Steve MacDonald Gallup reports that 56% of Swing State voters do not believe they are better off than they were four years ago, rising from an Obama low of 54% but not yet nearing the Oct/Nov 2011 high of 60%. A majority of those claiming they are not better off blame Mr. Obama, but not by a lot. Plenty of blame for both Obama and Bush, with some still only blaming Bush.
So I guess we are the 56%.
Nowhere on New Hampshire State Senator, Democrat Matt Houde’s Bio Page does it mention that he is employed as a Lobbyist for Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center (DHMC) . I guess they forgot to update it?
So when the Republican Liberty Caucus of New Hampshire (Disclosure- I am on the RLCNH board), asked Senator Houde to step down from the Joint Health Care Reform Oversight Committee (not knowing that he was a paid lobbyist), you might be surprised to learn why?
The problem is simple. Decisions Houde will make on the committee will have a direct effect on his employer, Dartmouth-Hitchcock. Decisions that could result in a massive expansion of Medicare, which given DHMC’s near monopoly in the Granite State, would ensure it access to millions of taxpayer dollars, a fraction of which could then be used to continue to pay Houde between $76,482.00 dollars to as much as $104,957.00 dollars for being a senior community communications specialist with DHMC.
Waving the job requirement for welfare seems like a natural extension of the Obama Economic plan. Make sure there are no jobs, keep people dependent on government. And now he can blame the states…who are suffering under every other yoke he has placed upon them in three in half years. Hey, maybe he’ll send Biden … Read more
New Hampshire is not California. We are not California because with the exception of 2007-2010, we try to avoid letting Democrats run the entire state government. (We’re also not Massachusetts for that same reason.) And this is good, because while Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick has now implemented “cost controls” for Healthcare providers in his state, guaranteeing(long term) less access, longer waits and poorer service, California is a bloody disaster.
The tax and spend, unsustainable pension and benefits, land of environmental extortion, saw sales tax revenue drop 33.5% last month. While but one small part of the problem that is “California” all the problems can be linked directly to things that New Hampshire Democrats want you to experience right here in the Granite State.
Yes it is all about the civility….just don’t expect any of it from a Democrat. (At least she didn’t try to bite off a finger.)
What are the unidentified costs of banning disposable shopping bags? I’ve been speculating for months. In this video PERC Lone Mountain Fellow Jonathan Klick argues that the presence of harmful bacteria (in reusable grocery bags whose use is mandated after plastic bag bans are put in place) creates a health cost that has not been considered. (Hey…I know I’m just chopped liver but I considered it. a few months ago ‘What could go wrong- LA Set to Ban Paper and Plastic.’)
And here, and here, and here, and here…
Mr. Klick points out that about half the reusable bags of shoppers heading in for more groceries have some form of contamination, and that the human cost could be a doubling in the number of cases of food borne illness in humans and even death as a result.
From the Weekly Standard– amidst speculation that Joe “Gaffe Machine” Biden has been having far too many Joe-moments, we bring you today’s schedule. (on the jump…)
We know Biden is not doing the ticket any favors.
So is it time to bring on Hillary–though she and Bill can’t stand the Obama’s and the Obama’s can’t stand the Clinton’s either…but for the sake of power a Democrat will do just about anything. Or is this just a sit down and straighten out Joe kind of a day?
[Update on the jump]
More than a few folks are probably wondering why I keep talking about vote fraud and photo ID. TEA Party Republicans more or less plugged up the domicile loophole that invited out of state influence in our local New Hampshire elections, and even passed a voter ID requirement. So where’s the fire?
Democrats are still lying about the issue, and if permitted any kind of majority in state government will do everything in their power to reverse the protections we’ve managed to gain. So it is essential that we reveal the half-truths and outright lies they will continue to peddle all the way to November and beyond.
Floyd Corkins II, of Hendron Virgina, walked in to the Family Rights Council offices in Washington DC and proceeded to shoot a security guard before the same guard subdued him (some reports say with help), preventing him from getting past the lobby of the building.
Corkins “had been volunteering at a community center for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people,” according to AP and CBS news. He is also reported to have shouted disagreements with the work the Christian group does before opening fire.
To their credit, Glaad, representing several gay rights groups, quickly released a statement condemning the shooting. The shooter is in custody, and no one was seriously injured in the incident, so the bigger story is the lack of wall to wall media coverage of a shooting in the heart of Washington DC.
There is a lovely new candidate survey being mailed out to New Hampshire candidates from the Concord Monitor. While most of the questions are loaded to demarcate the right left divide in state politics–have to make sure we know who the “TEA Party Extremists” are–one question in particular stood out.
“Do you support last year’s 50% cut in university Funding…”
As we find ourselves more and more exposed to committee meetings, public meetings, and even private ones, particularly with bureaucrats, paper pushers, or local or state level government officials, this bit of news might come in handy.
It’s about the Delphi Technique. From Informed Citizens United
In group settings, the Delphi Technique is an unethical method of achieving consensus on controversial topics. It requires well-trained professionals, known as “facilitators” or “change agents” who deliberately escalate tension among group members, pitting one faction against another to make a preordained viewpoint appear “sensible,” while making opposing views appear ridiculous.
It is hard to beat the annual burden of government regulation for keeping the economy down. It’s also a great way to keep unemployment up. If Businesses have to spend more money to comply with regulations there is less to invest in the business or more employees. And what’s even better is that this…(see chart on the jump)…is something the government did create. Forty-six billion dollars ($46,000,000,000.00) in new additional regulatory costs per year!, heaped on business owners–during a recession– thanks to Barry “Big Bureaucracy” Obama…in just three years.
(I wonder if the idea came out of one of those job summit break-out session?)
The Government Buy-up and Bail-out of General Motors saved union jobs while arbitrarily eliminating tens of thousands of non-union jobs at dealerships, put taxpayers on the hook, and at present will cost us at least 25 Billion in losses as the value of the automaker “we own” a part of continues to decline. Had they … Read more
The New Hampshire TEA Party Republican Legislature did a lot more than just eliminate the 800 Million dollar deficit Democrats willingly left behind, while writing a balanced budget, and estimating revenues that came in on target. They also managed to repair some damage to election law in regard to domicile.
SB318, vetoed by Governor Lynch, was overridden by both the House and Senate (House Roll Call)(Senate Roll Call) and become law. And while there are several important corrections to the forms and language that were made the one that strikes me as the most important is this.
Another New Hampshire Democrat running for public office, this time for Governor, has violated Department of Defense Rules. Bill Kennedy, one of three Democrats running in the party primary for New Hampshire Governor, is in clear violation of DoD directive NUMBER 1344.10
Bill is probably a great guy, and I’m sure he never meant to violate Department of Defense regulations by posting images of himself in uniform on a campaign web site. But that’s not the only thing that caught my eye while I was there. Bill is also guilty of lying by omission.
You see, while claiming to be something of a centrist, he still suffers from the same illness as the majority of Democrats in New Hampshire when it comes to talking about taxes and tax burden. On the same page in which he violated DoD regulation 1344.10, he also engaged in partisan hackery when he says…
“NH is ranked 2nd or 4th worst (depending on whose statistics you use) for property tax burden.”
By using the word tax BURDEN, we are meant to presume a horrible thing but every tax is part of that burden. If we are going to have an honest discussion about tax burden, shouldn’t we talk about total tax burden? And why, despite Bill’s sound bite-which is accurate by the way– New Hampshire still has one of the lowest overall tax burdens in the nation?
…yes he did. And he owned that 700 Billion Dollar cut. Watch him.
Why anyone believes that Democrats are the party of the people is beyond me. More aggressive PR perhaps. Well here is yet another example of where Democrats, and New Hampshire Democrats in particular, are in the super minority on what matters to most Americans. From a Washington Post Poll…74% of adult think requiring some form of ID to vote is a good idea.
(back up link if above has not been repaired)
But how about minorities?
Democrats in New Hampshire take a lot of money from outside the state. Don’t take my word for it, just go look it up. Millions and Millions. They use candidates, campaign committees, so-called non-profits, and even have super wealthy out of state special interest donors making personal donations here and there to move money around the campaign finance camp fire, often right into the state Democrat party coffer, then back out to your local races.
No one should be surprised or even taken aback at this because it is all part of the business of politics, every party does some of this, it is all perfectly legal, and everything was fine up until the point when the New Hampshire Democrat party decided to make it a recurring campaign issue against Republicans. It wasn’t Democrats who were affected by objects of out of state money and influence, just the Republicans.
Democrats are clearly guilty of hypocrisy on the issue (no surprise there), but whenever they start a narrative like this it is usually because they are doing something else that might be worse, that they need you to be distracted from. And guess what? They were.
Democrats obstructing speech they object to continued… after yesterdays post, which produced some necessary followup. Obama campaign officials obstructed a Pennsylvania reporter from speaking to Obama supporters waiting outside, in line for an Obama rally. A Commenter, C. dog, responded with a link to this story from 2008, at the Democrat National Convention, in Denver.
ABC reporter Asa Eslocker was filming for a story about the financial influence of lobbyists and wealthy donors. While taking pictures of Democrat Senators and others on a public sidewalk he was arrested and detained by the police.