In a study released in the fall of 2020, State Auditor Doug Hoffer reported that Vermont’s healthcare costs had increased by 167% between 2000 and 2018. Keep in mind that those years saw a number of “reforms” that promised to reduce costs while increasing access and quality, including Catamount Health, Green Mountain Care (the failed attempt at single payer), and the latest debacle that is OneCare Vermont. All of these programs shared some common characteristics: they were all top-down, government centered, and bureaucratic.

Sen. Ben Sasse, Republican of Nebraska, says “The Biden administration wants to surrender America’s Covid-19 vaccine technology to anyone who wants it—including China. That is the substance of the May 5 announcement that the U.S. will enter into negotiations at the World Trade Organization to waive the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of International Property Rights for Covid vaccine technology.

The Supreme Court has ruled unanimously for a Rhode Island man after police responding to a domestic disturbance took guns from his home without a warrant — a violation of the man’s Fourth Amendment rights, the justices ruled.

Nicholas Wade, formerly a senior science reporter at the New York Times, issued a dazzling investigative report last week on the origins of the COVID virus. He leans to the conclusion that COVID somehow escaped from the Wuhan laboratory, although the case isn’t closed yet.

On May 18, Vermont Secretary of State Jim Condos distributed a press release in defense of S.15, an elections bill currently under debate in the Vermont legislature, that would make permanent the practice of mailing live ballots to all active voters regardless of request.

What follows is a point by point refutation of claims made by the Secretary of State regarding the content and potential impact of S.15 on Vermont elections by Rob Roper, president of the Ethan Allen Institute. Points made are in red italics.

Three lawsuits now in progress are likely to expand parental choice in Vermont education. Rather than dealing with “an evolving and murky legal landscape”, the legislature should reform our laws to incorporate the new legal requirements into a well-conceived parental choice - provider competition model.