Thursday, Aug. 6 and Sunday, Aug. 9, marked 75 years since the respective U.S. atomic bombings of the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Hundreds of thousands of civilians lost their lives in the immediate blasts or years later as a result of radiation poisoning. These bombings were ordered by then-President Truman to, as is popularly misunderstood, force the Japanese into surrender, thus ending World War II and preventing a ground invasion of Japan by U.S. Troops.
However, there is another version of events, according to the late historian Howard Zinn, author of A People's History of the United States and Joseph Gerson, author of Empire and the Bomb.
The U.S. had broken the Japanese code and through intercepted communications knew beforehand that the Japanese were ready to surrender.
The Selectboard closed its Aug. 4 meeting early as a result of a person who heckled town officials and shared a multimedia cornucopia of sexist, racist, and profane language and music. The meeting was the board's first foray using the Zoom online meeting platform. The meeting also happened during...
As a former resident of Washington state, I was following the developments in the Capitol Hill area of Seattle (Capitol Hill Occupy Protest, or CHOP) with great interest. Once the killings started, my heart ached. The first thing CHOP did was establish a border of several blocks staffed by...
I am a urologist, I graduated from medical school 50 years ago, and I continue to practice medicine every day of the week. I have never done so before, but I feel compelled to speak out. COVID-19, as we all know, has killed many people, and it will continue to do so around the world. It is an embarrassment that our country, the richest and most powerful in the world, is impotent when it comes to doing simple measures that...
Lt. Gov. David Zuckerman will be taking on his boss, Gov. Phil Scott, in November. In the unofficial vote tally at press time, as reported by the Secretary of State's office, Zuckerman won a decisive victory over former Education Secretary Rebecca Holcombe in Tuesday's Democratic gubernatorial primary. Zuckerman led Holcombe, 52 percent to 39 percent, with Bennington attorney Patrick Winburn finishing a distant third with 8 percent of the vote and Ralph Corbo of Wallingford getting less than 1.5 percent...
Spurred on by the Windham County NAACP and the Community Equity Collaborative of the Brattleboro Area (CEC), a consortium is forming to examine the vital role of data collection in eliminating racial and ethnic disparities in health care. In so doing, we hope to improve the health of our entire community and reduce any health disparities going forward. Brattleboro Memorial Hospital administrators and Vermont Department of Health staff have joined the NAACP and CEC representatives meeting since mid-June to develop...
A quote jumped out at me. “What's the art that comes when what happened is out in the open? When what's been buried is laid out for all to see? What would the country's [creative works] look like if they said what was happening?” That quote from a pre-Black Lives Matter novel jumped out at me after a conversation I'd had with an editor of an art magazine. He'd hoped to feature a portrait of a Black man, but his...
The Hebrew scriptures narrate much contestation between Canaanites and Hebrews. After escaping Egypt and entering into what is referred to as the Holy Land, Hebrews encountered Canaanites in the land of “milk and honey” that they wished to occupy (Numbers 13:27-28). The story about the felling of Jericho's walls (Joshua 6:1-27) is a perfect example of such contestation. In the end, the Israelites invaded the Canaanites, defeated them, and occupied their land. The narratives in the Hebrew scriptures are usually...
Grab your lunch and join the In-Sight Photography Project for the organization's Lunch Time Artist Talks series via Zoom on three successive Wednesdays - Aug. 12, 19, and 26 - at noon. In-Sight will be chatting with Jon Henry (jonhenryphotography.com) on Aug. 12, Evan Lockhart (elockhartphotography.format.com) on Aug. 19, and Lyntoria Newton (www.lyntorianewton.com) on Aug. 26. The nonprofit photography education organization will featuring the work of each artist on its Instagram feed (@insightphotoVT) before each event. Virtual seats are limited...
Tax collection dates set in Brattleboro BRATTLEBORO - The town has set its collection dates for real estate and personal property taxes assessed upon the grand list of 2020. These taxes are now due and payable to the town treasurer at the Treasurer's Office in the Brattleboro Municipal Center, 230 Main St., in four equal installments due Sept. 15; Nov. 16; Feb. 16, 2021; and May 17, 2021. Interest at 1 percent per month will be charged on any overdue...
The Brattleboro Literary Festival invites everyone to a virtual summer Literary Cocktail Hour, featuring New York Times best-selling author Caroline Leavitt in conversation with best-selling author Amy Poeppel. The two authors will talk on Friday, Aug. 14, at 5 p.m. Poeppel will her talk about her new book, Musical Chairs, a funny novel that explores Bridget Stratton's summer - it was not what she planned. It is a story of motherhood, sisterhood, fixing up a house, music, and aging. It...
Every day at the gym and the grocery store there are people without masks or wearing them pulled down. My neighbors were away so their kids had a big party - no masks or distancing. Please don't undo the safety our isolating has done.
Obituaries • Corinne Elizabeth Bristol, 77, of Guilford. Died unexpectedly on Aug. 3, 2020. Corinne was born to Isabel (Tupper) and William Huestis Jr. at Brattleboro Memorial Hospital on Jan. 22, 1943. She graduated from Brattleboro Union High School with the Class of 1961. Corinne worked as a Candy Striper at BMH at the age of 15, before attending Yale-New Haven School of Nursing, graduating as an RN in 1964. Working her way up the ranks, Corinne continued her career...
Having recently read Ron Chernow's book Grant, I learned in detail about the life of Gen. Ulysses S. Grant and about the Civil War itself. The South struggled with a shortage of career military leaders. To fill the gap, they turned to using civilians. One could get a position and title if one was politically connected. It helped to be an industrial leader or the owner of a large amount of land - which also meant that one owned slaves.
I am grateful for MacLean Gander's piece, since it encapsulates the raw hysteria gripping the U.S., engulfing even our once reasonable, thoughtful oasis of Vermont. As a member of the board of directors of Vermont Independent Media, surely Mr. Gander is aware of the power of word choice. So when he writes, “The science is clear: the virus is incredibly skillful at spreading itself,” that there is “a wildfire of Rona sweeping the nation,” and that Vermont is “an island...
In a shocking move, during a time of crisis in our country, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), announced on July 24 that it intends to roll back protections for transgender people. The proposed policy reconsiders protections put into place in 2016 which allowed transgender people to access shelter space based upon their gender identity, not their sex assigned at birth. The removal of this protection would permit shelters to establish policies that disregard their gender identity.
Tom Ragle discusses the future of liberal thinking as we lose liberal institutions such as Marlboro College. Twice, he leaps over 1,700 years of Western civilization as he indicates large-scale cultural change from paganism to Christianity. I feel astonished. What about Judaism? Judaism may not be important to Mr. Ragle personally, but it is important in liberal education. And it is especially important during a time when anti-Semitism is on the rise.
Epsilon Spires, 190 Main St., will host a night of multimedia performance in its socially-distanced sanctuary on Saturday, Aug. 22 at 7 p.m. According to a news release, the featured performers, UCC Harlo and Valise, are solo artists who “carry traditions of music making into expansive sonic environments, employing electronic composition and sampling to blend and breed sounds from disparate sources to craft transportive aural worlds.” UCC Harlo is the performance moniker of Berlin-based artist Annie Gårlid. Classically trained in...
A request for proposals (RFP) seeking facilitators to examine public safety in town will return to the Selectboard next week. In the meantime, the town manager and members of the group that collaborated on the document plan to meet to adjust the RFP's language to reconcile municipal governance practicalities and legal constraints with social justice. The path forward followed many hours of discussion at special meeting of the Selectboard on Aug. 6, where members appeared divided on whether to approve...
It was the heaviest turnout ever for a state primary, but you would have never known it by visiting polling places around Windham County on Tuesday. That's because, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, an unprecedented number of voters chose to cast their ballots early to avoid venturing out to vote. “This is like no election we've ever experienced,” said Vermont Secretary of State Jim Condos at a pre-election news briefing on Monday. Statewide, 153,061 people requested absentee ballots, according...
River Valley Credit Union has come a long way from the financial institution that was formed at a kitchen table in Putney in 1946 and for a time run from a folding table and cigar box at the Putney General Store. RVCU - in its current form, a result of a marriage almost 25 years ago between two smaller credit unions - now has 61 employees, five branches, 18,540 member/owners, and an estimated $148 million in assets. Now, with plans...
When Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, President George W. Bush mishandled it. He praised Michael D. Brown, the director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. “Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job.” In light of the disaster, Bush undermined his own credibility. I have a theory about how he ended up in a situation where the head of FEMA was a novice, incapable of addressing the situation. During the Clinton administration, James Lee Witt was appointed head of FEMA.
It has been 4{1/2} months since we left the State House to begin doing our work remotely. During the 3{1/2} months we met remotely, we originally focused our work on COVID-19 issues. In the Senate Committee on Government Operations, we had much work to do very quickly. We worked with Vermont League of Cities and Towns to modify statutes to allow town government to continue to function. We addressed laws affecting open meetings, local elections, access to public records, property-tax...
DaVallia Art & Accents invites visitors to “Poetic Landscape,” a new fine art exhibition at the 39 North Gallery featuring paintings by Carol Aronson-Shore from Aug. 15 through Oct. 15. According to a news release, Aronson-Shore “employs poetic effects of light, color, and composition to coax magical and mysterious moments out of our daily world.” She was a professor of painting and drawing at the University of New Hampshire from 1980 to 1999 and has continued to pursue her muse...
The Community Proposal to be considered by the Selectboard, offered as a way to create, fund, and control the process of evaluating the Police Department and associated public safety concerns, is an earnest, well-intentioned, and fundamentally flawed document. As presented, it would mostly serve the town and its population by addressing the anger and guilt resulting from the historic injustices suffered by indigenous people and people of color. If the town and its residents wish to see a system in...
On the first day of Everyone Eats!, the community food program handed out 500 to-go meals - hardly a surprise. That volunteers did so in all of 39 minutes? That was the surprise, said local organizer Stephanie Bonin, who also serves as executive director of the Downtown Brattleboro Alliance. “We weren't expecting that at all.” On day two, the participating restaurants also made 500 meals, but Bonin said Tropical Storm Isaias cancelled the in-person distribution. “I like to be tested,