On Tuesday, I joined a few thousand of my compatriots in Vermont's capitol, Montpelier, for a rally outside the State house. It was a bright , beautiful winter day, with temperature around ten degrees, but in the hour I stood with them, it didn't feel cold. The rally had been "organized" online literally over the past few days, which is to say that there was a minimum of organization in evidence: no program, no speakers, no permit, no agenda. This being Vermont, there also was practically no visible police presence. Somewhere else, at some other time, this could have been a volatile, dangerous situation. This being Vermont on February 4, 2025, it was a good-natured gathering of a few thousand people to express their disagreement with the Musk/Trump regime. Oh, there was plenty of anger, alright, but it was expressed cheerfully, not with violence. Lacking a public address system, nothing could be heard from one end of the crowd to another, so chants spontaneously arose hither and yon: "Deport Musk!" "2-4-6-8 We don't want a fascist state!" "We are/need/welcome immigrants!" and so on. "Where's Phil Scott" was heard more than once. One chant blended into another from one moment to the next and one segment of the crowd to another. It was a continuous, curiously joyful noise. A woman came up to me, beaming broadly. "Have you ever done this before?" she asked me. I answered, "Since I was sixteen, lots of times." She said, "This is my first time!" She was reveling in her newfound community of feeling, and in the realization of what it truly means to be a citizen of a democracy, even a democracy so perilously on the brink of becoming something far darker and more nasty. There were a lot of hand lettered signs on view. My favorite was "I've seen smarter cabinets at Ikea." The moast engimatic onew that I saw said, "Don't fuck cultists." I puzzled over that one awhile. I think it must have been an allusion to Lysistrata; an exhortation to render Pussygrabber's acolytes involuntarily celibate. But my favorite sight, one that I will treasure for years, was the group of legislative pages, teens who work as go-fers and messengers in the House and Senate, in their distinctive green jackets, faces pressed to a second floor window as they watched, apparently spellbound, the peacefully vociferous crowd below them. Those kids were getting a fantastic civics lesson, one to set beside and counterbalance the ugly viciousness enlisted by that ugly vicious man four years ago.
As if that weren't enough, I was heartened today to learn that Vermont Attorney General Charity Clark has joined a coalition of a dozen other AGs in suing to force an end to Musk's illegal, unconstitutional, unauthorized invasion of Americans' private and confidential records. General Clark said, in a statement released this morning,
“In the past week, the U.S. Department of the Treasury has given Elon Musk access to Americans’ personal private information, state bank account data, and other information that is some of our country’s most sensitive data.
As the richest man in the world, Elon Musk is not used to being told ‘no,’ but in our country, no one is
above the law. The President does not have the power to give away our private information to anyone he chooses, and he cannot cut federal payments approved by Congress.
This level of access for unauthorized individuals is unlawful, unprecedented, and unacceptable. DOGE has no authority to access this information, which they explicitly sought in order to block critical payments that millions of Americans rely on – payments that support health care, childcare, and other essential programs.
In defense of our Constitution, our right to privacy, and the essential funding that individuals and communities nationwide are counting on, we will be filing a lawsuit to stop this injustice.”
Although our Congressional delegation still seems to be contenting itself with arm-waving and speechifying, perhaps the leadership shown by General Clark and the people rallying outside our Capitol on a cold winter's day will inspire them to take action commensurate with the crisis. Our two Senators have a lot of power, despite being in the minority. The Senate should be shut down so long as Musk is allowed to continue his depredations. Our Senate's rules peculiarly allow a single Senator, or just a few acting in combination, to accomplish this. Fillibuster everything you can, Senators Sanders and Welch, and put a hold on everything else! This is not a time for business as usual. There is only one item of business that needs attending to right now: shall we continue as a constutional government, committed to the rule of law, or not? Mere arm-waving and speechifying won't cut it.
