 Hello everyone. Thank you for tuning in to the Straight Talk Vermont show. Straight Talk Vermont is a program of service incorporated, our parent non-profit. So I'm Bruce Wilson, executive director. And today, I'm honored to have a wonderful, incredible guest and a friend of mine who served on a legislative, Vermont legislator and a lieutenant governor. And so David Zuckerman, how you doing, sir? I'm good. Thanks for having me, Bruce. It's nice to be on the show with you. Thank you. I know. It's always good to see you. Absolutely. We see each other far apart here and there all the years. Yeah. Well, I get off on the farm and don't come into town as much anymore. Yeah. I know. I don't know how long we've been doing it, so 20 years. I don't know. I'm guessing. Something. Yeah. It's my own way back there. That's right. Yeah. So for people who don't really know you who should, I probably do. I'm sure they do. But can you talk about a little bit about what you did within the legislators? Sure. Well, I served for 14 years in the house from a district right here in Burlington. I lived actually right around the corner from these studios on Dan's Court and Germaine Street and different parts around the hill section here and represented Burlington for 14 years in the house. And then when we found land to buy in Heinsberg, I left the legislature for a couple of years and expanded our farm and then a Senate seat opened up in Chittenden County. And I won that and served for four years. And so for 18 years, I was a policymaker. And I was inspired by Bernie as a student at UVM back in 92 that politics could be different. Unfortunately, a lot of politics has gone different in a sour way these days. But like with Bernie, whether you agree with him or you disagree with him, he stays focused on the issues that he cares about. He tells you what he thinks. And he says, look, agree with me or disagree with me, that's fine. But I'm not going to just be a finger to the wind politician. And so he really inspired me as a young person who was cynical about politics. I thought, wow, here's a guy that can be independent of corporate money, independent of the party politics that goes on and is fighting for things I care about. So when I volunteered for him as a student in 92, I started to meet people locally. That opened the door to me to then run. I lost in 94 and I won in 96. And when I was there, I really tried to put forward issues and ideas that maybe some other folks weren't in districts that they could do that in. So whether it was reforming our cannabis laws to bring that above board, whether it was discussing GMOs and farming and regulating this new technology that was really going to expand agrochemical use and expansion to be bigger farms, raise the minimum wage, universal health care, a range of things. My spouse, we were talking before the show, has Lyme disease and the long-term effects of that and trying to elevate the opportunity for medical professionals to use alternative practices to try to treat Lyme disease. So it was a wide range of things. And the biggest thing was that I tried to work on these issues with people from around the state. It wasn't just about being in my peculiar and trying to convince my colleagues by the conversations we would have. But it was also really getting out around the state and meeting with people who cared about these same issues and helping them understand how to positively influence their own legislator, share with them information, become a resource for those legislators. Because most people don't realize that all the folks that serve in Montpelier pretty much have no staff. So they're only getting information from whatever constituents call or lobbyists or the legislative council who's doing legal research. So if you really care about something and you really have a lot of knowledge about something, you can very well be the encyclopedia on the shelf for that legislator in your district. And if you develop a relationship with them, call them about it, tell them you've got that expertise, tell them why you think what you know is important relative to the issue that they're dealing with, you can have a really outsized impact. So I used to go around the state, talk with people about the issues that we had in common, and get them to develop those relationships. And that helped the issues in the building that I was working on. Yeah, so I know when you mentioned Bernie's name, I was thinking of talking about 1992. I know Bernie used to have all this youth stuff that we would do every year at... 242 and 42 and at UVM. He gave these youth a little certificate for being a part of the issues and concerns of what you want to do. And just like you, you know, he would tap around wherever he had to go to talk to people. And one thing you got to say a little about you and Bernie is that when you see Bernie on the news and he's in Washington, he'd say, I went to Burlington and I talked to Donna about healthcare. And she said we need to lower the cost. He meant it. He actually talked to Donna for real. And a lot of people might think that this might be some politicianism. No, no, Bernie really worked hard to get around the state. I mean, it's harder now that he's a senator in a bigger position working on some of the really biggest issues of the day right now. So some folks get frustrated that he's not getting out and about as much. But, you know, he is down there fighting on those issues that he's been elevating for decades. It's just amazing. So then you were elected as a lieutenant governor. Sure. And I know you fought for those same type of issues and you know, you weren't changing up or nothing, but you did have more power. And so what did you do? Well, it's interesting. Lieutenant governor has more power and less power. It kind of depends on some of the lens. As lieutenant governor, you're no longer serving on committees with people. You're no longer actually a policymaker. And so you have a bigger podium to speak from, but you've actually got less day to day power in shaping legislation. And so I tried to use the office in the part of that I had been doing as a legislator, but on my spare time. Now it was during the time of being lieutenant governor was to travel the state, really help bring the discussion that was happening in Montpelier down to Springfield or over to Danville or, you know, to different corners of the state. And really continue to try to elevate the conversation to make more room for the policymakers to keep moving in a more progressive direction, whether it was, you know, universal health care, raise the minimum wage, climate legislation, you know, paid family leave. It's a fascinating role because as lieutenant governor, you're a statewide office holder, so you think there's a lot of power. But really the governor has the administrative role for the state. And as lieutenant governor, your job is primarily to make sure you run the proceedings of the Senate within the rules and within a respectful way. And I really did try to do that. It was interesting. I think there were a number of more moderate to conservative Democrats and some Republicans who were pretty freaked out when I got elected lieutenant governor. And I think they were surprised because while I am very progressive on my issues and my views, I'm a fairly strong supporter of the institution of how our system is supposed to work because I think when we think about, you know, really kind of disrupting the system, it has both successes and real pitfalls. We look at the last president who disrupted the system and there's some real discord now. And it's hard if the faith in the workings of democracy gets undermined and there's too much cynicism about it and people don't believe it works. Then it doesn't work. I mean it only works if we all buy into the fact that the system can be fair. Now there are problems with the system, don't get me wrong. The number of people that can run for office and represent different viewpoints is really limited because if you don't have access to money or people with money, how do you run for office? So I think there's major changes that need to happen around campaign finance so that everyday people have a better shot. We're seeing a few more people able to run with some of the grassroots systems that Bernie really opened the door on but it's still a wealthy white man's game. And unless you're someone who's really fighting and scrapping to work your way up the system like I did, although I'm also a white man and I grew up in a fairly well-off family. My dad was a doctor. I've never hidden that. If you're in... And you should. No, but if you're in a household that talks politics while you're growing up and has resources to be able to have a little bit of free time to explore what's going on in the world, it gives you an advantage. If you're working 60 hours a week and you're just trying to keep your house going, there's no time to then also be engaged in the political process and call your legislator. You're just trying to get home in time to take your kid to the after-school program to then zip off over to the other kid and pick them up at childcare and get to the grocery store and get home and make dinner and you pass out exhausted. So we need a system that makes it so that everyday people have a greater opportunity to lend their voice into it. So I'm not saying the system is perfect. But as Lieutenant Governor, you really preside over the rules of the Senate to make sure every voice that speaks up has a chance. And some people can wield that power in a way that really slants the direction of the conversation. And that's not really the job. The Lieutenant Governor is kind of the referee of the Senate. So then I ran for governor a year ago. And when I kicked off my campaign in January, I think a lot of folks thought that it was uphill but winnable. We don't upend our incumbents very easily in this state or anywhere. But then two months later, the pandemic struck. And that was really the main issue. You couldn't do as much work as you wanted to do. You and Bernie are all boots on the ground. And I couldn't go anywhere. I couldn't travel around the state and visit with people. There were no events to be had. The governor had press conferences two or three days a week. We were all fixated on them to find out what we were going to do about the pandemic and what were the things we needed to do to protect each other and care for our neighbors. So he had a platform and nothing else mattered. Great opportunity. I'm sure it was incredibly hard work. I don't envy him having to make the kinds of decisions he had to make. And I think he did a reasonably good job with the pandemic. I still just agree with him on a bunch of other issues. But that didn't matter. Both of us know Governor Scott for God on forever. When he was Lieutenant Governor. And then Senator before that. And like you said, you don't think he's done an unreasonable job in whole as the governor? Well, no. I ran against him because I thought there were some issues that he really... And I didn't have the same views and I thought he was at a step with a huge number of Vermonters. The minimum wage, the climate legislation that he vetoed. He at first pushed back against the position of racial equity and governance and then adjusted the bill a little bit and finally got it through. He's vetoed more bills than any other governor in four years in the history of Vermont. So there were a number of things that I disagree with him on. With respect to COVID, you know, he did generally follow the science early on. He was slow to mandate masks. And both myself and Rebecca Holcomb who was one of the other candidates in the primary were pushing for a mask mandate back early on. Because it was quite clear that that would reduce the spread. And six feet densely. Right. Well, he talked about that, but he wouldn't do the mask mandate. And finally he did. And our numbers were really good. And Vermonters cared for our neighbors. We brought each other food. We looked out for each other and we kept our numbers really good. And I think he'd certainly deliver some credit for that as do the people of the state of Vermont. Because frankly, we did get vaccinated at a higher rate and so forth. So, you know, I think one of the things we have to learn to do and we thankfully still do it in Vermont is we can compliment people we disagree with. So I disagree with him on a bunch of issues. I think he did a good job with COVID. Yeah. That's fine. We need to do more of that. No doubt about it. So, Vermont is changing because of Senator Patrick Leahy who's retiring for some incredible years. How many are you 18? It'll be 48 by the time. How many years in the Senate? 48. Gosh. Yeah. 48 years in the Senate. 74 he got elected. Oh, wow. And it'll be in the 2022. Wow. Isn't that an incredible record? Yeah. Yeah. And so people are jumping in line right fast. Well, what you know, you know, you can figure what they should. Yeah. Yeah. It's an important position. You know, Peter Welch is moving from the House to hopefully in his opinion, hoping to be in the Senate. I had posted a op-ed and digger that I thought was going to be about a week before Leahy announced, but it was actually just a couple of hours before indicating that I thought it would be a good time for him to not seek re-election, because I think he and Bernie and Peter have set the state on a beautiful path for the next 10 years in terms of money to get us through rebuilding, you know, from the first infrastructure bill that just passed, but also some of the COVID money. I mean, one of the things back to Governor Scott, Vermont has benefited tremendously from federal money. While we were supposed to get Ball Park, I think $1.4 billion, we actually have $2.4 give or take billion. We got a billion extra dollars because of a policy that Senator Leahy and others have continued since Senator Aikin originally implemented it with cohorts across this country for small states to get a minimum allocation. So even though our population would only garner us X dollars, the small state minimum got us X plus dollars. So one of the reasons I would argue Phil Scott's done so well is he's had an extra billion, with a B, billion dollars to help our businesses to offer free shots and free COVID tests. I mean, in other states, they can't get COVID tests as much as we can. And now they just announced the free, you know, the free rapid tests and stuff and boosters. And we're able to do that because of federal money. So I sometimes chuckle that our small government governor has gotten to oversee the biggest government spending in the history of the state. But in any case, I think Senator Leahy and Bernie and Peter did a great job of sticking up for Vermont. So one of the dilemmas for a small state like ours is that if you gain seniority in the House or the Senate, that's worth something. It helps you get, you know, bring money back for airports or brownfield cleanup or investments in childcare or whatever it is. So they made a lot of money come back to Vermont these last few years. And we're going to lose that seniority. But we're well set up for the next five or 10 years with bills they're passing now to bring money in. So I said, you know, it is time for new blood. And I had urged Peter Welsh to stay in the House because now we're going to have two people with no seniority. He'll have no seniority in the Senate and then whoever goes into the House will have no seniority. So Vermont's going to be in a very different position with Bernie being the only person with a fair amount of seniority and he's up for election in two years and who knows what he's going to do. But yeah, so Peter jumped into the race for Senator Leahy's seat. And now more recently the Lieutenant Governor has jumped into the race for the House seat. I happen to think that probably Peter and the Lieutenant Governor both maybe knew about Leahy's intentions earlier than many of the rest of us based on decisions they made, you know, the fact that Peter hired some pretty big campaign people, you know, six, seven months ago. The Lieutenant Governor, Molly Gray, raised money right out of the gate as the Lieutenant Governor for an election campaign when people never did that. But it's her first term, right? It's her first term and in January, February of her first term, of a two year term, she raised like 50 grand for electioneering. And we just don't do that in Vermont. So, you know, in many ways they're sort of the inside track folks, but there's other couple people who are thinking about running for Congress. We've heard their names, Keisha Rahm, Becca Ballant. They both have a number of years of public service, having served in the legislature, House and Senate for Keisha and the Senate for Becca. So they have more understanding of making bills and writing laws than certainly the Lieutenant Governor does. But the Lieutenant Governor's got the inside track with respect to probably endorsements and money. So it'll be really interesting to see. But who's that said again? The Lieutenant Governor does, because she grew up, there's a lot of discussion about how she grew up on a farm, which she did. Her father is highly respected, a farmer in Newbury. But they were engaged and active with the Democratic Party back when she was a kid. So she knew Madeline Cunin when she was a kid running around. She knew Leahy, she knew Welsh. And so the familial ties, we were talking earlier about the different advantages people have. You know, she came out of nowhere and when the Lieutenant Governor's office was able to raise $400,000, mostly because of a lot of the connections that were there. And that'll be interesting to see for this next office how hard people dig in terms of where she stands on issues and what she's for. And I'm sure Keisha Rahm and Becca will bring up issues that they've worked on in the legislature. Keisha, I've known her from right out to Gabe from college. Everybody I could think of to support her on everything she wanted to try to do. And most of them did. And she is so smart. And like you say, she knows the rules. She's really full of people. She actually really are full of people of Vermont. I know that I'm saying this from your experience. From my experience and for the love I have for her as a friend and as just one hand and then the other hand. And I don't know, you're the first person I've heard from that she could be running for Congress. And she'd be an incredible candidate. Because I like Peter. He's running for Leahy's seat, it's a separate race. No, I'm just saying my years, it's so funny because I'm a youth service provider. And I worked with the coalitions around the state of Vermont. And one year we went up to the Capitol to visit our senators and congressmen. And one time I was sitting. So we went in Peter's office and it's a funny story. And all of us couldn't, you know, you were right. And so he said, Peter said, you can sit over there at his desk. So I'm like, whoa, I get to sit at his desk. And so they're taking pictures of me. And it's one day we was at some event, Burlington, I don't know, a kids safe collaborative event or something. I think it was. And he said, yes. And there's that guy, Bruce Wilson, who took over my office. So I thought it was funny. But anyways, I really, on the other hand, I have nothing about him. I'm not saying this is not bad or good because it's just me. One person said, I don't hear nothing. I don't hear nothing about him. I don't know what his record is. I don't know what he's actually done for us. I hope you can share something with me. And so as he's going into as a senator, could he seem like a self, he's a self-spoken or a good listener? You know, but I don't know what, you know, so can you tell me some things that he might have accomplished for us in Vermont? Well, I mean, he certainly, I think has brought a lot of Vermont's values where people accept the folks of different views and you can sit at the table and still try to work them out. One thing is Washington doesn't seem to have a lot of that. So that's, I think, a very high quality of his. But, you know, at the same time, you know, my inspiration was Bernie, you know, someone who's going to go out there and really bring these issues to the forefront. Elevate the issues of working people, struggling people, folks who are sometimes not in the main tranche of leaders and try to help other people come into leadership or get taken care of. Right. And I think Vermont could certainly send more of that to Montpelier, or excuse me, to Washington. And, you know, he's done a fair amount on the agricultural side. I think he's on the agriculture committee as well. And he's tried to be a part of this, the Problem Solvers Caucus, I think it's called, which is a group of moderate Democrats and moderate Republicans to try to find solutions that all sides will come to on. So in some ways, I think that sometimes is a quieter effort. And I'm sure he's met with some success and some struggles. But it'll be interesting because he's running for the Senate. I think he'll be 73 or 74 by the time the election happens. So six years later, he's going to be up around 80, 81, just like Senator Leahy is when he's saying I'm not going to run again. So the interesting situation is going from 18 years of seniority in the House to where he'll be almost no seniority in the Senate. And after his first term, who knows if he's going to run again? Right, exactly. And, you know, you mentioned Keisha and I just do want to mention that Senator Becca Ballant has fought for some pretty good issues as well. And one of the things I think will be interesting just in terms of dynamics, I don't know how it's going to play out. But Keisha is going to be probably campaigning mostly to the small P progressive side of the issues. I think Molly Gray is going to be sort of the moderate, don't make anybody upset Democrat kind of person. And then, and part of the institution really, like I said, she's connected to the Leahy world and the Welsh world and the Madeline Cunan world and Howard Dean and Peter Shumlin. So she's going to be the institutional candidate, kind of like Hillary and Bernie, right? Hillary was the institutional candidate. Bernie was the one who was really out there fighting for people. And then you've got Becca, who I think on issues is fairly progressive. But she's also part of the institution because she's in leadership. She's the president pro tem. And the other thing is she's a bit, well, she's close to our age. I mean, she's, I think, 53. And both the others are in their 30s. And so I think people really need to think about both the issues and life experience that folks bring. And do we want someone who's, you know, had some life experience? She's the only one of the three with children. And one of them has developmental disabilities, I think autism maybe. So she's got that experience. Kasia's got the experience of being a woman of color and mixed race parents and, you know, fighting for progressive issues. And but a bit younger. And Molly's never really served in office. She didn't vote for 10 years, grew up in a politically connected family. I don't know why she didn't vote when you've, when you've learned about politics your whole life growing up. You think it was pretty important to vote. But she's also, she's, she's quite smart as well. She's a legal trained lawyer and has done some activities around the globe. So people have a lot to weigh between them. And it'll be interesting to see how that plays out. So I guess, you know, candidates are always, not always, but a lot of them talk about, well, you know, you and Bernie, you always ask the question. That's why you do all these, I don't mean to walk into the neighborhoods or to the people who you serve getting answers. But a lot of candidates seem to, they come up with their own answers. You know, they don't do, they do not have boots on the ground. No more like, all right, hey, I'm Bruce Wilson. Here's my, you know, this is where I answer my bio vote for me, you know. But I don't, I don't necessarily, a lot of them don't seem to necessarily know what the people want. You know, like, how do you, how do you, how does a candidate get elected without working on really for the people who they serve based on what their people want? And you can say with healthcare, you can say healthcare and jobs, well, we got plenty of jobs. Jobs and all these other things that worldwide issue things you could talk about. You know, with everybody, you know, we don't want to, no wars, no, whatever. We are, everybody don't want these changes. But, but that's not grass root. That's not, that's not down. That's not really what the people want and based on what they really need. Yeah. So how do we do that? It's, it's tricky, you know, ultimately as a candidate running for statewide office, it's hard to have a conversation with all 600 plus thousand people. Sure. Okay. And in the age of COVID, it's particularly hard to have even group meetings with people and say, well, what's on your mind and what do you care about. And, you know, I think it is important as a candidate to be really clear about what you are coming to the table with. What is your life experience? What are the issues you care about that you think everybody else cares about or a majority of the people care about? And how are you going to execute that? How are you going to work with other people to get those policies passed? Because you have to be able to both articulate the issues you care about and be able to persuade others in the policymaking circles to work on the same issue and to vote for it. And, you know, sometimes folks can be a great candidate because they get along with everybody and people might think they have good ideas, but then they may be a terribly unpersuasive person with their colleagues. Or someone may be incredibly smart, but not really be very personable and be able to relate with folks. And so they're not a great candidate, but they might be a great negotiator. And so, you know, I think people just have to take the time to really try to learn who everybody is. You know, you've got to, as a candidate, make yourself available what you stand for, but also available to talk with people and listen to their issues. And that way, you learn as a candidate and people feel heard as a candidate. And people need to hopefully find some time to do a little bit of that homework and send messages. I mean, one of the things that people don't realize is you can reach out to campaigns and candidates and get an answer back because most people don't reach out. So I've always just said, reach out. Like, it means more work for someone in office. Absolutely. But it's their job to answer your question. We shouldn't just, the person who, in theory, next in line shouldn't just get it because they seem to be next in line. Yeah, or connected or whatnot. Vermont politics usually go, you know what I mean? If a Senate sees opening you to congressmen, then you slice right up, you know? Yeah, yeah. But I'm saying that, you know, that seems like that's how it goes, that's how it's been going here. But that's not right. Well, I mean, to me, that's, I think earlier we mentioned public financing and various things like that. You know, ultimately, being connected opens doors to both meetings with people that can give you the information you need so you can articulate well on the issues or be articulate on the issues and raise money. Because really, if you're not connected to enough people with enough money that, you know, you can go a long way with hundreds of people giving you 20 or 25 bucks and that's great. But you need thousands of those. Versus, you know, you get $34,000 checks running for statewide office and there's 120 grand, you raise, you know, a third of what you need. And so those connections and sort of who's picked by the insiders really does give them a leg up because those folks who are supporting them have all those connections. You know, when I first got involved, I was running as a progressive from Burlington. I think there were three in the state house at the time and one retired when I got elected. There were three of us out of 180 legislators. I certainly never thought I was going to be a senator or lieutenant governor because there's no way with a third party label you're going to get all those connections and all those networks of people saying, oh yeah, no, I'll get you money and I'll do knock for you and I'll do this and I'll do that. But most of the time, the people that move up the ladder are the people that are connected. You got to work triply hard if you're not part of the inner circle, which is I think one of the struggles for communities of color, for women, for a lot of different positions where it's been a white male club. And so how do you become connected when you're not part of that club? And, you know, thankfully some aspects of those barriers are being broken down, but there's still plenty of those barriers. So what is the money used for? Why do we need, you know, I understand why we need, why can they need money, you know, some money? But why do they need, you know, like the most money to make this outcome? No, I think that's a great question. And sometimes it's frustrating as someone who's run for office and had to raise money. It's just like, my God, what are we, what could we be doing for good with all this money? But the reality is you've got to get your face and your message in front of people. And you either do it through mailings, which cost a lot of money, or through TV ads, which cost a lot of money, or through radio ads, which don't cost as much money but still cost money. And if you're running statewide, that means you're also going to have some campaign staff. You've got a campaign manager who's helping connect the media to your campaign and trying to make things happen, who's trying to set up events for you. You've got volunteer coordinators and people that help get folks out in neighborhoods all over the state, leafletting and trying to make events happen. You know, so you've got staff to pay, you got mailings to do. Usually you end up renting an office for the six or 12 months. And so it just, unfortunately, that all takes a fair chunk of change. Yeah, I can do that. I was doing a math as you was talking. Yeah, yeah. I mean, when I ran for lieutenant governor, the first time I think we raised about $380,000 over the course of a year. And, you know, many would argue we barely had the money we needed for TV. I think we only did about $25,000 or $30,000 of TV ads. You know, these Senate races and House races, they're going to spend a couple hundred thousand dollars on TV. And if big money comes in from out of state to try to tip one of the seats towards the Republicans, I doubt they'll spend much here. There's much hotter, more competitive districts elsewhere. But if they do, you can start talking about millions of dollars on TV. I mean, people have seen it. They get sick of all the TV ads. I mean, it just bonkers. Yeah, it's a lot. So this is going to be very interesting. Do you know anybody who might be running for Senate? I mean, for U.S. Senate? For U.S. Senate? Well, the U.S. Senate, it's going to be Peter Welsh. And then there's a woman in, I've heard, I can't remember her name. She lives in the Mad River Valley. Excuse me, she's a doctor in Weitzfield. And she's partly running in Sheepfield because, you know, just because Peter's been there doesn't mean he deserves the inside track. Maybe it's time for some fresh blood. And I haven't heard of anybody else at this point. If earlier on, Tanya Vyhovsky from Essex had talked about maybe running for the U.S. Senate. But I don't believe she's going to at this point. I think just the fact that Peter Welsh has two million dollars that he's carrying over from his House campaign is pretty formidable. And he's already, Bernie's already endorsed him. That makes it hard for someone to run against him. You know, I think Peter Welsh made a pledge this time to not take any corporate PAC money, but I've heard quite a few people frustrated that he's still going to keep the money that he got from corporate PACs that is in his fund. I mean, maybe if he were to look at his past fund-raising and see what percentage came from people and what percentage came from corporate PACs and then said, OK, well, if I've got two million and 30% has been coming from corporate PACs, maybe I'll take 600,000 and give it to donations to kids groups or others rather than campaigning with it anymore. He chose not to do that, which, you know, I like Peter, but that's frustrating to me is to say, well, I'm not going to take corporate money, but I've already got corporate money. That doesn't jive for me, but... Well, anyone who want to donate to our so wonderful service running incorporated, just look us up and send us that money. And we'll make sure, like we have been doing since 1999, primarily with you service providers, helping you for families with their goals and aspirations by providing safe places. And we have over 50 awards for doing it. So Bruce Wilson, our so wonderful service running incorporated. There you go, indeed. So let's talk about what you're doing now. I know you're a farmer, but you've been a farmer for how long now? For forever. Yeah, well, I started a farm in 1999, so I'm going into my 22nd or 23rd year, and I worked for others for five years before that. So basically I've done both most of the time along. We raise about 20 acres of vegetables, all certified organic, part of the real organic project as well. We now have a bore and 14 sows, so we sell maybe 100-plus piglets in the spring. We raise about 30 or 40 hogs for meat. We raise about 1,000 to 1,200 chickens that we slaughter each year, and then we got about 75 laying hens. So we got a busy farm. Dang, how many eggs you get? How many eggs? Well, in the summer... It doesn't. Yeah, I know. In the summer we were getting about 70 or 80 a day, and now we're down to about 45 to 50 a day. They lay fewer when the daylight is shorter like this. But yeah, so it's been nice to be back on the farm full time. I'm picking up pieces of frayed edges that happened because I was in politics. I wasn't there all the time. I think one of the really nice things about, there's a silver lining to losing a race for governor and being home all the time, which is that I've got a lot more time with my daughter. I'm home for dinner every night. I was in office for 22 of the last, well, 25 years now, but had been 22 of the prior 24. And I was away from home, two or three, so there's four nights a week. And at least for the dinner hour, I might get home at 10 or 11 if I was down in Brattleboro or Bennington or up in the Northeast Kingdom somewhere. And so I'm home, and it's nice to be home with my family, because I was in high school, so it's nice this next couple of years, I think staying home and focusing on that at least until she decides what's going to happen after high school, and then who knows what will happen after that. Well, let's check this out. All right, so we got like five minutes. So here you are, 22 years, well-experienced person and legislator is sent in as lieutenant governor. Oh my God. I don't think any of the candidates have it more experienced than you in any of these areas. And so there's a Congress seat open, and there's a Senate, I mean, you will fit perfectly. It's tempting, and I really appreciated the, there's a number of people that have reached out to me through phone calls, emails, you know, social media, urging me to run or asking me if I'm going to run, and it's very flattering, and I appreciate it. You know, there's, it's amazing. In the 25 years I was in office, there was only one cycle, 2006, when a house and Senate seat came up then, because Jeffords didn't run, Bernie moved to the Senate, and Peter ran for the house, and I considered running for the house. I did not, but... There you go again. But that was once, you know, once in like 25 years. But two years from now, Bernie's up. Six years or seven years from now, the seat that Peter's in will be up again, and he'll be 80, 81. So I think, you know, and who knows what the governor's doing, whether he's going to run again this time or next time. So I think there will be... He might run for, he might run for a U.S. Senate. I don't think he will. There's, he said this, and I agree with him completely. I was saying the same thing, but he had a bigger, bigger microphone. Vermont right now is not going to send a Republican to Washington, because as much as we're okay as a population clearly from the election last year with him being governor, the balance of power of a Senate majority Democrat or Senate majority Republican, the consequences are huge. Yeah, that's true. And so I think there's a lot of Democrats who crossed over and voted for him for governor that wouldn't do that for him for a congressional seat, because if that meant McCarthy was going to be the speaker in the house or McConnell was going to be the majority leader in the Senate, Vermonters couldn't stand for that. Not after McConnell stole the, you know, the Supreme Court seats and stymied, you know, that situation and now we're dealing with the consequences of that and will for a long time. I just think it becomes much more important the party label for running for Washington than it does for running for governor and lieutenant governor. But, you know, I just think that Phil might be relatively tired. You know, he's I think he enjoys but doesn't love the job and this last year and a half has been particularly struggle, you know, with COVID as it would be for anybody in that office. So there may be opportunities in the future in 2024. Yeah, I don't think so either. I want to say one thing about government dollars. There could be 50 people in the room everybody's name. He knows everybody's name. There's just a natural ability there that is unbelievable. You remember those names, man. I'm like, I can't believe it. That's a biological gift for anybody that wants to run for office because boy, if you can remember everyone's name or what happened to their dog when you visited their house with the broken leg, whatever. You could remember every detail like that. Just incredible skill. So yeah, I mean, I have worked hard for a lot of issues and made a lot of friends, certainly made some enemies. And maybe we'll see what the future holds. But there's time for that and this time around I think for the most part I'm going to stay on the sidelines and give analysis like I just did on this show and sort of try to help people think about what they want to think about in terms of these folks who might be running and what are you looking for and what issues matter to you and what experience matters to you and how much integrity do these folks have and how do you gauge that? You know, maybe I can help because whoever wins may well be in Washington for 20 or 30 years. So I think Vermonters really need to dig deep and think about what is it that you want to be the voice for you? No doubt about it, that's what I'm talking about. Because once you're in, it's hard to get bumped out. No, that's true. And so I think folks should really look at each of their experience where they stand on the issues who they try to placate or why and really think long and hard about this because this decision is going to have ramifications for a long time. I know Senator Rams, she always asks the same questions to everybody. So how do you see me there? How do you see me do what I do? And here's the things that are all the things that I've done based on the people who I serve and she's right on, right on and also I really like her and she could be the, she's definitely the youngest probably, I don't know if Molly is. She and Molly are very similar ages, I don't know who's younger but yeah. And either one of them can be like you said in the house whatever for 30 years, 33 years whatever. Yeah. Well you know I live in Winnicki and just so you know I am the Winnicki Democratic Party Chairman. Oh good. Yeah. So we just had our meeting, our first meeting. Yeah. All the day and our goal is to help you know the community with voter registration. We want to do, we want to make sure equity and inclusion is involved in what we do. Winnicki is so diverse. It's beautiful. It's amazing. And we all need to know exactly what like first of all they need to know what the mayor does what are you know legislators done what they do, what their roles are. How does it work? I actually went door to door or actually talked to them about the roles of our people who serve us. Yeah. And one of the things I'm going to make sure they do and that's our team is they know that. Yeah when I was running for governor I actually walked down the streets of Winnicki both to visit some stores and businesses and now we're to some housing and it was it was a joy. Such a joy. Yeah it's a beautiful place. It is. Yeah. A lot of those individuals especially in New America don't get the information that they should you know. It's hard. And they should have they also might have some candidates who want to be run for something. I'm sure they have issues and concerns and ideas and suggestions. Yeah. We definitely want going to hear and want to hear. So you know it's interesting. I'm excited to be my first year as the chairman of Democratic Party in Winnicki. And I think that I hope you get people engaged. You know that's the main thing is help people recognize why it matters. You know we thankfully in Vermont have a higher participation rate but you know decisions that affect your life every day one way or the other are being made for you. And you know from street lights and road paving and things like that to schools and education and how the tax system works and whether you're going to pay more or less or what support is there for you for education or child care or job training or any number of things. You know what what are we going to do about the climate. All those things are you know are factors that are going to impact us in our lives for the next five 20 years and that's where voting matters. No doubt. So Mr. Zuckerman always good to you know have you on our show and see you. Would you got some parting words? Parting words. Take your time as you make a decision of who you're going to support. You know a lot of times people jump on band wagons real early and then they learn something later that oops I didn't know that about that person or oh I wish I knew that about them I would have gotten supportive of them. Give yourself some time to kick the tires a little bit and call the campaigns you know pay attention more than just the last two weeks of the election and keep an open mind. You know there's a lot of people out there on the right far right and far left that I think sometimes express views so adamantly and they don't have their ears open to understand why someone thinks something that they do and I'm not saying you ever have to agree with someone that's entirely up to each individual but we all come from different places with different experiences and if we feel that our experience is absolutely the right one and we got to shove it down someone's throat I don't care if it's right or left it's usually hard to hear it when something's getting shoved down your throat and I think we do need to figure out how to push hard for what we care about but push hard with respect and I guess that would be my closing words. Cool. I know for a fact that one vote and one person count because when I came in Vermont in 1989 it was the widest state in America so now it's like the third or something so I know one vote or one person count in Vermont and here we are, the third widest state and I came in when it was first and we both came in 1989 and I didn't realize that so cool needs. Thank you for tuning in to the service ministry talk and we'll see you next time.