June 1st through the 10th is “Filing Season” in New Hampshire. It’s when you have that short window of time to decide (if you haven’t thought about it yet – and you should have if you’ve been reading GraniteGrok!) to run for elected office.
This goes from the top of the ticket to the very bottom: Federal office (Senate, US House of Representatives), State (Governor, Executive Council, NH State Senate, NH House of Representatives), County (Sheriff, Court Clerks, Register of Probate), and local town and cities.
Some of you may be reading GraniteGrok as “recon” for the “other side” (e.g., Democrats, Socialists, Anarchists, Communists, Greens), but for the most part, our readers are Conservatives and Libertarians. Some are even Republicans (heh!)! YOU folks are the ones for whom this is written – think hard about running.
As many here, both Groksters and Commenters, have observed and discussed, we are at a tipping point – are we to continue to listen to Ben Franklin’s admonishment of “A Republic, if you can keep it.” While that remark was to a lady who had asked about the result of our Founding Fathers’ work in Philly, it still holds today. He challenged not just her but us as well.
We can yammer all we want here as we do battle in the Arena of Ideas (a necessary battle to hone ideas, stances, and debating techniques), but that is insufficient for “if you can keep it.” More is needed. I’m imploring you to do more – talk is fine, action is better. In fact, badly needed in defense of the political philosophy that we were gifted at our beginning: limited Government, maximal Individual Liberty within an “ordered society” (works well, not ordered around by “rulers”).
I did the action part: I signed up three times to run for my hamlet’s SB2 Budget Committee. The first two with TMEW’s blessings – the third term was under a promise to not run for elected office again. However…
I just came from Town Hall to sign up. No, TMEW hasn’t relented and released me from my promise, so no Town office runs for me. But I did persuade her that running for NH GOP Delegate isn’t like any other elected office. While it is on the ballot, no actual campaigning is needed, and there are only a couple of things that a Delegate does (she demanded, “How much MORE time is this going to take??” – she was happier, not happy, truth be told, but happier, when I explained what it is.
After all, I can’t ask you folks to run for whatever office you KNOW that will make a difference in your life, your family’s lives, and your community’s direction if I didn’t make an effort myself, right? While I CAN point to the past, I asked myself: “what about the present. As Reagan asked, what would I tell the Grandson when he asks, “Bompa, what did you do when they were taking my freedom away”? Working hard, sir, working hard to protect it.
You?
If you are a registered Republican, this is the least you can do. If you have questions, email me at Skip@GraniteGrok.com with your DISQUS name in the email, so I know who you are. I’ll send you the details.
The Establishment Republicans are going to hate me even more.
