If Democrat Senators got an earful from their constituents about rising property taxes, rising crime, and the cost of housing while they were home, it was nothing like what they heard from Senate President Pro Tem.
Kicking off the “welcome back” Senate Democrat Caucus meeting on March 12, Philip Baruth (D/P-Chittenden Central) took the microphone for a five-and-a-half minute, action-packed rant that included telling his colleagues not to pay attention to constituent objections to their climate policies – they are passing these bills anyway! – instructed the media, if they were listening, not to report the costs of said policies, and threatened to take away Republican lawmakers’ “seat at the table” if they didn’t accept the premise that these ludicrous policies were legitimate.
Baruth complained, “Every time we come out with something to mitigate the effects of climate change or to slow the effects of climate change – and I’m talking about the Clean Heat Standard, the Renewable Energy Standard, which we are going to see a concerted campaign to kill, and this bill, the flooding bill, will also see a concerted campaign to slow it, alter it or kill it. And that is because, again, one of the major parties, and it’s the Republican Party in Vermont, has decided not to create policy to deal with this issue.”
Let’s take this whining missive one point at a time….
Yes, every time you come out with a plan to tax the living hell out of working people trying to heat their homes, drive their cars, do their jobs, etc., in a thinly veiled attempt to steer hundreds of millions of dollars to your political cronies, it tends to tick people off. And, yeah, it sparks some folks to start blowing the fiscal rape whistle in a “concerted effort” to stop your highly corrupt and worse-than-useless policy from happening.
As for noting the Republican party in Vermont has decided not to spend time and resources on schemes to alter the trajectory of planetary climate trends in order to affect the weather patterns in our tiny patch of New England landscape, of course, Republicans aren’t putting forward policy here. Why? because, despite the many shortcomings of the Vermont Republican Party, its members aren’t completely insane.
Anyone who thinks Vermont lawmakers can or will have any impact on the global climate or Chinese/Indian/Russian/etc. policies regarding same is, very politely speaking, a fool. And any parties—looking at you, Vermont Democrats and Progressives—that want to make such an utterly useless gesture the primary function of state government at a cost of multiple billions of dollars better spent on solving solvable problems are fools who also pose a serious danger to others. It’s time to take away the scissors.
Baruth goes on… “What they [Republicans] do is wait for us to offer policy in this space, and then they line up against it with whatever the best argument is. The two arguments we most often hear is that it costs more than a dollar, and it will disrupt a little bit to a lot.” Well… yeah…. You’re reading this right: the Democrat/Progressive leader of the Senate is upset with elected officials who question the cost to and impact of a policy on their constituents and raise good arguments in regard to those policies.
Senator, the Republicans are not the problem here!
Baruth admits in his little speech that the cost and disruption caused by their plans to “remake an economy that runs on fossil fuels” requiring “huge systemic change” will require disruption and cost. Quite a bit of both! He warns his colleagues, “You will not receive kudos for your work [on the Renewable Energy Standard Bill, etc.]; you will receive sharp criticism, paid advertising talking about how you’re going to cost Vermonters money that they don’t have.” Note: you do not deserve kudos for these policies; they are unaffordable, ineffective, accrue no benefits, and take resources away from other crisis issues in our state. You deserve not just sharp criticism. You deserve to be fired for what you are doing.
Does Baruth think elected officials should listen to the concerns of the people who elected them? Oh no! He says, “We need to circle our wagons! We need to rededicate ourselves to getting these things through,” despite widespread public opposition. This is what Democracy looks like?
Then Baruth goes after the media, “putting them on notice,” to use his words on how they should cover these issues. “I’m also talking to the Vermont media,” he says. “The way it works [now] is, when the Renewable Energy Standard comes out, the headline is, ‘Democrats propose comprehensive legislation; Republicans point out that it will cost X number of dollars, with a quote from Phil Scott right up front.’” Um…. Question! Isn’t that what good reporting should cover? Here’s the policy and what it would do; here’s what that policy will cost and who pays; and here’s what the top elected official in the state has to say about it so you, a member of the public, can craft an informed opinion. Not according to Phil Baruth, and since no one spoke up against his take, I guess every other Democrat senator did as well.
Instead, Baruth et al. say the headline should be, “Democrats propose comprehensive climate change legislation, Republicans don’t.” In other words, don’t discuss the cost of the program. Don’t discuss what actual impact the program will have on Vermont citizens or, for that matter, the complete lack of impact it will have on a changing climate. Don’t ask the governor what he thinks. Just run propaganda that casts Democrats as heroes and Republicans as villains for, you know, asking critical questions about transformative policy and attempting to listen to what their constituents actually have to say. The bastards!
He concludes, “We are going forward with these bills!” despite public opposition. And, “We are going to make it clear that if nothing comes from the Republican side, do they deserve a full voice in the argument?” Well, the people who elected them might say yes, they do, and you do not have a right to de-platform duly elected officials simply because you disagree with them about priorities and policy. But that would be if you truly believed in the democratic principles of truly representative and responsible government. Baruth and his entitled, dictatorial fellow Democrats clearly don’t.