WOMEN'S WORK 

Two weeks ago, a committee was appointed to go to Governor Dean's office and escort him into the chamber of the general assembly for the purpose of his giving his farewell address. The committee was made up entirely of men; Representatives Westman, Tracy and Obuchowski, and Senators Bloomer, Mazza, and Welch.

This Thursday another committee was appointed to escort Governor Douglas into the chamber to give his budget address. There were four women and two men. Someone must have whispered into someone's ear that a woman's place is in the House. 

DOING MORE WITH LESS 

The budget address was not standing room only as was Dean's Farewell Address and Douglas's Inaugural Address. There was none of the maudlin of the passing of the old, none of the excitement of the coming of the new. It was business as usual. 

INTRODUCING MR. CLIFF NOTE 

The Douglas budget address as translated by Mr. Cliff Note (The complete but unannotated budget address is posted here) :

"There is a prolonged economic slowdown caused by a global recession and Vermont's own competitive disadvantages. Economists indicate that the risks are all on the downside."

"The budget is responsible, forward-thinking and compassionate. This is a balanced budget, balanced on the bottom line and balanced in its call for sacrifice...

"It is a budget our state can afford, and it does not raise taxes. (No applause, is everyone asleep? Do they want to raise taxes? Do they not stand for anything?)

"It is not that Vermonters are undertaxed, it is that government has overspent." (Silence. Are they so used to the staged rallies of the Dean administration that they are unsure what to do when the cheerleaders are absent? Maybe they do not agree, heavens forbid.)

"These are principles from which I will not stray: we must live within our means, we will fulfill our commitment to the neediest, we will not dip into the pockets of struggling taxpayers, the sacrifice will be shared broadly, the route back to prosperity is to invest in Vermonters' education, skills, and aspirations.(The silence is growing deafening. Do not people understand that this event is being televised? Do they not share the governor's energy and motivation? Do they only want to meet everyone's request for everything?)

"We will make more money available to entrepreneurs through VEDA, the Vermont Jobs Fund, and the Vermont Opportunity Fund. (Go to http://www.vermontgov.com for the details. They were not included in his speech.)

"We are committed to our family farmers and I propose a $15,000,000 low cost loan program through the Vermont Agricultural Credit Corporation. (Gee, in his inaugural address the farmers receive a standing ovation. What is happening?)

Remember, this is Mr. Notes version. The complete budget address will be posted on our web site tomorrow at: http://www.DwinellPoliticalReport.com/douglas_budget_2003.html.

"More money to the Agency of Commerce and Community Development. More money to infrastructure including abating farmer non-point pollution and dam maintenance, state parks, the Rutland Court House, new police barracks in my home town, updating our health and public safety laboratory facilities, two regional technical academies, the Circ, the Bennington Bypass, Mississquoi Bridge. (Yawns. Have they gassed the place?)

"Drugs threaten our way of life. Addicts are not independent, they are not prudent in their finances, they are not industrious.I want a substance abuse counselor in every middle and high school to work with at-risk youth. I propose $1,300,000 for after-school programs, $580,000 for clinical treatment, $780,000 for opiate treatment.

"If you deal hard drugs to a child who dies as a result of using them, you should spend the rest of your life in jail." (This surely will elicit a howl, but no, nothing.)

"If you deal drugs, Vermonters are prepared to make your lives very, very unpleasant." (Almost to page seven and hooray, someone clapped, then a few woke up, then the whole place, and, yes, finally they struggled to their feet.)

"Vermont ranks second in the percentage of its residents on Medicaid, nearly 138,000 citizens. I am proud to announce that my budget ensures that not one of those Vermonters will lose access to benefits." (Polite applause)

"Despite millions of dollars of additional funding, Medicaid remains unsustainable. Therefore, the regressive co-payment system will be replaced with a simple progressive deductible system. Those with higher incomes will pay more." (For the details, again go to http://www.vermontgov.com).

"I propose two, one-week tax holidays, during Christmas shopping and August, to buy personal computers. I propose a two percent increase in higher education. I propose capping Act 60 property tax assistance at $2,500.

"Vermonters demand tax relief now!" (Silence. Are all the Republicans in the wash room? Nope, every seat is filled.)

"I propose cutting the statewide property tax by three cents from $1.10 to $1.07. (What do you know, applause; and more than half rose and yes mostly Republicans. The Democrat leadership sat, they do not want to cut property tax even though that was their promise back at least to the 1996 election.)

"I propose eliminating the statewide property tax on all agriculture and forest land and buildings enrolled in the current use program." (Applause, most rumbling to their feet, and even a whistle from the member from Newport City.)

And then it was over. Another forty seconds of standing applause. 

WHO ARE THOSE NEW MEMBERS? 

Gazing at the Democrat house troika of Speaker wannabe John Tracy, D-Burlington, Gayle Symington, D-Jericho and Carolyn Partridge, D-Windham, filling the back row next to the exit on the far left, we see a familiar face in a seat between Tracy and Symington, former Representative, low income advocate and lobbyist for the City of Burlington Karen Lafayette, furiously taking notes. Is this the new brain trust?

Sitting in between Representative Steve Larrabee, R-Danville and Henry Gray, R-Barre Town, another former Representative and now newswoman Ruth Dwyer, R-Thetford. 

DEAD OR ALIVE? 

We could not tell. What was that all about, their sitting on their hands? Is it that losing nine house seats and another three senate seats was not enough? Was it that they are so unused to having one of their own on the podium giving the budget message?

Ruth Dwyer said, "It was so artificial with Governor Dean. After eleven years of Dean's staging applause, no one seemed to know what to do."

Cheer led or not, perhaps part of the Republicans defeat was that voters were not sure what they stood for. Here were some good opportunities to literally stand for something: a balanced budget, no new taxes, jobs, higher education, tax relief, and gezzums even family farmers. But no, they sat on their hands for each of these "applause lines," probably worked so deliberately into Douglas's speech. 

SPENDTHRIFTS 

At the end of the last session, one lobbyist complained. "Even though I am a Republican, these guys spent more money than Democrats, raising the budget by 4.7 percent?" Even former Governor Howard Dean called the Republicans, much to his amazement, "spendthrifts."

Clearly, the "buy their vote" strategy failed as fourteen house members and two senate members lost, over twenty percent of Republicans who stood for reelection lost. They had redistricting on their side, money and experience.

Speaker Walter Freed, R-Dorset, thinks that maybe they had too much experience. "Nine of the fourteen house members who lost were multi-term members. Maybe they took the election for granted. Some said, 'They know who I am, they will elect me if they want to.' Some may have been too far away from the appreciation of winning. But basically we were out-recruited and out-worked. It was not about reapportionment. Eighty-one members went away from here happy with their new districts."

Representative Sylvia Kennedy, R-Chelsea, had her own theory. "In 2000, the turnout was at an all time high for many communities, driven by civil unions. There were people who had never voted who did. Then they went home and watched and concluded, 'see, my voting did not matter, nothing changed.'

"But they were wrong. The civil unions crowd intended to come back and work for gay marriage. After seeing the new legislature these non-voters had elected, they changed their tune and said, 'the Vermont battle is over, it is on to Massachusetts.' But we never did get that message out to the conservative base who stayed home; fourteen hundred in Orange County alone. 

WITCH'S BREW 

Representative Kurt Wright, R-Burlington, loves to stir the pot. He has dumped two bills in the hopper. The first is to redistrict the in-all-probability unconstitutional six-member Chittenden County senate district, the only district in the country more than two, other than in Vermont. Republican redistricting coordinator Representative Rick Hube, R-Londonderry, agrees with the bill. "In the end it should be the people of Chittenden County who decide."

Perhaps someone can ask the town clerks to put the question on the ballot for town meeting. Needs to happen PDQ as the days necessary to warn the electorate are fast approaching. Vermont Title 17, Chapter 51, Section 2521 requires town clerks to warn ballot items thirty days in advance of the March 4th meeting.

INTIMIDATION?

Vermont law clearly calls for citizens to request their own absentee or early voting ballot. Title 17, Chapter 51, Section 2532: An early or absentee voter, or an authorized family member or health care provider acting in the voter's behalf, may apply for an early voter absentee ballot by telephone, in person, or in writing.

The ballot should be returned as follows. Section § 2543. Return of ballots: The early or absentee voter to whom the same are addressed shall return the ballots to the clerk of the town in which he or she is a voter.

However, because it is not prohibited, Representative Wright said, "Some Democrats go to the early voters, pick up their ballots and return them to the town clerk. The secretary of state told me that 'it was unseemly and inappropriate to collect ballots.' But that is not enough to stop the practice so I introduced legislation to prohibit it. Disappointingly, it may not even be taken up as the Democrat vice-chair is opposed to it."

Well sure the Democrats who have used this practice to pull off a few close elections want to be able to enter the "voting booth" of the early voter and perhaps influence the decision. Every democrat should be opposed to this anti-democratic practice. 

DUMB & DUMBER 

DUMB

In our November 9, 2001 edition in our commentary "The Case for President Dean," we wrote, "He has a Gore-like tendency to exaggerate and use inappropriate superlatives. DPR was astounded when first attending Dean's press conferences that the media never called him on his exaggerated speech. They must have all become used to and inured to it. But such will not be the case when he hits the national press."

Alas, the prophecy comes true. In Sunday's New York Times Magazine, writer Tucker Carlson called Dean. "Dean isn't surprised by the Trent Lott scandal. The Republican Party is fundamentally hostile to blacks and Hispanics, he says, riddled as it is with 'institutional racism.' It's also full of liars."

As if this was not enough, Dean went on. "'I find the Republican Party pretty bankrupt intellectually,' Dean says, adding that he doesn't read anything written by conservatives. Nothing? 'No.' Are there any conservatives who are intellectually honest? 'I don't think so. I can't think of any.' He sounds cheery as he says this."

DUMBER

This was really dumb. But then unbelievably Dean becomes dumber. "Dean...calls back and leaves this message: 'Tucker, this is Howard Dean. I was talking to some staff folks after I got off the phone with you, and they were worried about my term 'institutional racism.' Probably that might have been not the right word to use. I was a little nervous now that the word 'racist' was such a charged word that it might have been better if I talked about 'intolerance' and 'divisiveness.' If you could give me a call back, that would be great.'''

We do not know if this was Dean's habit with our beloved press core, to extend and amend his remarks. Clearly Carlson was not going to allow that. Carlson wrote, "Damn. The consultants. They have gotten to him already. Dean has not even had a chance to say anything truly outrageous and already campaign professionals, sworn enemies of colorful language, are telling him to tone it down, advising him to dilute his essential Howard Dean-ness. Fire them I thought. Send them back to Washington before it is too late."

DUMBEST

Gee, the story gets better each time he tells it. This from January 23rd USA Today: "Former Vermont Governor Howard Dean said there are pregnant teenagers who are telling the truth when they say, 'My father will kill me,' and he treated a 12-year-old who was impregnated by her father: 'You explain that to the people in America who think parental notification is a good idea.'"

When he was in Vermont, he cited a story about a young girl whom he thought may have been impregnated by her father as a reason he opposed the parental notification bill. But as we reminded him, Vermont's bill had a judicial review process which would have given that twelve-year-old support to deal with her return to her abusive home instead of just returning her to more abuse.

And there is more. The article continues, "Dean's... credibility may have been undercut by some jarring rhetoric. One example: Criticizing the Bush administration for steps to curb abortion, he said that if they continued on that path, soon U.S. women wouldn't be able to go to school. The implicit comparison was to the repressive Taliban regime in Afghanistan."

* * *
New York Times magazine article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/19/magazine/19DEMOCRATS.html
USA Today article:
http://www.usatoday.com/usatonline/20030123/4802991s.htm

FIRST A BRIDGE, THEN A RAILROAD 

Former Governor Howard Dean does not go quietly into the night. First he bought a bridge with your money unbeknownst to the legislature whose job it is to appropriate money. The cost to the state jumped "twelve times the original appropriation," according to Governor Douglas, but that did not slow Dean and his cronies down.

That project is now on partial hold because of a lawsuit filed by a few legislators. "The pilings on each end will be done at a cost of approximately $200,000, about the same termination fee" if nothing was done according to Douglas. 

CHOO CHOO 

Douglas has not funded continuation of the money-losing, low ridership Champlain Flyer. "The track improvements have been a good investment for businesses which want to use rail. I do not know what we will do with the stations."

According to the Free Press, Dean bought 61 miles of the Bangor and Aroostock tracks in November from Wells River to Newport, spending another $2,150,000 in unappropriated moneys. Fortunately, the King is gone. Unfortunately, this deal looks harder to undo. 

SHUMLIN ANNOUNCES? 

It was a puff piece in the Sunday Times Argus/Rutland Herald: former Senator Shumlin, D-Windhan, at home, taking his daughters Becca and Olivia skiing, doing God’s work of lowering prescription drug prices, and appearing on the front page of the paper of record, the New York Times. So smooth, so articulate, easily able to turn a phrase. Almost likeable.

Then kaboom!! "Jim Douglas" according to Shumlin, "is neither bold nor courageous." So much for Jim. Guess he had not seen the budget address yet. And as for his vanquisher Republican Lieutenant Governor Brian Dubie, Shumlin says, "He doesn't know anything." He knew how to whip Shumlin's butt, but maybe that does not count.

Asked to comment, Douglas quipped, "So he has launched his campaign already?" He continued, "Guess it says more about him than it does about us. He says that he was cleaning his toilet during my inaugural address?" 

DOUGLAS FOR STATE CHAIR 

DSR asked Douglas if he would provide leadership for the Republican Party, driving and controlling the party as former Governor Dick Snelling had.

"I am the titular head of the Republican Party. I think that being governor of our Republican Party now, I have a responsibility to provide leadership, to articulate the agenda, to work with the party organization to help elect more Republicans in this building the next session, to enlist their support for my proposals, and to help to recruit people to run."

Asked if he would support GOP Chair Joe Acinapura for reelection this fall, Douglas said, "Joe told me that if I wanted him to step down now, he would. I said no." 

CHEAP SHOT 

Not being able to appoint her own cabinet, Tracy Schmaler of Vermont Press Bureau went out of her way to write up an ad hominem attack on the distinguished former Mayor of Rutland Jeff Wennberg, appointed by Douglas as Commissioner of Environmental Conservation. The Times Argus ran a "stop the presses" sized headline completely across the top of the front page.

Inside the article, Tracy serves Wennberg up to Mark Sinclair of the CLF, Massachusetts’s Can’t Legalize Fun crowd, now telling us what we can and cannot do. "Jeff Wennberg’s track record has been one of a frontal assault on our, (now it is our and not your) environmental regulations." However, he presents no evidence of this "assault," although he does mention a "comment" Jeff made nine years ago.

Then comes Paul Burns of VPIRG, Vermont People Irritate Righteous Gurus, to say, "Wennberg shares the business outlook of the governor." Duh, the whole campaign was about jobs.

Her own editorial board expressed fewer opinions and offered more facts in their opinion piece on Jeff’s appointment than Tracy did in her "news" piece. 

Read the article here:  http://timesargus.nybor.com/Archive/Articles/Article/59225

WAS THE PRESS SNOOKERED? 

Both the Stowe Reporter and the Burlington Free Press ran articles about the closing of the Bell-Gates lumber mill in Jeffersonville after 75 years of operation laying off seventeen people. The Free Press article cited many of the problems in the forest products industry in Vermont, competition for saw logs, limited or no cutting on state and national forest lands, protection of endangered species, the tremendous jump in workmans' compensation rates, and the high cost of electricity. All of this checks out as true.

The Stowe Reporter writes, "One of the final breaking points for Bell-Gates was lack of good timber." The Free Press concurred "The biggest problem has to do with a lack of wood..."

Shortly after these articles appeared, we received from LandVest a brochure advertising the sale of the Bell-Gates forests, all 6,952 acres of it. It represented that these lands contained 27,837 thousand-board feet of marketable lumber and 10,583 saw logs on less than half the acreage which is part of the initial sale. One forester told DPR that Bell-Gates owns at least an 8-9 year supply of logs for their mill on their own property.

The Vermont Forest News and Notes said that Bell-Gates "has no intention of selling the sawmill or any of its equipment and will remain in the retail business. "Gates cited an ever shrinking profit margin caused by the rising cost of doing business..." 

THE EXODUS CONTINUES 

»» Rich Kaul, Minnesota: I’ve followed your descriptions of Vermont politics on the web for some time and I thought I should just bite the bullet and subscribe. I follow Vermont politics as a former resident with many friends still in Vermont. I know that Dan Foty has sent you some of my comments on the future of the IBM plant in Essex so I know you might be interested in what its like on the outside.

I’m a former flatlander who lived in Vermont and who left for better opportunities in Minnesota last year. It’s interesting that I moved to place where I’ve got a house worth twice as much as my Vermont house yet has lower property taxes, where income taxes are lower, where the schools are better, health care is significantly better for my son with diabetes, and I even pay less in water and electricity. For example, GMP used to charge about $0.12/kwh, but here I’m charged $0.0635/kwh of which about $0.037 is the actual cost of generating the power. And I won't even go into how much cheaper heating is here! Add into the mix better pay and better work and it’s hard to say that leaving wasn't a good thing. Well, I do have to admit that traffic is worse around here, but a more vibrant business climate can have its drawbacks ;-) I do miss the mountains and friends there, though, so it is with sadness that we had to leave. 

POTTED PLANT SPEAKS OUT 

»» Martin Harris, Addison: Thanks for the heads-up on the new permit requirement for construction on more than an acre, for erosion control. The information comes in the same week as the official adoption of the 2002 National Electrical Code, in lieu of an earlier edition.

Here I sit in the industry, and I haven't been notified of either one. We're never told about the new sewage regulations which came out last August without any notice to any of us practitioners. They seem to have no trouble finding me when they want my fee renewal money however. Why no notice to the industry of these new reg's? What are we, potted plants?

Your mention of Stephen Monahan: he's the one who looked me and my building committee right in the eyes while telling us that the ADA reg's called for the handicap entrance of a public building to be the front entrance, even though he and I both knew better. Later he backed down without admitting deliberate misrepresentation of the reg's

The "new Vermont" claims it is the most wonderfully governed place in the galaxy, and that our modestly higher taxes (ha) pay for this incredible excellence of public service. My opinion is that we're governed about as poorly as the folks in Alabama, but pay ten times as much for the supposed privilege. And, of course, the same goes for the government schools. This is not a State to be proud of any more. 

WIN-WIN 

»» Ed Malila, Milton: Your Report is Great!! I think Vermont's New Governor is doing a Good Job!! But he needs to get hot on JOBS and stop the bleeding. Democrats think that the government creates Jobs & Business and taxes just come from the sky or someone else.

Jobs are created by businesses and when businesses are booming the State & Federal governments make out like bandits. Likewise when you have a business like IBM then Vermont receives millions and millions of dollars from the payroll and the economic benefit of having such a large industry in this area. Dean refused to address the business problems in Vermont, but I know Jim will get it done. Once the economic engine is running at full speed everyone makes out. 

THE BALL 

»» Gary Barnes, Burlington: There was a line of traffic to get in, a line to get on the shuttle bus, a line to enter the building, a line to check coats, a line to enter the main hall, a line at the hors d'oeuvres, and a line to shake hands with Governor Jim. It was delightful to wait in these lines and realize that there really are LOTS of Republicans in Vermont. 

ERRATUM 

»» Ruth Dwyer, Thetford: You do a great job, but should know better than to take anything Tracy Schmaler writes in the Herald at face value. I did not wear a "white satin gown" to the inaugural...it was beige knit, made on my sewing machine about 20 years ago, total cost maybe twelve dollars. The question is why did Tracy even bother to include that inaccuracy when there were so many more interesting things to write about? Also the quote attributed to me, while meaningless, was fabricated. Tracy didn't have her notebook out during our VERY brief conversation.

Editor's note: We wrote "satin-like." We looked, but we didn't touch.

REALLY GOOD POINTS 

»» David D. Demar, Georgia: Reading your latest newsletter of 1/16/03, I couldn't help reading Rep. Kathleen Keenan, D-St. Albans, taking you to task for not mentioning Brian Dubie's small errors because you pointed out Secretary of State, Deborah Markowitz's faux-pas.

I think it would be more prudent if we look at something that Markowitz said after her candidate (Al "I-Invented-the-Internet" Gore) lost the last presidential election to George Bush: She mentioned doing away with the electoral college, and using the "popular vote" to elect the president.

If one thinks about it, the electoral college gives Vermont TWO THIRDS more voice in electing the president, since we have THREE electoral votes. Doing away with the electoral college would leave us with the equivalent of ONE electoral vote: One Representative per 610,000 people in the state.

If we were to adopt the popular vote in the United States to elect the President, Vermont would be shifting two thirds of our say in who is elected president to the (socialist) elite, who control most big cities. Our forefathers set up the electoral college to ensure that small, rural, sparsely populated states such as Vermont were not taken advantage of by larger populations.

How anyone in their right mind would vote for someone like Markowitz (who obviously has her own agenda) defies logic, especially when she is supposed to be looking out for the welfare of Vermonters, NOT for her favored presidential candidate.

I fail to see how taking away TWO THIRDS of our say in electing the President of the United States will help Vermont. What's more, one should ask why, since Markowitz's candidate, Al-Gore won in Vermont, she would even bring up doing away with the electoral college. Unless she really DOESN'T represent Vermonters. 

INEFFICIENCY VERMONT 

»» Karen Kerin, South Royalton: Nice job of exposing the much too high electric rates. I sat on the Clean Air committee run by the Secretary of ANR and the Commish of Public [Dis]Service. Never have I listened to as many lies, distortions and pie in the sky efforts to fund things like "Efficiency Vermont", windmills and solar power. I killed solar power phantasies by pointing out that above the 35th parallel in the northern hemisphere, there is insufficient solar flux to make it viable. After that, they just would not listen to my radical talk about reliability for windmills. God knows Douglas needs to clean out that rat's nest. 

PRIORITIES 

»» Jim Daley, Colchester: I note your reader's comments that attendance at the Gov. Douglas Inaugural Ball was "the highest in history" but received no coverage from the Burlington Free Press.

That's is probably because their staffers were too busy prepping for the January 16 Anti-War Rally in Contois Auditorium, Burlington attended by 125 folks. That event rated page one placement (above the fold), 23 column inches and two pictures....one of which artfully captures a protester against a background of the American flag. No subtlety with the Gannett Gazette, eh? 

THEY LIKE US 

»» Mary Schroyer, Waterbury Center: Each week, after reading your report, I wonder why I still subscribe to the Burlington Free Press.

»» Miriam Oakes, South Burlington: The best thing I get on my computer - keep up this great report - I quote many things from it on a daily basis (giving you credit of course!).

»» Bob Alexander, Londonderry: Congratulations on another year of providing actionable information. This issue of the newsletter clearly points out the obvious need to attack strongly the clearly biased press in Vermont and the damage being done by them. You need a louder voice, how about direct mail providing the "real story?" How about a print newsletter mailed across the state whose mission is to provide voters with the information they need to make informed decisions. Clearly, our newspapers have no intention of fulfilling their moral if not legal obligation to Vermonters to help the very basis of a democratic society - - an informed electorate!  

PARTY PEOPLE 

"[A] footnote on all the Leftist class-warfare effluent being spewed by the Demos, we thought you might be interested to know who the "classiest" guys are in the Senate. The wealthiest Democrat could buy and sell the richest GOP senator more than 13 times. Drum roll please.... First place goes to John "Ketchup King" Kerry (D-MA) $675 million (more than half a billion inherited); In 2nd place is bad-boy Jon Corzine (D-NJ), $400 million; 3rd place goes to Herb Kohl (D-WS) $300 million; In 4th place, Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), $200 million; 5th place goes to Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) $50 million. Finally a Republican, Lincoln Chafee, shows up in 6th position. Hold the phone, there is a Republican majority in the Senate, but the richest guys are all Democrats, you know, the 'Party of the People.'" --THE FEDERALIST DIGEST, 17 January 2003 

LEFT-WING SLANDER 

"Senator Charles Schumer, D-New York, can stand there and say - not suggest, actually say - that the Bush administration seeks to use judicial nominations to take America back to the days of colored water fountains and blacks in the backs of buses. . . . Is there a shred of human decency to this man?" - Columnist Mark Davis, Fort Worth Star-Telegram 

SHOOTING FROM THE LIP 

We should not go to war in Iraq because "I do not think that we can afford to rebuild Iraq." --Senator Patrick Leahy on the Mark Johnson Show

That Iraq has the second largest oil reserves according to Oil and Gas Journal and can afford to rebuild itself did not seem to dawn on Senator Leahy. 

IMMUTABLE LAWS 

"One major problem in Lithuanian is that many enterprising young people are leaving the country to seek greater opportunities. Lithuania's tax rates still are relatively high. The top income tax rate in Lithuania is 33 percent, compared to 26 percent for Estonia.

"The Heritage Foundation's Index of Economic Freedom examines factors such as tax rates, trade policy and government intervention. On the index, Estonia ranked sixth of 156 nations examined, tied with the United States. Lithuania ranked only 29th." Sound familiar? --Orange County Register, January 7, 2003 

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