“For a more beautiful Vermont our heart and mind know is possible.”
September 2014
I’m Ben Bosley and I’m a candidate for Vermont state senate from Colchester and the Islands. People who signed petitions to put me on the ballot told me of their many concerns and issues. Jobs vanish, higher property tax force many retired people to sell their homes, college costs go out of reach. Political gridlock and income inequality is worse then ever before. Income stagnation hurts and eats away at the Vermont middle class, the single most necessary element of a real democracy. We now see that this is due to few elite international corporations which increasingly dominate state and national politics. But now people everywhere are wising up to this operation of corrupt government and crony capitalism which is hollowing out the economy. Aware of this menace, we must face the on going theft of freedom, opportunity, rights and liberties. We the people must unite at the ballot box to protect liberty from ominous infringements on our rights and freedoms.
My campaign could be a lightening rod for your political energy. Vermont has always started things and led the way. First, to abolish slavery, first to admit women to college, first to capture a British fort, first to bring artillery to General Washington, first to have an independent senator grown in the VT Liberty Union campaigns of the 1970’s. When commanders needed a good brigade to spearhead a charge they were known to choose Vermonters. Let’s make this election for this one tiny senate seat the first rumbling of a political earthquake. Vote for “Big Ben” and vote for human heartedness and peace to bring down the bloated war budget. Then We The People through our representatives can free up our taxes to invest in Vermont’s infrastructure that has lasting value from generation to generation (not bombs and missiles that lose their value upon explosion). We The People need more of our tax money invested in our local communities for the common good and take the burden off of local income, sales and property taxes. Unless we do, I assure you that the cost of warfare will always draw our money away from Vermont and we will be stuck with rising property taxes to foot the bill. The buck stops with us. Let’s wise up and get at the bottom of this over taxation problem. I am campaigning outside the two party gridlock and I’m free to listen to your views and not pander to party lines. Here and now in this one, little local election, may I please have your vote as a step toward this 21st Century Modern American Dream? “The journey of a thousand miles begins with a first step.” I ask you to please take that first step with me and talk to friends, organize, internet, press, radio, TV, and vote on November 4th. Thank you.
Sincerely,
Ben
My Platform – Ben Bosley for State Senator from Colchester and the Islands
VT Should Cap Creeping Property Tax Increases for Retired Seniors
Vermont is the third most expensive state to live in and it’s getting harder to retire here. No one should have to renounce his or her state citizenship just to survive. We need to put a cap on property tax increases for people 65 and over that are due to higher annual school and municipal budgets. Seniors, vulnerable to so many forces, need assurance that, even if teacher’s unions negotiate a 5% increase in salary or municipal budgets rise to cover costs, they will be shielded from these two particular external forces. For planning purposes, seniors need facts and figures to see if they can retire in VT.
VT Should Lift The Ban On Renegotiating Lower Interest Rates For Student Loans
Students are now saddled with over a trillion dollars of debt for educational loans—more than all car loans, home mortgages, and credit card debt combined. Unlike others, graduates are unfairly forbidden to renegotiate a seven percent interest rate downward. Hard to move out, marry, start career and family.
VT Should Legalize & Tax Marijuana
A regulated, legal, and taxed market in marijuana, as in Colorado and Washington State, would reduce teenager’s exposure to other drugs in the illegal market. Marijuana is not a lethal drug; overdoses are nearly impossible. It has medicinal and recreational value and is safer and less addictive than alcohol or tobacco. Criminal prosecution of marijuana cases costs too much, wastes jail space, clogs courts, and diverts police, attorneys and judges from more useful work. Taxing marijuana can fund good causes.
VT Should Create Green Energy Investment And Hi-Tech Jobs By A Targeted Tax Break
To lure the best and brightest business people to VT we must enact a 10-year tax-free law to give start- up assistance to new green energy and high-tech business. VT can be the top dairy and high-tech state simultaneously. To compete with NY and others for the next generation of jobs we must attract businesses that drive our economy with innovative technologies like wind turbines, solar panels, geothermal systems, hybrid and electric cars, and next-generation batteries. We can create green jobs, address the deadly fossil-fuel climate crisis, and build a clean energy economy. Germany and China have begun to do this; you can see virtually whole cities with solar panels on the roof. Let’s catch up.
VT Should Expand AmeriCorps at the State Level – Move From Welfare to Workfare
After jobs have been shipped overseas people have looked every which to find opportunity for themselves and stay afloat. But there are still not enough jobs. I believe the work relief programs like AmeriCorps are preferable to plain public assistance because it maintains self-respect, reinforces the work ethic and keeps skills sharp. Let’s expand AmeriCorps and put Vermonters to work on small scale projects making our homes and buildings energy efficient, maintaining parks, bike paths, waterfronts, and community centers while employing writers, artists, musicians, day care workers and teachers.
VT Should Create a State Bank Like North Dakota to Shield Vermont From Financial Crashes
Far from helping the VT economy, big banks are making riskier gambles and hoard their extorted wealth in tax shelters off shore for use when a financial crash comes to snatch things up for pennies. That’s why I believe VT needs a statewide public bank to protect the people from the effects of market crashes, credit freezes, and state debt. A VT House committee found this idea had considerable merit.
VT Should Launch an Annual Oct. 27 Arkhipov Nuclear Disarmament Day To Ban The Bomb
Could the 21st century bring nuclear annihilation? But for one man, 5 pm, Oct. 27, 1962 almost did. It was the Cuban Missile Crisis; Soviet ships were blockaded off Cuba. Unknown to Kennedy’s “Excom,” four Soviet subs had nuclear weapons on board. A depth charge exploded near the hull of one. The Russian commander felt honor-bound to retaliate. But Capt. V. A. Arkhipov, at the last moment, refused to turn a needed second key. VT Students should get prizes for annual essays on nuclear disarmament.
——————————
Follow Ben’s campaign on facebook.