Category Archives: The media

What If They Held an Election and Nobody Covered It?

1 Reply

I would not be so bold as to say that our news media are in the tank for Gov. Phil Scott. But their sadly reduced capacity has redounded to the governor’s benefit, over and over again. No one has the bandwidth and/or interest in covering state politics anymore. As a result, recent events that might be harmful to Scott’s popularity have gone completely unreported or, at best, substantially underreported.

Example #1: The legislative hearing that revealed the disastrous state of the administration’s biggest IT project, which includes the budget, human resources, and finance and accounting — a project that touches on everybody in state government and every dollar it spends. This project is so badly off the rails that no one can say how long it will take to fix, how much more it will cost, or even if it will ever come to fruition. That’s not coming from critics, but from top administration officials themselves. I cannot explain why this isn’t a big fat deal.

Example #2: Scott’s attempt to bigfoot the Democratic primary for Chittenden County State’s Attorney. He openly urged Republicans to take Democratic ballots and vote for challenger Bram Kranichfeld over incumbent Sarah Fair George. At best it’s an ethically questionable thing for a self-proclaimed non-politician to do.

Example #3: What the Scott administration has done to Act 143, the Legislature’s attempt to reform the emergency housing program. I’m preparing to write a full post about this. For now, I’ll just say that Scott signed it and immediately began subverting it. His administration has devised its own plan that certainly violates the spirit of Act 143 and probably the letter of the law as well. Carly Berlin, a reporter shared by VTDigger and Vermont Public, did post a story about this on September 1, but it didn’t explore the full extent of the administration’s skulduggery. Otherwise this sorry affair has gone pretty much uncovered. It ought to be a scandal.

Example #4: In late July, the University of New Hampshire Survey Center published a poll showing that one-half of Vermonters “have a positive overall view of socialism, while only about four in ten have a positive view of capitalism,” and “a plurality have a positive view of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).” (It also showed Donald Trump’s popularity at an all-time low of 22% in Vermont, bwahahaha.)

Continue reading →

A Potentially Seismic Development in the Vermont News Business (Postscript Added)

Leave a reply

We may have just seen the first in a series of moves that could transform journalism in Vermont — for better or worse, but more likely the former.

The five-newspaper Vermont Community News Group, a locally-owned for-profit enterprise, is being acquired by the National Trust for Local News. The Colorado-based nonprofit is young (achieved tax-exempt status in 2022) but growing rapidly (2024 revenue $53 million). Its mission: to protect and sustain local news operations. In its own words:

The National Trust for Local News is protecting these vital civic assets and transforming them into a resilient, uniquely scalable non-profit news organization. Our goal is to harness local newspapers to build a more equitable and vibrant future for local news, nationwide.

I don’t know anything about the National Trust, but it seems to be legit. Its leadership includes an impressive array of people with experience in journalism, nonprofit enterprise, and (somewhat worryingly) the corporate world. (McKinsey? Ew.) It forswears donations from those with political agendas, and promises a hands-off relationship with its outlets’ editorial policies and journalistic standards.

Here’s why this could be a seismic event for Vermont journalism. When the National Trust enters a new state, it takes no half measures. It has operations in three states (Colorado, Georgia, Maine) and owns a total of 65 outlets so CNG’s five weeklies seem like a beginning, not an end. Based on track record, I assume the National Trust has made a thorough study of our news ecosystem and has decided it’s a promising market. I wouldn’t be surprised if it snaps up a bunch of local news outlets and maybe some bigger ones. (Some of our daily papers? VTDigger? Seven Days?) It could soon be a dominant force in Vermont journalism.

Continue reading →

The Reformer Has Itself a Hard-Right Nepo Baby

4 Replies

Back in 2021, global currency trader Paul Belogour purchased three long-established Vermont newspapers: The Manchester Journal, The Bennington Banner, and The Brattleboro Reformer. It was part of a Brattleboro-area property buying spree by the mullet-haired skillionaire. At the time I noted that it could be a very good thing to be owned a rich guy who could prop up the struggling papers — or a very bad thing because rich-guy owners (See Also: Bezos, Jeff) can be inconsistent stewards with no concept of journalistic ethics. And Belougour’s homeland, Belarus, was dubbed by Reporters Without Borders “the most dangerous country in Europe for media personnel.” That’s saying something, since Putin’s Russia is right next door.

For the most part, things have seemed… okay at the three papers. The paper has published the occasional op-ed or letter from Belogour, mainly parroting Putin’s worldview on European affairs and alleged corruption in Ukraine. But he hasn’t meddled too much in the newsroom as far as I can tell.

Until now.

The above LinkedIn profile lists Alexander Belogour as a “correspondent” for the papers’ corporation, Vermont News & Media. Yes, he’s the owner’s son. And he is a devout Catholic who seems to be part of a national movement toward Catholicism among MAGA men, up to and including Trumpian red-ragger Steve Bannon and Vice President J.D. Vance. Young Belogour is a student at Franciscan University of Steubenville (Ohio), founded in 1946 to cash in on the postwar education boom fueled by the GI Bill (as were many other upstart institutions). Franciscan U was characterized in a 1998 National Catholic Reporter piece as “a sleepy regional college” transformed into an epicenter of conservative Charismatic Catholicism in the late 90s. Enrollment has more than doubled since then.

(The NCR also noted how Franciscan U has infected the culture of the entire city, which should serve as a warning to Poultney, former home of Green Mountain College and possible future home of a university run by a Florida-based evangelist.)

Well, Young Belogour has been spending his summer away from campus as a very busy reporter for his dad’s newspapers. To put it kindly, that’s a mixed blessing. And a troubling portent.

Continue reading →

One Last Go-Round for Doug Hoffer

2 Replies

When you visit the official website of almost any elected officeholder, you’ll be greeted by a picture of said grandee. Or a whole bunch of pictures, because the ever-hungry ego must be placated.

But not Auditor Doug Hoffer. When you visit his homepage, you see a rotating gallery of Vermont writers who have won major awards, including Robert Frost, David Moats, Galway Kinnell, and yes, Louise Glück. I find that refreshing. Touching, really.

Hoffer’s not your typical politician. Sure, he’s got an ego and a sense of his own importance, but he has never ever expressed the slightest interest in climbing the political ladder. He’s kept his nose to the grindstone and produced a lot of great work, holding state government accountable for how it spends our tax dollars. Because as a Progressive (slash Democrat), he believes that government performs many valuable functions and has a responsibility to do them as efficiently as possible.

He isn’t as focused on self-promotion as most politicians. And I think he has suffered for it; his work has been routinely undercovered in our media and often ignored by those in the Legislative or Executive branches who ought to be taking his findings to heart. A couple of factors have worked against him: (1) Democrats and Republicans don’t like Progressives, and that’s his primary political orientation, and (2) he often challenges conventional wisdom, and nobody likes to hear that.

Now he’s on his way out, retiring at the end of his current term. He’s spending some of his last months in office encapsulating his past efforts in easily digestible form, hoping that people will pay attention. Kind of like an old rock-and-roller putting out a Greatest Hits album. Spoiler alert: It ain’t working very well. He’s getting the full lame-duck treatment. It’s a damn shame.

Continue reading →

Strap In, It’s Time for Another Touchdown on Planet Hank

8 Replies

I hate to give this douchebag the slightest bit of publicity, because it’s what he thrives on. But “Planet Hank” Poitras is someone who needs to be taken seriously. He cannot be ignored. Because he could very well be a rising star in Republican circles. (Governor, any comment?)

Poitras is seen above in a video he posted online himself. Yep, this is his favored public presentation. The problem is, he apparently holds a position (or two) of responsibility in the Vermont Republican Party, and he’s been creating a bunch of AI-generated attack videos aimed at U.S. Rep. Becca Balint and Sen. Bernie Sanders — videos being eagerly shared by Republican Congressional candidate Mark Coester. Poitras is the kind of bare-knuckles antagonist who tends to float upwards in the turgid swamp of Donald Trump’s America.

And now he’s elevating himself to the status of Crime Victim Slash Martyr, a casualty of the widespread lawlessness he gleefully chronicles in his cheap-ass “Cops” knockoff videos.

In case you missed it, Poitras claims to have been the target of a home invasion and deadly attack. The alleged assailant is a young man who was the subject of one of Planet Hank’s breathless videos. The man has been arrested and is in custody. And so far, all we have is Poitras’ word for what happened.

If you think I’m exaggerating, remember that while the Brattleboro police officially cut off any cooperation with Poitras, he has many friends in the department — perhaps including the officer/officers who wrote up the incident. And then ponder this quote from the judge who oversaw the arraignment hearing:

There may be more to the story than is obvious from the affidavit.

So the judge smells something fishy? So do I.

Continue reading →

The Decline of a Once Great Radio Station Continues Apace

1 Reply

Here’s a phrase that’s probably never been said before: “Soon we’ll be longing for the golden days of Guy Page.”

And here’s another: “Mary Beerworth is the sane person in this group.”

Allow me to explain. Guy Page of the conservative “news” site Vermont Daily Chronicle has announced the end of his association with WDEV Radio, where he had been holding down the 11:00 a.m. weekday slot with his call-in program “Hot Off the Press.” He is, in fact, taking his talents (such as they are) to WVMT Radio in Colchester, where he will host the 12:00 noon slot Monday through Friday.

That, in itself, wouldn’t induce me to write. What put this story over the top was the list of luminaries who will collectively occupy the timeslot forsaken by Mr. Page. All of them have made previous appearances in this space in notably dubious circumstances.

Oh man, you’d better be sitting down for this.

Continue reading →

The Rich Scent of Astroturf Descends Upon Our Verdant Landscape

12 Replies

This, my friends, is what you get when you ask Canva’s AI illustration tool to render “Vermont landscape.” And it’s a great example of the stuff you see when you visit websites or social media feeds for conservative candidates or causes.There’s a lot of AI usage; there are also things like tech bros defending rural Vermont and sudden-onset farmers with possibly inoperative staycation programs. In short, there’s a hell of a lot of astroturf in the conservative ideosphere.

These groups and individuals allegedly believe that rural Vermont is a precious resource, central to our very identity, and the people who live there are the true, authentic Vermonters, not those miserable lefty masses huddled in our “urban” communities. And yet these people present themselves with an inauthentic feel that makes you wonder what the hell is going on.

With AI maybe it’s a rights issue, not wanting to pay for copyrighted photography. Or maybe it’s just too haaaaaaaaard to do a DuckDuckGo image search. Or possibly, spitballin’ here, these color-saturated simulacra reveal something about the fakeness of the message itself. Because the Golden Age of the “real Vermont” — you know, the time before the unkempt flatlander rabble of hippies and Bernie Sanders fans descended upon the Green Mountain State — never actually existed.

So, when Sen. Russ Ingalls’ The Vermont Party posts a(n AI image of a) lapel pin saying “Make Vermont Vermont Again,” what year or time period does he have in mind?

I’m guessing it’s before the construction of the interstate freeway system, the development ranked by longtime journalist Chris Graff as the most consequential in recent Vermont history*. Before the freeways came, Vermont was a sleepy backwater that was difficult to navigate, so hardly anybody bothered to try. The freeways made our state much more accessible, enabling the arrival of those damn hippies and progressive types who eventually staged a hostile takeover of Vermont’s social order. (Never forget, Romain Tenney died for your sins.)

*Census data confirms Graff’s hypothesis. Our population grew extremely slowly from 1900 to 1960. The freeways triggered three decades of double-digit growth, sending our population from 360,000 to 563,000.

Continue reading →

More evidence That Our Machine Overlords are Not Quite Ready to Take Over the Planet

5 Replies

There’s a video clip making the rounds. It’s from an AI-generated YouTube channel offering “news” about the wonderful world of pro wrestling. The machine narrator is uncannily making its way through the AI-written copy when it comes to the acronym “WWE,” kind of a fundamental item for a wrestling channel. It doesn’t know how to pronounce “WWE,” and falls into a doom loop. At first it’s repeating “Wu-Wu-Wu-Wu-Wu-Wu” over and over again. Then the voice takes on a tone of desperation, as if it knows it’s screwing up but can’t stop. Eventually the sound devolves into a bunch of truly disturbing chokes, splutters, and noises not found in nature. It’s entertaining until it gets really uncomfortable.

I thought of this while reading a recent offering from Compass Vermont, the presumably AI-generated Substack newsletter. I don’t spend much time on Compass because it is completely unreliable. Some stuff is fine, there’s even the occasional scoop. But a lot of it reveals a conservative bias. And worse, the site offers no transparency whatsoever about who’s writing, who’s editing, or any information at all about its internal processes. No staff are identified except for Tom Davis, Compass’ “founder.” His ongoing role is not described.

I can’t say for sure Compass is an AI product, but it sure displays the hallmarks. And the item in question, “Update: Late filings reduce Vermont’s 2027 committee chair turnover from 13 to 8,” shows what happens when AI takes a pratfall into the mud and can’t get up again.

Continue reading →

The Reformer Steps Into an Ethical Quagmire

2 Replies

There are certain words in our language that need to be replaced occasionally because of context. Think “used car” becoming “previously owned vehicle,” or “garbage man” becoming “sanitation engineer,” or “undertaker” morphing into “mortician” and then “funeral director” and probably “bereavement facilitator” next. Or the various, now-unspoken descriptors for racial and ethnic groups and people with disabilities.

And in this age of grasping for revenue in the news business, we have “advertorial” becoming “sponsored content” and now, apparently, “content revenue.”

So I gather from a recent Brattleboro Reformer story about the hiring of longtime radio personality Peter “Fish” Case as “director of content revenue” for the paper’s parent company Vermont News & Media — the outfit owned by not-at-all-fishy Belarusian currency trader Paul Belogour.

We’ll get back to the whole “content revenue” thing and how it might affect the journalism on offer at Belogour’s three papers, The Reformer, The Bennington Banner, and The Manchester Journal. But there’s a more immediate question about the ethics of Case’s hiring that goes absolutely unmentioned in The Reformer‘s story about the hire. (The piece carries no byline, which means it wasn’t written by a reporter or editor. It’s a glorified press release, is what it is. There’s a little red flag off the top.)

Continue reading →

House Leadership Suffered an Embarrassing Defeat Last Week, Not That Our Media Took Much Notice

3 Replies

A former House speaker once told me that they never brought a bill to a floor vote unless they were certain of the outcome. Otherwise they’d put it off while they nailed down the necessary votes.

Last Wednesday, Speaker Jill Krowinski fell afoul of that maxim. Or ignored it, or didn’t care.

The full House was considering Act 181 dismemberment reform, which turned out to be a lengthy floor debate with plenty of amendments. And something happened that only rarely happens: the minority Republicans won a couple of votes. They actually had an impact on the process.

“In all of my 18 years, I can’t remember that happening,” Republican Rep. Mark Higley told the Vermont Daily Chronicle — the only media outlet to report on Wednesday’s events as a noteworthy, standalone story. Which is a depressing statement on the health of our media ecosystem, but we’ll get to that later.

Continue reading →