VCRD’s Vermont Proposition is a sincere liberal’s dream for somehow ending racism, reducing inequality, defeating poverty,  countering the menace of climate change, and replacing grassroots democracy with a hugely expanded and unaccountable administrative state.  Put it back on the shelf.

The Vermont Council on Rural Development has released a first draft of “the Vermont Proposition”, a vision for Vermont’s future. Imagine what you would get if you assembled a dozen of the most high-minded, most sincere, most politically correct liberals in the state, who as liberals are not at all hesitant to use the power of government to make sure everyone falls in line with the grand Vision. You would expect them to produce something very much like the Vermont Proposition.

Slavery was and is a horrible, dehumanizing institution, but to call it the United States’ “original sin” and to tear down statues and deface memorials to our founders (not to be confused with Confederate generals) is historically ignorant and dangerous. Slavery was hardly an original concept in the late 18th and 19th Century. In fact, pretty much every society since the modern version of humans evolved had slavery up until that time.

The Labor Department recently reported that the economy had 10.1 million job openings in June. This comes amid a booming recovery as the pandemic lockdowns ease and there were 8.7 million unemployed workers in July.

Three years ago Vermont raised the age for purchasing any firearm from 18 to 21. But on July 13, a three judge panel of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a Federal law barring the sale of handguns to persons under 21 was unconstitutional, calling into question Vermont’s 2018 action.

New York City makes it almost impossible to get a permit to carry a firearm for self-protection. Here’s what TV journalist John Stossel had to do when he applied: