This year’s March Madness is coming to a close without the fawning media coverage of Barack Obama’s brackets. But the theme of brackets reminds me that back in October of 2010 Mary Jane Wellner and Marjorie Smith of the Committee to elect House Democrats tried to fundraise on some brackets of their own. They called it the Extreme 16.
I broke the story on October 15th, and there was an immediate clamor by New Hampshire Republican House candidates asking why they were left off the list.
There are no screen grabs of the original bracket, but I was able to locate the text from the extreme16nh.com home page.
From constitutional amendments making the state powerless to stop child abuse to resolutions supporting secession from the United States of America – from opposing any education standards for home schooled students, to bigoted and hateful rants on the House floor – the Republican House candidates this year have voted for and are supporting some crazy pieces of legislation.
After the September 14th primary, the GOP nominated some absolutely out of touch candidates to represent them in the general election. And out all of those hundreds of candidates, we picked the most Extreme 16 Republican House candidates on the ballot this fall.
Who is the most Extreme? We couldn’t decide, each of these Republicans have some off-the-wall ideas that appeal only to the radical fringe of their party.
But you can – tell us who you think is the most radical of all the Republicans running for the House this year. Every few days we will update the bracket and move on to the next rounds, highlighting the pure crazy in the New Hampshire Republican Party.
Click here to view the bracket and vote
for whom you think is the most
EXTREME of the SIXTEEN!
If you’ve forgotten, Democrats in New Hampshire took an extreme beating in the November 2010 Election losing the majority in every state elective body and both US House seats. Votes gave the extreme candidates veto-proof majorities in both the New Hampshire House and Senate and all five seats in the state’s Executive Council. The only thing the Democrats clung to was the Governor’s office, and only because Democrat John Lynch was still incorrectly perceived as safe and harmless, a false image the state Republican party failed to attack or refute in any meaningful way.
The next two years, the O’Brien years, saw the elimination of an $800 million dollar structural deficit left by the Democrats without raising taxes and many significant reductions in government abuse and overreach. Democrats lost their minds. It was wonderful.
