Thank you to everyone who helped out by organizing their towns and participating in our first official state committee meeting.

You can now view the new VTLP Executive Committee and VTLP Town Chairs lists at:

http://www.vtlp.org/organization

Those members that would like to join the general discussion group, please let me know and I can add you. It’s open to all. Also, don’t forget to “Like” our facebook page.

In Liberty,

Jeremy Ryan
chair@vtlp.org

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Vermont Libertarian Party
53 Avenue C
Burlington, Vermont 05408
Phone: (802) 735-2149
Web: www.vtlp.org
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Of even greater concern is the administration of our laws. Our attorney general is supposed to defend the state, but has not sued the federal government for assailing the health care programs our legislature has created. Worse yet, with some 80 attorneys scattered in every department of government, the equal access to justice is unbalanced with some civil offences taking priority over more serious matters. The progressive candidate wants greater enforcement and more regulation of the clean water and clean air acts, further reducing opportunities for jobs in Vermont as her backers in CLF desire. Particularly irksome is the republican candidate alleging I am not qualified for attorney general to LSC republicans. Sadly I was not invited to the publicly funded AG debate on VPR to refute the lie. Yet, he has only been in Vermont for three years and has far fewer legal degrees than I do and much less relevant experience. His is limited to a small corner of his duties as an assistant states attorney.

Vermont needs some fresh air in the attorney general’s office where too often political concerns have determined prosecutorial discretion.

With a BS in engineering, a license in many states as a PE, a masters in environmental law, a doctorate in law, a certificate in dispute resolution, and studies for an LLM in human rights and international law where I was on the law review, the republican candidate for attorney general has the nerve to call me unqualified to the college republicans at LSC. He is also the one who after promising to appear for the only televised debate on CCTV in Burlington, failed to appear so he could lie to students. In addition to all this I have a great deal of practical legal experience, arguing before the 2nd circuit and practicing in the international forum. Moreover, I have executive experience in and out of government, which is why I argue that I would bring the 80 AG’s into one office to better allocate resources. Additionally, I would join the many suits to overturn the federal health care bill which undermines the work of our legislature because it is a duty of the office. I certainly would not opt for greater enforcement and more law as the progressive seeks with her backers, the CLF.

Contact Karen Kerin:
Web: www.karenkerin.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Karen-Kerin-for-Vermont/125301700832172
Twitter: http://twitter.com/karenkerin

There are few opportunities for voters to look at what is perceived as the down ticket office of attorney general, resulting in the continuation in office of someone who does not serve as a servant of the people. A great deal of explanation is needed to understand that the only statewide office not in the Vermont Constitution is in reality, perhaps the most powerful elected office in the state because prosecutorial discretion allows political considerations to intervene in the dispensing of justice. But I digress owing to my desire for substantial justice without procedural justice allowing a soft on crime regime to flower.

The video of the debate is below…

But before you spend the time to watch the whole thing, let me set the stage for you. The invitees were Progressive Charlotte Dennette, Liberty Union (now revealed to be socialist) Rosemarie Jackowski, Libertarian Karen Kerin, Democrat William Sorrell, and Republican Aaron Toscano. Jackowski did not attend, but sent a garbled statement that moderator Eli Harrington, program director from the Vermont Council on World Affairs, read for the viewers. Toscano, who had promised to attend, did not show up. I learned the next morning that he instead attended a college republican event. That left me facing the two big statists, Sorrell and Dennette.

Although it was not apparent due to the format, it is easy to dispose of CLF shill Dennette as a serious candidate because she ignores the US Constitution. She rants about the clean water act and the clean air act, neither of which are within the powers the constitution provides in Article I, Clause 8. While we all want clean air and water, it is clearly a matter for the states and the people who may be aggrieved by the actions of a particular property owner; and they have recourse legally in the courts.

Dean appointee and soft on crime Sorrell is equally easy to dispose of. Before delving into our differences legally, I must address his response to getting more bangs for the buck from his office as ridiculous in these economic times because he indicated a need for more staffing, while I made him cringe by proposing bringing all the attorneys general under one roof so allocation of resources could be more efficiently utilized. This demonstrates the difference between someone with real world management experience and a political appointee who has been there too long. At a cited cost of over $50,000.00 per year per prison bed, the question of defining non-violent offenders was sought as a question. Both of the liberals spoke about court diversion and other wishy-washy programs, when the Vermont constitution very clearly calls for “hard labor”. I pointed out that there are many tasks not being performed by the state that these offenders could be providing, and then needing only a dormitory to house them and feed them for their sentences, freeing the prisons for the violent and dangerous criminals.

Asked to explain why we were running under our party affiliation, I was stunned to hear Sorrell launch into his mother’s role in democrat politics, almost as if he does not share that party’s views. It is curious indeed that he has no better understanding. I explained that I am a libertarian because that most clearly represents what our founders of the nation and state embraced, liberty as long as it resulted in no harm to others and the dispensing of justice if harm results. Shockingly, Sorrell launched into his ideations concerning prevention, causing me to cringe in horror at the notion of offending the first amendment by making thoughts, words and actions wrongful in his eyes. God save us from such thinking. Other questions that we never got to would have led these two drones ever deeper into the statist swamp so it was fortunate for them we did not get there.

The summary statements were of the same ilk by the other two, but mine was laser like pointing out that Sorrell had been there too long and pointedly stating that his ideation of prevention is not law. I also chastised Dennette regarding VY, as I was fortunate enough to be one of the engineers on the project and fully understand that the reactor and its turbines are good for 100 years, despite the cooling towers leaking river water that is used to cool the process water that is in stainless steel piping to maintain the de-ionized water that is a must for the reactor system to not carry radioactivity. So VY is really very safe. The nonsense about having more hydro dams completely ignores both conservation and environmental concerns as it prevents migratory fish from making it back to their spawning grounds. I cited the loss of Atlantic salmon, shad, and at least one other species of fish that used to be found in abundance, but in declining numbers in the White River in my lifetime. Finally, I hammered Sorrell for claiming to protect families, when he has done nothing to protect children and the elderly. Apparently, they do not count as a part of the family, but not surprising since he had no response to the cyber crime problem that is defrauding the elderly without even the FBI caring because it emanates from outside the US. Please do watch the video.

Contact Karen Kerin:
Web: www.karenkerin.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Karen-Kerin-for-Vermont/125301700832172
Twitter: http://twitter.com/karenkerin

The Boston Tea Party (BTP) also endorsed nearly 30 other candidates across the country. The BTP was founded in 2006 with a one sentence platform, “The BTP supports reducing the size, scope and power of government at all levels and on all issues, and opposes increasing the size, scope and power of government at any level, for any purpose.”

Contact:

Karen Kerin
http://www.karenkerin.com

Ben Mayer
http://www.benmayervt.com

Boston Tea Party
http://bostontea.us

Topics discussed include the office of Vermont attorney general, property rights, gun rights, healthcare, commerce clause, stare decisis, permits, government employee pay and more…

Contact Karen Kerin:
Web: www.karenkerin.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Karen-Kerin-for-Vermont/125301700832172
Twitter: http://twitter.com/karenkerin

For sixty-six years I have been a staunch republican, but over the last few years I have been astonished at how many office holders elected as republicans embraced a different philosophy. The ideal of less government, lower taxes and less regulation of our lives, appeared to fall by the wayside, when it seemed advantageous for a republican to sacrifice principles to stay in office. I did not come to this easily. It was the product of examining the votes of legislators in view of the enormous growth of the body of laws. The evidence is beyond dispute.

Click link below for full article:
http://www.karenkerin.com/174/why-am-i-running-as-a-libertarian/

A big thanks to everyone who helped organize their towns and getting paperwork filed.

The new organization membership is located at the following page:
http://www.vtlp.org/organization

At a time when national and state health care reform efforts have become the top item on the domestic policy agenda, the speakers will zero in on what these plans mean for our liberty, the quality of our health care, and the enormous costs.

The keynote speaker will be John McClaughry of the Ethan Allen Institute. He was a state senator at the time of Gov. Deans reforms in the 1990s, and before that a senior policy advisor in the Reagan White House. McClaughry will explain how the proposed national ?reforms? will steadily convert the health care sector of the economy into a wholly owned subsidiary of the federal government.

Other speakers will include EAI Director, William Sayre, a past board member of Porter Medical Center and a member of the Governor’s Council of Economic Advisors, Rutland attorney,  Steven James Howard, interim coordinator for the Vermont Campaign for Liberty, Dr. Robert S. Emmons, Burlington psychiatrist and adjunct Clinical Associate Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Vermont, and Jane Combs RN, of the Burlington Health and Rehabilitation Center. The moderator is Paul Beaudry of True North Radio.

This forum will include overviews of the various Federal and State healthcare reform bills, their economic impact, their constitutionality and legal implications, insurance reforms, ethical considerations, the impact of government regulations on health care providers, and preserving the quality of medical care and the doctor-patient relationship.

Speakers will provide valuable information followed by an hour long question/answer period. Citizens who attend this forum will leave with a better understanding of how proposed healthcare reforms will affect their lives.

The forum is cosponsored by the Ethan Allen Institute and Vermonters for Choice in Health Care. VCHC is a coalition of Vermont organizations created to educate the public on the key issues involved in health care policy. (vermonters4choiceinhealthcare@gmail.com)

EVENT SPEAKER: John Tommasi

(http://www.leap.cc/cms/index.php?name=Speakers&bio=240

EVENT TITLE: Presentation to Champlain College SSDP

SPONSORING CLUB: Champlain College SSDP

EVENT TYPE: presentation

EVENT DESCRIPTION/DETAILS: SSDP is new at this school. John will present on his experiences and focus on the economic angles as to why the drug war has failed and needs to be replaced with legalization. 40-45 minutes presentation followed by 15-20 minutes Q&A

EVENT LOCATION/DETAILS: Alumni Auditorium, Champlain College, South Willard Street, Burlington, VT – Parking is free on the weekends; closest parking lot is behind Bader Hall. Alumni Auditorium is #27 on this maphttp://www.champlain.edu/Documents/about_champlain/Campus-Map.pdf

EVENT DATE/TIME: Saturday, November 14, 2009, 2:00-3:00pm

EVENT COST to ATTENDEES: none

EVENT CONTACT NAME(S), POSITION, PH#, EMAIL: Eric Geller, eric.geller@mymail.champlain.edu, 603-759-8575 DAY OF EVENT EMERGENCY NUMBER: 603-759-8575

APPROXIMATE ATTENDANCE: unknown EQUIPMENT NEEDED: projector and screen EQUIPMENT AVAILABLE: projector and screen.

MORE ON LEAP:

Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP) is an organization comprised of cops, judges, prosecutors, prison wardens and others within the criminal justice community who have fought on the front lines of the War on Drugs but have come to believe that the War on Drugs is a colossal public policy failure. LEAP believes that America will never be ‘drug-free’ and that in order to keep our children safe and make our communities safer, we must consider alternatives. LEAP calls for a dramatic and completely different direction: America must end prohibition and replace it with real control over the manufacture and distribution of all drugs. LEAP believes prohibition must be replaced with regulation and some form of legalization.

LEAP is absolutely not pro-drug. LEAP wants drugs to be less available to children and more restrictive to adults, and LEAP wants to reduce crime and violence in our communities. Our cops know that it’s not the drugs themselves that cause these problems, but the illegal drug marketplace.

Lions, Kiwanis, and Rotary Clubs, prestigious universities, political groups from both the left and the right have all hosted LEAP speakers and provided almost entirely positive feedback. In 2009, LEAP has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Economist and on CNN and MSNBC. In fact just today, three of our speakers were featured on the NYT web site here: http://roomfordebate.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/19/a-new-course-on-medical-marijuana/

Putting Vermont Back on Track
How the Power of Ideas Can Make Change Happen

Featuring: Lawrence Reed

Sheraton Burlington Conference Center
Thursday, October 15, 2009  – 5:30pm

Lawrence Reed is the founder and for twenty years President of Michigan’s Mackinac Center for Public Policy, long considered the most influential free-market state think tank in the nation. His address, part of the ongoing Sheraton Economic Series, will focus on how the ideas of individual liberty, private property, limited government and competitive free enterprise can be packaged to promote increased economic opportunity and prosperity for Vermonters. Reed is now President of the Foundation for Economic Education in Irvington-on-Hudson NY. In the past twenty years, he has authored over 1,000 newspaper columns and articles, 200 radio commentaries, dozens of articles in magazines and journals in the U. S. and abroad, as well as five books. His articles have appeared in The Wall Street Journal, Christian Science Monitor, and USA Today,  among many others. Reed?s most recent book is Striking the Root: Essays on Liberty. Reed holds a B.A. degree in Economics from Grove City College (1975) and an M.A. degree in History from Slippery Rock State University (1978). He taught economics at Midland (Michigan) Northwood University from 1977 to 1984 and chaired the Department of Economics from 1982 to 1984. He designed the university?s unique dual major in Economics and Business Management and founded its annual, highly-acclaimed ?Freedom Seminar.?  ”Larry Reed ‘s commitment to principle, his passion for liberty, and his vast practical experience have made him a much sought after speaker on four continents. This is a program EAI members and all friends of liberty and prosperity will not want to miss.” – John  McClaughry, EAI VP

The Sheraton Economic Series is hosted by the Sheraton Burlington Conference Center and cosponsored by the Vermont Economy Newsletter, Vermont Business Magazine, Vermont Tiger, and the Lake Champlain Regional Chamber of Commerce.

(Reservations not necessary; no admission charge.)