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GraniteGrok

Guest Post from Shane Vander Hart: Why the Iowa Caucus Results Should Matter

I met Shane for the first time this past fall at the American for Prosperity event back in May, 2011 where Ovide Lamontagne was honored as their 2011 Conservative of the Year and a “Presidential Summit on Spending and Job Creation” featuring the Republicans vying to be the Republican nominee for President.  We had the chance to chat with him then – listen to the fifth audio snippet on the page.  Well, he asked if I would be willing to write a post on how I thought the Iowa Caucus results would play here in NH at his site of Caffeinated Thoughts – so I asked him to do the same:

Why the Iowa Caucus Results Should Matter

The tired cliche heard around the world rang hollow just days before the Iowa Caucus.  Jon Huntsman, desperate for attention, for the second time said, “Iowa picks corn, but New Hampshire picks Presidents.”  Pretty desperate, but he is three-fourths right.  I have to agree that Iowa does pick corn (and soybeans).  I will also acknowledge New Hampshire’s prominent role in presidential nomination politics.  You play a very key role!  All one has to do is ask John McCain how important New Hampshire is.  Ask Bob Dole, George W. Bush, and now Rick Santorum how important the Iowa Caucus is and they would likely say – extremely.

I want to share with you three reasons why I believe Tuesday’s Iowa Caucus results should matter to those planning on voting in next Tuesday’s New Hampshire Primary:

  1. We weed out the weak.  You always have fewer candidates after the Iowa Caucus than what we have before.  We take the time to vet candidates, ask questions

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How else will Obama ignore the Constitution?

Yeah, replacing it with “himself” would be one way

(H/T: Nat Beeler)

Update: A friend of mine from Ohio sent me this email:

Skip – while I enjoy the cartoons, I think today’s cartoon misses the mark:  we have a Congress and Republican mindset that refuses to vote on appointments.   Its really too bad the President can’t fire Congress for failing to work.  On the plus side – at least when they’re on recess they’re not spending money 🙂

I really like this guy – have worked with him, collaborated with him, and have known him for years.  But this, I needed to respond to:

>> Its really too bad the President can’t fire Congress for failing to work

Think about it – this really is a feature and not a bug.  A DELIBERATE feature!

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Two days before NH’s First in the Nation Primary, here’s why I think the Iowa Caucus matters

I totally forgot to post this – my guest post scribblings that Shane requested and posted over at Caffeinated Thoughts on why I thought that the Iowa Caucus mattered here in NH right after it was over.  I will tell you, based on the Press reaction last night to Rick Santorum (uploading the video now, will post shortly), Iowa’s results do matter here in NH:

Well, we’ve now been through the warm up where the players assembled, a few that were desired by the fans declined to come out and play, and some of the would be players stayed home when the prelim lineup matchups didn’t play out as they wanted. We saw a wide range of nuances within a fairly narrow band stances which brought in either hoots or jeers from the stands with some flag waving, some huzzahs, and not a few raspberries thrown about. A couple more left after the general shoot around before the the Big Show started; a few of the lessors kept circling the court waiting to be asked to play (but never got the nod – and one finally went to another game).

Tuesday night, the opening buzzer to that Big Show sounded and it was a dash to the hoop – politicians looking to score big. Layups, gimmes, hooks, jump shots and three pointers. And yes, a couple of players got stuffed as they went for what they thought would have been a slam dunk on their home court. And like what happens in hockey, a game broke out during the fight. And when it was over, two winners, a tie, and a couple also rans. And one self-ejection.

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GrokTV Event: Prez Candidates at the Hillsborough County Republicans 1/6/2012

In addition to Newt, there were plenty more speakers at the event last night at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Nashua, NH held by the Hillborough County Republicans:

  • former LA Congressman and Governor Buddy Roemer
  • Mark Callahan
  • Fred Karger
  • Congressman Charlie Bass (R-NH, CD2, and no, he is not running for Prez, merely spoke quickly)

Here is the video clip of former LA Congressman and Governor Buddy Roemer:

The rest are after the jump:

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GrokTV Event: Rick Santorum at the Hillsborough County Republicans 1/6/2012

Former US Senator Rick Santorum was also present at the Hillsborough Republican event.  Although the Press surrounding Newt slowed the beginning of the event, they literally SWARMED him afterwards, making it all but impossible for Chair Chadwick to continue with the proceedings.  Through the ministrations of Stacy “the Other McCain” and my long term friendship … Read more

A response to Gilford Selectman Kevin Hayes concerning Town Administrator Scott Dunn

So, from the last exchange, we see that the Selectmen, a la Occupy Wall Street philosophy, have no problem in targeting a citizen just because they can classify that citizen as “part of the 1%).  Certainly, we see this emanating from the Oval Office and from the Progressive Caucus in Congress – how DARE the successful not pay their fair share and how cold hearted they must be to want smaller government (which would be less expensive and cost them less in taxes).  My response to that:

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Obama apologist Dick Gregory of “Meet The Press” gets schooled by Rick Santorum

I have, over and over, had one major complaint about the MSM – I have no problem in them asking hard questions of Republicans.  In fact, the harder the better; I only wish that they’d do the same to Democrats on a consistent basis.  In that, I guess I’d be better off wishing to win Powerball – it happens occasionally but only in the little things, so it seems.  And it seems less often still, that someone seen as a Conservative is allowed to best them, especially on TV (which is a reason why I tell people to always record any interview they get involved in, so as to “keep the record straight”).

Well, it happened yesterday as candidate for the Republican nomination for President, Rick Santorum, decided “not to be subservient to get face time”; he decided that when Gregory got in his face, he was going to return the dis-favor:

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Gilford, NH Town Administrator Scott Dunn has a response to my email – and Selectman Kevin Hayes

Well, it seems that the saga of officials from the Town of Gilford slagging a private citizen simply because she is holding them account and she has done well financially due to hard work, good ideas, and good decisions.  From this post, let me remind of this from Town Administrator Scott Dunn (writing in his official capacity):

Fact # 9 — There are no town employees who own two homes on Governor’s Island with a total assessed value in excess of $2.6-million.

where he is trying to make an example and a target of derision.  My response was “I am demanding a public apology to Ms. Aichinger for your lowbrow and low class tactic“.  Well, I got a reply – and frankly, it was short, sweet, to the point, and is ready to double down:

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Yes, we are still here, James, and thanks for noticing!

Every Friday (pretty much), James Pindell at WMUR Political Scoop does his Up and Down for the past week; given that it’s New Year’s, he swapped the timeline for the year’s span; in his Down side, he had this:

Local political blogosphere: With Dean Barker no longer running the day to day of Blue Hampshire, and with Red Hampshire gone, the blogosphere is less robust, is not growing, and is not driving the conversation like they were. At least Granite Grok got a face lift.

Well, at least thanks for noticing! And I also note: we’re still here, we have no plans to go away, and RINOs and Statists will still hate us and get annoyed by us.  Yes, like RH, many sites that started out around the same time we did have gone away or the passion has flamed out…..blogging takes a lot of passion to do well and it requires discipline to make it work.  Unlike others that tried it simply as a way to earn a living, this is our avocation (serious obsession?), not our vocation.  Being a full time political blogger is not easy to do, at least on the Right side of the blogosphere.   Financially, all I hope to do is pay the server bill and acquire the technology that will allows us to extend into different areas – more podcasts, more live streaming, more video, and whatever the next big tech thing coming down the line that will enable us to get our message out there.  And getting out the message transcends the technology – the goal is to influence people no matter the media.

Thus, I would tend to agree with the assessment, at least in part.

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GrokTALK! Special Interview – Stacy “The Other” McCain reporting from Iowa

Yesterday, Grokster Mike and I had the opportunity to interview Stacy McCain (aka “the Other McCain”), an independent investigative reporter who travels the country reporting on the political issues of the day.  While his main site is here, he also writes over at The American Spectator (and we discussed one of his posts located here). … Read more

The ATF in Brenham, Texas – Second Amendment breach? What Obama cannot do via legislation, he will use the Administrative State.

 

 

From one of my TEA Party friends, a report concerning a gun dealer on the Southern border:

Date: Sat, 17 Dec 2011

Unfortunately, YES!!!! What is so damn frustrating is usually you see the ATF every 3 or 4 years for a visit. They come in and check your records. They have paid John a visit about 5 times in the last 18 months, nit picking on little things just looking for a reason to get him in trouble. They were definitely on a mission to close him down. Well, they finally succeeded. My brothers all told him we would pitch in to help him fight the bastards but he said its not worth it. As of the end of December he will no longer be selling guns and will have until the end of February to get all of his repairs out of his store and back to the owners.

See the below note. This just happened in Brenham, Tx. Our back yard! Coming to a town near you!

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2012 Presidential Primary – Mitt Romney, again, but a -20

Instead of the +1 he got here, this is a -20 for a bad attempt at doing what Liberals do – redefining language for merely scoring political points.  The Hill has a quote from Mitt Romney that I’ve been hearing for a while now, and I frankly think it’s a crock:

“I’m happy to stand by the things that I believe. I’m not going to change my positions by virtue of being in a presidential campaign,” Romney said. “What we did was right for the people of Massachusetts, the plan is still favored there by 3 to 1 and it is fundamentally a conservative principle to insist that people take personal responsibility as opposed to turning to government for giving out free care.”

Such a silver tongue.  He’s been hit so hard on RomneyCare being the progenesis of ObamaCare he’s punch drunk.  No one believes him when he said that just because he created an individual mandate at the State level, it doesn’t matter as it is different than the one in ObamaCare since the Constitution covers ObamaCare (a Federal action) but not Obamneycare (at the State level).  Rubbish!  While indeed Obamacare will (or should) be judged unconstitutional, philosophically, there is not a whit of difference with what Obama signed into law vs what Mitt signed into law.  Philosophically, we have the State (be it at the Federal or State level) forcing people to buy something they otherwise would not.  If these stand, we no longer have the limited government that the Founders wanted.  And Mitt’s answer is a dodge, and a lame one at that.

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2012 Presidential Primary – So, Mitt said he was a Progressive?

A gem.  Or rather, a gaffe (albeit, from the past)?  Or evidence of pandering?

Once again, we see the disruptive technology that is the Internet on politics.  What you say now will be known in the future.  What you said in the past will generally be available now.  And you have no control over it.

No, sir, no amount of verbiage or “flackage” is going to convince authentic Conservatives otherwise. Video of this after the jump

(H/T: Townhall)

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As a Conservative, I have no problem in “kicking up the dust” on candidates…

This past week, I’ve heard a number of people complaining about Republicans and Conservatives criticizing Republican candidates (did you notice that I separated “Republicans” and “Conservatives”?). I am guilty as charged as one of those Conservatives who has been “kicking up the dust” against a few candidates.

After the disaster that is Barack Obama, America has a chance to reset, start over, change direction, and work towards recovering its greatness, which is clearly at self-imposed risk. Yet some of the Republican choices we are presented with are just rehashed versions of candidate’s we’ve seen before, fitting the mold of Republicans who helped us to this distressed place. My concern with these candidates is that if one of them were to win, they would quickly fall back into old GOP habits, failing to exploit the opportunity to make real change when we need it the most.

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Bill Whittle unbound about 2012 and the need to defeat Barak Hussein Obama

“In his last Afterburner of 2011, Bill Whittle takes a look at the state of this country three years into Obama’s rule and has amassed a list of breathtaking failures bound to stun and/or depress champions of smaller government. Solyndra, Fast & Furious, the Keystone Pipeline and the deficit are just a handful of the … Read more

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