Public Banksters - Part I

For those of you who may be unaware (and that would be most of you) the Vermont secessionists are at it again.

They're making their second attempt at getting a public bank established in Vermont. In 2010 the seceshers first started making noise about creating a public bank, eventually bringing a plan to the Vermont Legislature to create their dream bank. At that time they grounded the public bank plan in the debunked economics of Henry George, a late 19th century, charismatic contemporary of Karl Marx. The legislative committee tasked to dealing with these clowns heard them out but left their scheme "on the wall," the legislative equivalent of a graveyard.

This year they're back and they've learned a thing or two about horse trading and are leaving their lightening rod members in the background for the moment. But make no mistake about the fact that the seceshers have made public banking their number one priority since they see it as the first step to disengaging economically from "the Empire."

The Senate bill, S. 204, would create an advisory committee that would forward recommendations for implementation of the public bank plan in 2015. The bill does not address capitalization issues related to creating the bank that estimates for range from thirty to as much as seventy million dollars. I'm sure that the Finance Committee will be able to find that in-between the cushions of the Senate chamber since where they're not likely to find a loose 30-70 mill in the budget. One of the Senate sponsors' longtime hobbyhorse, a Vermont state credit card, is embedded in the next to last page of the bill (that's an example of the horse trading that I mentioned above) and that is likely to prove to be a poison pill for this bill since the bonding necessary to let this bird fly will probably come in at a conservative quarter of a billion dollars - minimum.

This whole public bank shebang has a few ways that it can go but rather than speculate I'm going wait to see what direction the Senate Finance Committee takes. It's safe to say though that this probably hasn't much of a chance of surviving the committee smell test.

UPDATE: 5:28 PM the Senate has just published its calendar for tomorrow, February 28, and no Second Reading of the bill is scheduled - tick, tock.

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Vermont Secessionist Rocket Scientist and Constitutional Blowhard to be an Early Presenter at...

... the third Vermont Secesher Statehouse Stunt to be held in Montpelier on Friday that they're calling their Vermont Independence Party.

There comes a point where one has to ask, how long will these idiots keep banging their heads into the wall of a society that finds them and their screwy worldview to be unsuitable, unpalatable and ultimately unsustainable.

Being one of those at the tip of the spear of the Vermont secesher braintrust, Gary Flomenhoft intends to make another boneheaded recommendation about the Vermont economy.

In 2009, Flomenhoft cooked up a scheme with ten other seceshers to set the elected Vermont legislature and other statewide elected officials straight. You see, Flomenhoft and his crew thought that the elected officials needed a report detailing their unconstitutional behavior over the last 140 plus years. So how better for Flomenhoft and his merry band of governmental usurpers to do so than by illegally convening a legally disbanded governmental agency, the Vermont Council of Censors. The Council of Censors' duties are now primarily performed by the Vermont Supreme Court but the Flomenhoft gang figured fuck'em. They said they'd be issuing their "report" on the legislature sometime around the end of 2010. Like so much of what the seceshers have promised over the years we're still waiting. The seceshers chatted repeatedly about what they were going to do as the Vermont Council of Censors at their super-secret listserv - a searchable mirror of which can be found here.

Another scheme that Flomenhoft has come up with, along with some dipshit at the "Gund Institute" named Robert Costanza who moonlights in some fashion as a kind of Vermont Commons editorial board honcho, is more confiscatory economic grab bagging. Normally when these clowns sit around dreaming up the junk they think will con others into joining them, they invariably call their tiny group a "think tank" or, as in this case, an "institute." This "institute" came up with a plan best described as Stalinism light. Along with other seceshers who propose asset and income caps, the Gund guys want to lay claim to Vermonters private property, land, minerals, woodlots and natural resources, as well as the national airwaves (radio, TV and wireless) and the Internet. Now where have we heard this bullshit before? Well, at earlier secesher konfabs for starters and from economist contemporaries of Karl Marx like Henry George. The first attempt to implement George's economic crackpottery occured in the first decade of the 20th century in Great Britain and the result was an economic crisis - Georgism now, with a few minor limited exceptions like a township in Alabama that hasn't hit the cellar yet, is dead.

And, as if Flomenhoft isn't idiot enough on his own, he's advocated that others commit felonies by hacking websites like this and two others that I know of. At the moment, one European hacker/supporter of Vermont secession is paying repeated visits to this blog, but more on this next week after the "party" is over.

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For the archive of the Free Vermont Framework listserv, click here.

"Senator" Robert "Needed Killin'" Wagner Chats About Campaigns Past and Present

Senator Robert "Needed Killin'" Wagner, Vermont secessionist candidate for one of Addison County's senate seats, likes to maintain a big, restricted (as in the old 30s, 40s and 50s meaning of the term as it applies to Jews) tent on his Facebook page.

I found this gem of a chat from his 2010 campaign in his Facebook photo album:


Is Wagner an anti-Semite like his secesher allies who post articles from known anti-Semites at their websites Second Vermont Republic and Vermont Commons where Wagner also maintains a tad unhinged blog? Certainly responding to an obviously anti-Semitic remark about the "Jew Mafia" uncritically has to make one think that Wagner is courting such support and, perhaps, more than a little sympathetic himself to the notion that Jews operate like a criminal enterprise that controls courts, the government and media.

Now, as if to show that his delusions about elections haven't progress much beyond the muddled state that they were in two years ago, here's the most recent post from his Facebook page today:


On the world where Wagner lives it's of no importance that Vermont legislators have no legal authority, nor can they assert same, over Vermont Army and Air National Guard assignments. Wagner sees politics as a game where the greatest ape who beats his chest hardest prevails.

Given that Sen. Claire Ayer (D-Addison) has been the number one vote getter for years and that Wagner seems only to be capable of locking up the 4% of drooling idiots who mistake bluster for competence, it'll be interesting to see what this year's results look like. Wagner may do a little better since there is no Republican in the race thus far and some Republicans can't ever vote for a Democrat, whether it be Sen. Ayer or her fellow Dem in the race, former Rep. Chris Bray. But we do know that Republicans will vote for idiots (read: Bush), so Wagner may pick up a few votes there. That is, unless the Republicans learn that Wagner backs an economic policy based on the confiscatory Henry George/Karl Marx model. Wagner's plans for private property in Vermont make Stalin's own actions look benign.

And, of course, Wagner's statement about his neighbor, Rep. Willem Jewett (D-Ripton), is utterly nonsensical in that Rep. Jewett is running unopposed in 2012. Maybe Wagner'll get a few people to write in his name for representative in the August 28 Republican primary for representative from Ripton. Why not? His sole secessionist running mate from up in Franklin County, Peter Moss, is also running for the U.S. Senate in addition to the Vermont Senate. Wagner wouldn't have a chance of winning either the senate or the representative seats but it'd sure give him a practical gauge of what his Ripton neighbors think of his nutty economics.

Meanwhile, in another matter related to Wagner's conflicting positions, there's been no word yet about whether Wagner will be returning the $288.30 Federal subsidy he received while flying out of the airport in Rutland, VT, which is exactly the kind of Federal subsidy that he "is strongly opposed to" and has argued harms Vermonters that I revealed he'd hypocritically availed himself of (as in sticking his snout in the federal money trough) here. Wagner must publicly give back that subsidy money or he'll be exposed for the hypocritical fraud that many of us Vermonters know him to be.

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For the archive of the Free Vermont Framework listserv, click here.