PUTNEY — The Occupy Wall Street movement has sparked a new wave of protest, especially by young people who are finally letting the world know that they have had enough: enough corporate greed, enough of ever-waning job opportunities, enough environmental degradation, enough passivity.
The focus of this loosely structured protest is the immorality and criminal behavior of the largest and most profitable corporations in the world.
The statements from many of the Wall Street occupiers make the clear connections between the extreme wealth of the 1 percent who have flourished, especially since the Reagan era, and the rest of the citizens.
They also state that they are protesting the cavalier manner in which energy companies pollute the land, creating a frightening future with extreme climate change, huge amounts of toxic waste, and a system of power production relying on the use of fossil fuels and devastating mineral extraction.
A glaring example of the corporate hubris that is bringing out thousands of Occupy Wall Street participants is Entergy's lawsuit challenging the right of the people of Vermont to close Vermont Yankee.
Entergy's case centers around a challenge to the elected representatives of the state of Vermont and their legal ability to write and enact laws to protect and defend the welfare of their constituents, the land, water, air, flora, and fauna.
We in Vermont have an opportunity to share our story of corporate overreach with the country and the world.
The people of Vermont, the most democratically governed state in the land, spoke loud and clearly. We told our elected officials that we needed their action, their leadership in finding a way to close Vermont Yankee safely at the end of its license, in 2012. They enacted a legal framework to allow Vermonters to determine our state's energy future.
New York State is also asserting the right to insist that Entergy follow its water regulations, and that Entergy close the reactors at Indian Point if the company refuses to construct the cooling towers that would allow the plant to discharge cooled water into the Hudson River. Entergy is also fighting New York.
No matter what the court verdict is in the current trial, Entergy has shown its disregard and disrespect for our state by making clear its intent to continue operating, whether by injunction in an appeal of a losing case, or by winning the legal case.
By completing an expensive refueling outage last month, Entergy made a clear statement to the public that Vermont's laws are irrelevant and that the law of corporate profit trumps democracy.
Vermont Yankee's illegal and arrogant refusal to close the reactor on time will be met with non-violent protest. The many thousands of people in Vermont, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire who have expressed again and again the critical importance to our region of the closure of Vermont Yankee will not be silent.
We will, like the Occupy protesters, be persistent and in the public eye. It is clear that we the people need to ensure the clean, green energy future for our children and our grandchildren.