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Vermont is poised to become the 30th U.S. state to legalize marijuana for medical or recreational consumption, and the first state to legalize adults’ possession and limited cultivation of marijuana through an act of the legislature, rather than by popular ballot proposition. A bill that would make marijuana legal for adults in Vermont received final approval Wednesday from the Vermont Senate and will soon make its way to the desk of Gov. Phil Scott, who vetoed a similar bill in 2017. In Decem

Just before Thanksgiving, I received a call out of the blue from a friend of Oz Griebel, a well-known and very respected business leader in Connecticut, and a Republican. He began by telling me that Mr. Griebel is exploring a run for governor, and that I was on his short list. “Short list for what,” I asked. “You know I am a Democrat, right? And, I believe strongly in gun violence prevention, social justice reform, and protecting our most vulnerable” among other issues. He responded: “Yes. Tha

In the wake of the Republican tax reform bill, which has been hailed by supporters as the most significant revision to the federal tax code in 30 years, many Democratic states and city governments are looking for ways to work around the effects of GOP tax reform. As it turns out, the Republican-crafted tax reform law just so happens to penalize many taxpayers in states and cities that typically vote Democrat. Interestingly enough, this has led lawmakers in some of these state and local governme

Supporters of a 2018 ballot initiative to legalize psychedelic mushrooms in California were given the green light by the state attorney general's office earlier this month to circulate petitions and gather signatures. They now have until April 30 to gather and submit 365,880 valid signatures from registered voters in the first state to ever legalize medical marijuana under Proposition 215 in 1996. That ballot proposition, as well as Prop. 64 -- the 2016 voter initiative titled "The Adult Use o

Property rights are fundamental in America – or at least they are supposed to be. Yet each year, prosecutors and law enforcement agencies seize hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of cars, homes, cash and other property, with no due process to determine guilt or innocence, or even without even filing charges against the property owner. It’s called asset seizure or civil forfeiture, and it’s just wrong. By claiming that you or your property are related to criminal activity, the government j

Chad Peace, attorney for the Independent Voter Project, as well as 6 high-profile signatories, filed an amicus brief on September 22, 2017, in support of a legal challenge brought by Level the Playing Field (LPF). On October 13, Peace spoke about the brief and its significance to changing the exclusionary presidential debate rules on NBC7 in San Diego. "The brief argues that the bipartisan Commission on Presidential Debates' (CPD) 15 percent rule exacerbates the political divide in the US, lea

A woman I know sent me a note the other day. I was surprised, but happy to hear from her as we don’t know each other well. In the note, she explained that she had woken up last Monday morning to the news of the Las Vegas shootings. While preparing lunches for her boys to take to school, she wondered whether to tell them what had happened before they started their day. She decided to tell them — better to hear it from her than in the school hallways. Her note touched me, in part because she'd w

The bipartisan Commission on Presidential Debate’s (CPD) 15 percent rule exacerbates the political divide in the US, leaves millions of voters unrepresented in presidential elections, and undermines fundamental democratic principles in order to protect the two-party duopoly. That is the argument the Independent Voter Project and 6 individual signatories make in an amicus curiae brief filed Friday in support of a legal challenge brought by Level the Playing Field (LPF) against the debate commiss

Dr. Howard Dean, the former governor of Vermont, and a leading contender for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2004, recently had some sobering words for the two major political parties in the United States. On a Washington Post podcast, Dean said, "The most reliable demographic of our voters are the young people across the board, across racial and ethnic lines," but added that this is a major problem for the DNC, because: "These people are not Democrats." Dean went on to explain: "Th

Political advisor and author Mark McKinnon says that “A messy participatory process is representative democracy at its best.” We understand what he’s getting at. The contest of ideas and the formation of interest groups is an important part of our political process. But there’s a difference between messy and rigged. Nearly half of all Americans identify as independents, unwilling to endorse either the Democratic or Republican political parties. Yet, even in an election like 2016’s presidentia