Co-founder of GraniteGrok, my concern is around Individual Liberty and Freedom and how the Government is taking that away. As an evangelical Christian and Conservative with small "L" libertarian leanings, my fight is with Progressives forcing a collectivized, secular humanistic future upon us. As a TEA Party activist, citizen journalist, and pundit!, my goal is to use the New Media to advance the radical notions of America's Founders back into our culture.
What is free enterprise? It is the system of values and laws that respects private property and limits government, encourages competition and industry, celebrates achievement based on merit, and creates individual opportunity. Under free enterprise, people can pursue their own ends, and they reap the rewards and consequences, positive and negative, of their own actions. … Read more
President Obama has blamed his predecessor, President Bush, for three and a half years on the economy “we inherited”. Thoughts: I don’t remember President Reagan complaining suchly about his predecessor, President Jimmy Carter And for such a brilliant man (Punahoe, Columbia, Harvard), is this an admission that he is not a sufficiently good enough manager … Read more
One of the biggest items that this two year session of the NH House has had to face was cleaning up the budget left by the Democrat supermajorities in the House and Senate that left the Republican supermajorities between a $600 million to a $1 Billion deficit. They handled it by cutting the budget back … Read more
In all of the hubbub of the weekend, I kinda forgot to keep this going – but after seeing John this weekend, he certainly is not! We continue on with our interview as he is making a run to step up from the the NH House of Representatives (where he is a two term legislator) … Read more
This afternoon, the Rye Republican Town Committee held their “Gala Reception for 2012 GOP Candidates” at the Abenaqui Country Club in Rye, NH and GraniteGrok was there to livestream the event. Given such a name for an event, a number of NH GOP candidates vying for seats in 2012 did attend the sold-out crowd of about 250 – 300. The keynote speaker was James O’Keefe, founder of Project Veritas, who Skyped in to give that address.
This video is the Intro Ceremonies (National Anthem, Invocation, Pledge).
The next clip is Jeff Chidester being introduce as Master of Ceremonies and Congressman Frank Guinta (R-NH, CD1) addressing the crowd at the top of the event:
Last night, we were at the Institute of Politics at St. Anselm College in Manchester, NH for an event hosted by the National Heritage Center for Constitutional Studies on the NH Constitution: Seminar and Panel Discussion on “Coming to terms with the rulemaking power of the Judicial Branch and its impact on personal liberty: … Read more
Seminar and Panel Discussion on “Coming to terms with the rulemaking power of the Judicial Branch and its impact on personal liberty: Article 73-A.
After the Intro Ceremonies conducted by M.C. Patriot Pastor Garrett Lear, NH State Representative Dan Itse took the podium to give his take on the NH Constitution, a history lesson, some comparisons with other state constitutions, and his general take on the relationship of the people to those that are stewards of the peoples’ power by election and appointment:
After the jump, NH State Rep. Paul Mirski continues the discussion:
Certainly it is a talking point of the Democrat, the Obama campaign, and the MSM that the TEA Party is “old news” and can be ignored. However, as Steve pointed out, that “conventional political wisdom” is dead wrong. Me? I think that they JUST want people to think that – frankly, I do believe that they are terrified that events are slipping away from them. Oh, they know full well that the TEA Party is around – and not just kicking but simply like most middle class / working class folk do in flyover country – see a job to be done, not waiting for someone else to do the job, and putting their work ethic in gear to get that job done.
Most of us just quietly go about the job now – the emotional events are done as those were just the intentions. Unlike Libs for whom “intentions” are the most important issue and raison d’etre, most Conservatives concentrate on the actual results. And 2010 saw those intentions turned into concrete results in a big way. Seeing Dick Lugar ousted by the TEA Party, a 35 year incumbent with tons of seniority, shows that there is steel in the TEA Party spine: Principle over Politics. The Triple threat of the TEA Party principles – free markets, fiscal frugality, Constitutional governance – overrode any thoughts of keeping pure political power.
Courts in multiple states have oft been the agency by which gay marriage has forced upon the residents of those states – the rest have been by Legislatures that oft have been bombarded by “gay money” advocacy groups as we saw here in NH.
“Oh, that’s because it’s full of bigots in that Bible Belt state – those Conservative backward looking, knuckle dragging, rednecks that don’t get with the inevitable” will be the excuse.
This afternoon, the Rye Republican Town Committee held their “Gala Reception for 2012 GOP Candidates” at the Abenaqui Country Club in Rye, NH and GraniteGrok was there to livestream the event. Given such a name, a number of NH GOP candidates for seats in 2012 did attend the sold-out crowd of about 250. However, the … Read more
He wrote this post post about being denied the ability to record James’s speech:
Patch was almost kept from recording any of O’Keefe’s remarks Sunday. Partway through O’Keefe’s speech, Rye Republican Town Chairwoman Diane Bitter told Hampton-North Hampton Patch that O’Keefe’s speech could not be recorded.
She said conservative website Granite Grok would have video posted after the event. Patch stopped filming partway through the speech to ask Bitter for clarification, as O’Keefe’s speech was given before multiple media outlets and in front of a packed event to which Patch was invited.
Bitter replied that she normally doesn’t allow cameras to roll at a “private event” because her committee “want[s guests] to be able to say what they want” during private conversations without being recorded.
That would be correct – we are and I did here (YouTube is still processing the video as I type; it should go live soon). For the record, we had been asked weeks ago if we would do this for the Rye Republican event and I accepted. Frankly, given the 2 hour drive and the time for equipment set up and scurrying to actually pull off the event technically, I thank Diane for allowing us exclusive recording of the event.
We are at the Institute of Politics at St. Anselm College in Manchester, NH. As you can see by the announcement post, some of the best minds in NH are here to talk about the NH Constitution and specifically, Article 73. We join the event in progress (technical network blockage (site? protocol?) are the reason) … Read more
Well, DES Commissioner Tom Burack called in at noon this past Tuesday to have a conversation with a couple of we Groksters (Susan and me) concerning our Right To Know Requests that we have submitted to both his department and that of the Department of Information Technology.
Sidebar: we received the response to our Second RTK yesterday. I have not had the chance to review it but will be posting it up later. At first glance, however, it seems like they have decided that government records, if they exist, are for their eyes only. If it seems that this first glance is true, we will be taking this up a level.
Now, that call is not of the greatest audio quality; it seems I have a problem from phone line 1 into the soundboard that introduced a bunch of background noise. Also, Commissioner Burack was on a speakerphone with one of his assistants which made him sound a bit distant. I am going to post this audio up now, warts and all, but will continue to try to boost his end of the conversation and reduce the noise. You can download the MP3 here (30 minutes, 30K) or listen to the conversation (about 30 minutes) using the online player:
Also, I have no intention of doing a complete transcription, but I will be grabbing a few highlights and will post them here:
(0:26) Skip: In accordance with New Hampshire state law, I do need to inform you that this conversation is going to be recorded
(1:10) Commissioner Burack: wishes to know where we live in NH
(1:34) Commissioner Burack: Thanked us for bringing Richard de Seve, his employee, to his attention
(2:29) Skip brings up oversight of government by the citizenry
(2:51) Purpose was not to talk about the RTKs directly, as the second two RTKs are addressed to DoIT and not DES
(3:11) Skip points out, however, that it is DES’s Gretchen Hamel (Administrator!) that is still handling the communications.
(4:15) Skip brings up an additional Letter to DoIT
(4:42) Skip asks: what is so hard about obtaining these Government records
(5:10) Skip informs Commissioner Burack about the new RTK – filtering requests
(6:06) Skip corrects Commissioner Burack on this new RTK – DES does have a part in it.
There’s GOT to be a conservative TEA Party leaning person showing up for RRTC (Diane Bitter, Chair (and new NH GOP Assistant Secretary) at this event, so GraniteGrok is here. We were asked if we could provide live stream and record the event by ‘Grok friend Diane, so we are attempting to oblige. Unfortunately, the … Read more
(H/T: Business Insider) (H/T: CNN) NOTE: the economy has to grow by 250,000 to 300,00 jobs / month just to stay even with population growth. “Obama – isn’t working” means Obama’s Administration has not put the right policies for the economy to achieve that – nor does it seem interested in doing that either. Unemployment … Read more
The high office of the presidency requires not a continuous four-year campaign for re-election, but, rather, broad oversight and attention to three essential areas – the material, the moral, and the nation’s survival, in that ascending order of importance. And in the last presidential election, you, the people, were gravely insulted. You were told that … Read more
Continuing on with the interview with John Hikel, who is running for NH State Senate in District 20, we started to veer into one of my favorite questions: Should Govt be in the role of selling services and goods? because it always leads to my favorite topics: what is the proper role of Government? For … Read more
