Vermont Number 37 | Fall 2010 CommonsSubscribe online at www.vtcommons.org VOICES OF INDEPENDENCE

Vermont’s statewide independent news journal

Vermont Most Likely To Secede: Independence U.S. Empire, Vermont Secession, Citizen Journalism, Candidates And Media Democracy (Part 1) Gaining Traction Rob Williams Wars’ Casualties, Wars’ Costs ($1.5 Billion Annual Bill for “You can’t bloat a modest republic into a crapulent empire without sparking one hell Vermont) are Key Issues of a centrifugal reaction.” –Bill Kauffman, Bye Bye Miss American Empire Will Lindner (Chelsea Green, 2010)

hey are the advance guard. While no candi- “The Gods of the Empire are not Tdate would endure the sacrifices, the rigors, the Gods of Vermont.” and sometimes the humiliations, of running for –Dennis Steele; 2010 Vermont office with the intention of losing, in this election independent gubernatorial candidate year of 2010 Vermonters are encountering a differ- ent kind of contender for statewide and legisla- “Secession is every American’s birthright.” tive office: candidates with a vision that extends –Vermont Commons: Voices of beyond themselves and beyond this year. They Independence news journal want to change the political conversation, break Join the Vermont Commons Cooperative for 2011, receive through the barriers that the system (which very a FREE silver “Freedom and Unity” coin, and read more much includes the media) has created, and help The “S” Word Introduced: History and about how to reclaim Vermont’s currency commons – Vermonters contemplate the previously unthink- Political Culture details inside this issue. able and conventionally unacceptable premise of independence. What’s the dirtiest word in U.S. politics? A few But what is “independence”? Its ultimate expres- hints. It begins with an “S,” and, in its verb form, really an English colonial struggle to secede sion for Vermont would be seceding from the sounds like “succeed.” It is a word that even many from the British Empire and establish “free United States of America and forming what propo- well-educated Americans have trouble pronounc- and independent states,” was built on it and nents are calling the Second Vermont Republic ing, let alone spelling. 19th-century northern and southern political (the first Vermont Republic existed for 14 years It is the founding principle of the United States leaders alike embraced it. Nineteenth-century before Vermont joined the United States in 1791). as a political creation. With help from Benjamin New Englanders talked openly for decades about That’s what Dennis Steele favors, and it is the Franklin, John Adams, and the first Continental secession, in response to federal abuses of power thrust of his campaign for governor. Congress, Thomas Jefferson enshrined this key continued on page 4 “I’m straightforward and direct about Vermont political concept as the first action verb – “dissolve” becoming an independent republic,” says Steele, – in the 1776 Declaration of Independence. O N T H E W E B a native Vermonter from the Caledonia County It was a constitutionally legitimate and widely town of Kirby. “This is the only issue. We’re affirmed concept, publicly agreed upon by politi- • Huffington Post covers Vermont going to have to deal with the Empire [the United cal leaders from both Northern and Southern Independence (Christopher Ketcham) States] or start gutting Vermont to save the states, during the first 70 years of the U.S. republic. • Collapse: A Personal Invitation Empire. We have to choose, and it’s for the sake Numerous new 19th-century American states, (Jasmine Lamb) of our children and their future that we need to from Maine to Kentucky, employed it in hiving • Grace Potter Live on Lake Champlain come to grips with this and secede from the U.S.” off from existing states. (Katherine Maund) Peter Garritano shares that opinion. The Invented in the South, it was first championed • Your cards, letters and more. (Blogroll) Shelburne resident is the independence candidate as a regional movement by 19th-century New for lieutenant governor. Englanders. And since President Lincoln’s success- Join the Conversation: www.vtcommons.org “There are horrible things going on, perpetu- ful victory over the Southern states in the so-called Subscribe to our FREE VERMONT bi-monthly e-newsletter. ated by the Empire,” Garritano said (while “Civil War,” it has been largely forgotten. making plans to attend a memorial event for the The dirtiest word? Secession.1 U.S. nuclear attack on Hiroshima). “We believe A little revisionist history is useful. continued on page 6 The 18th-century American “revolution,” 2 VERMONT COMMONS FA L L 2 0 1 0

Editorial Six-Day Vermont Road Trip Brings A Blast Of Hope

e at Vermont Commons: Voices of Independence visited, even the most tiny or remote, exhibited By the time my expedition ended, I was even Wnews journal quietly celebrated our fifth that striking sense of collective organization for more impressed with Vermont and Vermonters birthday last spring. which Vermont is celebrated the world over: the than when I started, and I couldn’t help but imag- As a founding partner in our nonprofit news town common/green, the community house ine a day when, despite the imminent collapse of venture, I find it hard to believe that we published and/or place of worship, the general store, the “Petroleum Man” and the U.S. Empire, Vermont our first issue – a mere 12 pages with just a few post office, and the local watering hole (some- may very well land on its feet – with continued advertisements – in April 2005. Back then, during times all in the same building). foresight, planning, hard work, and (of course) the height of the Bush/Cheney regime, we distrib- And Vermonters’ “live-and-let-live” tolerance, grace and good humor. uted our monthly journal through a network not to mention their good sense of humor, is also Oh yes. of several volunteers across the state, and as an alive and well. On my journey, I talked with and I picked up 130 more locations for our news insert in Vermont Guardian, a weekly independent listened to truck drivers, single moms, loggers, journal on my journey, bringing our total number newspaper (now defunct). store owners, bankers, butchers, bakers, and deli of distribution venues across the state to 350. We Five years later, as Team Obama continues sandwich makers – and always came away greatly list them all on our web site at www.vtcommons. its imperial status quo policies, it is gratifying to enriched. Vermonters can be stubborn, yes, but org. Click on the “town by town” button on our see our little start-up independent journal now they are also open to dialogue – and they can home page. running at 32 pages per issue, with some coura- banter with the best of them. We can now reasonably claim to deliver our geous thinking, visionary (and often curmud- Finally, the sheer physicality of the places I visited news journal within easy reach of every town and geonly) writing, and more and more statewide made a significant impression. In a 21st-century every citizen in Vermont. businesses using us as a multimedia platform to world that bows down before the Internet, the Let the expanded conversation about Vermont market their goods and services than ever before. electronic screen, and the virtual, the Vermonters independence continue. Just as exciting? The transformation of our across our once-and-future republic that I We hope to hear from you in the weeks and Vermont independence conversation into a fledg- witnessed were all actually doing things – grow- months ahead. ling but genuine political movement, with a dozen ing their own food in even the smallest terraced Free Vermont! Vermonters from around the state running for hillside gardens, harvesting their own energy for Long live the UNtied States. political office on an independence platform this winter (to see a home without a significant wood- fall. (Read Will Lindner’s two-part feature, and pile in process was a rare sight on my journey), and Rob Williams see many of the candidates’ profiles in the summer making the most of the land by “making hay while Publisher 2010 issue of Vermont Commons, now online.) the sun shines,” as the old adage goes. To celebrate our fifth birthday, I spent six days this past June driving around our once-and- Contributors future Vermont republic. As publisher, my official mission involved seeking new distribution loca- Gaelan Brown serves Vermont Commons: Voices of Independence as its business manager and as a tions for Vermont Commons. While we’ve been a member of the editorial board. He blogs as “An Energy Optimist” at www.vtcommons.org. statewide presence for several years, I knew there Carl Etnier is director of Peak Oil Awareness in Montpelier. He hosts two radio shows and blogs were a number of neighborhoods in the greater on the subjects of Peak Oil and relocalizing. Green Mountains where our newspaper wasn’t Ben Falk yet available – towns with names like Belvidere, works with Whole Systems Design, LLC human habitats systems (sustaining buildings Leicester, Adamant, and Orange, which didn’t yet and landscapes) to be resilient in the face of peak oil, rapid climate changes, deepening have regular print access to our ideas. Selfishly, economic insolvency, and other challenges emerging from these. He shares tools and too, I wanted to get out of my own head, meet techniques involved in this practice through Whole Systems Skills transition trainings. www Vermonters where they live, work, and play, and .wholesystemsdesign.com. take some time to experience the sights, smells, Gary Flomenhoft teaches energy technology and policy at the University of Vermont. and sounds of our beautiful state. The Greenneck loves heavy metal music, combustion motors, animals, and working the land. He My route, as anyone who has traveled Vermont lives in a self-built, solar-powered home in northern Vermont and may or may not be based on knows, was circuitous by nature, as our “can’t get the life of Ben Hewitt, author of The Town That Food Saved and proprietor of benhewitt.net. there from here” topography encourages mean- dering, rather than straight A-to-B sojourns. Will Lindner is a mandolin player, writer, and editor living in Barre. He serves as managing Beginning in the Mad River Valley, I headed editor for Vermont Commons: Voices of Independence. northeast, through the Northeast Kingdom Robin McDermott is a co-founder of the Mad River Valley Localvore Project. She and her all the way up to Derby Line and points east. husband, Ray, operate their business, QualityTrainingPortal, from their home in Waitsfield, From there, I steered my Subaru west to Lake where they also grow much of their own food. Champlain, crossing the Green Mountains up by Jay Peak, and then arc’ed down their western Ron Miller is on the editorial board of Vermont Commons: Voices of Independence. He has written spine through Rutland and Bennington. I finished several books on progressive and alternative education, and is currently editor of Education by winding through the middle portion of the Revolution magazine. He has taught at Goddard, St. Michael’s and Champlain colleges, and state, over to the Connecticut River, and upward established the Bellwether School in Williston. to the bulge that marks Vermont’s upper eastern Kirkpatrick Sale, editor-at-large and author of a dozen books, including After Eden: The Evolution half, before heading west again, and home. of Human Domination (Duke), is the director of the Middlebury Institute. What I experienced on my 1,200-mile jour- Curtis Savard is a Moretown-based photographer. Visit him at www.curtissavard.blogspot.com. ney (six distinct day trips) across Vermont both astounded and delighted me. Jeb Wallace-Brodeur is a Vermont photographer and serves as staff photographer for The Times I’ve often joked about Vermont as “The Shire,” Argus newspaper of Barre and Montpelier. with a nod to J.R.R. Tolkien’s popular Lord of the Rob Williams, editor and publisher of Vermont Commons: Voices of Independence, is a teacher, Rings trilogy. But seeing the state up close, the historian, writer, musician and yak farmer living in the Mad River Valley. simile is made real. Nearly every single town I FA L L 2 0 1 0 VERMONT COMMONS 3

IN THIS ISSUE

1 Most Likely To Secede: U.S. Empire and Vermont Secession Rob Williams 1 Vermont Independence Candidates Gaining Traction Will Lindner 2 Editorial: Six-Day Vermont Road Trip Brings a Blast of Hope Rob Williams 3 Letters to the Editor 9 Free Vermont Media: Contemplating Cultural Change in the Face of Climate Change—Book Reviews Ron Miller 12 How To Recover Vermont’s Monetary Commons—Who Creates Money? And Who Ought To? Gary Flomenhoft 15 Energy Optimist: Shred, Don’t Dread— Combustion-Free Heat for Vermont Gaelan Brown 17 Transition Times: Original UK Transition Town Sees 40-Percent Participation Carl Etnier 18 Homestead Security: It’s the Chemicals that are Killing Us—Five All-Star Food Medicines Ben Falk 21 Localvore Living: Expanding the Localvore Circle in Vermont Robin McDermott 22 Vermont Vox Populi: Broadcasting Media for Democracy—Interview Here’s one place that Vermont’s major political parties and news media can’t monopolize: the roadways. A Steele for Governor sign with CCTV’s Lauren-Glenn Davitian on Route 2 in Marshfield. Rob Williams 25 The Greenneck: Sitting by the Vermont Commons welcomes your input. Sugarhouse Letters to the Editor 31 Please e-mail letters to [email protected] or Dispersions: Walking the Talk? What post to PO Box 1121, Waitsfield, Vermont 05673. They’re Saying About Secession Although we will try to print your letters in their THE CASE FOR RE-LEGALIZING CANNABIS Kirkpatrick Sale entirety, we may edit to fit. Please be concise. Be sure to include your contact information (name, address, Editor, Vermont Commons: Vermont Commons is a print and online forum for exploring telephone, and e-mail) for verification purposes. Cannabis, hemp, a.k.a. marijuana, is the answer the idea of Vermont independence—political, economic, social, and spiritual. We are unaffiliated with any other to our economic and environmental woes. organization or media, and interested in all points of view. Humankind has utilized this God-given plant for We welcome your letters, thoughts, and participation. VERMONT COMMONS: at least 10,000 years. It is in the Chinese pharma- VOICES OF INDEPENDENCE copoeia dating back to 6400 BC. In America the www.vtcommons.org first laws regarding hemp date back to the colony output of cannabis. If we planted just 6 percent at Jamestown, where there were mandatory-grow of our arable land with hemp we could provide Publisher Emeritus Ian Baldwin laws for the survival of the colonists. Washington for 90 percent of our energy needs, with the rest Editor/Publisher Rob Williams and Jefferson were premier hemp farmers in their coming from solar, wind, and small-scale hydro. Managing Editor Will Lindner time (under current federal law they could be FIBER: It has more cellulose for paper making, Editor-At-Large Kirkpatrick Sale executed!). Washington said “make the most of textiles, and clothing than any other plant. Art Directors Peter Holm, Abrah Griggs Business Manager Gaelan Brown the indica hemp seed and sow it everywhere,” and MEDICINE: It helps alleviate pain and suffering Advertising Designers Serena Fox, Jefferson commented “always set aside one acre from a panoply of human illness, and is helpful in Brian Deerwester for hemp.” treating or preventing Alzheimer’s, cancer, AIDS, Cannabis is the word the Greeks used. The MS, epilepsy, migraine headaches, menstrual Editorial Board Ian Baldwin, Gaelan Brown, Rick Foley, Amy Chinese called it ma, the English called it hemp, cramps, glaucoma, ileitis, chronic pain, and other Kirschner, Robin Lloyd, Ron Miller, Rob the French le chanvre, the Mexicans refer to it conditions. Williams as mota. It wasn’t until the 1930s that William Cannabis also has 50,000 “green” industrial Randolph Hearst coined the word marijuana – uses creating good-paying, non-outsourceable Editorial Office and Submissions 308 Wallis Drive, Waitsfield, Vermont 05673 out of economic and racist motives, as blacks and jobs in a “new” industry. Hispanics used it more than whites. After 14 years of the Volstead Act and alcohol Business Office and Advertising Cannabis is the premier source for a variety of prohibition from 1919 to 1933, Americans came PO Box 1121, Waitsfield, Vermont 05673 uses such as: to their senses and realized that all prohibition Circulation FOOD: It has more highly digestible protein does is create a black market with crime, corrup- 10,000 copies in 350 venues throughout Vermont than soybeans, making it a No. 1 source of food. It tion, and violence. In 1937, Harry Anslinger, who six times a year, and through PO subscription. also provides gamma linolucleic acid—an essen- was in charge of alcohol prohibition, was out of tial fatty acid. a job. He conspired with Dupont (who invented FUEL: It is the No. 1 source of biomass for nylon that year when a decorticator, like Eli energy. You could count [the No. 2 to No. 100] Whitney’s cotton gin, was created to cut hemp plants combined and it won’t equal the energy continued on page 27 4 VERMONT COMMONS FA L L 2 0 1 0

Most Likely to Secede, continued from page 1 sort of possibility for democratic discussion and involving war, militarism, territorial expansion, representative government. and immoral confiscation of escaped slaves. And Instead, however, the evidence seems to indicate Abraham Lincoln’s “War to Prevent Southern that Washington, D.C., has allied itself with large Secession” (as it’s sometimes called) linked this corporations to strip away both decision-making legitimate political concept forever to the South, control and resources from ordinary Americans in slavery, and racism, largely erasing it from our almost every conceivable way. Libraries of books 20th century cultural and historical memory. have been written on stupendous financial skull- These days, the concept of secession is deemed duggery and Wall Street’s fleecing of Main Street, too “radical” – even “treasonous” – to be discussed U.S. war-making and arms dealing globally, in mainstream political, media and news circles. multinational corporations’ monopolistic control Until now. “Secession, Not Aggression” – Purchase the new 2011 of our nation’s food and energy supply, massive Secession, the “S” word, the dirtiest word in U.S. Vermont independence bumper stickers online at www.vt electoral fraud, and the impending bankruptcy of politics, is ready to re-enter U.S. political conver- commons.org/store. CURTIS SAVARD the U.S. government, beholden to the Wall Street sation as an old idea, rediscovered. The next big banksters, Goldman Sachs and their ilk, and the thing. Which is funny. Because secession is about of its citizens, but an uncontrollable Empire so-called Federal Reserve (which is neither). smallness. Decentralization. Devolution, not governed by an unholy alliance of transnational To complicate matters even further, throw into revolution. And there are signs that Americans of corporations and a U.S. government bought and this mix Peak Oil and global climate change, twin all stripes are interested. paid for by the same. 21st-century sisters who are poised to clean plane- “Secession is the next radical idea poised to Like blind men with the elephant, liberal and tary house and dramatically destabilize our world enter mainstream discourse – or at least the conservative critics alike recognize portions of as we know it. realm of the conceivable,” writes Bill Kauffman this troubling reality. Blue Staters complain about It is no wonder that the United States, in the is his new book Bye Bye Miss American Empire: Big Business and corporate personhood. Red throes of what Yale historian Paul Kennedy calls Neighborhood Patriots, Backcountry Rebels, and their Staters bear witness to Big Government excess ”imperial overstretch,” strives to maintain a Underdog Crusades to Redraw America’s Political and intrusion into the lives of ordinary citizens. policy of “full spectrum dominance” in an effort Map. “The prospect of breaking away from a In truth, they are both right. The 21st-century to control the world’s remaining easily recov- union once consecrated to liberty and justice but United States is governed by neither a republican erable fossil fuel energy reserves. Or that the now degenerating into imperial putrefaction will form of government, nor organized around a capi- United States seeks to bolster what retired policy only grow in appeal as we go marching with our talist form of economic life. Instead, “fascism” analyst Chalmers Johnson calls a global “empire PATRIOT Acts and National Security Strategies rules the day, as defined by Il Duce himself, good of bases” (as many as 1,000, by best estimates) in through Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and the frightful Italian Benito Mussolini, who defined the term as more than 130 countries around the world – the signposts on our road to nowhere.”2 “a monopolistic merger of Big Business and the best defense is a good offense. Or that the United Secession’s signposts, meanwhile, are popping power of the State.” “This left/right thing has States promotes what former Wall Street financial up all over the United States. got to go,” explains Vermont Commons: Voices of analyst and Bush pere regulator Catherine Austin More than 30 of our 50 states in the U.S. Empire Independence co-founder and publisher emeritus Fitts calls a “tapeworm economy,” in which are home to active secessionist organizations.3 Ian Baldwin. “We’re decentralists and we’re up small groups of large corporations make obscene During the past five years, the country has against a monster.”6 amounts of money by blowing up stuff (and witnessed three national conferences orga- Sightings of the monster-in-question, the United nized around secession – the first (Burlington, States of Empire, have been reported by Project Vermont, in 2006) and the third (Manchester, Censored for decades now (see www.project New Hampshire, in 2008) both taking place in censored.org). On the domestic front, the news is New England. The second, held in Tennessee, deeply troubling. “Of all western democracies, the produced a document called the Chattanooga United States stands near dead last in voter turn- Declaration, which declared that: out, last in health care, last in education, highest in homicide rates, mortality, STDs among juveniles, The deepest questions of human liberty and youth pregnancy, abortion and divorce,” explains government facing our time go beyond right journalist Christopher Ketcham in a recent issue of and left, and in fact have made the old left-right GOOD magazine, summarizing his conversations split meaningless and dead. The privileges, with retired international businessman and Duke monopolies, and powers that private University economics professor emeritus Thomas corporations have won from government Naylor, co-founder of the secessionist think tank threaten everyone’s health, prosperity, and the Second Vermont Republic. “The nation has liberty, and have already killed American self- trillions in deficits it can never repay, is beset by government by the people.4 staggering income disparities, has destroyed its manufacturing base, and is the world’s most egre- In a July 2008 national Zogby poll, more than gious polluter and greediest consumer of fossil 20 percent of American adults agreed that “any fuels.” The nation is also inhabited by “some state or region has the right to peaceably secede 40 million Americans living in poverty, tens of from the United States and become an indepen- millions more in a category called ‘near poverty,’ dent republic.”5 and a permanent underclass trapped by a real Even venerable national newspapers and maga- unemployment rate of 17 percent.”7 zines of record – the New York Times, the Wall This depressing demographic data would be Street Journal, and TIME among them – have somewhat easier to confront if one assumed that begun covering the “secession story.” the United States government is at all interested in solving the myriad problems that bedevil its 2. WHY SECESSION: THE U.S. AS EMPIRE citizens. Or, that the current average size of U.S. Why nonviolent secession? Simply stated… congressional districts – a whopping 647,000 citi- The United States is no longer a self-governing zens per representative, larger than the entire republic responsive to the needs and concerns population of the state of Vermont – creates any FA L L 2 0 1 0 VERMONT COMMONS 5 people – “collateral damage”), rebuilding what living adherents are all too aware of the risks REBELLION: Just as armed rebellion gave birth they’ve destroyed with taxpayer and borrowed facing the Empire, but feel completely power- to the United States in 1776, so too could some money paid to “contractors,” and then privatizing less at the feet of corporate America and the U.S. combination of stock market meltdown, economic once-publicly held assets (oil, and much more). depression, crippling unemployment, monetary Look no further than the now-seven-year-old U.S. crisis, skyrocketing crude oil prices, double- invasion of Iraq as a case study in how the “tape- Secession “represents the only digit interest rates, soaring federal deficits and worm economy” works.8 trade imbalances, curtailment of social services, In the face of what James Howard Kunstler morally defensible response to the repeated terrorist attacks, return of the military called this “Long Emergency,” what options do draft, or environmental catastrophe precipitate a we as Vermonters, as Americans, have? “The only U.S. Empire.” —Thomas Naylor violent 21st-century revolution against corporate ones I can envision are: denial, compliance, politi- America and the U.S. government. However, we cal reform, implosion, rebellion, and dissolution,” also reject this option, because we are opposed to writes the Second Vermont Republic’s Thomas all forms of violence.9 Naylor, in his 2008 book Secession: How Vermont government to do anything about them. So they There is, then, just one viable option: peaceful and All the Other States Can Save Themselves from talk about how bad things are and they try to dissolution. Also called “secession.” the Empire. In the passage below, Naylor briefly live their personal lives in positive ways, but in This article appears, in chapter form, in the new describes each of these options, and concludes relation to our government they do nothing but book Censored 2011, published this fall by Project that nonviolent secession “represents the only naively hope for the best. For them the name Censored. Part II of this article will appear in the Stick morally defensible response to the U.S. Empire.” of the game is compliance. Since that gets us Season 2010 (November/December) issue. Visit www. nowhere, we reject this option, too. projectcensored.org to find out more about their impor- DENIAL: Most Americans – including our tant work. • government, our politicians, corporate America, REFORM: The real Pollyannas are liberal Wall Street, the Pentagon, and the media – are in Democrats who believe that all we need do is Endnotes 1 See Donald Livingston, “The New England Secession Tradition,” complete denial of our perilous plight. In spite of elect the right Democrat president and all of our Vermont Commons: Voices of Independence news journal, May 2007; all of our obvious problems, they seem oblivious problems will be solved. They see political reform now featured at the home page at www.vtcommons.org. to the cataclysmic risks we are facing. But, obvi- (such as campaign finance reform) as a panacea, 2 Bill Kauffman, Bye Bye Miss American Empire: Neighborhood ously, denial does not solve problems, and it seems failing to realize that so long as the Congress is Patriots, Backyard Rebels, and their Underdog Crusades to Redraw clear that these problems will not simply vanish controlled by corporate America there will never America’s Political Map. (White River Junction, Vermont: Chelsea Green, 2010), xv. or solve themselves. So we reject this option. be any meaningful campaign finance reform. 3 For a state-by-state list of secession organizations, visit the Since we have a single political party disguised Middlebury Institute at www.middleburyinstitute.net. COMPLIANCE: Many armchair environmental- as two, it matters not whether the president calls 4 See www.middleburyinstitute.net for the complete text of the ists, pacifists, democratic socialists, and simple- himself a Democrat or a Republican. The results Chattanooga Declaration. will be the same. So, again, we reject this option. 5 Christopher Ketcham, “The American Secessionist Streak,” Los Angeles Times, September 10, 2008. Read the online article through www.latimes.com. IMPLOSION: When Soviet Leader Mikhail S. 6 Kauffman, xx. Gorbachev came to power in 1985, who could 7 Christopher Ketcham, “Most Likely To Secede,” Good maga- have imagined that the Soviet Union would soon zine, January 2008, Issue 008. implode and cease to exist? The United States 8 Visit www.vtcommons.org/essentialreadings for the books and resources we think most useful in understanding the U.S. seems to be well on its way to replicating the expe- as Empire. rience of its former archenemy in an American 9 Thomas Naylor, Secession: How Vermont and All the Other setting. So, do we want to sit by and wait for that States Can Save Themselves from the Empire. (Port Townshend, to happen? Again we reject this option. Washington: Feral House, 2008, 43-44. 6 VERMONT COMMONS FA L L 2 0 1 0

VT Independence Candidates, continued from page 1 Republic activists, hoping to round out the the only way to end it is to remove ourselves from roster. Morrisseau contends that the legisla- the beast.” tive branch is the seat of true power in both the Other candidates are more circumspect. Vermont and federal systems, with more influ- “I’m not a secessionist but am sympathetic ence over political decisions than the executive to the cause,” says Todd Pritsky of Fletcher branch. (Franklin County), who is running for a seat in Meanwhile, though, Naylor was recruiting the Vermont House of Representatives. “I view Steele and Garritano for the high-profile execu- myself as a fellow traveler; I find common cause tive offices. Morrisseau’s vision was further and common ground with the folks of the Second diluted when some candidates declared for the Vermont Republic, but I don’t believe you’re going Vermont House rather than the Senate. to convince people about secession when they’re Eventually, a roster of independence candidates Secessionist gubernatorial candidate Dennis Steele attracts more concerned with ‘How am I going to feed my emerged, even though they are not lock-step in attention on the campaign trail. JEB WALLACE-BRODEUR family and where’s my healthcare going to come their vision of what independence means (fitting from?’ Those are the more important issues and enough for people who define themselves as inde- the money for that; I’ve got a day job. But at the always will be.” pendents). That roster includes: end of the day, this is Vermont, and you can reach Gaelan Brown, of Fayston, is running for a out in person on an individual basis. If people like Vermont Senate seat from Washington County. you they’ll vote for you.” • Gaelan Brown, State Senate candidate from His views are similar to Pritsky’s. “It’s been really interesting,” said Brown Washington County; “I’m not running on secession as a single issue,” (Senate, Washington County). “I’ve had lots of says Brown. “There are plenty of people in the • Peter Garritano, Shelburne, candidate for interesting conversations with people all through- secession movement doing that, and I applaud lieutenant governor; out the political spectrum – left/right, red/blue. I them for it. I’m running on Vermont’s economic feel like I’m having success and seeing heads nod sustainability as a single issue. Secession has to be • Craig B. Hill, State Senate candidate from about issues like the dysfunctional and corrupt considered, but I also respect those who don’t see Bennington County; federal government and states needing to stand it as the only solution and are focused on lower- • Steve Laible, State Senate candidate from up and make their own priorities and somehow level tactical challenges and opportunities.” Chittenden County; move forward.” Mostly, the candidates see Vermont indepen- Garritano pointed out that to some degree dence – be it political independence, economic • James Merriam, candidate for the Vermont campaigns were static over the summer, wait- independence, energy and cultural indepen- House, Washington-5 District, from ing for the resolutions of the Democratic and dence, or all of these – as a process. And they see Montpelier; Republican primary battles on August 24. It was themselves moving that process forward. especially true regarding the gubernatorial and • Dennis Morrisseau, State Senate candidate “I am actively promoting what I see as the lieutenant governor campaigns. from Rutland County; necessary mental preparation for independence “I’m talking to people on a daily basis, but I’m by asking voters to consider declaring their indi- • Peter Moss, candidate for the Vermont Senate not really doing much campaigning yet,” he said vidual independence from the evil of the federal and the U.S. Senate from Fairfax (Franklin in early August. “I’m waiting for the primaries government,” says Wilmington resident Craig B. County); to see who I’m going to be facing – although I’m Hill, Vermont Senate candidate from Bennington 90-percent sure that none of them are going to County. “Before they can be enthusiastic about • Todd Pritsky, candidate for the Vermont talk about the war, the PATRIOT Act, genocide in Vermont as an independent nation they must House from Fletcher (whose district combines the Middle East, the corporate takeover, as long come to grips with dissolving their own, individ- areas of Fletcher, Fairfax, and St. Albans Town); as they’re in bed with those same interests.” ual ties with the hopelessly evil and corrupt U.S. • Dennis Steele, Kirby, candidate for governor; Garritano got a dose of reality when he government. Only then can they take the next contacted Vermont Public Radio, seeking to step, supporting nonviolent actions that will save • Robert Wagner, State Senate candidate from participate in a candidates forum, and was our rights and improve our lives by declaring de Addison County. refused. “They said it was only for candidates facto independence.” (This list may not be complete, “independents” in the primary right now.” After the primaries, being the unherdable cats that they are. Readers Garritano expects increased exposure as media The Current Lineup on the Campaign Trail can find position statements and introductions to outlets conform to the Federal Communications With such divergent viewpoints, can it be said these candidates online in the Vermont Commons Commission’s Equal Time Rule, which obligates that there is a distinct, identifiable “indepen- Summer 2010 issue referenced above.) broadcast licensees to provide opportunities to dence” movement and a unity of purpose among diverse candidates who demand it. these candidates? Meanwhile, Garritano has been attending Yes, it can be said – both said and defended. Getting on the ballot was no mean feat for public events, partly to make his candidacy As related in the Summer 2010 issue of Vermont these candidates, given that the Legislature, near known. He spoke from the floor at a meeting on Commons (“Voices of Independence Emerge in the end of its 2010 term, moved the traditional the proposal to base F-35 fighter jets in Burlington, Vermont Politics,” available online at www. filing deadline forward by nearly two months, to and his comments were aired by the local Fox vtcommons.org), the state’s seven-year-old late June. However, they obtained the requisite channel. (“There was also a [Burlington] Free secessionist movement entered the realm constituent signatures and met the other filing Press reporter who was very enthusiastic and said of electoral politics this year when Second requirements, and are officially in the running. he’d give me a call,” said Garritano. “He probably Vermont Republic founder Thomas Naylor By the time August came around they were gain- went back to the newsroom and got straightened persuaded Steele to pursue the governorship ing experience and learning the lay of the elec- out by the editor. I never heard from him again.”) as a secessionist candidate. At the same time, toral landscape – a significantly different one for But despite their outsider status, the unresolved there was another strand to the movement – the candidates not labeled “Democrat,” “Republican,” major-party primary battles, and Vermont’s tradi- “Senate30” campaign, led by Dennis Morrisseau or even “Progressive.” Yet, to varying extents, tional suspension of politics during the summer, of West Pawlet. Morrisseau, whose political they had concluded that the landscape was indeed the independence candidates have made inroads. activism goes back to 1970s, envisioned a coor- negotiable for them. Pritsky was mentioned along with the two incum- dinated effort to post secessionist candidates for “It’s going well,” said Wagner, the Addison bent candidates in his House race in an article in all 30 seats in the state senate; he put himself in County senate candidate. “Trying to play an the St. Albans Messenger (“Maybe no one else had the running for a Rutland County senate seat, election by the rules of the establishment would filed yet,” he speculated), and chatted for an hour and spread the word to other Second Vermont indeed be an uphill battle. I don’t have the time or with the host of “Shotgun Express,” a political- FA L L 2 0 1 0 VERMONT COMMONS 7

Gaelan Brown Todd Pritsky James Merriam www.GaelanBrown.com web: http://www.toddfor [email protected] [email protected] vthouse.com/ 4 Dunpatrick Circle, PO Box 1121, Fayston/ twitter: http://twitter.com/ Montpelier, VT 05602 Waitsfield, VT 05673 Todd4VTHouse (610)755-5875 802-272-0991 facebook: http://www.facebook .com/todd4vthouse snail mail: Dennis Morrisseau 215 Bog Rd., [email protected] Cambridge, VT 05444 Peter Garritano Vermont30.net phone: 802-238-3436 www.vtgarritano.com 2LTMorrisseau.com 802-999-6818 FireCongress.org P.O. Box 177, Dennis Steele West Pawlet, VT 05775 [email protected], 802-645-9727 http://www.governorsteele .com. Craig Hill http://www.freevermontradio www.vermont-independence .org Peter Moss .info http://www.governorsteele.com [email protected] [email protected] P.O. Box 28, http://petermoss.org 802-989-6815 E. St. Johnsbury, VT 05838. P. O. Box 413, Fairfax, VT 05454 802-748-3475 Phone/ fax: 802-849-2108

Robert Wagner No [email protected] Steve Laible photo They want to change the http://senatorwagner.com www.prohibitionbluesband.com Box 174, Ripton Vermont 05766 available. [email protected] political conversation, break home phone: 802-388-0670 mobile phone: 802-989-9673 through the barriers, and help Vermonters contemplate affairs program on Public Access TV. in the cause of peace and Vermont’s unilateral “He called me up because of the article he’d the previously unthinkable withdrawal from the wasteful and tragic military seen in Vermont Commons,” said Pritsky, who has adventures the U.S. wages habitually around the also made a habit of sending press releases to premise of independence. globe. newspapers and media outlets. “Hey, Todd was at “Vermont has the highest per-capita death rate this forum on health care, and that forum on the econ- from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan of any omy,” he said, mimicking his press releases. “I’m U.S. state,” says Wagner. “Talk about 9/11 and actively campaigning, not just sitting back and Facebook and Twitter and getting thousands of whether it was a false-flag operation is going to letting things happen.” responses, forum sponsors started changing their make people uncomfortable; I would rather talk In Washington County, Gaelan Brown has minds. about what the U.S. government did in response spoken to the Waterbury Rotary Club and has “That tactic is working pretty well,” said Steele. to 9/11. That’s damning enough. Vermont’s been invited to speak to the Waterbury Veterans’ He described one of what he said were several proportionate share of the cost of the wars is Association. In Addison County, Wagner’s candi- examples: A statewide organization of Lesbian $1.5 billion a year, and Vermonters are out there dacy has attracted the attention of the Addison and gay Vermonters denied him a place in a candi- dying for this – two major wars perpetrated on Independent, a weekly newspaper published in dates debate; after he posted the information on the flimsy excuse of 9/11.That’s what affects them Middlebury. “They’ve given me and other inde- Facebook, members of the organization were directly. It becomes academic who did it.” pendent candidates a fair shake,” he said. outraged. Pritsky and Brown tend to fold the enormity of Several candidates have found less-tradi- “Even though a lot of them didn’t agree with me the ongoing wars into a pattern of abuse and over- tional means to elbow their way into the public they wanted me to be heard,” he said. “So they’ve reaching by the federal government, and its effect dialogue. Pritsky has an active Facebook pres- created a whole ‘nother debate for October 6 just upon states. Brown uses examples from his field ence, which he uses for fundraising and spirited because of the pressure that was put on them.” of expertise, citing a recent ruling by the Federal political discussion. Brown, who works for a The traditional media – print and broadcast Energy Regulatory Commission that forbids Vermont-based solar energy company, writes for – continue to wield power and influence in elec- states to give preferential rates, through feed-in alternative-energy publications (and for Vermont tions. But alternative candidates are finding tariffs, to renewable energy. Such programs are Commons) and does not hesitate to let his read- alternative means for entry and exposure, the already under contract, in Vermont and else- ers know that he’s seeking election to the state so-called “social networking sites.” As the 21st where, and are part of states’ efforts to contend Senate. century gathers steam, newspapers and TV will with the economic and environmental impacts of But the most notable success in leveraging ignore them at their own peril. (dwindling) fossil-fuel resources. public support to force his way into a structurally “It creates a huge layer of uncertainty,” said closed campaign system is Dennis Steele’s. At the Rejecting a war economy Brown. “The states are trying to make them- start of his campaign he found himself excluded Tactics are one element in an election. Another selves sustainable and the feds are blocking this.” from events featuring the gubernatorial candi- one – supposedly the very heart of the matter – Brown cites further incursions of federal policy dates (and was famously arrested in Barre when is policy. The independence candidates are not of that he believes resonate with voters across the he tried to insert himself into a debate at the Old one mind in the matter of secession and its imme- political spectrum. “I’m talking in terms of Labor Hall; the police later dropped the charges). diacy in Vermont. But as a group they constitute decentralizing government power, but also about When he began posting these exclusions on the most unequivocal political voice in the state continued on page 8 8 VERMONT COMMONS FA L L 2 0 1 0

VT Independence Candidates, continued from page 7 the military budget.’ If we weren’t spending that “I intend to run again in 2012 and again in 2014,” sustainability and how both of those perspectives $1.5 billion on the wars we could put it into educa- says Brown. “If it doesn’t reach a critical mass this can work toward a stronger Vermont economy. I tion, agriculture, and our other critical needs at year, that’s fine. I’ll build on that.” think that’s where I’m seeing heads nod.” home. Our kids. Steele, the most high-profile of the candidates, Yet Steele and Garritano – the candidates who “This is about moral authority. I think that’s the hopes to get voters more comfortable with the take the strongest pro-secession positions – are jugular vein, and that’s what we have to go after.” concept of secession, and felt he scored a victory most direct in their condemnation of the wars Steele believes Republican candidate Brian recently when the Newport Daily Express printed and their effect upon Vermont. Dubie will seek to bring the U.S. drone the following headline: “Five Dems and One “Most people are scared to say anything bad program to Vermont – installing pilots, who Secessionist Vie For Votes in Governor’s Debate.” about the military,” said Garritano. “The catch- guide the drones electronically from comfort- “People are going to be talking about seces- word these days [for political candidates] is to able, air-conditioned buildings stateside as they sion all over Newport,” said Steele. “I’m trying say ‘I’m fiscally conservative and socially liberal.’ bomb targets in Afghanistan and Pakistan. He to plant the idea so it’s no longer a taboo thing. I Yeah? If you want to be ‘fiscally conservative’ let’s condemns Vermont’s U.S. senators, Patrick Leahy see myself clearing the path so that other candi- bring the troops home and close the bases around and Bernie Sanders, for securing military-related dates will be able to run on it in the future. And the world. I keep stressing the total incompetence contracts to boost Vermont’s economy. it’s working.” of the military. They don’t do anything well. If it “Are we going to send our Vermont military In Bennington County, Craig Hill admits that were any other business they would be bankrupt.” off to fight overseas so our people in Vermont he does not sense much movement toward seces- Nor does Garritano shrink before the loaded are going to have jobs?” asks Steele (a service sion and independence yet. question of whether he “supports the troops.” veteran himself). “What’s the morality of killing “I have been nonplussing the electorate, draw- “I say I don’t support anybody invading another around the world so that we can maintain our ing blank stares,” he says. Voters there helped country. I don’t support anybody killing anybody. economy?” elect President Barack Obama, and Hill says they When we go over there people take orders and want him to succeed despite the many ways that do horrible things.” He’s certain that the main- Reckoning the odds, short term and long his policies continue along the odious path forged stream candidates, once selected by the prima- Do the independence candidates think they can by George W. Bush. “It seems they won’t be able ries, will not speak so unequivocally about the win in November? to exhale until January 20, 2017, when Obama “sacred” U.S. military. Pritsky believes he has a decent chance in a five- leaves office,” he says. “Everything else for them Steele agrees. He participated in a debate in person race for two House seats. Wagner says he’s politically simmers on a distant back burner.” Brattleboro in which Democratic gubernatorial working more for Steele and Garritano than for Yet Hill, like the others, is philosophical, know- candidate Peter Shumlin outlined a plank of his himself. “The statewide candidates can’t knock ing that the concept of separating from the U.S. fiscal plan for Vermont. on every door in Vermont, and I’m better at blow- Empire will take time to germinate. For historical “His idea was for us to save $40 million by ing somebody else’s horn than my own. I consider reference, he points out, “Rome wasn’t disman- taking all the low-risk offenders out of the prison that a little distasteful.” tled in a day.” • system,” said Steele. “When it was my turn I said, Mainly, they believe they’re laying the ground- ‘That’s chump change when you’re talking about work for the future. FA L L 2 0 1 0 VERMONT COMMONS 9

Free Vermont Media: Contemplating Cultural Change In The Face of Climate Change Reviewed by Ron Miller

Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet While neither of these authors would be classi- dioxide in the atmo- by Bill McKibben fied as “doomers” (à la Michael Ruppert or James sphere has surpassed 350 (New York: Times Books, 2010) Howard Kunstler) or anarcho-primitivists like parts per million, the Derrick Jensen, they see that big changes are on level that climate scien- and the horizon. They chart a possible course toward tists have determined to a more sustainable and participatory society that be the tipping point for The Town that Food Saved: might replace the current technocracy. While trapping excessive heat. How One Community Found they grapple with the difficulties of this transi- Writing around the time Vitality in Local Food tion, both of these authors offer hopeful visions of the failed Copenhagen by Ben Hewitt of the future. conference on climate (New York: Rodale Books, 2010) change, he reviews the Eaarth political and economic wo superb Vermont authors have recently The strange title of Bill McKibben’s book is meant forces that inhibit any Tpublished important books describing the to be provocative, for he is making a jolting argu- sensible response to this crisis; an entrenched transition to a decentralized, post-carbon soci- ment: we no longer live on the Earth that we have paradigm of endless growth, plus an enormous ety. Bill McKibben, the internationally known known throughout human history. As of now, we investment in the existing infrastructure, have climate- change journalist and activist, and Ben inhabit a different planet, and we will be forced paralyzed modern nations from taking effective Hewitt, a gifted young writer firmly rooted in to live differently. “We may, with commitment action to reduce carbon emissions, so the propor- his land and community, explore complementary and luck, yet be able to maintain a planet that will tion of CO2 in the atmosphere continues to rise. aspects of the massive cultural shift that lies before sustain some kind of civilization,” he writes (all Add in the reality of Peak Oil (the dramatic end us. McKibben sketches the big picture – dramatic italics in quotations are his), “but it won’t be the of cheap energy that made industrial civilization alterations in the planet’s climate and ecological same planet, and hence it can’t be the same civili- possible), observes McKibben, and it is clear that systems – while Hewitt focuses in on the fine zation. . . . We simply can’t live on the new earth our civilization is in deep trouble: “the system has details of life in a rural community (Hardwick, as if it were the old earth; we’ve foreclosed that met its match.” Vermont) that is reinventing its agricultural option.” Our new planet, “Eaarth,” is one with far Yet even after pronouncing this austere diag- economy. McKibben, too, cites Hardwick as an less biotic abundance and diversity, an impover- nosis, McKibben maintains that “we can build example of the adaptations required to inhabit ished and fragile place. durable and even relatively graceful ways to the changed earth and wrote an endorsement for Marshalling extensive data from numerous inhabit this new planet.” He refuses to “obsess” Hewitt’s book. sources and illustrative anecdotes, McKibben over the dangers of societal collapse and calls for The impending collapse of the industrial serves up a methodical, disturbing catalog of the creative strategies to “manage our descent” into system looms in the background of both works. profound effects of climate change: from now a lifestyle of less consumption and complexity. on, life conditions on this planet will be more The cultural phase of growth must be followed severe and chaotic; there will be more extremes by a phase of maturity, where we value what is of temperature, more floods, more droughts, durable, stable, and hardy rather than what is fast more destructive storms, more (and larger) forest and flashy. Above all, we will need to stop pursu- fires, more crop failures and food shortages. ing bigness and learn to appreciate a smaller, Insects, viruses and diseases will spread disrup- more local scale. McKibben then launches into tively; the melting away of glaciers threatens a remarkable 23-page reflection on “the biggest water supplies for millions of people; the oceans object of them all: the United States itself.” In are rising, warming, and becoming more acidic. these pages, he touches upon the core concerns And so forth. McKibben explains that climate of Vermont Commons and the Vermont secession change is taking off more rapidly and severely movement, though he comes to a somewhat than expected because of the complex interdepen- different conclusion. dencies among planetary systems; each alteration First, McKibben discusses the ongoing tension triggers or reinforces others. from the beginning of American history between McKibben reminds his readers that all this is a Jeffersonian, anti-imperial radical democracy, happening because the concentration of carbon and a Hamiltonian nationalism that has sought to concentrate political and economic power. He argues that nationalism has prevailed for two centuries because the U.S. pursued a series of “national projects,” from canal and railroad building to the Cold War and space program, that required enormous resources. “Jefferson couldn’t build the highways,” he comments. Whether or not this is true, and whether or not a more Jeffersonian, decentralized society could have avoided the pitfalls of reckless industrializa- tion and empire without sinking into a reaction- ary agrarianism, the deed is done. Now, however, conditions on planet Eaarth make large, ambi- tious projects ever-less viable; resources become prohibitively expensive, and we can no longer continued on page 10 1 0 VERMONT COMMONS FA L L 2 0 1 0

Free Vermont Media, continued from page 9 secessionists, by the way) to be suspicious of those so eloquently describes in this book. McKibben afford the waste and complexity that massive groups’ more reactionary agendas. does not see it this way; he thinks we can pursue projects involve. The work of survival on this But advocates for Vermont independence localization while accepting federal authority for less-hospitable planet “needs to be done close to are not “forever” hanging out with reactionar- all the “good” things it does (such as protecting home. Small, not big; dispersed, not centralized.” ies; most of our thinking and effort, in fact, are civil rights and wilderness areas). “When my The entire second half of Eaarth describes strat- devoted to the very goal that McKibben explic- town flooded, federal money helped,” he notes. egies – from Transition Town Well, sure, but the one who pays initiatives to local currencies and the piper calls the tune, and banks to “the new agriculture” Hewitt and McKibben chart a possible course toward a more many of the tunes chosen by the – that tend toward resilient local federal government are enor- communities, living in ecologi- sustainable and participatory society that might replace the current mously destructive. How can we cal balance. “The project we’re now be functionally independent while undertaking – maintenance, grace- technocracy. While they grapple with the difficulties of this transition, we are financially and politically ful decline, hunkering down, hold- dependent? ing on against the storm – requires both of these authors offer hopeful visions of the future. Eaarth is an informative, a different scale.” That is precisely provocative work that will get what we at Vermont Commons have many, many people thinking been saying all along, and McKibben affirms that itly endorses: “functional independence,” figur- about the severity of the challenge before us, because of Vermont’s unique streak of local self- ing out “how Vermont might one day grow more and it offers an encouraging portrait of a more reliance, it “may be one of the best places in the of its own food and provide more of its own ecologically balanced society. Still, because world to think about the scale of the future.” energy…” We know that secession alone is not McKibben is reluctant to consider the prospect of Bill McKibben has not embraced the Vermont the answer to climate change; Vermont can never complete systemic collapse or the radical political secession movement, however, and he actually be a secure island on a disintegrating Eaarth. strategies that might be needed to achieve genu- makes it a point in this book to explain why. He But some of us are convinced that the culture of ine localization, I did not find his scenario to be finds us too far out on the fringe, “forever hold- endless growth, centralization, and technocracy completely convincing. After demonstrating just ing conferences with southern diehards who can’t is so deeply embodied by our national govern- how serious are the impending horrors of climate wait to return to the old Confederacy,” aligned ment that Vermont can never truly implement chaos, McKibben’s picture of a “graceful” transi- with Sarah Palin’s friends or the “sorehead” (not just “think about”) “the scale of the future” tion seemed unrealistically cheerful. The transi- governor of Texas, and too receptive to conspir- while we are subject to its rule. tion from corporate/technocratic/consumerist acy theories. It is true that some members of our Asking hard questions about the insidious culture to a simpler, locally rooted way of living circle have explored common interests with other (conspiratorial or not) power of an imperious will require a profound and wrenching shift in groups that oppose the continuing spread of the national government, and raising the possibil- our worldview. We need to be prepared for a radi- American empire, and it is reasonable for any ity of political secession, reflect the same aware- cal break from the civilization that has destroyed progressive person (which includes most Vermont ness of our transitional times that McKibben Earth, and this is why the doomers, primitivists, FA L L 2 0 1 0 VERMONT COMMONS 1 1 secessionists, and conspiracy ponderers speak Persistently inquisitive and thoughtful, Hewitt what this essential commodity is truly worth. to our present condition. They dare us to think provides a balanced, carefully nuanced study of There is a political dimension to Hewitt’s anal- outside the box of modern culture, not hold onto the community. While the emerging local food ysis, though for the most part he understates it. it merely because it is familiar and comfortable. system is widely praised and “feels right,” Hewitt At one point, echoing the theme Eliot Coleman McKibben recognizes how difficult this shift wants to know why it is right. Questioning simplis- sounded, he asserts that “there’s a bit of revolu- will be, at one point admitting that modern tic assumptions, he asks “What should a decen- tionary lurking in every small-scale farmer,” but people, who are conditioned to seek novel and tralized food system look like?” and examines he does not explicitly define the revolutionary diverse experience, will find local life parochial, the ironies and controversies that lurk below the politics of localization. This, I think, is what he limited and boring. But rather than critique the worldview that makes consumerist expectations seem normal, he suggests that we can cushion Hewitt places the quirky stories of Hardwick’s people into the larger context of an the transition to simplicity by using the Internet to provide substitute experiences of novelty and economically strained community trying to gain independence from the corporate variety. What a disappointing non sequitur! If life conditions on Eaarth prove to be as unforgiving as system. This is the most significant story Hewitt tells. he insists they will be, there will be little margin for self-indulgent novelty. As long as people remain entranced by the worldview of growth and self-gratification, they will not embrace a media hype of the Hardwick phenomenon. For is suggesting: A life rooted in land and commu- “mature” civilization that values balance, sobri- example, if the economics of small-scale produc- nity reflects “a desire to connect with something ety, and self-restraint. I think McKibben gets this, tion lead to high-priced specialty products beyond real and lasting.” To pour one’s energies into this but he seems unwilling to challenge his readers to the reach of a working class town’s citizens, can strenuous and financially difficult way of life is step fully out of this worldview. the system still be called “local”? to resist the role of passive consumer. To claim, Meanwhile, though, we can fully support Hewitt gives readers an unusually intimate through one’s own effort, a life of self-sufficiency, initiatives, such as those McKibben describes, look at the people involved – the “agrepreneurs” is to refuse the seductive ease of mass consump- that move our culture in the direction of local who have become media celebrities, as well as tion. It is a citizen’s life that is engaged with the life scale and modest consumption. Ben Hewitt’s farmers whose families have grown food in this of nature and community; one expects to partici- book provides a detailed account of this process. community for generations, and back-road home- pate in the world rather than simply to consume. steaders who have lived off the land for decades – And this, of course, suggests a more authentic The Town that Food Saved because this is his own community and he knows democracy. “When we feed ourselves, these people well. The information he gained Toward the end of the book Hewitt acknowl- we become unconquerable.” from extensive interviews is spiced with wry and edges the local newspaper editor’s lament that --gardening author candid observations of their habits and attitudes. the Hardwick revolution has been brought Eliot Coleman, to Ben Hewitt Hewitt is a thorough and careful researcher who about by a small number of prominent individu- gives us serious sociological insights, yet he is als pursuing their economic interests; in other Food is a logical rallying point for the localization also an engaging writer who fills this book with passages he explains how some in the commu- movement. Agriculture is the most fundamental delightful wit and humor. nity feel alienated by the success and fame of the of all economic activities, because food is essen- Hewitt places the quirky stories of Hardwick’s agrepreneurs. But ultimately Hewitt sees these tial to life. Food self-sufficiency, as Eliot Coleman people into the larger context of an economically as temporary flaws in the early, transitional (and Thomas Jefferson strained community trying to gain independence phase of reclaiming local systems. He argues that long before him) from the corporate system. This is the most a healthy food system has the potential to invite suggested, is the basis significant story Hewitt tells. He explains how broad participation and reinvigorate democ- for independence. The industrial food appears to be cheap because so racy: “The participatory nature of local food corporate centralization many production and distribution costs are exter- systems holds tremendous power, not merely of our food system has nalized – that is, they are paid for by degraded to secure and understand the cycle and source turned us into passive, soil and compromised nutritional value, and by of our nourishment, but to reawaken a sense of unskilled consumers, taxpayers in the form of subsidies to agribusi- responsibility for and toward the communities in utterly dependent on ness and oil companies, rather than directly by which we live.” Even after his thorough, critical the money economy consumers. As well, there are economies of scale inquiry into the Hardwick phenomenon, Hewitt and on the availability to centralized production – and Hewitt gives a concludes that it is a hugely important step in the of cheap oil. In The Town good bit of attention to the problem of defining right direction. that Food Saved, Ben appropriate scale – but at least a local economy is Both of these books support the argument that Hewitt explains why circular, and profits stay within the community. modern society can no longer afford to pursue this system is on the One of the keys to Hardwick’s success, writes business as usual in its agricultural, economic, verge of breakdown, arguing that “our nation’s Hewitt, is that its diverse agricultural businesses social, and political practices. Our massive, food supply has never been more vulnerable. form a complete loop from seed gathering to centralized systems for producing and distrib- And we, as consumers of food, share that vulner- planting and harvesting to compost. The system uting goods and managing human affairs have ability, having slowly, inexorably relinquished is relatively self-contained. proven to be enormously wasteful and destruc- control over the very thing that’s most critical to When the centralized economy implodes, due tive. They violate the integrity of ecosystems and our survival.” to resource depletion, ecological collapse and human communities alike, and bring ruin to the The Town that Food Saved considers the economic financial chaos, this model of local self-sufficiency air, water and soil upon which all life depends. and social dimensions of re-localizing our food will prove to be vitally important. “If ever the The enclosure and commodification of nature system. Hewitt, the popular “Greenneck” colum- chemicals and petroleum stop flowing, we will for the sake of corporate profit has fashioned a nist for Vermont Commons, spent many weeks go hungry; we simply can’t have 1 person feed- world that is hostile to thousands of species and to exploring the dynamic agricultural enterprises ing 140 of us without these inputs… Chemical human civilization as well. But the technocracy emerging around Hardwick, Vermont – success- fertilizers and petroleum are to agriculture what is running out of fuel, and these books (among ful young businesses such as High Mowing Seeds, easy credit was to the housing market, and we all a flurry of others that have appeared in recent Pete’s Greens, Jasper Hill Farm, Vermont Soy and know how that turned out.” We will pay more for months and years) help us imagine what the new others that have attracted national attention. food, but as Hewitt suggests, we will be paying culture might look like. • 1 2 VERMONT COMMONS FA L L 2 0 1 0

Beating Wall Street: How To Recover Vermont’s Monetary Commons Who Creates Money? And Who Ought To? (Part II of II) Gary Flomenhoft

This continues and ongoing series of money on deposit at a reserve rate of 5 percent. of Vermont Commons articles This stems from the historical process gold- exploring how Vermont might smiths used to loan out credit for many times the generate much-needed revenue value of gold held in their vaults, and it was due AND protect our commons in to the fact that only a fraction of their loans came this new century. Part 1 of Gary back to be redeemed in gold at any one time. So Flomenhoft’s latest contribution they only had to have a portion of the money ran in our Summer 2010 (July/ loaned out on hand in gold. Likewise banks only August) issue. Flomenhoft wrote: “Of all the common need a fraction of the money loaned out on hand assets that have been privatized, arguably the most at any given time to satisfy demands for cash. The damaging and fundamental is the U.S. government’s exception is during a “bank run” when people constitutional power to create money.” It is available lose confidence in banks and everyone tries to online at www.vtcommons.org/journal. withdraw their savings. Thus we need the FDIC. In the 1920s many leading economists called hort of nonviolent secession and the for 100-percent reserve requirements, which Sre-invention of Vermont as an independent would end bank creation of money. In recent Vermont’s new “Freedom and Unity” silver coins. Purchase republic, how might Vermont take back the years this has been considered economic heresy, them through www.vtcommons.org. unconstitutional money-issuing power of the but after the financial crisis, calls are being heard Federal Reserve? The U.S. constitution in Article again for elimination of fractional reserve bank- borrowers, as in classical economic theory, and 1, Section 10, states: ing. By contrast, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben collect the difference in interest as their fee. Bernanke has recently called for elimination of As a result, the job of money creation would “No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, reserve requirements entirely, essentially calling revert back to government, as it was in the colo- or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and for zero-percent reserve requirements, presum- nies with scrip or bills of credit, under Lincoln Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make ably due to the lack of credit currently available. when he issued Greenbacks, or JFK’s Treasury any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in (Gotta pay those bonuses, don’t ya know!) notes. (Note that Jackson, Lincoln, and JFK were Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex With 100-percent reserve requirements, how all subject to assassination attempts, two of three post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of would banks operate? They could only loan out successful.) Money could be issued at the federal, Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.” money on deposit, and that money would not state, or local level. be available for withdrawal. Currently money Much debate currently goes on about this ques- That would seem to settle it, wouldn’t it? No on deposit in savings or checking accounts can tion, but the discussion is based on one funda- coining of money or emitting bills of credit by be withdrawn at any time. If the bank has $20 mental agreement: Money should be a public the states. (I assume that the requirement for gold million dollars out on loan, at 5-percent reserve utility for the benefit of the people, not a private and silver has been superseded by the courts.) requirements the bank only needs $1 million on tool of banks to collect interest payments. In the Let’s say you are not a secessionist or a Tenth deposit to satisfy reserves. Some say banks now colonies government money was most successful Amendment rebel claiming sovereignty of the don’t even need deposits and base loans on bank when spent and loaned at low interest into the states. There are still several steps that could be assets, rather than deposits. But if you deposit economy. The spending allowed governments to taken short of political independence and creating $105 in the bank in a checking account and the create public goods and services, and the loans a state currency. They include: bank loans out $100 and keeps $5 on reserve, allowed the money to be returned to the govern- Creating local and state complementary you can still get your $105 back at any time. You ment and prevent inflation. Money could even currencies; have $105 in your bank account, and the person be issued as an unconditional basic income to Moving state tax and pension fund money from who got the loan has $100 in theirs created by an everyone. Wall Street to Vermont banks; accounting entry. So there is now $205 based on Sharing bank interest with the public; the $105 you originally deposited. At 5-percent Complementary currencies Creating state and municipal banks; reserve, this multiplies to 1/R x 105, or $2,100, Many experiments have been done with comple- Speculation fees on short-term financial as borrowers spend their loans and the people mentary currencies, both nationally and interna- transactions. they pay for products and services redeposit this tionally, and they have been ruled legal by the Let’s go through them one at a time. But first money in other banks. This process is explained courts. Several articles have appeared in Vermont it is necessary to understand how banks create in any macroeconomics book. Commons about them, so I won’t spend much money in the first place. With 100-percent reserve requirements this time on it except to say that they arise historically Most people think that banks take your savings trick no longer works. For every $100 loaned out when the national currency is in distress, and and checking deposits and loan them out. This is there has to be $100 on deposit backing it up. This they are often short-lived. Experiments in local what is described in classical economic textbooks: means that your deposit would be like what is currency have generally not been that success- Investment equals savings; people save money now a certificate of deposit (CD). You could not ful, but a small cadre of activists keeps these and then it is loaned out for homes, business, and withdraw the money until the term of the certifi- experiments alive, such as time-dollars, Ithaca other enterprises. In actuality the banking system cate expires. Since banks borrow money on short Hours, Burlington Bread, Liberty Dollars, etc. creates many times the amount on deposit in a terms and usually loan it on long terms, there The most successful and long-lived complemen- system called “fractional reserve banking.” The would have to be a continual supply of people tary currency is the Swiss Wir Bank, a business amount created follows a mathematical formula depositing their savings to provide enough capi- mutual credit clearing system operating without of 1/R, where R equals the reserve rate. So if the tal for bank loans. Imagine Americans saving physical currency notes. For extensive reading reserve requirement is 5 percent, then 1/.05 = 20. money! Banks would no longer create money, but on complementary currencies read Tom Greco The banking system creates 20 times the amount simply act as intermediaries between savers and or other writers on this topic. See Greco’s blog FA L L 2 0 1 0 VERMONT COMMONS 1 3

U.S. and Vermont Financial Speculation Creating state and municipal banks One state that emerged with minimal damage Current Trading Projected After-Tax from the financial crisis is the state of North (Annual Rates) Volume Volume Tax Rate (both sides) Revenue Dakota. In the early part of the 20th century, Stocks $11 trillion $7.3 trillion 0.5% $36.5 billion North Dakota farmers were squeezed financially Gov Bonds $41.6 trillion $27.7 trillion 0.1% $27.7 billion by out-of-state bankers. Determined to avoid this Corporate Bonds $22.1 trillion $14.7 trillion 0.1% $14.7 billion loss of autonomy in the future, the state legisla- Futures Contracts $100 trillion $66.7 trillion 0.02% $13.3 billion ture created the Bank of North Dakota in 1919. Currency $200 trillion $133.3 trillion 0.1% $33.3 billion All state funds and funds of state institutions (worldwide) (U.S. share – 25%) are deposited with the Bank of North Dakota, as Swaps $22 trillion $14.7 trillion 0.02% $2.9 billion required by law. The Bank administers several Options Not available NA 0.01% NA lending programs that promote agriculture, commerce and industry in North Dakota. Suggested Total U.S. Revenue @.25% Tobin Tax rate: $128.4 billion Vermont would be well advised to follow x .21% North Dakota’s example and consider forming a Vermont Revenue $268,891,964 Vermont Sovereign State Bank. In the case of a crisis due to the declining value of the U.S. dollar, From Taxing Financial Speculation: Shifting the Tax Burden From Wages to Wagers, Dean Baker, Center for Economic and Policy Research, February the state bank would be in a position to create bills 2000. Vermont total is pro-rated by population: Vermont was .21% of 2000 US population. $128.4 billion x .0021 = $269 million of credit or state currency to maintain the opera- tion of the state economy and state government. http://beyondmoney.net/ and read his book, ignored this information and has done nothing Both Jim Hogue and I testified on separate occa- The End of Money and the Future of Civilization, to ask Treasurer Jeb Spaulding to move Vermont sions this year to the Vermont House Committee published by Chelsea Green. state money out of Wall Street. on Ways and Means about creating a state bank. Bankers attended Hogue’s session and opposed Moving state tax and pension fund money Sharing bank interest with the public the idea on grounds that it was competition. from Wall Street to Vermont banks The monetary system is a socially created system, A mass effort called “Move your Money” is which has been almost completely privatized by Speculation fees being organized by Arianna Huffington and the Federal Reserve Banks. In 2008 a compre- Arguably financial speculation was the cause of Rob Johnson to promote the idea of moving hensive study of revenue from common assets the financial collapse of 2008. Mortgage-backed your money from Wall Street to banks in your was done by the Green Tax and Common Assets securities are all based on another privatized home state and town. http://moveyourmoney. Project. It can be found under documents at: http:// common asset, which is the publicly created value info/. A short film on the topic was made by www.uvm.edu/giee/?Page=research/greentax/ of land. Landowners and speculators are able to Vermonter Eugene Jarecki based on the classic commonassets.html. For this study, creation of retain the unearned increase in land values as the “It’s a Wonderful Life”. See it here: http://www. money and speculation were briefly assessed for real estate bubble inflates. This creates a massive huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/move- revenue potential. asset bubble, and irrational exuberance follows, your-money-a-new-yea_b_406022.html As long as money creation has been privatized except that real estate collapses every 18 years. New Mexico’s House of Representatives voted shouldn’t banks pay us a fee for granting them the Try telling that to the 70 percent of people who in February, 65-0, to move their state money to privilege of creating money? The total bank loans own their own homes and used their equity as an local credit unions and community banks. Both in Vermont in 2009 appear to be $3,884,680,000, ATM machine for the last 10 years. Jim Hogue and I testified on separate occasions or $3.884 billion, according to FDIC statistics. An Due to the financial crisis, there is consider- this year to the Vermont House Committee on (arbitrary) 1-percent tax on bank money creation able discussion of financial speculation taxes both Ways and Means about moving our money out would generate $38.84 million of public revenue at the national and international level. Former of Wall Street. As far as I know the Legislature in Vermont. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and PM Nicolas Sarkozy of France have both proposed an international speculation tax of 0.25 percent. In the U.S. Congress, Rep. Peter DeFazio and Sen. Tom Harkin have proposed a bill called “Let Wall Street Pay for Wall Street’s Bailout Act of 2009,” also based on a rate of 0.25 percent. If these measures do not pass, Vermont could consider a state financial-speculation tax. The disadvantage of a federal tax is that Vermont does not receive any of the revenue. Capital gains taxes do not differentiate between productive investments in goods and services and gambling in financial securities or real estate. It would be beneficial to exempt the job-producing investments from capital gains taxes and main- tain them fully on speculative investments. Exemptions could include entrepreneurs, venture capital and angel funds, investments in IPOs and new stock offerings, small business loans, housing construction, or any other productive investment, and not a paper profit with no equiv- alent good or service provided. These productive investments could also be exempted from any speculation tax imposed. During the 2010 legisla- tive session, the capital gains exemption for busi- continued on page 14 1 4 VERMONT COMMONS FA L L 2 0 1 0

Beating Wall Street, continued from page 13 the federal government has taken on the debt of on the issuance of money? In nullifying the ness was restored, but not for stocks and bonds, Wall Street’s derivatives and other exotic financial constitutional requirement for Congress to issue following the principle stated here, much to the gambling mechanisms, the solvency of the federal money, doesn’t this simultaneously nullify the credit of the Legislature. government is in question. If China and other restriction on states “coining money, or emitting Of all the financial transactions that take place bills of credit”? internationally, it is estimated that 95 percent Maybe it’s time Vermont implemented its own are speculation in paper assets only, and only 5 If you deposit $105 in a checking monetary system, if for no other reason than to percent in actual goods and services. Economist prepare for the collapse of the federal system. If James Tobin suggested a tax (Tobin Tax) to slow account and the bank loans out $100 Vermont wants to seek economic and political down the rate of speculation, which creates no independence, then independent monetary policy new goods or services. Financial markets and and keeps $5 on reserve, you can still as outlined above is a good place to start. We all regulatory bodies that monitor them are socially know the Golden Rule: “He who has the gold, created assets that allow financial transactions get your $105 back at any time. You makes the rules.” • to take place. Therefore the public deserves a share of the money generated in these markets. have $105 in your bank account, and References Barnes, Peter, Capitalism 3.0, Berrett-Koehler Publishers; In 2000, economist Dean Baker of the Center for the person who got the loan has $100 Economic and Policy Research calculated the November 1, 2006. Brown, Ellen Hodgson. Web Of Debt, The Shocking Truth About Our revenue potential of a 0.25-percent Tobin Tax for in theirs created by an accounting Money System And How We Can Break Free, Third Millenium the United States. Applying this revenue on a per Press, Baton Rouge, 2008. capita basis would have generated $268 million in entry. So there is now $205 based on FDIC statistics on Depository Institutions. Downloaded June 3, 2010 Vermont in 2000. from http://www2.fdic.gov/SDI/main4.asp the $105 you originally deposited. Flomenhoft, et al, Valuing Common Assets for Public Finance, Green Vermont independent monetary policy Tax and Common Assets project, UVM, 2008. The banking system has come under increasing Flomenhoft, et al, A Green Tax Shift for Vermont, Green Tax and scrutiny due to the financial collapse of 2008. Common Assets project, UVM, 2009. Serious questions have been raised about the U.S. creditors decided to dump the dollar, there Greco, Tom. The End of Money and the Future of Civilization, wisdom of the Wall Street bailout, which was would be a massive devaluation of the currency Chelsea Green, White river Junction, VT, 2009. Hubbert, Marion King. Exponential Growth as a Transient opposed by 600:1 prior to approval. The Troubled and resulting loss of buying power, most likely Phenomenon in Human History. Reprinted from Societal Issues, Assets Relief Program (TARP) and other taxpayer followed by hyperinflation. Scientific Viewpoints (New York: American Institute of bailouts may represent the largest transfer of If the U.S. federal government is creating Physics) in Valuing the Earth by Herman Daly, MIT Press 1993. public money to private hands in U.S. history. The unsustainable debt, and has unconstitutionally Move Your Money: http://moveyourmoney.info/ and http:// federal government is simultaneously increasing transferred the money-creating power to the www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/move-your- money-a-new-yea_b_406022.html the debt on a massive scale to fight two uncon- private banking system, then hasn’t the federal Wiki quote-Andrew Jackson stitutional wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Since government relinquished its claim to legitimacy http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Andrew_Jackson FA L L 2 0 1 0 VERMONT COMMONS 1 5

Energy Optimist: Shred, Don’t Dread—Combustion-Free Heat for Vermont Gaelan Brown

t’s common knowledge anything, using a local, abundant, renewable to create each of his mounds. He claimed that his Iamong farmers and garden- resource, and the byproduct at the end: high- energy-return-on-energy-invested (EROEI) was ers that compost heaps get yield, soil-building compost. more than 85 percent, meaning that if he spent warm, often warm enough The “Jean Pain Method” is a two-part concept. the equivalent of 15 gallons of gasoline to run to melt all the snow that falls Heat is generated from the anaerobic digestion his truck, chainsaws, and chipper to produce the on them. And over the years, of a specially designed mound of soaked wood shredded biomass, he would get the energy equiv- many Vermont barns have shreds (mulch). The heat is collected by passing alent of 85 gallons of gasoline as a result (energy actually burned because of hay water through the pipes that are coiled through- from the hot water and the methane). or corn silage that had the right conditions (a lot of moisture) to cause the bacte- rial digestion process (composting) to get hot The woodchip mound we built was 14 feet wide at the base and eight feet tall. I can enough to spontaneously combust the material around it. still get half a gallon per minute of 110-115-degree water continuously, 24/7 – more None of this is really news, right? Here’s the news: It is possible to heat your than 700 gallons per day of virtually free hot water. That’s enough to heat 1,000 house and all your domestic hot water by captur- square feet with a radiant-floor heating system. ing heat from a composting mound of biomass in your yard, without burning anything. And we actually built a working prototype of a “Pain Mound” at my house last autumn, which a year out the inside of the mound. There is also a Aside from achieving energy self-sufficiency, later continues to generate 110-plus-degree water sealed inner-chamber placed in the center of the Jean and Ida wrote a book and had a few years of from the waterlines we buried inside it. I can get mound as it is being built, which is then filled fanfare in Europe based on the strong crop-yield more than 700 gallons of 110-degree water per with a manure-slurry, sealed and used to generate results achieved with compost made this way. day from this system. methane-gas. This composting concept defies conventional Like many innovations, this concept is based The heat from the mound creates the ideal thinking that compost must be created with a lot on old knowledge revived. More than 30 years conditions for methane production inside the of nitrogen-rich material mixed in. He proved that ago a French farmer named Jean Pain figured out sealed inner barrel. Jean Pain pumped the meth- low-nitrogen woody biomass can make excep- how to generate hot water and methane from a ane out of the inner barrel through a tube in the tional compost when it is fully digested by bacteria specially designed mound of composting wood top, and compressed and stored it to be used later. in this way. Oh, and by the way, you can heat and shreds. His goal was to build up the soils of his He and his wife, Ida, captured enough natural gas power your entire home too. Sadly, in the early farm with effective composting, but he was also to fuel all of their farm equipment, vehicles, and a 1980s Jean died, cheap oil came back, and like able to power his entire farm and home from the generator (the engines having been converted to other sustainability solutions of the era, the “Jean methane (natural gas) and the hot water that he natural gas), as well as all of their gas for house- Pain Method” seems to have withered on the vine. collected as he made his innovative compost out hold cooking. About a year ago, Ben Falk (Vermont Commons’ of shredded woody biomass. Jean kept careful records regarding the amount “Homestead Security” columnist, who I hope All of this energy came without burning of fuel it took to harvest and shred all the brush continued on page 16

Known as a “Pain Mound,” after French innovator Jean Pain, A thermometer recording the interior temperature of the Pain The Pain Mound under construction, showing the waterline that this unpretentious-looking, but carefully constructed, heap of Mound (115°F). GAELAN BROWN will be covered with woodchips and heated by the biomass- woody biomass can provide virtually free hot water for home composting process. GAELAN BROWN heating. GAELAN BROWN 1 6 VERMONT COMMONS FA L L 2 0 1 0

Energy Optimist, continued from page 15 will soon become Vermont’s secretary of agri- culture) sent me a link to a YouTube documen- tary that showed exactly how Jean Pain built his “Mound de Pain,” including in-depth interviews with him. It was a fascinating story, and I said, “I gotta have one of those!” Then a local arbor- ist told me he had lots of woodchips to get rid of from his tree-service work, and that I could have as many truckloads as I wanted. At that point there was no turning back for me. I had to see if we could make this work. So my wife, Jasna, and I reached out and got help building our Pain Mound from our friends at the Carbon Shredders, Vermont Commons, the Valley Futures Network, SunWood Systems, and Whitney Tree Service. Based on what we learned from our research, we figured out how to coil 400 feet of 1-inch waterline inside a large mound of soaked/packed Pain Mounds can also include a sealed container holding manure; heated by the decomposition process, the manure produces wood chips. And it worked! The buried water methane gas, which can be captured, compressed, and used for fuel. GAELAN BROWN loop – going from our basement, to our mound, and back to the household plumbing – could the mound as a potential methane chamber, but offering a class in October, in which several lucky bring our 48-degree well water up to 110-plus we never loaded it with manure. I wasn’t comfort- students will get a hands-on learning experience degrees, at about one-half a gallon per minute, able experimenting with natural gas, and we were of how to build a “Mound de Pain,” with myself continuously. more focused on making hot water. as the instructor. Check out Yestermorrow.org for A couple of days after we completed our mound, The internal temperature of our mound held more information. its interior had heated up to 90-plus degrees. steady for the first five months, but then we I believe that the opportunities for these kinds Within 10 days it reached 110-plus degrees. The learned why Jean Pain insisted that it was essen- of “innovations” are all around us, but that we woodchip mound we built was 14 feet wide at tial to use finely shredded material (mulch) as must stop waiting for someone else to solve the base and eight feet tall. I can still get half a opposed to the 1-inch-diameter woodchips that our problems. Will BP, the Bank of America, or gallon per minute of 110-115-degree water contin- we used. Woodchips don’t have enough surface Halliburton provide us this kind of energy solu- uously, 24/7, without the mound cooling off. This area for the bacteria to sustain a high level of tion that creates local jobs and uses our local equates to more than 700 gallons per day of virtually activity. So after four or five months and winter renewable resources? Probably not. So let’s get free hot water. This flow rate, if maintained in the weather kicked in, the digestion process in our moving and realize that we can and must come winter, could generate enough Btu-value to heat mound slowed down and it cooled to 65 degrees up with our own solutions, ourselves. This is the about 1,000 square feet with a radiant-floor heat- by the spring. By early summer the temperature same reason that I’m running for Washington ing system, since radiant-floor systems work best was back up to 115-degrees. Jean Pain had several County Senate in November, because I’m not with a slow but steady flow rate and temperature documented successes using finely shredded willing to sit and wait for someone else to solve of 110-120 degrees. This is assuming an average mulch in which the temperature held steady at our problems. Vermont winter and a home with average insu- 130-plus degrees for between 18 and 24 months. Shred, Don’t Dread. lation, according to several radiant-floor experts That means one mound the size of ours could www.GaelanBrown.com • I spoke with. It would be simple to set up a few provide two winters’ worth of heat and hot water, storage tanks in the basement, and circulate water replacing around $5,000 worth of fuel cost. through the mound at a slow but constant rate We are looking forward to rebuilding our into the tanks, ensuring that we would always mound, using shredded mulch from a local have a large amount of hot water on hand. processor who supplies garden stores and land- We did place a 50-gallon drum in the middle of scapers. Yestermorrow Design/Build School is

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Transition Times: Original UK Transition Town Sees 40-Percent Participation Carl Etnier

founding father and Transition Towns arose out of the realization [In Transition Darby,] they are partnering with a Amother of Transition that this change was inevitable and that if we farmer. It’s hilly land, it’s grazing and livestock. visited Vermont in July. responded to it, if we created something, a differ- So they’ve set up a community-supported-agri- The world’s first Transition ent way of living that was more in tune with how culture scheme with this farmer. They are learn- Town grew up in Totnes, UK, the rest of life works on this earth, then we would ing an animal every year as a way to learn how when Rob Hopkins, Naresh be better off. We could create communities that to come together as a community and help this Giangrande, Sophy Banks, and lived well, that lived, in fact, probably better than farmer farm his land. I talked to a woman, Helen, others met and discussed how we do now. So that was the initial realization, that who is in Transition Darby, and she said, “If you’d to prepare for a time of diminishing fossil fuel change was inevitable, and it was better to plan told me two years ago that I was going to be a live- supplies and climate change. Later, they added for it than just to let it happen to us. stock farmer, I’d have just looked you in the face the collapse of a fragile economic system to the and said you’re crazy. But,” she said, “that’s what list of drivers of change. Before long, people What proportion of the people in Totnes would you say I’m doing; it’s a fantastic load of skills to learn.” from all over were contacting them, trying to are involved in some part of the Transition Town learn from the Totnes experiment. To spread activities now? When last we spoke, a year and a half ago, you the ideas, Rob Hopkins wrote The Transition NG: Well, interesting you say that. We just did a introduced your talk by saying that you were here to Handbook. Giangrande and Banks created a two- representative sample survey of Totnes about talk about Transition from A to C because nobody knew day Training for Transition workshop and have five months ago, and what we found was that what it looked like from D to Z. Now where are you in been traveling around the globe, teaching the 75 percent of the people had heard of Transition envisioning the future of Transition? How far down the workshop and training trainers. Town and were supportive of it and thought that alphabet have you come? Giangrande was the featured speaker at the stuff we were doing was good and relevant to NG: I’d say we’ve added a few letters since then. Transition Town Montpelier’s first public event, their lives. And we also found that 40 percent of First of all, what happens when you start getting a in November 2008. In July of this year, he and the people of Totnes had been involved in Transi- number of Transition Towns in an area? There are Banks held a public event in Putney and then tion Town Totnes in some shape or form; either certain properties that emerge from that coming went on a retreat near Montpelier, where they they had spent a Totnes Pound [the local currency together in that large group of people. Local also met with some Transition Town activists one introduced by Transition] or they had come to a government is under a lot of pressure in the UK afternoon. Giangrande sat down with me for an meeting or organized an event or some such at the moment. They’re facing cuts of between 25 interview on the basics of Transition as well as the thing. That’s quite a proportion of our town, and and 40 percent in their budgets. They’re looking latest news. Here are some excerpts. that’s quite a group to reach. to Transition Towns to help them deliver essential services. The reason they can do that is because What is Transition and how did it come about? What are some of the most exciting things going on that there are certain areas in the UK where there Naresh Giangrande: We live in a system, this global- you’ve seen? are a concentration of Transition Towns. Like in ized, industrialized system of an economy that NG: Up in the peat district, Transition Darby, Somerset, and Norfolk. And there’s a possibility requires growth every year. And that worked they’ve started working with some farmers who in Devon, as well. really well for many years. But we’ve reached have been farming organically for many years So that’s one thing that’s emerging – what the point now where we’re at an inflection point. but are getting very old. In the UK, the average happens when you start to have a group of We really need to change this whole globalized, age of farmers is 65. They’re reaching retirement Transition Towns. industrialized system into something else. And age, and they don’t know what to do. They want For more of this interview with Naresh Giangrande to hand off their land to people who are going visit www.equaltimeradio.com and look for the July 19 to farm it in a way sympathetic to their values. program. • 1 8 VERMONT COMMONS FA L L 2 0 1 0

Homestead Security: It’s the Chemicals that are Killing Us—Five All-Star Food-Medicines for New England (Part II of II) Ben Falk

In Part One of this series, Homestead Security colum- tend to be restorative to the soil in which they are nist Ben Falk described the accumulation of chemical grown – not a coincidence, given the co-evolution hazards, often unnoticed, from of humans and plants. decades of industrial and agri- The plants discussed below are just part of a cultural activities, even in rural larger group – allies to the human community, Vermont. Invigorating soil and potential partners in our journey toward reinvig- water systems, while closely build- orating our landscapes and ourselves to become ing our sustenance and health healthier and more vibrant in the generations upon them, will likely become ahead. The information presented here is in part more important than ever before in a future of peak oil derived from Whole Systems Design’s testing of and minerals, rapid climate change, and increasing these species on our research sites in Vermont. biospheric toxicity. Rice paddies in Vermont? In fact, results at research farms look promising for producing brown rice here. If feasible, such Seaberry (Hippophae rhamnoides) s described in the last issue’s “Homestead water-based cropping systems would transform marginal land Thought to originate in Eastern Europe and ASecurity” column, medicinal-quality food that is often considered un-farmable (due to high water table, Siberia, seaberry is found in large expanses across and water are primary defenses against increas- heavy clay soils or tight subsoil) into intensely productive land. Eurasia. Seaberry’s Latin name means “shin- ing toxins in our biosphere. Levels of erosive Rice yields are twice that of terrestrial grain. PHOTO COURTESY OF ing horse”; legend has it that Genghis Khan fed chemicals – those that oxidize and mutate our WHOLE SYSTEMS RESEARCH FARM. his army’s horses seaberry before they entered cells, disturb endocrine system functioning, and into battle. It is a large shrub, growing to about in other ways undermine our health at the cellu- Homestead Security columns from the Fall 2009 10-feet-to-12-feet wide and 12-feet-to-18-feet high lar and macro levels – continue to accumulate through Winter 2010 issues of Vermont Commons (variety-dependent) if left unpruned. The plant in our biosphere as we enter the 21st century. for an overview of these practices). Built upon produces a bright orange berry that ripens in late Reducing the affects of these toxins is possible this foundation of healthy water and soil are summer. by harnessing the remedial qualities of certain foods that are particularly powerful at helping us Seaberry is exceptional in that the plant fixes plants, animals, fungi, and even chemicals pres- maintain and enhance our bodies’ immune and nitrogen in the soil, thereby increasing that key ent in life-sustaining foods and medicines. toxin-resisting responses. These are foods which soil nutrient which almost all other fruiting From a land-use perspective, biologically are nutrient-dense, loaded with living organisms plants actually deplete. Parallel with this soil- active, mineralized soil and living water are the (cultures), antioxidants, essential fatty acids, restorative function, seaberry also aids in cellular foundation of this health, as their vigor promotes amino acids, phytochemicals, bioflavonoids, vita- restoration, a function thought to stem from its the healthful properties of the vegetables, grains, mins, minerals, and micronutrients that support large spectrum of essential fatty acids (unusual fruit, fungi, and meat grown and nurtured in the mind/body in optimal health maintenance. for a fruit) and micronutrients. and on the land. It is unlikely for the produce of These are, of course, whole foods eaten in the land to be healthier than the soil and water from freshest forms possible and prepared in ways that which it is grown, just as it is unlikely for the preserve the enzymes present within them at quality of our own health to be greater than the harvest time, or in ways that actually increase the quality of the foods we consume. Maintaining biological activity of the foods – as with kimchi/ and enhancing our health, therefore, begins sauerkraut and other live-cultured foods. One can with land-management practices that restore and think of these “superfoods” as sources of “good develop ever-healthier biological communities chemicals” countering the influence of oxidizing which compose the land system. We can think and mutagenic chemicals, which degrade – rather of healthy ecosystems as the front line of toxic than bolster – our bodies’ functions. resistance; for every coal or nuclear power plant, In this column I will focus on a selection of we need, say, a million more acres of vigorous underutilized plant crops that can be grown on Seaberry is one of the few fruits that actually build soil (rather ecosystem from which we might cultivate the most sites in New England, and which people than depleting it). Seaberry fixes nitrogen and yields a fruit health and resilience impaired by those facilities. can cultivate without an overwhelming commit- packed with essential fatty acids, a large mineral and vitamin At the homestead level this toxic resistance is ment of time and resources. These crops repre- spectrum, and potent antioxidants. PHOTO COURTESY OF WHOLE rooted in soil- and water-enhancing activities (see sent unusually powerful food-medicines that also SYSTEMS RESEARCH FARM. FA L L 2 0 1 0 VERMONT COMMONS 1 9

The restorative quality of seaberry has been vigorous clumping shrub, six-to-12 feet in width ribes in various configurations and finds that appreciated for decades, if not centuries, in Russia, by six-to-16 feet in height if left unpruned. You can these species generally favor mounded sites with where the plant pharmacopeia is highly evolved. think of elderberry as a shade-tolerant seaberry consistent moisture. This can be achieved in Russian doctors have administered seaberry to that can also tolerate moist (though not inundated) on-contour swales, a form of earthwork that can patients facing environmental stresses, includ- soils, even with large amounts of clay and shade be highly restorative for New England’s sloping ing cosmonauts, Olympic athletes, and people present. Its small, dark berries are harvested from soils, as the swales catch surface water before it suffering from radiation poisoning. Seaberry clumps which hold the flower heads in midsum- runs off the land. contains about 15 times the Vitamin C of the mer. Elderberries, like other strongly pigmented Like all other colorful fruits described here, same quantity of oranges, and is extremely high berries, are rich in bioflavonoids, phytochemicals ribes are high in vitamins, minerals, and anti- in essential saturated and polyunsaturated fats, and other antioxidant-containing compounds, oxidant, cancer cell-resisting factors. Its fruit is carotenoids, amino acids, and many micronutri- as well as vitamins and minerals. Many parts enjoyed by people fond of tart flavors, although ents. Of particular interest are seaberry’s likely of the plant are useful medicinally, including some varieties are sweeter and not so tart. The anti-cancer benefits, which are currently being the berries, flowers, and bark. Interestingly, the tartest varieties, like certain black currants, are researched. Unfortunately, Seaberry’s legendary flowers contain compounds used as compost- particularly useful for jams and jellies and are healing properties have led to over-harvesting accelerators commercially, so the odd flower or generally considered to be the most medicinal, as in many areas of Europe; the plant is considered two in your compost heap could be of significant evidenced by their dark pigmentation. endangered in Hungary, though China has more value, like comfrey. Elderberry, like seaberry than 600,000 hectares of it planted in dry regions and many lesser-bred varieties of minor fruits, is Hazelnut (Corylus cornuta) of the country. nearly disease-free and can thrive with little care Of all the powerful health-promoting plant Seaberry is uniquely valuable in New England if planted correctly and weed-suppressed in the species available to us, only a small number for several reasons: it fixes nitrogen; it is highly first year or two. Pruning needs are minimal, and produce food-medicines dense in proteins and drought tolerant and tolerant of poor, dry soils; elderberry is easy to harvest. it is extremely hardy and able to tolerate high winds, salt, and cold to about zone 3 (around Currants and Gooseberries (Ribes species) -40ºF). Seaberry will not tolerate wet soils and The Ribes species represent one of the only vigor- does poorly in the shade (needing sunlight for ous, reliably easy-to-grow superfruits possible in about three quarters of the day). Most sources the New England climate that, like elderberry, list seaberry as being intolerable of clay, but our can tolerate significant shade. They are happier in research has shown that it may be grown on full sun in northern New England but can do well compacted clay soils if planting depth, amending, in half-day sun the likes of which will lead to very poor harvests of blueberry, raspberry, blackberry, seaberry and almost any fruit tree. These plants are hardy to a wide range of soils, though they cannot withstand droughty, sandy environments like many nitrogen-fixing plants. Ribes species Hazelnut – one of the few home-scale options for producing have been held in high regard in most Northern invaluable, nutrient-dense plant oil in Vermont. PHOTO COURTESY OF European countries for generations, as they can WHOLE SYSTEMS RESEARCH FARM. tolerate significant cold (hardy to zone 4, easily), cloudiness, and lack of heat for ripening, as well as fats. Hazelnut is one of these, and perhaps the diseases that predominate in cool, moist climates. only one that is productive in a short timeframe, Ribes are compact shrubs easily kept at three- a result of its shrub formation; all other nuts in to-four feet wide by three-to-five feet tall, and can this climate are tree-form and longer to bearing. be integrated into small spaces easily. They do Hazelnut oil is arguably the most valuable well as small hedge borders and are used as such food-medicine produced by this plant, although Seaberry, elderberry, aronia, and blackberry – a small sample throughout many Scandinavian cities in small the nut is of high value to humans and wildlife of healing plants that can help restore our health in an age urban lots. Ribes fruit is generally tart, although alike. The oil is dense in essential fatty acids disease and degradation. PHOTO COURTESY OF WHOLE SYSTEMS RESEARCH gooseberry is less so than currant, with black while the nut meat is high in protein and fats. An FARM. currant being the most tart compared to red and abundance of minerals and micronutrients is also white. made available from the soil, rain, and sunshine and mulching strategies are done specific to these While new to North American growers in by hazelnut. conditions. Whole Systems Design is testing general, ribes have adapted well in New England, Although this plant has been native to the seaberry in hedgerows as windbreaks and living depending on soil and sun situation. Whole New England region for centuries and possibly fences, and in conjunction with sheep and goats Systems Design’s Research Farm has planted longer, its cultivation commercially, or even by to determine browse-resistance, palatability, and the modern small-scale subsistence grower, has use as a fodder crop for livestock medicine. been almost nonexistent. We are experimenting Seaberry will likely be of great import in a post- with growing corylus in hedgerow patterns to Peak Oil homestead and economy for its medici- figure out its optimal site, soils, harvesting, and nal, food, soil-restoration, and animal-fodder/ interactions with other species. Hedgerows offer medicinal values. There exist few better ways microclimate benefits, enhanced yield density, to extend abundant nutrients produced in the and snow-fencing functions. This medium-to- growing season into the dormant season than large shrub seems to favor a multiple-stem habit by drying and juicing nutrient-dense produce for maximum yield; well-drained loams are ideal, (berries in particular). Seaberry may be superior but a large array of soil types is possible, given to most other crops, currently or potentially in appropriate amendments, earthworks, and water use, in this regard. availability.

Elderberry (Sambucus Canadensis) Currants and gooseberries. A classic example of “missing” Amaranth (Amaranthus species) Vermonters and others across the cold-climate food plants on the North American continent, these have been Another rare plant for this region – in that it world have been cultivating and wild-foraging popular yard staples for generations in Northern Europe. PHOTO synthesizes high levels of protein – amaranth will elderberry for millennia. Elderberry grows as a COURTESY OF WHOLE SYSTEMS RESEARCH FARM. continued on page 20 2 0 VERMONT COMMONS FA L L 2 0 1 0

Homestead Security, continued from page 19 climates of the world. More research and breed- be of increasing importance for health enhance- ing is needed to further the human-amaranth ments as well as local and regional food security, co-evolution and potential value for cold-climate for several reasons: it can be grown on marginal human settlements. soils if nitrogen is well supplied (unlike most grains); it can be stored for long periods of time Diversity and Vigor: Response to Toxicity with no energy input; it is the most protein-rich “The greatest service which can be rendered grain in known existence (higher than quinoa); any country is to add a useful plant to its [agri]culture.” -- Thomas Jefferson

These five plants represent a small sampling of the options available for adapting to the increas- ing rate of change and adversity brought about by both natural cycles and the terminal phase of industrial empire. Other options – includ- ing honeyberry, shiitake and many other mush- rooms, styrian pumpkin (for seed), chestnut, nut Shiitake mushrooms contain 30-percent protein and grow at pine and many other nuts and seeds, along with 45°F in dense shade upon wood – making them an optimal a selection of powerful vegetables and animal crop for Vermont, post-Peak Oil. PHOTO COURTESY OF WHOLE SYSTEMS foods – will be harnessed as a new era of land- RESEARCH FARM. based toxic resistance is mounted. Loaded with crucial fat and protein, amaranth is a super grain Increasing our prospects to survive and thrive The Take-Make-Waste operating system of surpassing even quinoa in most regards, with a nutrient spec- depends upon expanding our sustenance possi- industrial society has amassed an unprecedented trum closer to a nut than a typical grain. Here it is seen trialed bilities – the options that each food-fuel species, challenge for humanity: invigorate or devolve. in the leach-field garden at Whole System Design’s research variety, and production system represents. Every Avoiding a future of mass cancer, mutation, farm in Moretown. PHOTO COURTESY OF WHOLE SYSTEMS RESEARCH FARM. food and fuel plant, animal, and fungus species obesity, and a general perversion of the human (and variety) represent options for enhancing condition will rely upon a human-ecosystem and it is abundant in many vitamins, miner- the critical link between humans and their envi- response harnessing the most potently regenera- als, and complex carbohydrates. Amaranth is ronment. The development of this cornucopia tive land, water, and human-health-promoting 15-percent protein, contains lysine (which most allows us to expand the length of our growing systems and species. We can respond by allying grains lack), and is gluten-free. season, the range and density of our nutrition, ourselves not with any political party or version Amaranth arguably (possibly along with rice) and the variety of our fuel sources – which, taken of Bigness, but with Smallness and the particu- stands alone in its high potential as an energy together, enables us to increase the resilience of lars of a living place – soil, plants, animals, fungi, (carbohydrate) crop for the post-Peak Oil home the human ecosystem and its ability to cope with water, and other forces in the web of life on this and community-scale food system in the cold change. still-breathing planet. • FA L L 2 0 1 0 VERMONT COMMONS 2 1

Localvore Living: Expanding the Localvore Circle in Vermont Robin McDermott

he two biggest barriers to than 3 percent of the average Vermonter’s food 20 percent, from a Localvore’s standpoint the Tthe local-food movement budget goes toward local food purchases? The question remains the same: How do we get more have always been cost and time: answer is that we need to adapt the local-food people to eat more local food? the often-higher cost of local economy to Vermonters’ lifestyles, rather than Recently, I was in the huge Shaw’s grocery food compared to food from asking Vermonters to adapt their lifestyle to local store in Waterbury and I observed several people industrial agriculture, and the food as we have been doing for the past five years. shopping in the produce department. The vegeta- time it takes to prepare whole Since the Localvore movement got underway bles were beautiful and people were filling their foods compared to readymade carts with tomatoes, lettuce, and other seasonal foods and highly processed produce. What would it take to get those people foods that can become a meal in minutes. For We need to adapt the local-food to buy local tomatoes over the California variety the past five years, the Localvore movement has economy to Vermonters’ lifestyles, they were grabbing? My question was answered worked to reduce the perception of those barriers when I noticed a beautiful display of zucchini that by showing people how to eat local on a budget rather than asking Vermonters to adapt was identified as coming from Sam Mazza’s farm and how to quickly prepare local meals. But there in Colchester. A mother with two kids in tow was is more to being a Localvore than that. their lifestyle to local food, as we have carefully selecting zucchini and putting them The truth is that being a Localvore is not easy, been doing for the past five years. into her basket. and this is probably why at best 10 percent to 15 There was the answer: convenience and price. percent of Vermonters are truly committed to The Mazza’s zucchini looked good, it didn’t buying and eating local food. It takes a lot of time in Vermont five years ago, our message has been require a special trip to the farm, and it was to source and prepare local food. For example, I that people need to change the way that they shop being sold at a price that was comparable to other love going to the farmers’ market on Saturday for food. Instead of one-stop shopping at the local zucchini. morning, but by the time I drive to the market, grocery store chain, we told people to get their If we have any hope of Localvorism going purchase everything that I need and visit with produce at the farmers’ market, at farm stands, beyond the committed local-food buyers, we friends along the way, half of Saturday (or 25 or grow their own. When we heard the all-too- need local food to be more accessible and afford- percent of my weekend) is gone. familiar excuse that local food was too expensive, able (and, I am not suggesting that farmers make I realized this in the spring when my husband we suggested people change their diets or eat less money). We need to bring local food to where and I put together an aggressive list of things that lower on the hog, so to speak. I even suggested people shop and not ask people to shop where we needed to do around the house this summer. in presentations and articles that we should be local food is. If local food was more convenient, If we had any chance of completing the list of eating more like peasants. more people would purchase it – not necessarily projects, we were going to need to cut back on I was brought to my senses when someone because it is local, but because it is there when our time at the farmers’ market on Saturdays. asked me what portion of people in Vermont is they need it. Is that bad? I don’t think so. Not Instead, what I started doing was making a run truly committed to buying local food. Heck, just everyone has the time to connect with their local through our town on Friday morning stopping about everyone that I know is, but what about all farmer every time they want to make a salad. at various farms to pick up flowers, eggs, cheese, of those people buying produce at the grocery I realize that what I am suggesting is not a syrup, vegetables, meat, and milk. It turns out store in the peak of the summer? My best guess simple task. But if we truly want all Vermonters that there was no time savings; it still took the (as noted above) was that about 10 percent to 15 eating more local food, then we need to broaden better part of the morning to complete my rounds percent of people in our community are commit- our thinking about how we are going to achieve and I burned a lot of gas in the process. ted to buying local food, and I expect that is the that. It is time to start looking more deeply into The Localvore movement has successfully same for the rest of Vermont. In fact, several what it is really going to take to make eating local picked the low-hanging fruit, you might say. But experts I have talked with agree with my esti- a reality on every Vermonter’s plate. • how are we going to go beyond that so that more mate. Whether it is 5 percent, 10 percent, or even 2 2 VERMONT COMMONS FA L L 2 0 1 0

Vermont Vox Populi: Broadcasting Media for Democracy – An Interview with CCTV’s Lauren-Glenn Davitian Rob Williams

As Vermont’s flagship community cable television community access channels and a percent- station, what exactly does Burlington-based CCTV do? age of cable company revenue for public use. Lauren-Glenn Davitian: CCTV Center for Media Community cable TV is like a public park or & Democracy, www.cctv.org, is a free-speech a public boat launching area; it’s the way we organization that opens the door for community get to access and use what is essentially public activists, local government and nonprofit orga- property. nizations to increase their reach and impact. We started some of Vermont’s first community access And the Internet seems to be changing the rules of the channels in 1984 and today we operate Chan- game. nel 17/ Town Meeting Television (a regional LGD: In some ways, yes. You ask, why does this government-access TV channel, www.channel matter in the Internet age? Because there is no 17.org), CCTV Productions (a media produc- equivalent in the internet age. The FCC does tion company), and Common Good Vermont not require internet providers to set aside band- Meet the spiritual godmother of Vermont community cable (a nonprofit capacity-building project, http:// width and revenue for public purposes, even television, Lauren-Glenn Davitian. CCTV commongoodvt.org). though they, too, are using public rights of way! Community access is an oasis on the increasingly LGD: I’ll try to make it short. When I was at the So in the age of the Internet, why does community cable commercialized communications networks and University of Vermont I studied anthropology television matter? it must, at all costs, be preserved. The ultimate and started to document the changing life of LGD: There are now 24 community media centers objective of CCTV and access advocates across the people in Winooski, Vermont. I was very operating 44 public, educational, and govern- the country is to require public access to all tele- interested in how to let them tell their own stories ment-access channels across the state of Vermont communications networks. I am not sure we will through audio and video, and began to see a vital – a vibrant network of community building be able to achieve this in the upcoming rewrite connection between free speech and a commu- across the state. These channels exist because of the Federal Communications Act, but we are nity’s ability to determine its own future. cable operators use the public rights of way to working toward this. If we don’t we may lose this string their cable and offer commercial services – precious access to our public property. Nice. cable, and now the internet. LGD: When I discovered John Grierson (founder The Federal Communications Commission Some refer to you as the “spiritual godmother of Vermont of the British Film Board, Canadian Film Board, (FCC) requires the cable operators to set aside community cable.” How did you get involved in CCTV? and producer of many influential documentaries) FA L L 2 0 1 0 VERMONT COMMONS 2 3

Yeah, Stoney was a real visionary, by all accounts. LGD: Putting all of this together, I marched to Cox Cable in 1983 and asked for the channels, equip- ment, and money necessary to open the airwaves for the people of Chittenden County, Vermont. They were not very responsive and thought that I’d just go away. Instead, we got organized and with other like-minded free speechers, organized CCTV and made a compelling case to the Vermont Public Service Board. They supported our request and required Cox Cable to provide funding and channels in Burlington, Montpelier, Middlebury, and Rutland. More channels followed.

Vermont is blessed with more than two dozen community cable TV stations around the Green Mountains. How do you account for this burgeoning interest and involvement? LGD: More channels followed those first four because Vermont people like to talk things over and make up their own minds about important issues. If offered the opportunity to watch their local government and neighbors and even to speak their own mind, they are willing to pay a small fee on their cable bill to do it. It makes sense Stella Rose, daughter of Lauren-Glenn Davitian and WDEV radio host Mark Johnson, celebrates 25 years of CCTV. LAUREN-GLENN as a cost-effective way to control and manage DAVITIAN their own local media network.

I got really excited, because in the 1930s he talked Through this line of study, I learned about How has the coming of Web 2.0 convergence culture about the power of democratic media to make a George Stoney and how he started the public transformed community cable television? How has difference. He said, “Once good feelings and good access TV movement in the U.S., using many the role of community cable changed over the years? ideas move like wildfire across the democratic of Grierson’s principles and lessons from the LGD: Public access TV channels have evolved into sky, we are halfway towards building a commu- Canadian Film Board’s “Challenge for Change” community media centers that remain open to all nity worth living in.” project. continued on page 24 2 4 VERMONT COMMONS FA L L 2 0 1 0

Vermont Vox Populi, continued from page 23 slow attrition, our media programs will move members of the community and offer an increas- off the cable networks and to the Internet, and ing range of digital production tools, new media the precedent and revenue for our channels may strategy and training, and online (as well as no longer exist. This is why we need to fight TV channel) distribution. We continue to work to expand public access to all communications together to serve our communities. For example, carriers. all of Vermont’s media centers share the Vermont Media Exchange, which enables us to distribute How do you know that the work you are doing has an community programs to channels across the impact at the local, state and national level? state! LGD: We know we make a local impact because many, many people tell us that Channel 17 is the

Slowly, through outright legislation or attrition, our media programs will move off the cable networks and to the Internet, and the precedent and revenue for our channels may no longer exist. This is why we need to fight to expand public access to all communications carriers.

Looking ahead, what are the biggest challenges to “go to” channel for local elections and public community cable television in Vermont? meeting coverage. A 2009 Comcast survey shows LGD: The biggest challenge is the cable indus- that 30 percent of cable viewers watch commu- state and country are able to generate the view- try’s argument to the feds that they should nity access channels in Chittenden County and ership and involvement that comes from the free not be required to provide public, educational, across the state. We know that 8,000 viewers flow of information, the opportunity to speak and government-access channels. They claim come to www.cctv.org every month and watch freely, and the tools to mobilize supporters to that it makes it more difficult to compete our programs there. Dozens of people attend our make change happen. with satellite providers (who do not have the Media Maven and video training. Local govern- same requirement), and they, increasingly, are ment officials know that we are reliable way to Thanks for talking with us, and for all of your vital “media moving programming to Internet services that reach their residents. and democracy” work. do not have the same public-access require- I believe that this change is best measured LGD: Thank you. • ments. Slowly, through outright legislation or locally. Other local access channels across the FA L L 2 0 1 0 VERMONT COMMONS 2 5

The Greenneck: Sitting by the Sugarhouse Ben Hewitt

didn’t find the old sugar- in the big rig, sat up late as steam rose high I want to live my life honestly. Not only in I house foundation until the into the night sky. What might they have been my relationships to other humans, but also third or fourth summer we thinking? Of the morning chores that would in my relationships to the animals and land lived on our land. Unlike so come all too soon? Of what they’d buy with around me. For as much as other people, they many things I don’t do, or the syrup money? Surely they wondered over are what sustain me, and they deserve noth- don’t do until much later than the weather, hoping for another sap run or two ing less. Indeed, I deserve nothing less. This one might expect, this was not before the maples budded out and the season seems if nothing else an obvious truth, a clear due to laziness; after all, we ended as abruptly as it had begun. and necessary path, and yet it is too often lost were building a house at the Our house is built now, or close enough to it, in the hurried, day-to-day rushing from chore time. For a while there, strolling in the woods and so on occasion I walk down to the founda- to chore. was not particularly high on the priority list. tion and perch myself on one of those stones. So every so often I walk down to the old The foundation is tucked into a stand of mature It is a luxury, I know, to take this time. But I sugarhouse foundation and sit. And I feel the balsam fir, a handful of which have grown up do not sit for long: ten, maybe fifteen minutes. unshakable integrity of those stones, stacked inside of it, towering high above a roofline that Just enough to sense that depth of history, to by hand, pulled by the hoof of some loyal beast. is visible only in the mind’s eye. The sugaring rig be comforted by the knowledge that someone I imagine I can see the structure that has long is still there, rusted and listing, slowly return- worked this land before me. since fallen away and been consumed by the ing to the rich soil like the bones of some great Enough to be reminded that the things I expe- forest, and I consider the work of it all: the saw beast. There is no evidence of the wooden struc- rience – the quiet satisfactions, the dispiriting blade back-and-forth, back-and-forth, the bit of ture that once stood atop the stacked fieldstone, setbacks, the occasional whooping joys – are the axe rising and falling, again and again and but I can imagine its rough form, the beams and nothing new to this place. It has seen them all, again. The buckets of sap heavy and sloshing, 30 boards hewn by the stroke of the broad axe and time and again, and the record of mine will or more gallons to make just one of syrup, most stained by the sweat of the task. merely be added to the records of those that of it to be boiled away, rising into the air as if it It was for the syrup – or the money the syrup have come before me: A tumbledown fieldstone were nothing at all. would bring – that someone gathered and foundation, almost lost to the forest. A farm And at the end of the night, with the fire gone arranged those hundreds of stones. It was for implement, broken into pieces and half buried at cold and the March sky a cold blanket of stars, this that someone felled the trees and shaped the edge of a field. A rusted metal chair perched all that will remain is the sweet distillation of the wood, hung and gathered the buckets, cut at the height of a wooded knoll: Who put that these efforts. The honest return on an honest and piled the sugaring wood, stoked the fire there, and for what? investment. • 2 6 VERMONT COMMONS FA L L 2 0 1 0 FA L L 2 0 1 0 VERMONT COMMONS 2 7

Letters, continued from page 3 rope, rigging, and sails. All the great paintings of Instead of arresting almost a million Americans harvests from 100 man hours to one hour and did Rembrandt, Van Gogh, etc., were done on canvas every year on cannabis charges at a cost of $50,000 not want competition with his petroleum-based (cannabis). The Conestoga wagons that tamed per inmate, not to mention billions more on law clothing), along with Hearst, who did his lurid the west were covered in hemp canvas. enforcement costs, we need to change a failed, “reefer madness” scare stories in his yellow press When the Japanese took over the Philippines flawed policy that has continued for over 73 years. newspaper chain, and Secretary of the Treasury (cutting off our supply of manila and jute) during Insanity has been defined as repeating the same Andrew Mellon, to create the Marijuana Tax Act World War II the U.S. gave out tons of hemp seeds behavior and expecting different results, and all of 1937. That also was the year that Henry Ford to 4-H clubs and farmers throughout the Midwest we get is more money wasted and lives ruined created a car that was made of 50-percent hemp to help with the war effort by creating rope and because of prohibition. and ran on 100-percent hemp fuel. rigging for the navy. It was considered so patriotic A revived cannabis industry could create tens Is it surprising that after 73 years of prohibition, that hemp farmers were excused from military of millions of good-paying non-outsourceable wasting tens of billions of dollars and arresting service. When George H. W. Bush parachuted jobs and help save the environment at the same tens of millions of Americans, the result is more from his plane, the straps were made of hemp and time. Hemp paper, unlike tree paper, does not crime, corruption, and violence? In just the last saved his life. require toxic chlorine in its manufacture. Hemp four years more people have been killed in the The Partnership for a Drug Free America needs a small amount of natural fertilizer to grow “War on Drugs” (80 percent spent on cannabis consists of Big Oil, Big Pharma, alcohol and instead of using all kinds of toxic chemicals in the eradication), than 9/11, Iraq, and Afghanistan tobacco industries, as they don’t want their prof- manufacture of other products. Cannabis is good combined! its diminished by the utilization of cannabis. If for the economy and the environment. The first thing ever printed was Guttenberg’s we changed from a fossil fuel-based economy to a If Vermont does decide to secede from the Bible – on hemp paper. The first drafts of the hemp-based one it would solve energy and other American Empire, ending cannabis prohibition Declaration of Independence and the Constitution national security issues, as we can be self-suffi- should be among the top agendas for the indepen- were written on hemp paper, and Betsy Ross’ flag cient and grow our own energy and don’t need to dent Republic of Vermont. It would not only help was made of hemp. Hemp paper is stronger and bleed billions of dollars a day to countries with oil save the family farm but increase it many-fold. I lasts 10 times longer than tree paper. Hemp can that dislike us. The ramifications of a hemp-based envisage having five factory processing plants in be produced annually, but it takes 20 years for economy could even affect global climate change. north, east, south, west, and in central Vermont. trees to mature (which we need in the ground Beginning over a century ago, every govern- Farmers could take their harvests to be processed for oxygen). The flagship of America’s navy – ment and scientific study has shown only bene- into food, fuel, fiber, medicine, and the 50,000 the USS Constitution – had over 90 tons of hemp ficial applications. When the British army was other industrial uses. Plastics, for example, could in India, there was concern about the amount be made from polymerized cannabis. Spin-off of soldiers smoking ganja. So the British Indian industries would create a goldmine for new jobs Hemp Commission of 1898 did a study and and businesses while preserving the environment found only beneficial medical applications. at the same time. I say it’s time to end prohibition Mayor LaGuardia of New York in the 1920s had now. a study done which recommended its continued With all the known uses for cannabis, hemp, use. The same was true under Nixon’s Shafer a.k.a. marijuana, it is insane not to utilize this Commission, which recommended decriminal- wondrous, versatile plant. It is time to re-legalize ization. President Carter once said “the penalties this plant to serve man as God intended. (Genesis against a drug (marijuana) shouldn’t be worse 1-29: “And God said behold, I have given you than its use.” every herb bearing seed.”) Under President Clinton, drug czar Gen. Barry If you doubt my thoughts on the subject of prohi- McCaffrey wanted to stop states from legal- bition, then [check this out, from the law-enforce- izing medicinal marijuana and commissioned ment perspective]. Law Enforcement Against the National Academy of Sciences’ prestigious Prohibition (http://www.leap.cc/cms/index.php) Institute of Medicine to do an exhaustive two- has a 12- minute intro video on their homepage. year study. Their three most-salient findings were Walter Cronkite said of this, “Anyone concerned that cannabis is not addictive, is not a gateway about the failure of our $69-billion-a-year War on drug, and has beneficial medical applications. The Drugs should watch this. It is a must-see for any DEA’s own Judge Francis L. Young called it “the journalist or public official dealing with this issue.” safest therapeutic substance known to mankind.” Denny Lane Cannabis is so safe that there has never been an Warren overdose in history. (802-496-2387, [email protected])

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Dispersions: Walking the Talk? Here’s What They’re Saying About Secession Kirkpatrick Sale

ou might all be interested, and proud, to know that right now Vermont some with political passion, to a degree that would have been unimaginable Yhas the standout secessionist organization in the country, a beacon for five years ago. And when you figure that this is an idea still an anathema for the movement. much of the country, ignorant as they are about it, so much attention is really There is some action elsewhere. The folks in the Texas Nationalist remarkable. Movement who have opened a “prototype” office in Nederland, southeast The best way is to follow this outpouring is on the extraordinarily thor- Texas, are suing Mexico for the return of artifacts taken from the Alamo ough and very valuable website created by South Carolinian Bill Miller at 175 years ago, and continue with their petition for a referendum on Texas SecessionNews.com. (He also has a site called SecessionUniversity.com, where secession. The Alaska Independence Party ran candidates for offices in the he intends to archive all the postings that he puts up on his other site, plus other recent primary, garnering 4 percent of the vote, and has a candidate for the secession-related material. They didn’t have that 150 years ago.) Beyond that, there are a half-dozen other chief sites for secession discussions: DumpDC. com, LibertyDefenseLeague.com., Palmettorepublic.org, Athousandnations. Ours is a world of decentralization, flexibility, and choice. com, LewRockwell.com, and TenthAmendmentCenter.com To secede is to look forward; to support a Byzantine and Below are a few recent sample selections from those sites to give you an idea of the kind of chatter that’s out there. unlawful empire is to look backward. —Wilton Strickland • Wilton Strickland, Liberty Defense League (libertydefenseleague.com) governorship this fall. The Puerto Rican Independence Party was a strong From a moral perspective, secession is legitimate because government is only supporter of the student strike at the University of Puerto Rico this spring, a means to achieve human happiness, not an end that requires sacrificing our in which students eventually won significant concessions. The Palmetto happiness on a government altar… Modern secession would be legitimate Republic organizers in South Carolina had a demonstration on July 3 for because it seeks to honor the Constitution and reject a renegade government Secession Day 2010. that desecrates it… Modern government clearly has breached the constitu- And that’s that. For all the talk about secession these days – and it’s agreed tional contract, so government has no . . . argument to keep us from leaving. that there’s more of that than any time since, let’s say, 1860 – there’s not that I venture that a new American republic carved from the old one would serve much action going on. Only Vermont has mounted a serious and potentially the Constitution’s ideals more faithfully than anything we’ve witnessed in important political assault. That’s the good news, and the bad. our lifetimes. But if there’s more talk than action in the secession movement, it is also Yet the psychological hurdle remains, largely out of the fear that a seceding true that there is a great deal of talk. A lot of thoughtful people all over the territory will prove racist, corrupt, or oppressive. The strongest response to country are looking at all aspects of secession, some with scholarly attention, qualms of this sort is that secession creates more choices, and membership is optional. A new republic carved out of the old one would not compel anyone to join or penalize anyone for trying to leave (something that the current regime cannot say for itself). One more reason for secession cannot go ignored: It is the wave of the future. The past few decades have witnessed the collapse of bloated centers of power, yielding a constellation of new nation-states with no need or desire to assert the global dominance that the American political class clutches to its chest. This sort of dominance is a relic that cannot withstand the new competitive environment or the onrush of technology that further empow- ers us to exchange ideas, goods, and money as we see fit. Ours is a world of decentralization, flexibility, and choice. To secede is to look forward; to support a Byzantine and unlawful empire is to look back- ward. Yes, my friends, it is time to get serious about secession.

• Russell Longcore, DumpDC Secession is the hope for humanity. Who will be first?

• Bill Miller, Secessionuniversity.com Secession—the right to it, the lingering threat of it—is what gives ultimate power to the people in a political system. The right to secede gives the people control, as the ultimate influence, over their government instead of the other way around. It implies a continual assent from the people that, for the moment, this government is the best one we can envision, and if it’s not, we have a right to either change it or form a new one more responsive to, and reflective of, our common needs.

• Chuck Baldwin, Liberty Defense League People all over America are discussing freedom’s future. In short, they are worried. In fact, many are actually talking about State secession. In coffee shops and cafes, and around dining room tables, millions of people are speak- ing favorably of states breaking away from the union. Not since the turn of the twentieth century have this many people thought (and spoken) this favorably about the prospect of a State (or group of states) exiting the union. In my mind, this is a good thing. Good, indeed. • 3 2 VERMONT COMMONS FA L L 2 0 1 0