Victoria Sullivan for Manchester Mayor – Campaign Office opening

The momentum continues as our team grows and we amplify our efforts to reach out to voters throughout the city. This upcoming Saturday is an exciting day for our campaign as we officially open our campaign office. I truly hope you can join us for some light refreshments and then an afternoon of door-knocking as … Read more

coming soon

Coming Soon – Your Own Local Granite Grok Experience

We’ve promised some new and exciting things since the Springtime and we’re ready for ‘What’s next!’ We call them MicroGroks. And you are getting one soon!

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Mayor Joyce Craig

Mayor Joyce Craig – Some might call these kickbacks

This was sent in by a ‘Grok reader and I stared at it in horror.  I can see a quick lunch being offered by the department…but a “banquet” and “prizes” worth thousands of dollars??? Reformatted, emphasis mine: My friend started a job working for the Manchester Cemetery maintenance department.  Two weeks ago ,he was cutting the … Read more

Joyce Craig

Manchester Mayor Joyce Craig: a lousy education legacy

Mayor Joyce Craig has done nothing to improve the quality of education in Manchester. As Chairman of the Board, she should have come in with a plan to improve the public schools in Manchester. Instead, she appears to be punting that authority to community organizers like Manchester Proud and the Nellie Mae Foundation.  Both of … Read more

Victoria Sullivan with petitions

Grok MicroInterview: Victoria Sullivan, candidate for Mayor of Manchester

After Victoria had filed her candidacy paperwork at Manchester City Hall (“FIX THE CLOCK!“) and had addressed her supporters, I was able to get a bit of an interview with her.  Go with me here – a bit of “non-interview” at first but I think it adds a bit as to her character.

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Democrat Party

NH and Maine Democrats Are Pushing the Exact Same Loony Left Agenda (And What it Means)

From my inbox: Anyone else find it funny that NH’s loony-left bills mirror Maine’s almost exactly? For the sake of perspective, does anyone else find it funny that Maine’s loony left bills mirror New Hampshire’s almost exactly?

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Dog playing Image by Katrin B. from Pixabay

New Hampshire Needs a Pet Czar Comrades

Looking to grow government with some 4th Amendment infringements, a side of the slippery slope and a bit of infringing on your property rights? HB688 fits the Bill.

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Is Your Local School Board Breaking the Law?

Ann Marie Banfield, writing last week, pointed out that some school boards around the state pay membership dues to the New Hampshire School Board Association (NHSBA) which then lobbies the legislature. State law prohibits the School Board from using any taxpayer dollars (so no money from the school budget) to pay those “dues.”  It is … Read more

Steve Negron Unveils Veterans and Military Families for New Hampshire Coalition

Press Release FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE October 4, 2018 Contact: Roger Wilkins press@teamnegron.com, 603-864-8633 Steve Negron Unveils Veterans and Military Families for New Hampshire Coalition Nashua, NH – Steve Negron, a U.S. Air Force veteran and small business owner, unveiled his Veterans and Military Families for New Hampshire Coalition with over 130 United States members. Previously … Read more

Guest Post: The Debate on 3D Printed Guns

If you’ve been paying any attention to the news at all in recent weeks, you’ve no doubt heard about the controversial subject of 3D printed guns. 3D printed guns are indeed exactly what they sound like: a gun that can be downloaded and assembled using a 3D printer and the right materials.

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Margaret Drye – Dedicated to Our Community

For almost four decades, I have been responding to Plainfield and Cornish homes and roads as an EMT with Cornish Rescue.  As a result, I have seen the opioid epidemic up close, and I have also seen the many medical, physical, and financial challenges our senior citizens face.

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There’s a reason why NH ranks much higher than Maine

Income TaxReformatted, emphasis mine:

“…The compilation data is stunning.

In many of the selected reports, Maine lagged far behind New Hampshire for competitiveness for new industry, tax burden, cost of doing business, workforce education, infrastructure, regulatory environment and labor supply. New Hampshire came in, nationally, as the 15th best state in terms of business climate and taxation — the best in New England, by a long shot. Maine’s average score designated our state the 34th best for business climate, trailing every other New England state except Connecticut.

But the rub becomes apparent when one studies the data.

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Maine’s Embrace of Broad Based Taxes vs. New Hampshire NOT Doing That.

FPI NH v Main Private sector growthOur good friend Michael Graham, writing at NH Journal, has an article titled “Study: Maine Vs. N.H. Shows “More Government Means More Poverty.”

The annual Family Prosperity Index is out and, while New Hampshire didn’t make the Top 10 (it’s ranked #16), the study’s authors did use the Granite State to make their case for more economic liberty vs. reliance on government. They used the case study of New Hampshire and its neighbor, Maine (FPI ranking: #39).

The result of Maine’s dancing with the tax devil in the “blue” moon light? More government, a shrinking private sector, and one of the highest dependency cultures in the nation.

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Don’t Like NH’s Property Taxes? Then Move to Maine

Source: WalletHub This is an Interactive map!

Skip took some time to fisk a letter to the Concord Monitor in which someone named John Andrews complains about the high property taxes in New Hampshire. He notes that across the border in Maine, he’d be paying a lot less in property taxes.

Skip does a great job exposing the fallacies upon which Andrews makes his case, and rightly points out that Maine has lots of other taxes that John never mentions. But he doesn’t have space to show how vast the chasm of the overall tax burden is between Maine and New Hampshire.

It’s Yuge.

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The Republican Party and Civil Rights in America – The Untold Story

Rogers J Johnson
By Rogers J Johnson

There is no question that the Kansas-Nebraska Act which dissolved the Missouri Compromise was the catalyst for the creation of the Republican Party.  But its foundation firmly lays in the opposition of the single most reprehensible act in US history, slavery.

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We Just Need A Tax Structure That Would Allow it To Be Accessed For Government Use

I was doing my promised duty to screen scrape the million or so (hyperbole) comments by Gaia from the Concord Monitor Web site –who, by the way, seems almost reasonable for a Democrat–when I came across this.

By Gaia– 04/14/2011 – 9:30 am

Some of us are broke. There’s still plenty of cash in the state, if only there were a tax structure that would allow it to be accessed for govt. use.

..if only there were a tax structure that would allow it (the money) to be accessed by the government.

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BE BREITBART: DoIT Right To Know Request : Outbound Internet traffic summarizations – Update 2

Well, I would say that the response we had when Ms. Gretchen Hamel (Administrator!) emailed Letter arrived could be described amongst us “Techi Groksters” was a “really, you expect us to believe that this is difficult?”.  After all, amongst us, we have a handful of degrees and upwards of 75 years of technical experience and several of us are the corporate experts in our areas for our respective companies. So, we’re asking the main technical guy of the State of NH – is this really that difficult?

Good evening, Commissioner,

Upon reading the rather sparse Letter from Ms. Hamel (April 27) concerning our Right To Know request concerning the website traffic Summarizations, we became technically puzzled.  It is our hope that you would be able to address our concern and lack of understanding of the difficulty implied by Ms. Hamel’s Letter.

Our response to that is below, as well attached to this Letter in both WORD and OpenOffice formats.

Regard

– Skip

Skip Murphy for Steve Mac Donald and Ed Naile.

*****

April 30, 2012

To:

Stanley “Bill” Rogers, Commissioner, Department of Information Technology / CIO, State of New Hampshire

Re: April 30, 2012 Request for Records Pursuant to RSA 91-A – delay of response.

Dear Commissioner Rogers,

We are in receipt of the letter by Ms. Gretchen Hamel, Administrator of April 27, informing us that it was impossible to transfer the Internet URL Summarization records that we, as citizens of the State of New Hampshire, believe that we should have access to, especially under the aegis of RSA 91-A (the State’s Right To Know (“RTK”) law). From a technical standpoint, we are extremely puzzled over two issues:

  • First, we included DES Commissioner Burack as a courtesy on this RTK simply as our first RTK dealt specifically with one of his employees abusing the Internet access afforded by your network and we requested those Summarization records specifically in that case. We accept the fact that in a case pertaining a single employee, we understand that these could be labeled as “responsive but exempt”.
  • Secondly, our latest RTK concerned these Summarization records are in toto, thus not tied to any given employee or subgroup of employees and therefore, would fall into that category of “responsive but non-exempt”.

But more to point of fact, we are puzzled as to the “additional time is needed” in delivering records that taxpayer monies have already paid for and whose existence has already been confirmed by the State.. As a technical person (although we do recognize that you are, by dint of your title, a Political Appointee, and thus mired in politics which most engineers tolerate but abhor), you must realize that we understand how such records are obtainable in short order.

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Ray Buckley’s Norman Rockwell

This morning’s Union leader has the Lasky snatch and grab photo on the front page. Elliot Lasky, (Husband of State Senator Bette Lasky) stands mid stride, stolen campaign property in hand.

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