Tag Archives: David Barton

Beware of Redpilled Zealots in Democratic Clothing

4 Replies

I have to admit, I missed it at first glace. I was scanning the Secretary of State’s list of candidates for the Legislature, and my eyes just glossed right over a familiar name. To be fair, I was focused on Republican candidates and this guy has qualified for the August Democratic primary in the Windham-1 district.

Fair warning: He is not a Democrat. Not anywhere close.

This is Jason Herron, previously noted in this space as a stealth conservative — at the time, he was a candidate for Guilford Selectboard touting himself as a humble maple farmer who merely wanted more transparency in local government.

In reality, he is (as you see in the screenshot above) the Vermont state director for Convention of States Action, a far-right fantasy camp that wants to selectively rewrite the U.S. Constitution. The object of its desire: a Constitutional convention “restricted to proposing amendments that will impose fiscal restraints on the federal government, limit its power and jurisdiction, and impose term limits on its officials and members of Congress.”

Yeah, none of that pesky reproductive rights stuff or clarifying the Second Amendment or eliminating the Electoral College or clarifying the separation of church and state. Only approved topics will be allowed in this arena of free speech.

In an appearance on a COSA YouTube video, Herron said a Constitutional convention held on COSA terms is “the only way we’re going to save our country without shedding blood.”

Good to know he’s keeping a level head about all this.

Continue reading →

Stealth Conservatives: A Leopard Can’t Change Its Spots, But It Can Try to Pass as a Cheetah

2 Replies

Meet Kathi Tarrant, mom, musician, teacher, and Republican candidate for the Vermont House in the Washington-Chittenden district currently represented by two Democrats, Tom Stevens and Theresa Wood.

Ms. Tarrant might not like it that I topped this piece with a picture of her at the August 2021 Patriot Rally on the steps of the Statehouse. The event was captured on video by the good folks at Orca Media, and you can see several speakers talking about the poor attendance. And you can see Tarrant talking about the federal lawsuit she filed against Gov. Phil Scott over his mask mandate. Yep, she’s one of them.

But that’s not how she’s presenting herself in the race for House. Instead, she’s donned the garb of a garden-variety conservative — to the right of Phil Scott, but not quite off the deep end. In a candidates’ forum sponsored by ORCA and another of my former employers, The Bridge, she managed to avoid subjects like the Covid vaccine and climate change denialism (“CO2 is NOT a pollutant”) and weather conspiracy theories and her membership in 802Freedom, the online community of anti-vaxxers and their ilk.

Instead, we got anodyne language about carbon taxes, ballot security, supporting law enforcement, fixing the housing shortage by unleashing the landlords, doubts about cannabis legalization, Second Amendment absolutism, and opposition to Article 22 over its wording, not its intent.

Now, it’s possible that she’s completely changed her political orientation in the past year. But it’s much more likely that she’s trying to pass as a standard conservative when in fact she’s way out on the fringes of political discourse.

Continue reading →

Dregs of the Ballot: Beware the Humble “Tree Farmer”

8 Replies

Pictured above is Jason Herron, self-described “maple farmer,” candidate for Select Board in Guilford and believer in a bunch of ultra-conservative nonsense. Like other stealth candidates for local office around Vermont, he presents himself as a simple guy who merely wants “transparency” in town government.

Transparency, as we have seen before, is one of the code words used by far-right candidates in an effort to con mainstream voters. Because, you know, if these candidates came right out and said what they believe, they’d get a tiny sliver of the vote and they know it.

Some of his supporters have been writing letters to local media endorsing Herron in the most generic of terms: “tree farmer,” “open, sincere, honest,” “no hidden agenda.” I have seen three such letters, and they make the same arguments using the same phrases. Almost as if they’re working from the same set of bullet points.

Herron is known among a certain tranche of the community as the organizer and presenter of a series of “educational” events under the rubric of “Constitution Alive!” That sounds benign enough, but “Constitution Alive!” is headed by David Barton, disgraced amateur historian, and Rick Green, identified by a far-right website as “the man Chuck Norris calls a ‘Constitutional Expert.'”

Continue reading →