A Day to Run Away, A Day to Move Forward

First, a quick apology to those of you looking forward to a live blog from the State House yesterday. We ran into some significant technical issues that could not be resolved on site. So once again, my apologies.

Yesterday, as you all are aware, 61 members of the House voted to uphold Governor Douglas’ veto of the comprehensive energy efficiency and global warming bill. In spite of overwhelming scientific evidence pointing to the need for action and massive public support for the bill, these legislators buckled under the weight of special interest pressure.

Also, 50 members of the House voted against overriding Governor Douglas’ veto of the Campaign Finance bill. Perhaps with an eye on larger campaign donations from PACs and political parties, they once again decided to vote against the public interest.

Feel me building a rhythm here?

Finally, even after the pieces of the global warming bill that Governor Douglas deemed most offensive were taken out of the bill, 54 legislators could still not see their way clear though the heat, humidity and fog of special interest influence to do what’s right for Vermont.

In other words, they ran away.

They ran away from the facts and from the great weight of public opinion.

In fact, you can watch Governor Douglas showing them how to do it by running away from a polar bear and Bill McKibben right here:



However, it was also a day to move forward.

More than 400 Vermonters turned out yesterday to show their support for pro-active change in the way we do business, including Bill McKibben and a really cute polar bear who was sadly rejected by her legislators:

We lobbied our legislators, we showed our support to the heroes of this bill, and we made our positions known. We made it clear that the agents of business-as-usual and influence peddling are not the only voices in the State House. The people, too, have a voice and a say and if anything is clear from yesterday’s events it is that the while the enemies of progress won a victory, they are not going to win the war.

In other words, I think we’ll look back on the day as a last chance for those who do not believe in global warming or fair elections to celebrate victory in Vermont.

For the rest of us, it was our day to move forward.

Check out what Bill McKibben had to say at an historic address in the well of the House after the vote:

Thank you again everyone for coming together on a stormy afternoon and helping us push Vermont forward and make the future we all deserve.