A Loud, Proud, ”NAY” On Stroud (Candidate, Hillsborough 21, Merrimack) - Granite Grok

A Loud, Proud, ”NAY” On Stroud (Candidate, Hillsborough 21, Merrimack)

In June of 2011, I contacted current House candidate Representative Kathleen Stroud and asked her about her reasoning for not supporting Right to Work (HB474).  She replied with the usual vacuous boilerplate one expects from a politician, but what surprised me was her reasoning’s incoherence and lack of depth.  What I found most off-putting was her pat-me-on-the-head-you-silly-constituent condescension encrusted in the email exchange.  She must have thought that I was an idiot and would simply, unquestioningly bobble-head support her arguments without understanding them.  Well, I’ll share some of her reasoning, and you can decide whether she intended to be condescending by putting forth such discombobulated arguments in order to intentionally confuse, or if she is actually confused.

One of her reasons for not supporting Right To Work is that, “It is being driven by an out-of-state lobby from Virginia; and I do not believe Virginia knows (or cares) what is best for New Hampshire.”

Now, leaving the snarky last bit aside, let’s stipulate that she’s correct with the lobbying from Virginia. What does that have to do with the substance of the idea they’re pushing?  If Colorado, California, or New Mexico found a good way to deal with wildfire prevention, and an organization, lobbyists or otherwise, took up the cause in order to spread the word, do we simply ignore them and put New Hampshire at risk while we reject their solutions simply on the grounds that they’re not homegrown?  That’s a ridiculous argument.

Another reason proffered from, hopefully soon-to-be former, Representative Stroud is:
“New Hampshire ranks higher as an attractive state for high-tech employers (ahead of all but 1 RTW state).  We need to bring jobs to this state that will encourage our young people to stay and build families.  Right now they are leaviving [Sic] in droves. Offering them ‘factory work’ will not build our future.”

Parsing this is difficult, but let’s try.  After reading the first two sentences, it sounds like the environment is good for bringing high tech employers and workers to New Hampshire.  Then, things start to get a little wobbly, and we swerve when reading the third sentence, “Right now they are leaviving [Sic] in droves”.  Wait. If things are good, why are they leaving in droves?  Furthermore, what does Right to Work have to do with either the good environment or the reason for leaving, as it had yet to be enacted? How could a political debate cause people to leave in “droves”?  She just asserts it, fails to persuade, and expects me to buy it. Well, it sounds ludicrous without more detail, and I’m not buying it.

She then caps it off with the last sentence, “Offering them ‘factory work’ will not build our future.”  Firstly, does Right to Work constrain the entrepreneurs, investors, and businesses only to invest in “factory work”?  No. How does she, or anyone, conclude that having a Right To Work state means only factory work will be available?  How can she offer this and expect me to believe this piece of incoherence, unless she thought I was a bobble-head or she actually believes this nonsensical drivel–which would be even more disturbing.

Her argument also implies that high-tech employers have unions, and by enacting Right to Work, they’ll leave, and only non-union factories will stay or replace them.  This seems to me exactly backwards. I’m in high-tech, and most, if not all, high-tech shops that I know are non-union e.g., Oracle, BAE Systems, Dell etc.  Plus, if these companies were union shops, why would they leave because the state is Right to Work?  If the companies were wedded to the unions, they could keep the unions.  Right to Work doesn’t prevent that, and her implying it does is just another piece of evidence that she’s intentionally putting forth straw men with the presumption that I’ll unquestioningly accept them.

There are a lot of assumptions in her reasoning, like the implicit denial that high-tech and factories often exist in the same company and the denial that there are actually high-tech factories (see companies I just referenced as examples).  We can go on and on and on trying to untangle her assumptions and specious arguments, but I think I made my point.

Stroud is pro-union all the way:

On HR1677 Right to Work this year, Stroud: Nay

On HB 1645, Permitting secret ballots for public employers, Stroud: Nay

On HB 1206, “which would require employers and employees to split the cost of continuing benefits when a labor contract expires and a new one is not in place;”  Stroud: Nay

When it comes to supporting the unions and all that they stand for, Stroud has been there.  That’s fine for some, but not for me. I say a loud, proud Nay on Stroud.

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