" Robert Wagner's hastily thrown up collection of links to "The 30" (who should probably be more accurately described as "The 5") takes you to nothing more than a placeholder containing zero information on the candidate for the Addison Senate seat, Michael Patno.

So far, all there is on Michael Patno is that he's probably a 50 year old Colchester high school grad with no discernible record of public service but who's got a solid record of failure as a secesher.

That should say it all.

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