Smear Campaigns Fuel Shutdowns of Occupations Across Country

Originally posted at Truthout

Tuesday 15 November 2011

by: Michael Corcoran, Truthout | News Analysis

An Occupy Wall Street protester is detained following an attempt to re-enter Zuccotti Park, in New York on November 15, 2011. Hundreds of police officers arrested about 200 demonstrators early Tuesday in an operation to clear the nearly two-month-old camp. (Photo: Todd Heisler / The New York Times)

City officials in Burlington, Vermont, recently used the suicide of a 35-year-old man as an excuse to deceptively close down the occupation. In New York City, just this morning, police threatened arrest to anyone who did not clear Zuccotti Park - the birthplace of the Occupy movement. Across the nation the media, right-wing critics and city officials are wrongly blaming Occupy for seemingly any crime or incident that occurs anywhere in their respective cities in an especially sinister smear campaign that aims to discredit and ultimately try to destroy the movement. Other occupations are in jeopardy of being shut down by the police. Organizers and supporters must act bravely and quickly to save - and expand - this movement as we head into the dead of winter.

A new and vicious smear campaign against the Occupy movement is in full swing. The narrative of this campaign is to portray the movement as a hotbed for violent crime and danger. This false narrative, if it sticks, could prompt more city and town officials across the country to shut down occupations, as the City of New York has attempted to do just this morning, and weaken the movement. This cannot be tolerated.

The full picture of the smear campaign became evident to me when I received a message on a social networking site from a right-wing relative of mine. His message linked to a right-wing smear site [3] that, citing the suicide of a 35-year-old homeless man in Vermont among other things, painted the occupations as one of "sexual assault, violence, vandalism, anti-Semitism, extortion, perversion and lawlessness."

My relative and many of his right-wing comrades, it seems, really believe that the Occupy movement is in favor of murder, violence, rape and drug dealing. This is rather astounding, but it is also the reality of how far beneath contempt the opponents of Occupy are willing to go to kill this movement. The mention of "sexual assaults" is especially slimy, given that it was a protester from Occupy Wall Street [4] who was the victim, not the perpetrator, of an alleged rape and her fellow protesters assisted her with medical and legal help and reported the alleged rapist to authorities.

It is fascinating - as well as scary - to see the way attacks on Occupy have evolved since it first started in late September. Originally, the media coverage and the right-wing attacksattempted to portray the protesters [5] as aimless, lazy, hippie freeloaders, who were fornicating and defecating on the streets, while banging on drums and rambling about nonsense. This caricature did not work, as the support and diversity that make up the movement and its supporters were just too obviously different from the cartoonish portrayal the movement's critics tried to paint. As Bill Maher rightly said on his HBO show "Real Time," "Occupy is not the counterculture. It is the culture [6]."

Take back the media by making a tax-deductible donation to Truthout this week. Click here to support news free of corporate influence. [7]

But, now, this new and far more sinister smear campaign is well underway. The corporate media, right-wing critics and city and town officials are trying to blame the protests for virtually any and all crime that has occurred on or near the encampments. The headlines in the media outlets - which are owned by corporations [8] that make up the 1 percent in most instances - continue to amplify these narratives and push for the closing of the occupations. The vast majority of these crimes and incidents have nothing to do with the Occupy movement; in fact, many of them speak more about the major social and economic injustices the protesters are trying to end. But that has not stopped city officials from trying to use these instances to stop the occupations. The occupation in Burlington, Vermont, has already been shut down. Occupy Oakland has been shut down twice. Zuccotti Park, the birthplace of the movement, is being cleared out by police as I write this [9]. And if the false narratives continue, other occupations - and the strength of the movement - could be in jeopardy.

This is now a crucial moment for the Occupy movement. How organizers and supporters proceed in the next few days may well shape the health and survival of the movement heading through the winter and into the spring. It is absolutely essential that Occupy organizers and supporters (including independent media) work aggressively to: 1) counter the false narrative that tries to, absurdly, link the movement to street violence, rapes and drugs deals, in order to discredit the movement; 2) better explain the relationship between the homeless and the Occupy movement, as the media has portrayed the relationship between organizers and the homeless as vitriolic and divisive, while understating the spirit of acceptance and cooperation between activists and the homeless - themselves products of our unjust economic system; and 3) most importantly, the movement must continue tomaintain the occupations, even in the face of crackdowns from city officials and police. This movement is the single most exciting development in decades for the prospects for creating a more just society. It must continue.

Read the rest here.

Single Payer Isn't Dead: How States Are Keeping the Movement Alive

Originally published at Truthout.


The grassroots single-payer movement in Vermont reflects the growing belief that the fight to make healthcare a human right must come from the states. But will the passage of federal reform get in the way?


Burlington, VT – When Barack Obama signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in March, many thought the long and tedious stretch of legislative wrangling and endless debates about healthcare reform had come to an end and the prospects for further meaningful reform would be shelved for years or decades.


But while the country was consumed with the incredibly narrow debate in D.C., dictated largely by drug and insurance lobbyists, anti-abortion politicians, and a collection of conservative Democratic senators with close ties to the insurance and drug industries, another significant healthcare battle was taking place hundreds of miles to the north, in the tiny little state of Vermont, population, 600,000. By the time Obama signed a federal healthcare bill into law, the Vermont Workers' Center was almost two years into its “Healthcare is a Human Rights campaign,” which had the unambiguous goal of abolishing for-profit healthcare in the state and passing a state-wide, single-payer healthcare system that guarantees healthcare as a right to all Vermonters. In May, the Vermont Legislature, under constant pressure from this growing people's movement, passed a bill that could possibly lead to Vermont being the first state to pass a single-payer healthcare system, setting up what could be a crucial phase of the fight for healthcare justice.


If Vermont is able to break this ground, the implications could reverberate well past the borders of the Green Mountain State. The fight for state-wide single-payer here reflects a growing belief among healthcare activists that the path to a universal public system, will not take place in Washington D.C, where moneyed interests have a death grip on the legislative process, but through state houses across the country. Further, the effort in Vermont may prove to be the first test case of the “state innovation” language in the federal reform bill, and could indicate if Obamacare will ultimately serve to enable state-wide single-payer systems or if it will kill them. Finally, the movement in Vermont also highlights a fascinating debate over the rhetoric of healthcare reform. Should advocates point to the significant savings associated with single-payer healthcare and the unsustainability of the current system? Or, should the primary emphasis view the fight for public healthcare as a matter of basic human rights?


Read the rest here.

Single-payer health care: dead in Washington, but alive in the states

Originally published in the Christian Science Monitor.

By Michael Corcoran

Boston - President Obama delivered a stirring address to Congress last night, but the federal government's inability to truly overhaul our broken healthcare system – which now leaves more than 46 million uninsured – is becoming all the more apparent.

Speaking before a joint session of Congress, Obama declared that a public option to compete with private insurers, considered vital by many liberals, was merely a "means to an end," and not essential to healthcare reform. Earlier this summer, a New York Times/CBS poll showed that 72 percent of Americans support a government-run healthcare plan. But Obama's speech last night indicates that while a bill will probably pass, prospects for comprehensive reform – the kind millions of Americans voted for – have dimmed rapidly. Insurance companies, which have given large donations to both political parties, are winning the fight in Washington.

The inability of a popular president with substantial majorities in Congress to pass a progressive health bill is immensely frustrating to healthcare activists, and to all who gave Obama a mandate for change.

But their cause is not lost – they just need a new strategy.

Read the rest here:

The Left's Public Option Problem

(Published at Blast Magazine and on Znet's front page.)

Given the failure of similar programs in states, single-payer should not be thrown aside for this battle.

For advocates of guaranteed truly universal healthcare the debate over Obama's reform efforts have been rather disappointing.

Despite the fact that a clear majority of Americans prefer joining the rest of the developed world and having a comprehensive government plan that will cover everybody, President Obama and most of Congress, all of whom have received large sums of campaign donations from the drug and insurance industries, have made a government run plan that would not sell healthcare as a commodity to make profit, a non-starter. As a result, single-payer healthcare advocates, despite having overwhelming grassroots support, have been dismissed in Washington.

Now, with few other options, liberal members of congress and advocacy groups have largely focused their advocacy and money behind what appears to be the most heated battle over possible healthcare reform this summer: the fight to include a "public option" to compete with private plans in the healthcare package.

Predictably, ideologues opposed to any kind of government involvement in healthcare are fighting tooth-and-nail to oppose this option, ridiculously, calling it a step towards socialism. But as much of the left rallies to counter these shameful distortions, they may want to consider a very important question. What exactly are they fighting for?

By taking single-payer off the table at the start, Obama and his supporters may have put all of their fuel into a sputtering vehicle. To date, two state governments Massachusetts and Vermont have attempted to implement "hybrid" pseudo-public solutions to major healthcare problem. Both of these plans have been floated as possible templates for national reform; the Mass plan is often cited as a possible angle, and Rep. Peter Welch, D-Vermont, has introduced legislation for a public option that is somewhat similar to Vermont's state-wide plan. Sadly, in both cases the results of these efforts have not been promising.

Those of us living with the new and once-highly touted Massachusetts plan, which aims to cover everyone by requiring that everyone buy insurance (and providing subsidies for those who cannot afford it), have become all-too familiar with the problems of this arrangement, which was worked out in 2006 between Mitt Romney and the Legislature.

The Boston Globe's recent front-page article highlighting how Boston Medical Center, which provides more healthcare to the poor than any other hospital in Massachusetts, is facing major deficits largely because the 2006 healthcare legislation has bled money from the "free care pool," is only one example of how this legislation, well-intended it may be, is not sustainable.

By June 2011 enrollment in the plan is projected to be 342,000 people at an annual expense of $1.35 billion up considerably from the original projections of covering 215,000 people at a cost of $725 million.

Moreover, because so much of the funding for the plan has come from the state's free care pool, many low-income residents who were once able to get care, now face unaffordable co-pays, premiums and deductibles (which have already risen 9.4 percent since passage of the reform.) According to a study done by the Physicians for a National Health Program, if a middle-income person on the cheapest available state plan got sick, he or she could end up paying $9,872 in premiums, deductibles and co-insurance for the year.

"The Massachusetts reform law is not providing universal access to care even in a state with highyl favorable circumstances including previously high levels of spending on health care for the poor, high personal incomes, and low rates of uninsurance," the report said. "It is not a model for the nation."

A recent New York Times article, aptly titled "Massachusetts Takes a Step Back from Health Care for All," reported problems as well. The July 14 article states (emphasis is mine), "The new state budget in Massachusetts eliminates health care coverage for some 30,000 legal immigrants to help close a growing deficit, reversing progress toward universal coverage just as Congress looks to the state as a model for overhauling the nation’s health care system."

Vermont's Catamount Health, public-private hybrid effort to cover the state's uninsured population now at 11 percent is also failing. Passed in 2006 as a compromise after Gov. Jim Douglas vetoed single-payer legislation, the bill, unlike the Massachusetts plan, does not mandate residents buy insurance. Instead it offers residents a chance to purchase healthcare from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Vermont with help of government subsidies based on income. But the plan, even according to its own advocates, does little to solve the problem.

One reason: the plan is unaffordable for many working Vermonters. Even those with no income must pay a monthly premium, and someone earning $30,000 a year still must pay $160 a month for coverage, plus monthly deductibles and co-pays for prescription drugs and doctor visits. Accordingly, less than a quarter of those eligible have signed up for the plan. Catamount can also deny coverage for pre-existing condition and the recently unemployed must wait a year before they are eligible for the program.

Since Vermont, like Massachusetts and so many other states, is facing dreadful revenue forecasts, the co-pays and premiums may well be raised in the near future, or services cut. A Democratically-controled Legisalture was able to avoid cuts in the most recent state budget, but more cuts may well be needed during the year, according to Tom Kavet, Vermont's Legislative economist.

As Peter Sterling, Catamount Health's outreach director told Seven Days, Vermont's largest weekly paper, "It doesn't solve the big problem, and we know that."

Sterling's words, and the failure of both of these reform efforts, could serve as a warning for healthcare activists as the national debate over a public plan reaches critical mass. Putting all of our muscle and money into a potentially doomed public option something that "doesn't solve the big problem" may yield little benefit in the fight for universal healthcare. Worse, if Congress pushes through a failed public option, neutered by congressional Republicans, it could give the concept of public healthcare an undeserved black eye in the eyes of many Americans.

In fact, a more intriguing consolation prize in Obama's health reform bill could come from Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) who has a plan to fund pilot programs for universal healthcare in five states -- one of which would be a single-payer plan. This could prove to be a sterling example of the cost-effectiveness of such a program. If Sanders' home state, Vermont, were to implement state-wide single-payer, it would save the tiny state a sizable $51 million a year, according to a study commissioned by the Vermont Legislature in 2006. Predictably, however, the Senate has not been very open to this idea, moderate as it may be, and voted it down in committee. One can only hope this idea will resurface as the debate rages on.

Despite such unceasing opposition from Washington, giving up on single-payer healthcare is not a wise move. As healthcare costs continue to skyrocket, the likelihood of a single-payer plan becoming reality in the US will only increase. The United States currently spends about 16 percent of its GDP (and rising fast) on healthcare more than any other country in the world and still has embarrassing rankings on infant mortality, life expectancy and overall healthcare rankings, according to the World Health Organization and BMJ, a peer-reviewed international medical journal. 46 million are left uninsured with many more underinsured, and an estimated 18,000 people die each year from lack of insurance.

Since nearly half of healthcare costs go towards corporate profits and administrative waste, two expenses that are virtually eliminated by implementing a single-payer system, in time some kind of not-for-profit government-run system is the only option that will make any fiscal sense. This reality should not be lost in the battle for a doomed-to-fail half measure that may or may not be attached to healthcare reform in the coming months.

Further Reading:

*PNHP Report on Massachusetts Reform Plan

*Vermont Workers' Center: Health Care is a Human Right Report (Features information on Catamount)

*Study commissioned by VT Legislature on economic impacts of a single-payer system

*Hasta la vista single-payer movement? (Article I wrote in 2007 on a hybrid plans vs. single-payer)

UPDATE: 6:22 p.m., July 16)

A Blast reader commented on my post. Since the internet is all about open debate, I thought I would post his comments here, and my response. I will update you if he responds again.

He wrote:

Not everyone who opposes single payer healthcare is simply an
ideologue. There are a lot of legitimate concerns about a single payer system
and what it would do to real access to a doctor as opposed to just having a card
that says you’re insured, the actual cost of care, progress in research and
development of both drugs and medical equipment, and making certain types of
care unobtainable for patients when the government doesn’t feel like paying for
them.

The ‘rest of the developed world’ which you vaguely refer to
has had plenty of problems with their single payer systems. In one survey of
citizens 80% of Americans said that the current system needs to be reformed or
rebuilt, with only %20 saying they liked it the way it is. But when the same
question was asked of citizens of the UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand,
which all have single payer national healthcare, the distribution of answers was
the same. Even with national coverage, patients still want massive overhaul of
their healthcare systems.

To say that a single payer option is the only that makes
sense, or that ‘not for profit’ automatically means that waste will be
eliminated is just silly, especially when no evidence is provided. Anyone who’s
ever paid any attention to how the government spends money knows
this.

For anyone interested in hearing real researched arguments
against single payer healthcare, a good place to start is: http://www.cato.org/subtopic_display_new.php?topic_id=80&ra_id=6

My reference to the 80/20 survey comes from their podcast
about the Massachusetts healthcare model.

Please read and consider the information there and
elsewhere before simply writing off anyone who doesn’t agree with you as an
ideologue.

My response:

Hey Lucas,

For the record, this article was not meant to be a full fledged defense of single-payer, but rather a critique of the half-measures liberals and Obama are now advocating for hence - so, indeed, much is left unsaid.

Still you raise interesting points, avoided attacks and presented evidence. I appreciate your comments, though as you might expect disagree with most of them, and I will address some of them here. I will use footnotes, rather than hyperlinks, as comments sections are shaky sometimes.

You have three paragraphs mainly. The first is mostly introductory, so I won't respond to it, other than to say I don't think all opponents of single-payer are ideologues. In fact, the major point of the article was to attack liberals for backing away from the idea, despite the fact that the majority of the public supports it. I did note that there are hyperbolic ads, paid for by ideologues (which, is not a pejorative term, in my view) comparing the possibility of a quasi public plans to socialism. An absurd argument, I think, and can elaborate if you like.

Also, before I delve further, allow me to provide some evidence to the above statement regarding public opinion. There are many polls, framed in many different ways, but all of them indicate that the majority of the public (floating around 55-65 percent) believes the gov has the responsibility to make sure everyone has care.

An ABC News/Kaiser Family Foundation/USA Today survey found that 56 percent of Americans preferred a government-run universal health system "like Medicare" to our current employment-based system run by private insurers. (1) This one is apt, because it bluntly compares our system to Medicare -- a single-payer system for the elderly.(2) Interestingly, the elderly are the most satisfied healthcare consumers in the US. (3) Further a majority of Americans said they are willing to pay higher taxes and give up future tax cuts to accomplish this. (4)

Perhaps I should have highlighted all of these arguments, but i was already over a 1,200 word limit and , again, was critiquing two complicated state plans, not making the case for single-payer in details (which, I have done, and will do again, if you care to continue the debate. Glad to have you as a guest blogger on my blog, or maybe Blast can work something out.)

The second graph raised great points, and I would like to address them.

You write:

The ‘rest of the developed world’ which you vaguely refer to has had plenty of problems with their single payer systems. In one survey of citizens 80% of Americans said that the current system needs to be reformed or rebuilt, with only %20 saying they liked it the way it is. But when the same question was asked of citizens of the UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, which all have single payer national healthcare, the distribution of answers was the same. Even with national coverage, patients still want massive overhaul of their healthcare systems."

This is true. Even countries that cover everyone, via singlepayer (like Canada, UK) or otherways (France, Australia) etc ... have room for improvement, for sure. Healthcare systems -- good or not -- are complicated and there are always problems.

For example, the UK only spend 8 percent of GDP on healthcare - way less than other single-payer countries. It is bled dry to an extent, even though everyone is covered, no small point.

But even with their faults, public opinion polls consistently show that other countries are more satisfied with their systems than our's.

According to MArket Watch, hardly a marxist rag, "A third of Americans said they believe the U.S. system 'has so much wrong with it that we need to completely rebuild it,"' while only 9% in the Netherlands hold such a sentiment about their health-care system. Twelve percent of Spaniards favored a complete overhaul, compared with 15% in France, 17% in New Zealand, 18% in Australia and 20% in Italy." (5)

The article continues, "What's more, Americans' personal share of medical expenses is the highest in the industrialized world, Davis said. In 2007, 30% of Americans reported having out-of-pocket medical expenses of more than $1,000 in the last year compared with 19% of Australians, 12% of Canadians, 10% of Germans and New Zealanders, 5% of Dutch and 4% of Britons. "

These stats are backed up elsewhere. The US pays the most in the world for health care, yet is ranked 37th by the WHO, has 46 million uninsured, and low satisfaction rates. We pay double what most countries pay.

You are right that they want improvement. Market Watch reports, "Majorities in France (70%) and Britain (59%) said their health systems are the envy of the world. Still, nearly as many in France as in the U.S. said fundamental changes are needed to make the system work better. Half of American adults said so compared with 47% of French adults."

But overall, costs are lower, people are healthier and more satisfied, and everyone -- everyone - is insured. And only the United States has a system where healthcare is not guaranteed to everyone. That is quite radical.

Now, why do spend so much, yet cover so few?

You make this point:

"To say that a single payer option is the only that makes sense, or that ‘not for profit’ automatically means that waste will be eliminated is just silly, especially when no evidence is provided. Anyone who’s ever paid any attention to how the government spends money knows this.

Allow me to give the evidence. There are two major reasons, as I mentioned, why single-payer is more fiscally conservative. 1) There are no corporate profits, which make up about a quarter of overall costs. This, obviously, is eliminated if you eliminate private insurers. the other reasons is administrative waste. Having so many payers, leads to expensive overhead -- another 25 percent of health care spending is this administrative waste. (6)This is about ten times as much as single-payer options. According to the New England Journal of Medicine Canada's national health insurance system spends just 1.3% on overhead, and the US's Medicare and Medicaid programs have administrative costs of between 2-5%. (7)

The International Journal of Health Services estimates the US would save 75 percent of its administrative costs by switching to single-payer. (8) (Note, because peer-reviewed journals are behind pay walls, I am linking to studies citing them.)

To conclude, you are right I did not make a full-blown case for the economics of single-payer, because my article was a critique of state plans. But I am happy to make a full-blown case for it, if you would like to have a formal exchange (say, we pose the question "Would Single-Payer Improve Health care in the United States, I in the affirmative, you in the negative.)

Still, you raised questions about the merits of single-payer -- why it is cheaper and so forth, and I tried to address them here. Anxious for a response and all the best.

1 as quoted in http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2006/12/31/silent_majority_for_single_payer/
2) http://www.commonwealthfund.org/Content/News/News-Releases/2009/May/Elderly-Medicare-Beneficiaries-Give-Their-Coverage-Higher-Ratings.aspx
3) http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/01/washington/01cnd-poll.html?ex=1330405200&en=45c0a4cf48ed21a1&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss (see complete poll results to the left of article.
4) ibid
5.) http://www.marketwatch.com/story/americans-rate-us-health-care-system-lowest-among-10-nations
6) http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/abstract/349/8/768
7) iBid
8) http://www.pnhp.org/news/IJHS_State_Paper.pdf

Why Vermont Marriage Equality Matters

This was originally published at the Nation.

(Republished at CBS NEWS)

Montpelier, Vermont

Vermont may not be the first state to legalize same-sex marriage. In fact, it's not even the first state to legalize same-sex marriage in the past week--that designation belongs to Iowa, where the State Supreme Court overturned a ban on gay marriage last Friday.

But nonetheless, when the Vermont Legislature overturned a veto from Republican Gov. Jim Douglas and legalized same-sex marriage, it was indeed a historic moment. Vermont is the first state to permit gay marriage rights through a democratically elected legislature, as opposed to Massachusetts, Connecticut and Iowa, where courts ruled it unconstitutional to ban the practice. And many feel that this victory is a sign of things to come in the battle for marriage equality.

"The fact that Vermont is the first state to legalize same-sex marriage through legislation is very significant," said Allen Gilbert, executive director of the Vermont American Civil Liberties Union. "Eventually, there will be marriage rights for everyone in the country, but it will take years of work and lots of education."

The legislation is significant, but it was not easy to pass. Despite Vermont's largely liberal citizenry, the passing of S.115 was far from certain. While there was no doubt the Vermont State Senate would be able to overturn Gov. Douglas's veto--it supported the legislation 26-4 last week--the vote was much closer in the House.

House Speaker Shap Smith needed 100 votes to overturn Douglas's veto, despite only securing 95 yea votes in the original passing of the bill. But Vermont Democrats played hardball with the opposition in their own party.

Shay Totten, a columnist for Seven Days, Vermont's alternative weekly newspaper, reported that "Democrats who oppose the bill could also face primary challenges next year--it's that important an issue for some leaders."

And in the end, the leadership was able to whip several nay voters into the yea column, and finished with the 100 votes they needed, compared with forty-nine opposed. Rep. Albert "Sonny" Audette, a Democrat who opposed the bill due to his Catholic upbringing (and actually apologized to his colleagues on the floor for doing so), simply stayed home for Tuesday's override vote.

The passing of the bill marks another chapter in what is now a decade-long debate over same-sex marriage in the state. Vermont is only nine years removed from a contentious and emotional battle over civil unions, which saw Vermont become the first state to pass equal rights--if not equal recognition--for gay couples.

Advocates at the time celebrated the passing of the civil union legislation, but not without trepidation. "So many people felt that civil unions were not enough," Gilbert said. "There was always the implication that, at some point, Vermont would move on and that there was a promise of sorts to gays, that finally got fulfilled today."

Of course, much like in 2000 when civil unions prompted a "Take Back Vermont" movement that helped oust legislators who supported civil union legislation, there was intense opposition this time around. Hundreds of same-sex marriage opponents gathered outside the State House with "Thank you, Jim" signs, praising the governor for his controversial veto.

Much of the opposition came from outside the state. Several legislators got reports of "robocalls," deceiving constituents by wrongly telling them their representatives had changed their minds on the subject. Some calls were traced back to the National Organization for Marriage, a New Jersey based nonprofit dedicated to "protect[ing] marriage and the faith communities that sustain it."

"In they end, they were a waste of money," said Rep. Tom Stevens, a Democrat and a co-sponsor of the marriage legislation. "I received more calls that were generated by the robocalls urging me to vote for marriage equality than to oppose it. There was no onslaught, because we all recognized the ham-handedness that went into them. They caused a bit of a misunderstanding for some folks who didn't listen all the way through, but in the end I'd say they backfired."

Despite the tenacious efforts by same-sex marriage opponents, in the end marriage equality proponents simply proved to be too organized to lose this time around. Further, according to local polling, the majority of Vermonters favor same-sex marriage, and the debate reflected this reality.

During a key House debate on Thursday, supporters of the bill arrived as early as 7:30 am, to secure seats for a vote that would not occur until after 9 pm. Much of the organizing was done by the Vermont Freedom to Marry Task Force, which bused in supporters to the State House and even fed them granola bars as they sat through dry budget discussions, waiting for the bill to reach the floor.

Several of the four openly gay legislators in Vermont gave passionate-- at times teary-eyed--speeches asking for equal rights. Rep. Jason Lorber, a Democrat from Burlington, told his colleagues on the floor that he "shouldn't have to ask my coworkers for the right to marry the person that I love."

And liberal bloggers were as passionate as ever, according to John Odum, founder of Green Mountain Daily, a popular liberal political blog in the state. "The energy around this issue has been like nothing I've seen on the blog to date. The only thing comparable was a few years back when there was a push...for an impeachment resolution against George W. Bush," Odum said.

Even local businesses organized on behalf of the bill, arguing in a letter to legislators that their "vote[s] will move Vermont forward economically," referencing a study by the Williams Institute, that projected gay marriage would "boost Vermont's economy by over $30.6 million over three years...and create approximately 700 new jobs," as a result of gays coming to the Green Mountain State to marry.

This effort repudiated the governor's repeated statements that same-sex marriage debate was " distracting" the state from its significant fiscal problems.

But now that the exhausting battle in Vermont has come to an end, marriage equality proponents are enjoying their role in an important civil rights struggle.

"If there's one thing I keep hearing over and over today," Odum observed, "it is people--both online and off--telling me how proud they are to be Vermonters today."

Election 2008: Vermont, first state to be called for Obama

Unsurprisingly, the tiny state of Vermont (population 600,000) was called for Barack Obama first. The votes have not all been counted but pundits are already calling it a mammoth blowout.

It should come as no suprise that Vermont went this direction. The state. arguably the most tolerant and liberal in the nation, has a self-identified socialist in the Senate, a vibrant third party with seats in the State House, and openly supports the impeachment of Bush.

The state is known for it independent streak. 80 years ago, President Calvin Coolidge, said of the Green Mountain State, “If the spirit of liberty should vanish in other parts of the Union and support of our institutions should languish, it could all be replenished from the generous store held by the people of this brave little state of Vermont.”

There is also a curious gubernatorial race going on in the state. Incumbent Gov. Jim Douglas, a Republican, is going to beat out a Democratic challenger, Gaye Symington (speaker of the Vermont House) and progressive Anthony Pollina, who is tied for Symington in second place, with about 24 percent of the vote, according to recent polls.

Interestingly, Douglas will win, but may not be re-elected right away. If he wins with less than 50 percent of the vote, the Legislature (which is dominated by Democrats) gets to choose the governor by secret ballot. I think they would likely choose Douglas, who will win with a double-digit lead, but I imagine the Douglas campaign is hoping they never have to find out.