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And yes, that would be we Groksters.  For years we have warned about taking “free money with strings attached.” There’s another meme that describes the below from the Pravda on the Merrimack: “Fed crack.” No, not real drugs but the allure and the addiction is just as real as that white powder: greenbacks. Lots of it. FREE MONEY they say. Until it isn’t free. Or not there at all.

And it is solely the fault of NH Republican elected “leaders” that opened up OUR (financial) veins to inject it into the NH budget. They ha /have no political will to resist, only “gimme, gimme, gimme.”

Though he’s declared himself no fan of Obamacare, Gov. Chris Sununu and fellow Republican governors John Kasich of Ohio and Charlie Baker of Massachusetts oppose the bill because it would cost their states money. Lots of money. New Hampshire would lose $1 billion in federal revenue between 2020 and 2026 which could force the state to, horror of horrors, consider the imposition of a sales or income tax, Sununu said. The alternative, of course, would be to reduce Medicaid benefits, raise eligibility levels and insure fewer people.

So now the NH Republicans may have to walk the political equivalent of the Katahdin’ Knife Edge – which way are they going to fall?

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In fact, mine operates on a philosophy of “let’s get away with as much as we can and spend it” – but more as we go along during our budget season.  No, this post is about one that did the right thing – “Huzzah!” to the Conway School Board (reformatted, emphasis mine):

CONWAY — Conway School Board members shared some good news earlier this month — they’ll be returning nearly $2 million to the town to help offset taxes. At a recent meeting, the board revealed it has more than $1.7 million left in its coffers from the prior school year. On top of that, they agreed to release another $215,000 by not retaining the 2.5 percent of the budget for the next year.

“This is great news, it’s big,” said school board member Mark Hounsell at the Sept. 11 meeting. “At the end of the 2016-17 school year, the district shows an ending school year balance of $1,783,854. That is money that will be returned to the taxpayers. That’s a very good return.”

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“But in the end, Meyers added, the New Hampshire DHHS – like the rest of the country this week – lies at the whim of Congressional forces.”

They never seem to learn the rather straight forward lesson of “with strings attached”, do they?  And the other one is “he who has the gold doesn’t have to hand it out, either”.  This is what happens when politicians, in never learning that it doesn’t matter to taxpayers WHICH level of government is reaching into their pockets, never seem to learn that in creating a local budget (in this case, the State of NH) that highly depends on a higher level of government’s money, you will get screwed in the end.  And politicians, especially the NH Republican ones, have put NH into this position – willingly.  In Pravda on the Merrimack comes this evergreen headline:

HHS head: GOP health bill could result in $820M N.H. Medicaid cut

New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services Commissioner Jeffrey Meyers predicted a sharp financial toll on the state’s Medicaid program if the federal Graham-Cassidy health care bill passes, and warned of funding shortages that could result from the bill’s block grant system.

Who could have seen this coming, eh?  Oh yeah, ME!  I didn’t have to be a

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In her address to the UN General Assembly:

“Show me the loving bonds between your families today and I will show you the patriotism and moral clarity of your nation tomorrow. Our choices on how we raise and educate our children in fact provide the blueprint for the next generation. If we do not advocate a love of country to our children and generations to come, then why would our children grow up to fight for their countries?”

-Melania Trump, First Lady of the US

It is here that she very much differentiates herself from the preceding First Lady. For Melania, it is the family that is the most important structure in Civil Society and not Government trying to be that penultimate force. Is this why Progressives continuously try to replace the nuclear family?

From the IBD Editorial:

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This here’s right funny – they’ve nailed his character to the bone.  Was it that “If you like you doctor, you can keep your doctor” and that Obamacare would let everyone keep $2500 more of their own money? How can they be SO cynical of the former LightBringer? Emphasis mine, reformatted.

After Obama nixes agreement, groups say they want city ordinance

The Obama Presidential Center planned for Jackson Park could be a shot in the arm for the South Side, bringing jobs, economic development and other benefits. But a coalition of activists and residents want those promises put in writing — something the former president himself refused to do just this week.

Where’s the trust, guys?  After all, he was (and is again) an “activist” and an “organizer” just like you all – or is there no honor among thieves (so to speak)? You mean that phrase “Trust in God” isn’t quite sufficient (yeah, go to the link)?

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Puerto Rico just got nailed bad by hurricane Maria – and it pretty much tore up the place.

Yennifer Álvarez Jaimes, Gov. Ricardo Rosselló’s press secretary, told NBC News that all power across the island was knocked out.

“Once we’re able to go outside, we’re going to find our island destroyed,” Emergency Management Director Abner Gómez Cortés said at a news briefing. Rosselló imposed a 6 p.m.-to-6 a.m. curfew, citing flood warnings and the importance of keeping streets clear for repair and rescue teams. San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz told MSNBC that the devastation in the capital was unlike any she had ever seen.

“The San Juan that we knew yesterday is no longer there,” Yulín said, adding: “We’re looking at four to six months without electricity” in Puerto Rico, home to nearly 3.5 million people. Maria, the strongest storm to hit Puerto Rico since 1928, had maximum sustained winds of 155 mph when it made landfall as a Category 4 storm near the town of Yabucoa just after 6 a.m. ET, the National Hurricane Center said.

Stateside, we have folks that get all bent out of shape if the power’s down and inconvenienced for a day or so.  Sure, an

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42.3 million Americans are paying back $1.33 trillion in federal student loan debt.

• A staggering 49.8% of all respondents said they would give up their right to vote in the next two presidential elections in order to have their debt forgiven
• 43.6% were willing to give up Uber or Lyft forever in exchange for debt forgiveness
• 42.4% of respondents would also give up traveling outside of the country for 5 years, while
• 27.0% said they would be willing to move in with their parents for 5 years
• only 13.2% reported being willing to give up texting and any mobile messaging equivalent for the next year in exchange for having their debt forgiven
• Only 8.2% of respondents chose to select none of the above and said they would rather keep paying off their student debt

So about 50%

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I haven’t watched the speech yet but from reading the Rightosphere’s reaction to it, it seems to have been a doozy.  Then I came across this transcript and now my reaction is WOW – I can’t believe that finally someone said and hit all the right notes in front of all those tinpot and retrograde regimes – and spanked a lot of the sclerotic attendees who love their sinicues and perks while running down the hands that feed them.  A couple of lines that caught my eye (emphasis mine in the transcript):

PRESIDENT TRUMP: Mr. Secretary General, Mr. President, world leaders, and distinguished delegates: Welcome to New York. It is a profound honor to stand here in my home city, as a representative of the American people, to address the people of the world.

As millions of our citizens continue to suffer the effects of the devastating hurricanes that have struck our country, I want to begin by expressing my appreciation to every leader in this room who has offered assistance and aid. The American people are strong and resilient, and they will emerge from these hardships more determined than ever before.

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Standing question of Progressive Totalitarians everywhere: “Whaddya mean that you won’t do what I tell you to?!?!?!” (emphasis mine, reformatted):

Columbia University students recently voted against a proposal that would make all restrooms on a dorm-floor “gender inclusive.”

Yeah, right.  Inclusive – anything that rebels against traditional American norms. Trust me, even as they preach “inclusivity,” I’m not part of their “in” group or clique. Hypocrites. But wait! You mean to say there are others like me?

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And is there any wonder why the headline exists?

Total Irrelevance: Trump-Hating Emmys Hit All-Time Ratings Low

…Instead of being the lowest-watched Emmys in its 69-year history, Sunday night’s telecast might be able to squeak into the second-lowest.
As of now, though, it looks as though all that promised Trump-hating resulted in a record low, which is especially shocking (at least to bubbled Hollywood) because last year everyone was certain the bottom had been hit…This news, of course, comes just days after the ratings for the MTV Awards hit their own record low.

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My almost two year old grandson LOVES blowing bubbles (he’s learned how).  But this snippet shows adults all wrapped up in their own smug self-justified bubble to where, once again, they couldn’t find their own self-induced irony even if you gave them a magnet (reformatted, emphasis mine):

University will host dinners as part of ‘racial reconciliation’ program

To promote “racial reconciliation” after the deadly clashes between white nationalists and counterprotesters in Charlottesville last month, Brown University plans to offer segregated events to its black students and female Muslim students. The university received a $30,000 grant from the Association of American Colleges and Universities, which represents liberal arts schools, to create a campus center whose mission is to “break down racial hierarchies and create a positive narrative about race in the community,” according to The Brown Daily Herald.

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…and demanding that long dead heroes of Texas live up to the Political Correctness sinkholes of today’s Progressive Totalitarians (who never seem to remember the “mote in your neighbor’s eye – the log in your’s” parable. Oh wait, that’s a Biblical reference – what AM I thinking??):

So let me get this straight: in Dallas, Texas — Dallas, Texas! — the school board is thinking about expunging the names of Sam Houston, as well as Alamo heroes Jim Bowie and William Travis? That is even more shocking than Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and Benjamin Franklin. If you’re not from Texas, or never lived there, it is impossible to overstate the reverence with which Texans hold men involved in the Texas Revolution.

Rod Dreher adds this on history as well:

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That is a lot of government in a nutshell – not with their words but with their actions, they see their employers (that would be all of us) as a bothersome lot that keep ignoring them and their rules.  And in this case, I will break my usual self-censorship and say DAMNED rules.  Behold the power of the bureaucratic mind and heart (emphasis mine):

Celso Perez was helping his neighbors remove some fallen trees blocking their street when a county code enforcer rolled up and issued him a safety notice for having a downed fence. “I laughed,” Perez tells WSVN-TV. “I thought he was kidding. ‘You are kidding right? We just had a hurricane six hours ago.’”

It wasn’t a joke. The official told Perez that the downed fence—which encloses a pool—was a safety hazard, and that if it wasn’t fixed by the time he returned, Perez would be hit with a fine. The official then hung the safety citation on the portion of Perez’s fence that remained standing, leaving him and his neighbors to finish clearing the debris from their street.

Nary a hint of the circumstances.  Nary a flicker of recognition that there was debris around him (and probably much he stepped on while there).  Nary a dollop of irony either.

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