Jeffords Announces Retirement

I try not to complain about people like Tom DeLay and Rick Santorum because I do not live in the states they represent. (That said, I might not complain about my senator, Bill Frist, enough. For example . . . .) I support each state's right to select it's own elected representation, even if some states' choices baffle me. But when you feel as though your own legislators do not represent your interests (as I often do), you tend to support representatives from your party, regardless of state. That leaves me, an independent, with one representative in the Senate: Jim Jeffords from Vermont (one of the handful of states I've never even been to). Today Jeffords announced that he will not seek another term in 2006.

In 2000 Jeffords was elected as a progressive Republican; but with the GOP shifting further and further to the right, he soon left the party and became an independent. (In so doing he gave the Democrats a one-seat majority in the Senate . . . for less than two years.)

Fortunately, Congressman Bernie Sanders, also an independent, has expressed interest in Jeffords's seat. People of Vermont, help me out.