Deb Bucknam and Me
Two weeks ago, I wrote a blog post urging Republicans to embrace a positive agenda for the future by rejecting Trump and embracing pragmatists like the governor of Vermont - Phil Scott.
Lifting the debate out of the muck of Trump would be good for the country. The climate crisis, gun violence, poverty, education, health care, and racism deserve this debate.
Deb Bucknam, the vice-chair of the Vermont Republican Party and a sometime candidate for statewide office, published a response to my post in the Vermont Daily, an online outlet that is the Fox News of Vermont.
If Republicans are ‘nervous,’ why is left frantically stifling dissent?
To Bucknam, my writing "echoes Leftists blinkered view of Republicans, and more disturbingly, their dystopian view of our Republic."
She goes on to say the Vermont GOP is in "great shape" with no personal agendas.
"We are happy warriors for our party and our state," she says.
And then come the usual talking points:
Leftists believe that people are too stupid to understand what is best for their children.
Tax cuts are good because people know how to spend their money better than the government.
School choice.
Cancel culture.
Voter integrity.
She ends by calling her party vibrant and diverse.
Two points. The numbers in Vermont do not support Bucknam's view. Her party is in shambles. Democrats and Progressives control the Vermont Senate by 23-7. Republicans hold 46 of the 150 seats in the Vermont House. Our Lt. Governor is a Democrat. The Speaker of the House is a Democrat. Women lead our entire Vermont legislative apparatus.
Our Republican Governor Phil Scott is a highly successful moderate (he won more votes than Bernie Sanders in 2020), rejected Trump, and proposed serious gun control reforms that his party opposed.
But this is what bothered me about Bucknam's piece. She said nothing about how to govern a state or a country or how to meet the challenges we face as a society, beyond the usual talking points about small government, socialism, school choice, and tax cuts.
She offered no market-based proposal to deal with climate change.
There was no acknowledgment of police shooting black people in our streets or the history of police and government violence against people of color. There was no acknowledgment of the rampant inequality and runaway CEO pay while middle-class Americans struggle, nothing about the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol.
And finally, there was no acknowledgment of Trump and his hatred. Bucknam's party focuses on preventing transgender kids from playing high school sports, demeaning President Biden and Democrats for wanting to make hamburgers out of your life.
The Republican party didn't bother to adopt a party platform for the 2020 election, so we don't have anything to read to understand what they stand for. What does the Republican Party stand for today besides being "happy warriors." Happy warrior for what exactly.
As for her tepid defense of Vermont Governor Scott, Bucknam and her colleagues said little to nothing when some in their party attacked the governor and urged him to leave the party.
One question for Ms. Bucknam? Do you or do you not accept the results of the 2020 presidential election?
If the Vermont Republican Party wants to be a force for a better state, I have some recommendations.
Write a platform that says something. Propose a market-based, pro-business approach to climate change via a transition to a carbon-free economy.
Propose a solution to poverty, especially for children.
Acknowledge the results of the election.
Oppose Biden's tax increase proposals as creating too much debt to the Chinese.
Support school choice but leave out the religious schools. It is a significant wedge issue for Republicans. But their fealty to the culture wars means they are in bed with the religious right in a way that violates the Constitutional separation of church and state.
Acknowledge America's racist past. Talk about the Tulsa bombings and chronic police violence. If Democrats overreach in righting the past, say so.
Be for something. Support broadband internet for rural communities, school choice, extending health care to all.
In short, return to the Reagan era.
Above all - Be for "prosperity for all." We can all agree that we want everyone to be prosperous. My sneaking suspicion is that, deep down, too many Republicans don't want "prosperity for all," but power over others.
The government we have today that Republicans don't like didn't just happen. We all created it, and it is the way it is because the so-called free market system doesn't work very well when it comes to health care, poverty, and equality. That system creates wealth for the few. It also created the American middle class and built houses, steel mills, and the American myth/dream.
But in a modern technological society, that system puts too many people to work doing jobs at low pay. When it comes to climate change, poverty, and health care, the system we created isn't working. So people, via their government, have to act. And that's what Biden is doing.
The free market led to the closing of the steel mills in Pittsburgh and Youngstown, and Trenton, NJ. The Republican free market didn't do much about that. And it didn't do much about IBM moving most of its business out of Vermont and into New York State.
If Republicans are to become something beyond angry white people, it should remember Jim Jeffords, Margaret Chase Smith, and George Aiken. Then they can get back in the game, and Deb Bucknam could put some policy details into her arguments.
