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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.

GrokTV Special Interview: NH State Rep Mark Warden

At last nite’s event, I had the opportunity to corral Mark, a freshman NH State Representative, and ask him about his impressions concerning completing his first year as well as what the Legislature had accomplished:

GrokTV Special Interview: NH State Senator Jim Forsythe

At last nite’s event, I had the chance to pull Jim aside (who is also my State Senator and like Mark, a freshman legislator) and asked him as well what his impressions were on completing his first year as well as what the Senate had accomplished.

OK, Big Tent time – come on IN!

Congressman Thaddeus McCotter (R-MI) has just announced that he is going to be announcing his run for the Presidency on Saturday.  Other than appealing to the "Red Eye" crowd (a Fox news program hosted by Greg Guttfield and on which McCotter is a frequent guest due to his VERY dry wit). He knows the issues … Read more

Third Circuit – Online speech by students cannot be treated the same as on campuss – NH & Federal Bullying laws at risk?

I do hope so.  I have had great concerns as School Administrations have incrementally increased their reach and control far from the schools from years ago to the point where it seems that the Edu-Industrial Complex believes it is responsible for their students (vs Parents for their own children).  Witness the growth of pre-school day-care, post-school day-care, breakfast / lunch / dinners provided 365/year, health clinics, abortions when needed, and daycare for the kids’ kids.  With the advent of the Bullying laws, that reach was extended to any speech any where in real space and cyberspace.

In effect, Parents were being stripped of control and responsibility in one action after another.  Who knew it would be the First Amendment and the Third District Court that may have broken that lock that was rusting shut on parents?

From FIRE, the "money line" and great Executive Summary:

Is there a place where a student can go that’s far enough away from school grounds to allow that student to speak freely online? Every single one of the 14 judges on that court said ‘yes.’

Background:  

Yesterday, the full court for the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit issued two simultaneous opinions to resolve how much control grade schools and high schools may exercise over their students’ off-campus, online speech. In Layshock v. Hermitage School District and J.S. v. Blue Mountain School District, the 14-judge court delivered two landmark victories for free speech, holding that school officials cannot "reach into a child’s home and control his/her actions there to the same extent that it can control that child when he/she participates in school sponsored activities." In the cases, two students had been disciplined for creating parody MySpace profiles mocking their respective principals. The Third Circuit held that schools cannot punish students’ online speech simply because it is vulgar, lewd, or offensive.

Excerpts:

The full Third Circuit convened en banc to resolve this conflicting in-circuit precedent. Yesterday, the court decided in both cases that schools may not punish online, off-campus speech to the same extent that they may when dealing with in-school speech. The court thus concluded that the Supreme Court decision in Bethel School District No. 403 v. Fraser, 478 U.S. 675 (1986), which held that a high school may suspend a student for "lewd, indecent, or offensive speech and conduct" when such behavior conflicts with "essential lessons of civil, mature conduct," is inapplicable to online speech created off campus…

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They have no intentions of reining in spending

From Boortz: We’ll give the nod to the tax cheat Obama chose to run the IRS – the Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.  Geithner was testifying before the House Small Business Committee – not about how he cheated on his taxes – but on his boss’s plan to raise taxes on small businesses in this country … Read more

And they say that hate us because we are….huh?

Often, the claim is made that Islamofacists hate us because we are occupying their land – and neo-isolationists would have us believe that if we simply pulled out of Islamic countries (among others), peace and kumbaya would break out, and we could all just break bread together instead of heads and other body parts. I … Read more

Data Point – if we’re so slow, how can we use so much?

There are those that complain that other countries are FAR superior to the US in terms of Internet acceptance as well as local Internet speeds and coverage.  These arguments are especially vocal over at the FCC with the Net Neutrality brouhaha going on – Government MUST take over control, as we are behind! Over at … Read more

Public Financed Campaigns in NH? No? And Granny D walked all those miles – for nothing.

The Supreme Court of the United States has just declared that public financed funding is kaput: The Supreme Court has ruled taxpayer-funded campaign systems in which state governments compensate outspent candidates with more government funding unconstitutional. CNN reports, “A conservative 5-4 majority of justices on Monday said the law violated free speech, concluding the state … Read more

It’s like, well, burning money…or letting money collect dust…

"The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works — whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified."            – President Barack Obama, Inauguration, 1/20/09 This is not a sterling example of Goverment that … Read more

Notable Quote – Michael Graham

“As long as it’s easier for Whitey Bulger to bring illegal prescription drugs across the border from Mexico than it is for an elderly leukemia patient to go home to Michigan, forget it.” – Michael Graham (radio talk host and author of "That’s no mob, that’s my Mom!").   Whitey Bulger, the Boston mobster that … Read more

Well, this will not favorably dispose Steve towards Huntsman (heh!)

Updated and Bumped: someone (who shall remain nameless for now) decided to challenge me over my use of the words association, No Labels, McKinnon, and Huntsman.  So, here’s yet another association for Huntsman that may drive NH Conservatives crazy: When Huntsman took second spot in the Republican Leadership Conference straw poll last full week in … Read more

Union Derangement Syndrome

Usually, BDS (Bush Derangement Syndrome) or PDS (Palin Derangement Syndrome) is actually describing those that pretty much go off the rails when either President Bush or Gov. Sarah Palin comes up.  Here, however, my fellow Samsphere blogger friend, Maggie Thurber (Thurber’s Thoughts) takes apart a local union VP of communication as he runs off the … Read more

OK, Kitch ALMOST got it all right….heh!

Links added:   From the Laconia Daily Sun (P 12):

GILFORD — Americans for Prosperity (AFP) Foundation has named David “Skip” Murphy of Gilford, who hosts the conservative political blog GraniteGrok and the radio talk show GrokTalk, as its “Activist of the Year” for 2011. The award was presented at the fourth annual RightOnline Conference in Minneapolis, which was attended by some 1,200 conservative and libertarian activists last week.

Each year AFP honors an individual for their effective use of online media to further personal liberty and economic freedom. GraniteGrok describes itself as “fire-breathing, Mtn Dew powered, extremist, right-wing, hard-charging, gun-toting, opinionated, outspoken, rabble rousing, letter writing, radio microphone stomping, buying ink electrons by the Gilford blogger honored by Americans for Prosperity barrel Conservatives and Rational Libertarians!”

A technical analyst for a software firm headquartered in California, Murphy was drawn to local politics by Doug Lambert, with whom he shared the blog and microphone until Lambert withdrew after intemperate insults about New Hampshire Democratic Party chairman Ray Buckley reached the public. Murphy stayed the course, allying himself with the Tea Party and drawing contributors from the libertarian wing of the Republican Party, to become a strident voice in conservative circles.

Murphy has served on the Gilford Budget Committee since his election in 2006 and is the father of two sons serving in the United States armed forces.

— Michael Kitch

I humbly thank Americans for Prosperity for the unexpected honor given to this ordinary schlub from central New Hampsha.  If no one had mentioned it, I wasn’t going to either, but I felt that the error-prone article had to be corrected.

But really – strident?  The corrections:

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A Democrat quote about NH’s responsible budget

Gov. John "Can’t do nuttin’" Lynch bowed to reality and has decided to let the "controversial" new budget become law without vetoing or signing it – deciding to do nothing.  With veto-proof margins by Republicans in the House and Senate, there is nothing that he could do – and he could not muster sufficient courage to make a stand and even issue a symbolic message from the Democrat side.

So, once again, he has to rely on others to make that token attempt.  In Friday’s Laconia Sun (P 11), both Terrie Norelli and Lou D’Allesandro put up the obligatory taunts:

“Let it be known that today we traded the wellbeing of thousands of New Hampshire citizens for higher cigarette company profits,” objected House Democratic Leader Terie Norelli of Portsmouth.

Really, Terrie?  How hypocritical!  For the last four years, the Democrats could have done anything you wanted – especially you as the Speaker of the House!  You could have easily decided to run a bill through the House, throw it over the Democrat controlled Senate, and then on to Gov "Can’t do nuttin" to sign that would have said "Tobacco is illegal in NH".  Why not?  After all, there are ‘dry states" where the sale of alcohol is banned.  Failing that, you could have boosted the taxes so high so as to effectively do the same thing – except for the very rich.

Instead, you punted, knowing the real truth – you crave the money that comes with the taxes. You desired that money so as to grow the size of goverment and in concert, continue the march to demanding how citizens would live their lives (e.g., HassanCare and HassanSpeech being two prime examples). No, Terrie, the Republican controlled House and Senate did not trade the wellness of sovereign citizens for anything.  Unlike you, Republicans…

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Another Democrat Quote about NH’s Budget

Again, the Democrats here in NH are all squawking about the budget that is about to become law, based on veto-proof margins by the Legislature and Gov. "Can’t do Nuttin’" Lynch deciding to, once again, doing nothing.

While Terrie Norelli decided to make an ill-fated whiff of a quote, now we have NH State Senator Lou D’Allesandro making another "let’s change the language" statement in the same article (P. 11):

Besides criticizing Republicans for giving smokers a break while forcing college tuition hikes that could make higher education unaffordable for some, Democrats also pointed to other cuts with far-reaching impacts. For example, they pointed to a $1.5 million cut to help about 240 elderly people with housing services such as meals and light housekeeping to keep them independent and out of nursing homes. “Without these services many of these people will be relegated to nursing facilities at a cost greater than the appropriation,” said Democratic Sen. Lou D’Allesandro of Manchester.

Zero in on the word "independence". Once again, only in that rarefied atmosphere (think: lack of oxygen?) of the hallowed halls of the Legislature, can this kind of redefinition of a word be taken with straight faces of the denizens of those marble lined halls while the rest of us go "huh?".  As in the case during most budget seasons where a department asks for X amount above their current budget and then wails that their budget has gotten "cut" when they don’t get all that they wanted (but more than they did last year), we see another instance of a redefinition of yet another word.

Independence commonly means being able to function without input or assistance from others.  In this above instance, if these seniors have to rely on government to keep them in their homes, is that truly "independence"?  Instead of absconding the rightful use of the word, why can’t D’Allesandro (and all those that continue this misdirected meme) just say "to keep them dependent on Govt welfare to keep them in their homes"?  This is not independence, but dependence – not on family and friends but on the faceless visage of Government.  Sure,…

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Debt Ceiling: Vote for it, and we are your enemy

Erick Erickson of Redstate has thrown down the gauntlet over the upcoming national debt ceiling debate: I pledge that if any Republican votes to increase the debt ceiling without first cutting, capping, and balancing using Lee-Cornyn-Hatch, I will work like hell to beat the hell out of him/her in a primary, even if their election … Read more

Hey there, young lady, how about saying no?

Here in NH, the Executive Council refused to fund a $1.8 Million contract with Planned Parenthood of Northern New England on a 3-2 vote – Ray Burton and Chris Sunnunu decided to vote to give the money to the abortion providers. Indiana has also voted to follow suit; the complaints are already beginning to pour in: how dare you refuse to make me responsible for myself?  A court battle (seemingly similar to that levied by ACORN when the Feds cut off their funding – they lost) has been filed by PP and the Obama Administration and the sob stories are starting to be put out:

Nicole Robbins, a 31-year-old single mother who has been a Planned Parenthood client for six years, said she had intended to visit a Planned Parenthood clinic in Indianapolis on Tuesday to pick up a 2-month supply of birth control pills. Then, the Medicaid recipient learned that the more than $100,000 in private donations the group had raised since May 10 had dried up.

The Ivy Tech Community College student from Indianapolis who is pursuing a physical therapy degree said she’s not sure how she’ll pay for her birth control.

“There are a lot of people who don’t have jobs, who don’t have income, and Medicaid is their only source of income as far as health insurance,” she said. “I feel like I’m stuck between a rock and a hard place.”

I do not know if she was married or not.  If the former, I do not know if her husband left her or the other way around.  But the point that sticks out quickly is that she believes that others should be responsible for her sexuality, that any consequences from her personal behavior is not hers to bear.  Yes, I’m old school…

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