If a big pharmaceutical company was given $40,000.00 by the New Hampshire’s Executive Council to advertise the benefits of a drug therapy that had 
not only not yet been approved but was not even known to be viable, would people be up in arms about that? I think they probably would. So how about some outrage over this?
The New Hampshire Executive Council, by a vote of 4 – 1, has just spent $40,000.00 so that the NH-DOT and the New Hampshire Rail Transit Authority can hire…
“… a consultant for the sole purpose of public outreach and public relations to increase the public awareness of the mission of the NHRTA … and to educate the public on the benefits of rail as part of a comprehensive multi-modal transportation system, both statewide and specifically within the N.H. Capital Corridor.”
The NHRTA’s sole reason for existing is to develop commuter rail in the Granite State without regard for long term costs, efficiency, or even need, all questions which have been answered time and again, but not to the satisfaction of proponents because the answers were not favorable to their cause.
To correct that they have been given $40,000.00 to propagandize the public on “the benefits of rail” (there are benefits to freight rail, but they are talking here about commuter rail) and will hire a professional ad guy or gal to develop a campaign promoting their commuter rail “drug” therapy, which is not only not approved but not known to be viable.
Actually, it is known to be unviable, though I am betting that the pot of gold the same Executive council directed toward a detailed study of these questions will produce answers not dissimilar to those of the ad campaign.
Councilor Chris Sununu, the only dissenter, is asking the only intelligent question.
“How can we be educating people on the benefits of the Capital Corridor if we haven’t even completed a study on the benefits of the Capital Corridor?”
The answer, and I’m sure he knows this, is because the results of the study are already pre-determined. The only real question is how to spend the money on the study to arrive at the desired result. When big “anything else” does something like this with their own money, it is misleading, corrupt, contemptible, and suspect. When big government does it with state money, and only one Executive Councilor even cares enough to point it our for what it is, what kind of contemptible, misleading, corruption is that?
H/T Dave Solomon – Union Leader
