Democrats will send a message
Toolbox
Published: July 3, 2006
Vermonters must send a firm message to Washington, D.C. this November by electing both Peter Welch and Bernie Sanders.
Working together with a Democratic majority, they will help stop the corruption and illegal practices being promoted by the Republican Party.
Do you hear Vermont Republicans calling for investigations into where missing billions of dollars from Iraq and Katrina went or complaining about the loss of yet more federal dollars to help Vermonters?
I ask you: which is the greatest threat to your way of life: same-sex marriage, flag burning, no health insurance, or bringing our troops home safely from an illegal war? No exit plan three years later ... but it doesn't seem to bother the Republicans (do you hear Martha Rainville or Rich Tarrant calling for an exit plan? I don't.) They might if their own children were at risk.
I still remember the last troops coming home from Vietnam hanging precariously from the helicopters. Evidently they don't. I remember the young girl, on fire, running down the road after being burned by napalm. It's been renamed "white phosphorus" for use in Iraq. Depleted uranium (cancer and birth defects) put our troops and their families in grave danger. Are the Republicans talking about this, or is "supporting our troops" only a bumper sticker to them?
Instead of using "wedge" issues to pit people against each other, let's concentrate on policies that bring us together — basic health care for all, a well educated workforce to keep our young people in Vermont that will entice companies to move here, and fair taxation (no more tax breaks for the rich at the expense of the working (wo)man).
Vermont Republicans are busy on the phones ... with polls (called push-polls) that will ask you questions that are supposedly rhetorical in nature (outrageous example: Would you vote for Bernie Sanders or Peter Welch if you knew they beat their wives?) ... but designed to denigrate one candidate while promoting another.
Both Rainville and Tarrant are trying to slide away from Bush Administration policies while Rainville has both hands out for money from the worst offenders. Tarrant, of course, is vowing to spend at least $10 million of his own considerable fortune, while building another multimillion dollar home in Florida. Strange? You bet.
BARBARA A. MACINTYRE
Bennington
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