Comments on a Union Leader Op-Ed on Andrew Hemingway - Granite Grok

Comments on a Union Leader Op-Ed on Andrew Hemingway

Andrew Hemingway For NH GOP Chair!From the Union Leader comes this Editorial on Andrew Hemingway who is competing with Walt “No Apology for Teabagger” Havenstein for the NH GOP nomination for NH Governor – couple of snippets (reformatted, emphasis mine):

Republican candidate for governor Andrew Hemingway will have to read this column online. On Wednesday afternoon he flew to San Francisco to participate in the Coin Congress, a gathering of Bitcoin advocates. Its slogan: “A culture of individuals ready to break the mold.” Hemingway presents his campaign the same way.  Gov. Maggie Hassan, whom he hopes to unseat, “has no plan, no agenda,” he said in an interview on Wednesday. “Her State of the State speeches are all Skittles and rainbows.”Hassan’s catch-phrase is “innovation,” which Hemingway finds laughable. “Her idea of economic development is to get business people around a table like this and have a meeting,” he said. The state needs ideas and leadership, not slogans and make-work meetings, says the 32-year-old.  “It’s pretty simple what New Hampshire needs to get our economy started again,” he said. He then presented a series of detailed white papers explaining major tax and regulatory reforms that he proposes.

First is scrapping the state’s business enterprise tax, business profits tax and Medicaid enhancement tax and replacing them with a “business flat tax” of 2 percent, which would apply to nonprofits as well as for-profit businesses.  To reduce energy costs, which are hurting economic growth, Hemingway would abolish the Public Utilities Commission and devolve many regulatory responsibilities to local governments. To improve K-12 education, he would devolve the issue to local governments, letting them select their own curricula and run their own systems free of state involvement.

He supports right to work, opposes any state involvement in marriage, and says the state should impose no restrictions on gambling, letting localities decide the issue. Hemingway’s agenda sounds more like a libertarian than a Republican one. On issue after issue, he says “this is about free markets” and “I believe in competition.” To improve education, the economy, health care, the answer is the same: competition.

To me, here is the money quote:

“That doesn’t equal anarchy,” he said. “It doesn’t equal no government. It equals limited government. It’s really that simple.”

Exactly!  Unfortunately, the public has been groomed over the last few decades to believe that ONLY the luminaries in Concord or DC are capable of deciding “such important matters”.  Sorry, but I’ve met a number of them a number of times and I always make the same observation. Some of them are luminaries but in no great concentration than what I would find in my home town and the latter know FAR better what is needed locally than those in Concord or DC.  Some smarter and much wiser, truth be told.  And in all cases, all their puffed up chests aside, they all put their underwear on the same way the rest of us do.

There’s nothing special about non-local control except for bigger egos and a driving premise “they know better than us”.  Andrew is right – I and my neighbors can make better decisions for our families and towns than they can.  Often, our elected officials forget that valuable axiom that sometimes the best thing to do IS to do nothing.  Just let us do it for in most cases, we can do it better, faster, and with a heck of a lot more efficiency than a lumbering and expensive bureaucracy can from far afield.

…However, there is a sense among some in the party that 2014 gives Hemingway a chance to prove he has grown up.  One test, I was told by a high-profile Republican, is whether he can make the switch from criticizing others to focusing on what he brings to the table. In a 90-minute interview Wednesday, Hemingway never mentioned opponent Walt Havenstein unless asked. He spoke of his own ideas, going negative only when talking about Gov. Hassan. It was, perhaps, a sign of a changing Andrew Hemingway.

I have watched him over the last few years and I can attest to a changing Andrew.  No, not that his ideas and backbone philosophy has changed – but he has grown as he has put in his dues and made the most of them.

I will also say this – in an alternative universe where the Republican Party had embraced the TEA Party for its willingness to work hard, the energy it brought, and its philosophical grounding (which pretty much matches the Republican stated (although not followed) Platform), it would never have went out to recruit Havenstein – it would already have had its Champion.  Andrew is everything that the NH GOP keeps talking about what it wants: homegrown NH Native, more active, thinking, and vigorous young people.  So one pops up that many in the Party already approve of.  So what does the NH GOP?  Instead of putting action to words, it remains true to form.  It goes out and…

… recruits an old, Elitist, and arrogant man from out of state that immediately and non-apologetically insulted the Conservative base.  Yessir, that’s the way to impress people and make friends.  Let’s see how that plays out in the General if Andrew doesn’t win the Primary.
Andrew Cline is editorial page editor of the New Hampshire Union Leader. His columns run on Thursdays. You can follow him on Twitter @Drewhampshire.

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