Articles tagged as

GraniteGrok

Just Do It!

by Steve MacDonald

NHGOP LogoI am growing weary of this game.  We can no longer wait for the current NH State GOP chairman to tell us once and for all what his intentions are.  I’m not even sure why we are waiting. GraniteGrok has video of the announced retirement from the Cornerstone Dinner.

Governor Sununu announced that after this election he was retiring.  What happened on November second that does not constitute a complete political coup?  The only office the democrats hold is the governorship, but our victory was so complete that this no longer even matters.

So what is left for a seasoned New Hampshire politician to do?

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Unemployment Up

by Steve MacDonald

For people seeking jobs, that’s not a happy tale to tell. But it’s not the only tale. Texas is creating jobs. And New Hampshire has an opportunity to charge after Texas, even do them one better, and become the beacon of the Northeast. It’s something we need to do. There are people out there looking for work. We just need to give them a reason to come here to find it.

Things Are Looking Up

by Steve MacDonald

This is the picture that has replaced the mug shot of former House speaker Terie Norelli on the General Court Web Site.   I’m already pleased with the direction New Hampshire has taken since the election.

What’s Greene Shaheen Up To?

by Steve MacDonald
corn snake
corn snake

Senator Shaheen has signed onto a letter to Senate Majority leader Reid and Minority leader McConnell, suggesting that the corn based ethanol mandates, and all the tariffs and protections associated with it, not be extended.  Your initial reaction might be surprise, but this is not in and of itself surprising.  Shaheen is on the record being against them since at least 2008 when she ran for the US Senate but not because she is against ethanol.  Her problem is the kind of ethanol, and so we can assume her co-signers have similar issues.

On the surface they are claiming to be against the law (the mandate) that props up ethanol on three fronts and also gives 31 billion dollars to the oil companies to offset the cost of forcing them to add ethanol to fossil based motor fuels.  I’m against corporate welfare so I can’t object to repeal even with ulterior motives, but this starts off as a calculated, backhanded poke in the eye, not just to the stupidity of the subsidy regime that liberals normally love, but to big oil.  And we should expect oil to get screwed. We should simply accept that even with repeal of the ethanol mandate, we could still see the government use other means of legislative or bureaucratic force to keep ethanol in the fuel supply and pass those costs off to the oil companies.  If they can screw oil and get what they really want along the way, that’s a dream come true to Progressives.  But what do these signers really want?

As usual, nothing in Washington is quite what it seems.

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DREAM a Little DREAM

by Steve MacDonald

Ed Morrissey over at Hot Air shares with us Senator Jeff Sessions revelation that despite the events of early November, Mr. Reid has submitted his badly written DREAM act aka-amnesty bill, on four seperate occassions in recent months. Ed brings the point home so well I’ll not even try to do better. (As if I even could)

One More for Reid

by Steve MacDonald

Nevada must be ….so proud. The Lame Duck agenda is rigged…says Democrat Senator.

Landmark Ruling?

by Steve MacDonald

It is never a good idea to expect any kind of consistency in the application of rulings by your State Supreme Court but in this case they did and I have to wonder what the broader applications could be? 

The New Hampshire State Supreme Court dismissed a lawsuit in which a golfer sued a golf course because he got hit in the eye by his own shot (off a yard marker).

Dan Tuohy, correspondent for the Union Leader reports today that Paul F. Sanchez does not have a case against Candia Woods Golf Course, which is mundane until you read the language used by the court to explain its dismissal.

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Carol Soros-Porter 2.0 [Updated]

by Steve MacDonald

Carol's Sugar Daddy?Nothing says banking, special interests, or rich SOB’s like George Soros.  So as you contemplate all the things you have to be thankful for, one of which has to include the defeat of Carol Shea-Porter just a few weeks ago, ask yourself why the guy who has spent hundreds of millions of dollars and fronted dozens of groups, for the sole purpose of destroying America from within, has a family interest in the political fortunes of the soon to be former congresswoman from CD-01?

[updated] Seems there is more Soros support for Carol, call it institutional support, going all the way back to 2007.  Every time we turn around there is another member of the Soros Clan turning up as a donor to our de-throned congressperson.  SO many, in fact, I’ve had to push them to the jump to fit them all.

Updated list on the jump.

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A Message From Barack

by Steve MacDonald

I just got this email from the President. (me an anyone else on that email list) Steve — When Michelle and I sit down with our family to give thanks today, I want you to know that we’ll be especially grateful for folks like you. Everything we have been able to accomplish in the last … Read more

A Real Separation Of Powers

by Steve MacDonald

Separation of powers is something of a throw-away phrase for the Socialist-Democrat-Progressives.  They hand it out like a comfort object to the public, a sort of well-worn teddy bear for the masses.  It is meant to remind you that no matter what they do (or did) that bear will be there to help you feel better.

So what if it is a highly regulated bear, made by dues paying  union workers, stuffed with warning labels, wearing a little red hat with a hammer and sickle on it, and maybe even an Obama T-shirt for good measure.

Separation of powers is also this idea where the three branches are divided to ensure that the tyrannical might of the federal government is divided to protect the rights of the people.  This used to work, right up until someone wrote the seventeenth amendment, and then politicized the national court system.  At that point we no longer had separation of powers just the separation of parties, except where the two parties agree; in which case we are looking at an Oligarchy by direct democracy, which is one of the shortest paths by which little Red Totalitarian-Riding hood arrives at Comrade Grandma’s house.

Why do you think both parties appear to be moving to opposite extreme’s?  Why are states rebelling against the federal government?  Because the system was broken on purpose, by progressives, who need direct democracy so that fear and intimidation can drive the polity to allow top down federal rule as the only viable solution.

So our central planning friends view separation of powers to mean separating you from their power, so they can go about the business of managing your lives, and no one has worked harder or longer to excise the power from the people than democrats, though the ruling class Neo-Cons have done plenty to help fill the picnic basket for grandma.

But there is a solution to this problem, one that can relieve the pressure of special interests, the boys club mentality, and the lack of responsiveness by the federal legislature to the state and the people.

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Nothing Says Thanksgiving Like Property Rights…

by Steve MacDonald

..Just ask the Pilgrims.  Or maybe you can watch this video from Reason TV.  

Elephant Innards

by Steve MacDonald

Any migration of Republicans away from a vote for “Speaker O’Brien” might say more about Gene Chandler than it does Bill. It might mean that Gene was either insincere in his request for unity–and I am on the record both commending him and taking him at his word for that stance–or it demonstrates his inability to control even those who would have chosen him as their House Speaker.

Blind Spot

by Steve MacDonald

The saving of New Hampshire Taxpayer dollars has already begun. Peter Bragdon announced that his State Senate chief of staff will not be earning the $100,000.00 his predecessor is said to have received.

Obama Dissaporval Reaches 60% (From Zogby!)

by Steve MacDonald

  Good to see that post election bounce…er, I mean…(what’s the opposite of bounce?) Courtesy of Zogby International with a H/T to Hot Air!

Some Advice From Across The Pond

by Steve MacDonald

Want to better understand the relationship between public and private sector jobs, tax production and consumption, without sitting through a boring three hour lecture?  Here it is an just under six minutes from our friends in England.   Now, go explain it to your progressive friends, the ones who have been supporting all those high-paying … Read more

Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows Part I

by Steve MacDonald

My children have been raised on Harry Potter. So it is a foregone conclusion that we were going to see it though to the end. And it is not disappointing.
While I cannot comment on how well the movie hews to the book (so far)–we read it so long ago it seems–my oldest son claims they changed a few things, though nothing terribly important seems to have been lost.

Chris Christie v. Teachers Union. (again)

by Steve MacDonald

What better way to start Thanksgiving week than with some wisdom from the kind of chief executive we wish we had, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie?

Nothing Fair About It

by Steve MacDonald

Every now and people who appear rational find themselves repeating nonsense, usually in the Nashua Telegraph which is one of New Hampshire leading sources for editorial nonsense.  This time around it’s a guest commentary from Robert Collinsworth, who has an internet footprint large enough to identify him as an otherwise sensible guy.  So why has he taken to the editorial pages to sell the left wing meme that there is a gender/wage gap?

I only bring it up because his reasoning is right out of the liberal weenie play book.  Women only make 0.78/$1.00 compared to men.  He then asks why Republicans in the US senate are blocking the liberal legislation being sold as a fix, as if we can and should trust this unexplored talking point.

Rather than try explore any one persons motivations or sanity, we should probably just look deeper into the issue, and a Bill that looks like it creates more problems than it solves.  (Links and resources on the jump.) 

Like most liberal shibboleths Paycheck Fairness is based on incomplete analysis to pander to a bloc of voters the democrats have identified as worthy of their endless grievance mongering.  To repeat their talking points is, as far as I can tell, not worthy of Mr. Collinsworth or anyone else.

This is not an issue that can be evaluated strictly on the price paid for an hour of labor averaged across the full spectrum of work and wages.  To do so ignores every other factor in life, the free market, and the real danger that the legislative solution being proposed creates.

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Republican Suckers!?

by Steve MacDonald

John Lynch could only win re-election with the help of Republicans and independents and so he did.  So are they all liberals in denial, or just a bunch of suckers?  Someone fell for the lies about the budget.  They believed the liberals and their RINO agitators who sold them on a $70 million dollar surplus while the state was still trying to rob the JUA and sell off property.  Never occurred to ask why the state needed to spend taxpayer money on lawsuits and litigation to steal money from the JUA when they claimed to have a "surplus?"

I asked that question often.

But when votes showed up in adequate numbers to take every branch of government with a super majority of Republicans, they still left the little governor that could.  Suckers.

We are suckers because on November third, as if by magic, the surplus smoke screen cleared to reveal the wreckage of years of democrat majority rule.   Now that the election is over we have a budget crisis again. 

Cathy Silber of the very partisan (so-called non-partisan) GSFTC began early by trying to sell the solution for our resurrected funding woes on a more modern revenue structure. (Sales and income taxes if you didn’t know.)  Every major democrat began talking about the challenges of dealing with a Republican majority and our budget situation–and how it might affect services.  And now John Lynch admits we have a huge problem.

Have?  We always had this problem!  And we have it because John Lynch let the democrat majority spend and spend, then used gimmicks and one time money to hide it, and now it is time to pay.

When will we learn?

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What The…?

by Steve MacDonald

Did anyone happen to notice the names bandied about in this Weeks Granite Status for the job of New Hampshire GOP state chairman? John DiStaso mentions Jim Bender again, who I was told is not as interested as people think (always subject to change depeneding on whom you are speaking to); Jennifer Horn–who is getting nudged by the more conservative/libretarian elements along with Ovide Lamontagne who was an early favorite with the new Republicans; and then there’s Juliana Bergeron and Jim Foley–both of whom are (as far as I can tell) from the Fergus Cullen wing of the party.

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