2016 Presidential Primary – Donald Trump

We here at the GraniteGrok have a history of trying to get to where the Republican Prez Wannabees are speaking and now that the November elections and Town Meeting elections are over, we are going to try to do just that – why watch WMUR’s 30 second sound bites when you can get it all … Read more

Democrat appointed Speaker of the NH House Shawn Jasper (R) – threatening Free Speech in the House?

Once again with Spring, the little birdies start tweeting again – even if Spring is measuring 11 degrees outside and this is pretty good one.  So, one would think that the NH House Speaker Shawn Jasper (Democrat appointed, if you don’t already know) would be a fine upstanding supporter of Free Speech.  After all, not only is Free Speech protected by the US Constitution:

First Amendment, US Constitution:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

But so does our NH Constitution, as the Bill of Rights comes FIRST in our Constitution – to protect Individuals FIRST (and then and only then does it talk about Government):

[Art.] 22. [Free Speech; Liberty of the Press.] Free speech and liberty of the press are essential to the security of freedom in a state: They ought, therefore, to be inviolably preserved.

And if our Lawmakers can’t even follow that, well, they (at the least) deserve all the mocking that we citizens can muster!  After all, they ALL swore an oath to protect and preserve it – not to ignore or subvert it.  And the words make it clear – Inviolate to deny Free Speech to an Individual. But, I guess, the Democrat supported NH Speaker of the House has decided that he knows better and has his own Pen and Phone:

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Democrat appointed Speaker of the NH House Shawn Jasper (R) – In favor of raising the Gas Tax?

NH Gas tax payerI have said for years that the primary reason why the NH Highway Fund is in such a stupid financial position is that Politicians refuse to do the right thing – let that fund do what it is supposed to fund and stop raiding it.  And, instead of constantly using taxpayers to pay for the lack of true priorities by lazy politicians (who love to claim they have “solved” the crisis – but rarely ante up that Government created the problem in the first place).

Lately, the “wonder cure” is to put expenditures on auto-pilot – which is exactly what and how the Highway Fund has been used.  And it is in BIG trouble because that auto-pilot has been buffeted like a jet in the thunderstorm as politicians keep taking, and taking, and taking more out of it.

Thankfully, it seems like SOMEONE has decided that this cannot continue and one of the smartest Legislators in the NH House is trying to do the Very Right thing.  Yet another little birdie sang what seemed to be a happy, melodious song to me this morning – and then the Democrat appointed NH Speaker of the House and his Majority Leader decided that their duet would go off key – from my taxpayer ear, rather flat indeed:

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Carlos Martinez, Constitutional Conservative, I have an answer for you! Ted Cruz to announce…

Ted Cruz MicroInterview at TurbocamLast Sunday at Turbocam, Ted Cruz was asked by Carlos when he was going to announce his run for the Presidency – you can see the video here as Cruz was a bit out front (and coy) with his answer.  Well, we now have the answer  from the new GraniteGrok Twitter follower,  Ted Schleifer ( @TeddySchleifer ) from the Houston Chronicle (reformatted, emphasis mine):

Ted Cruz to announce presidential bid Monday

Sen. Ted Cruz plans to announce Monday that he will run for president of the United States, accelerating his already rapid three-year rise from a tea party insurgent in Texas into a divisive political force in Washington.  Cruz will launch a presidential bid outright rather than form an exploratory committee, said senior advisers with direct knowledge of his plans, who spoke on condition of anonymity because an official announcement had not been made yet. They say he is done exploring and is now ready to become the first Republican presidential candidate.

The senator is scheduled to speak Monday at a convocation ceremony at Liberty University in Virginia, where he is expected to declare his campaign for the presidency.

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Just in: official Presser on the Ted Cruz announcement

From: “Cruz Press” <press@jobsgrowth.org> To: skip@granitegrok.com Sent: 3/22/2015 11:44:16 AM Subject: MEDIA ADVISORY: Sen. Ted Cruz in Lynchburg, VA on Monday, March 23 FOR PLANNING PURPOSES ONLY Rick Tyler, (703) 431-3350 Media Advisory Catherine Frazier, (512) 751-5984 March 22, 2015 MEDIA ADVISORY Monday, March 23 Sen. Ted Cruz will deliver the convocation address at Liberty … Read more

Data Point – Transit Growth 1980-2012

“In short, it took at least a 170 percent increase in spending to produce a 136 percent increase in transit service which resulted in just a 24 percent increase in transit ridership and an 18 percent decline in per capita ridership. Since APTA’s goal is to increase transit spending, it should be proud of that … Read more

Just for Susan The Bruce: Liberals just don’t like real equal protection

The Cognitive Dissonance is strong with this one.  Over  at Steve’s post (“NH Democrats Put a Price-tag on Rape“), well known NH Progressive blogger Susan the Bruce decided that she wanted to start a flame war with the premise that women should NOT be able to protect themselves against bigger, stronger male n’err-do-wells with what the … Read more

GrokTV Event: US Senator Ted Cruz – MicroInterview with Ted Cruz

When US Senator Ted Cruz had finished with his address to the crowd and the questions, he did come over to the ‘Grok area where we had set up to talk for a few moments.  Knowing that time was valuable in getting to a couple of other meetings / events that day, it was nice to meet him in person; we had time for two quick qestions:

  • What Constitutional matters did we miss yesterday (he was on GrokTALK! the day before: “..the most substantive, serious conversation I’ve had in terms of a discussion of the issues,”  and he went on to “complement the degree of depth we got into on constitutional issues.”)?
  • The importance of politicians believing in “Honor Your Oath”

Previous videos:

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First Responders – Susan The Bruce shows us the Progressive view

From the March 2015 of America’s Freedom (p.39, emphasis mine):

In the United States and other nations, more and more people are recognizing that victims have the best chance of survival when they can be the first responders.

First Responders.  We usually think of these folks as heros – and they are, no doubt.  But they are also Government employees – police, firemen, EMTs..  Nothing wrong with that – unless you feel that the role of first responder should only be government workers.  However, that is the outlook of Progressives like Susan the Bruce (here, here) where in the real world when bad people go after nice ones, individuals are not to do anything – especially defend themselves.  They are to outsource responsibility for themselves to others.

In government.

It is yet another startling,

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GrokTV Event: US Senator Ted Cruz – “The Wallet” & “The story of Snowflake and the White House”

  • “The Wallet” – I’m not sure how to describe this segment where a man in the front row went on a bit of a rant in support of a Ted Cruz penalty to the point of throwing his wallet in front of Ted Cruz (e.g., an open check)
  • “Snowflake” – a cute story about a new dog and the White House

  

The Wallet                                                                    Snowflake

Previous videos: 

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GrokTALK! for the week 3/21/2015 – the videos

Unfortunately, the UStream servers had hiccups during Segment 2 with Hal Shurtleff on the Article V Convention of the States, so apologies.  In the mean time:

  • Pre-Show – Steve, Mike, and Skip just yak for a bit
  • Segment 1 – Judiciary Update with NH State Rep Max Abramson
  • Segment 3 – Dr. Betsy McCaughey comes on to talk about the Supreme Court case of King vs Burrell where the issue is whether or not the black & white words in the actual Obamacare law are to be obeyed – or not.
  • Segment 4 – More with Max

  

Pre-show                                                             Segment 1

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GrokTV Event: US Senator Ted Cruz – Questions 5 & 6

From last week’s Ted Cruz event comes a couple of more questions from the audience:

  • Question 5 – From former NH GOP Chair Jack Kimball: “will you push MORE against Obama’s Constitutional Lawlessness?
  • Question 6 – From a teacher:  what would you do about Common Core?

  

Previous videos:

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Let’s see if you pick up on what I oberved in this snippet?

From Instapundit:

NOBEL PEACE PRIZE UPDATE: Breaking a decades-long trend, the world gets more violent. “That’s a pretty disturbing spike by anyone’s terms. And if you look at the first few months of 2015, the violence doesn’t seem to be waning. What’s even more worrying is that this seems to be part of an ongoing trend that now goes back eight years. According to the Australia-based Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP), global violence — as defined by a range of measures from conflict deaths, to displaced persons, to homicide rates — has been rising since 2007. This news is in many ways surprising because up to 2007, the data suggested the world was becoming a much safer place.”

Gee, look at that year…

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Data Point – Driving is going up

“From 1980 to 2005, driving grew at about 2 percent per year. But it grew even faster than that before 1980, and many people think that the market for driving is nearly saturated as 75 percent of households with workers have two or more cars and only about 4 percent have no cars at all. … Read more

Another person leaves the Republican Party

And that would be Glenn Beck – Allahpundit reports and then opines:

… And who can blame him after the big cave on executive amnesty? Remember, the DHS funding debacle wasn’t just a Republican capitulation to Obama on separation of powers. It was a sham from the beginning, a bogus fight the GOP set up to show conservatives that they’re pretend-serious about resisting Obama but don’t quite have the numbers to force a meaningful confrontation on the issue … even though they now hold a majority of seats in both chambers. How do you keep a party together when the leadership disdains its own base and their priorities and the base knows that and disdains them right back? Is there anything holding it together at this point beyond the simple math involved in coalition-building?

And then he uses one of my questions (“we may not win but you will surely lose”) using different words:

GOP minus tea partiers equals President Hillary, right?

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GrokTALK! Videos from 3/14/15 (Segment 3 and 4)

And I’m still late with posting up the videos of last week’s GrokTALK!  So, here are segments 3 & 4.  I will post up our interview with Ted Cruz later on tonite. Segment 3 – Groksters talk about the News of the Day and the Week Segment 4 – Dr. Jeffrey Singer returns to talk about … Read more

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