This is so funny! What appears below is a column from today’s New Hampshire government-newspaper, the Concord Monitor. I glanced at the top of the top of the column and though “Hey, great! My friend—the excellent Rep. JR Hoell—has written an interesting piece about 2nd Amendment concealed carry for everyone!” So I happily read the excellent column…
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: November 29, 2011
Contact: Carolyn McKinney, chairman, RLCNH, 603-769-4264, chair@rlcnh.org
RLCNH will target Right to Work opponents for defeat
A Right to Work law is fundamental to the freedom to associate
CONCORD, N.H.—Because the right to freely associate is fundamental to liberty in a free market economy, the Republican Liberty Caucus of New Hampshire has decided to use the Right to Work override vote as a litmus test for candidates running for reelection in 2012.
To be clear: any representative or senator who votes to sustain the governor’s veto of the Right to Work bill, HB 474, will not receive an endorsement or assistance of any kind from the Republican Liberty Caucus of New Hampshire during the 2012 election cycle. In some cases, the Republican Liberty Caucus of New Hampshire will actively support these incumbents’ opponents in their primary elections, especially if those opponents pledge to support a Right to Work law.
A proposed NH state constitutional amendment banning the introduction of a state income tax has been voted out of committee with a recommendation that it "Ought To Pass." The full State House will vote on it in January. Not surprisingly, Democrats deplore it—great angst!—because their true agenda is being exposed to open examination and debate. That is…
I have a feeling that this is gonna be a long (and fun) campaign with stuff whizzing back and forth. It seems that Maggie Hassan is the front leader on the Democrat side (taking into account some of the undeclareds) and may well be the nominee. Problem is, we believe her to be the antithesis of what the spirit of New Hampshire to be (and fits rather well with the Progressive mantra that Government should be as big as it has to be in order to make sure of equal outcomes vs equal opportunity (e.g., healthcare: MaggieCare, free market be damned), making sure Government gives you stuff instead of being self responsible and acting like an adult ("Diapers R NH Govt!"), and if you don’t like it, we’ll regulate your speech instead of honoring your right to free speech (HassanSpeech here and here). Live Free or Die makes no sense to the Progressive mindset.
Well, there was a spat in the Union Leader between Shrill Kathy Sullivan and Pat Hynes over that free speech (complete snippet after the jump) part:
Granite Staters will begin hearing from Hynes’ version of the Forum today when it unveils a radio ad going after the new Democratic candidate for governor, former state Sen. Maggie Hassan, just two days after she announced.The spot accuses her of supporting:
"more than 80 taxes and fee increases, including the LLC tax."
"Hassan even hatched a harebrained scheme to have state bureaucrats take control of our hospitals," the ad charges, saying "it’s no wonder" she lost a bid for reelection to the Senate last year.
Right after that, I got a "boo hoo, they’re attacking me!" email:
Dear Friend,
As you may know, I announced my campaign for governor of New Hampshire on Tuesday. It did not take but two days for an extremist PAC to start running radio ads attacking me.
But what’s worse is that they are doing this because they want to direct attention away from an out of control legislature with an extremist agenda and the right wing gubernatorial candidates who would be a rubber stamp for their policies.
But you can help fight back against these attacks by contributing $10, $25, $100 right now.
This attack is a perfect example of what’s wrong in Concord.
Funny, during her announcement speech, you called both the Republicans and your announced opponent, Ovide Lamontagne, extremists. So Maggie, if you are going to accuse others of inciting a food fight, it’s a done deal that you threw the first dish of chocolate ice cream.
Here’s the ad itself
This ad is extremist only if one thinks that one’s past actions (and her leadership in those actions) being read back to you. Let me give you a piece of advice – extremist is the new racist, and is entirely overused and not effective.
If you, dear readers, feel as I do that the current property assessing and taxing practices in New Hampshire are often unfair and inequitable, then I invite you to join me at an upcoming grievance hearing in the NH House on October, 20th.
I believe that my property is not fairly taxed so I appealed for redress to the NH Legislature in Concord. They granted me a hearing which is set for Thursday, October 20th at 10 a.m. in Room 303 of Legislative Office Building, the LOB, (directly behind the state house with the gold dome.)
Representative Duffy Daugherty, Coos District 1, has presented my petition. Among other things, Mr. Daugherty, on my behalf, is attempting to stop the towns and assessors from applying “separate subjective factors such as those related to views as indicated on current property cards.”
Yes, I am referring to the odious “View Tax.”
Let’s face facts. If five non-collaborating assessors come to a property on five different days, it is almost certain that five different tax values will result. The reason is simple. There are no written guidelines for assessing views leaving assessors to play the “I’ll know its value when I see it” game.
This is the sort of arbitrary tax that Mad King George the 3rd of England would have loved to impose on the subjects in the colonies! We all know how that story ended.
I cannot imagine that I am the only property owner in the state who feels this way. If you believe that your own property is not fairly assessed, for any reason, I invite you to come to Room 303, LOB in Concord on October 20th. This discussion on a potentially dull subject should prove to be pretty interesting.
Frank M. Handibode
Hebron
If you missed it, a State party Democrat (David Robinson), speaking for a left wing Veterans group (VoteVets.org) is part and parcel to an effort by the New Hampshire Democrat Party to petition House Speaker O’Brien to remove Republican Al Baldasaro as Chairman of the House Veterans Affairs Committee. None of the reporting to date, other than here at GraniteGrok, has identified the group or Robinson as Democrat-backed or connected. But there’s news about the petition they plan to give to O’Brien.
If you go to Change.org, you can see the petition set up by the New Hampshire Democrat Party, but the list of signatories is not accessible just by visiting the petition page. One thing we do know however is that of the ten names we can see, seven of them are from out of state.
   
“A hypocrite is the kind of politician who would cut down a redwood tree, then mount the stump and make a speech for conservation.” —Adlai E. Stevenson
Following my recent RINO OF THE WEEK report, an amused reader and friend inquired, “Isn’t the RINO one of the world’s deadliest animals? Or is that the hippo…”
Pondering this for a minute, I juxtaposed the question concerning the herbivorious, odd-toed ungulate native to Africa and parts of Asia: The “Rhinoceros”. versus Political RINO’s….an acronym for, “Republican In Name Only,”.
While “Rhinos” are related to the horse, zebra, and tapir; are known for their bad eyesight, good hearing, and mud-rolling. RINO’s, on the other hand are ambiguous about who they are related to…some show a Republican-leaning while others a full out leftist Democrat leaning. RINO-eyesight is through rose-colored glasses and instead of rolling in the mud, they sling mud. That sums it up for me, Nevertheless my response was as follows:
   
This week’s Rino of the Week Report is two days overdue. We have now moved into that area of RINO-dom where we are now looking at “RINO-esque” house votes versus overall house vote performance. Prior RINO-of-the Week selections were pretty clear. Republicans adhering to the part platform were very easy to distinguish from those who ran as Republicans, yet vote consistently with liberals. Now we are in that area where the constituents must decide if the Rep voted “RINO? of if the Rep is a RINO overall. At any rate, ROTW will continue to decide who the RINO is for the present week and the constituents can decide the rest.
In this next shade of the RINO Report, we now examine some house members whose records may show adherence to the party platform, but go off the reservation on key social and fiscal issues like the budget, parental notification or important gun and self-defense bills. Those Republicans we will now focus on.
   
THE RINO OF THE WEEK is two-term House Representative Timothy D. Copeland. Representative Copeland not only has a RINO voting record, but openly embodies pro-Union positions. Copeland not only voted against right to work, But resigned his House whip position when the speaker reshuffled the leadership based on RINOism. Representative Copeland has voted consistently against two core liberty issues: Legislation pertaining to self-defense and firearms and voted against the passage of HB 474, commonly known as the “Right-to-Work Bill. Like that of his RINO Counterparts, Representative Copeland is also an enthusiastic advocate of police-statism is ranked by the New Hampshire House Republican Alliance with a score of 67%.
Reading Steve MacDonald’s entry, “You Can’t Be A Republican And Vote Against Right To Work“…caused me to once again step back and reevaluate the public debate about Right-to-Work. I opened House Bill 474 and carefully read it again…and again…I could find no provision within the Legislation that abolished Unions. I read it yet again…. I could find no provision within the Bill that restricted, outlawed or otherwise “busted” Unions. Not one.
Several reasons brought me to revisit this. First, there seem to be many Republicans who fancy themselves “liberty-minded conservatives yet they support statutory Union oppression; Second, The strident opposition, bad behavior, swearing and threatening by Police and Fire over this bill has created a loss of confidence and apprehension within the communities they serve. Finally, What Unions say about this bill is absolute nonsense and nothing more than bold-faced lies.
    “Remember that a government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take away everything you have.” ~Barry Goldwater The RINO of the week is seven-term House Representative James P. Pilliod, Belknap District 5. Rep. Pilliod’s voting record presents us with yet another rank statist consistently supporting government over the … Read more
The House voted today to override the Governors’ veto of Senate Bill 88 on the heels of the Senate voting to override last week. The vote was 251 to 111. It should be important to note that the Governor and his faithful went into overdrive to build support for sustaining the veto, to include a walking tour of Lincoln street area of Manchester in the vicinity of Hayward and Somerville Streets. It was there where Attorney General stated, “And we will be providing drug dealers and street gangsters with a new right to respond using more violence in public places…”
At the Governor’s press conference the morning before the house leaders’ press conference, Chief Robert Wharem, President of the New Hampshire Association of Chiefs of Police, told WMUR, “Senate Bill 88 is one of the most dangerous bills we’ve had come before us in our time…” while he had roughly a dozen other police chiefs gathered around him, seeming to imply he speaks for all New Hampshire Chiefs. The difference here is many likely opted to stay home and not politicize this bill, remaining within the confines of their sworn oaths.
At the end of the day, none of their Charlatanry, pandering or demagoguing held any political water, resulting in the veto override which now means the bill is law. Now SB 88 is law. The streets will not run red with blood and responsible, law-abiding citizens will not be prosecuted for lawfully defending themselves against violent attacks.
But to be expected, whenever there is a gun crime it will be certain that the critics of the bill will point to this law as a manifestation of that crime, ignoring the fact that criminals with guns will still commit crimes. They did so before this law and will continue to do so even after this law.
This law protects law-abiding citizens, not Criminals. On the coattails of Senate Bill 88’s passage we will likely hear be hearing next from the Brady Bunch about the enormous social costs of gun violence. Guy Smith, Author of Gun Facts, has undertaken a most complete compilation of data. Here are just a few examples:
Fact: Because guns are used an estimated 2.5 million times per year to prevent crimes, the cost savings in personal losses, police work, and court and prison expenses vastly outweighs the cost of criminal gun violence and gun accidents. The net savings, under a worst-case scenario, is about $3.5 billion a year.257
Freshman NH State Rep JR. Hoell emailed me a list of folks that had scored well in a combination of ratings that are done of reps in the NH House, primarily the House Republican Alliance and the NH Liberty Alliance:
| House | |||||
| Republican | Attendance | Liberty | |||
| Alliance | (HRA based) | Alliance | Total Score | ||
| Dan McGuire | Epsom | 100 | 98 | 91 | 289 |
| Andrew Manuse | Derry | 99 | 100 | 90 | 289 |
| Brian Seaworth | Pembroke | 96 | 100 | 95 | 291 |
| Jonathan Maltz | Hudson | 97 | 100 | 91 | 288 |
| Paul Brown | Raymond | 93 | 99 | 95 | 287 |
| Lucien Vita | Middleton | 99 | 98 | 90 | 287 |
| Spec Bowers | Georges Mills | 98 | 99 | 89 | 286 |
| Cam DeJong | Manchester | 96 | 99 | 90 | 285 |
| Steve Vaillancourt | Manchester | 90 | 100 | 94 | 284 |
| Richard Okerman | Windham | 98 | 97 | 89 | 284 |
| Laura Jones | Rochester | 94 | 99 | 91 | 284 |
| Kyle Jones | Rochester | 95 | 95 | 92 | 282 |
| Susan DeLemus | Rochester | 100 | 95 | 88 | 283 |
| Seth Cohn | Canterbury | 91 | 97 | 95 | 283 |
| Cliff Newton | Rochester | 99 | 97 | 87 | 283 |
| Mark Warden | Goffstown | 95 | 90 | 97 | 282 |
His observation was that of these 16 folks, 14 of them were part of the New Republican Freshman class that were elected by campaigning on Principle and then voting on Principle, rather than on merely sticking an "R" next to their names (are you listening, Kevin Janvrin?).
Turns out that Manchester and NH House Rep. Steve Vaillancourt had put this scoring system in place. Head on over to NH Insider to see how some of the "names" (e.g., DJ Bettencourt, Pam Tucker, Gene Chandler) did.
You know, I should do the same ranking for my Belknap County Reps…
And Steve had done a listing here.
Update: Belknap County Reps after the jump:
“There is hardly a political question in the United States which does not sooner or later turn into a judicial one.” ~Alexis de Tocqueville The Senate has now voted to override the Governor’s veto of Senate Bill 88. The Bill next will come to the full house for concurrence, allowing “Stand your Ground” to become … Read more
    “Remember that a government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take away everything you have.” ~Barry Goldwater This Week’s RINO of the Week is Representative-elect Kevin Janvrin of Seabrook, Rockingham District 14. Janvrin was not even on the radar screen until he spoke to WMUR’s James Pindell, … Read more
“Remember that a government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take away everything you have.” ~Barry Goldwater The RINO of the week is two-term Belknap District 5 House Representative Peter Bolster. Representative Bolster could be more aptly portrayed as a “soft” RINO, but still another Republican who ascribes … Read more
“Remember that a government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take away everything you have.” ~Barry Goldwater No RINO Report will be featured this week in observance and honor of the Sixth Annual Live Free Or Die Rally in Jaffrey, NH, beginning Friday August 26 and ending Sunday, … Read more
“Remember that a government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take away everything you have.” ~Barry Goldwater
A common theme heard from whiney liberals these days is that conservatives, tea-party patriots and some Republicans take absolute positions on issues and are unwilling to compromise, “for the good of the people.” There are four fundamental flaws in that logic.
First, how liberals define compromise. In final analysis, compromise means abandoning ones principles and going along with liberals, perhaps watering down some measure that renders the original principle sought after inoperable.
Second, the logic implies that the maker of the statement (the liberal) is irrefutably correct. The liberal implies all facts are on his or her side.
Third, liberals just love those who go along because that means the opposition is malleable. The opposition has weak links in their unity and party platform.
Finally, it implies a tacit acknowledgement by the “compromiser” that perhaps the liberal, “is correct” in his or her logic.
There is nothing wrong with spirited and sometimes bitter partisanship. The citizens governed should have clear unambiguous choices. Voting for most Republicans means one favors less government intrusion, reasonable and lower taxes, whereby the majority is not paying for the select few to live off the many. One favors a government that is both responsible socially, and looks to people, not government as a first resort to solve problems.
The RINO REPORT has featured those Republicans in Name Only who have distinguished themselves as the harlots of the left. Those who run on principles claiming to be an, “independent voice” in Concord without ever being held accountable to say, what that really means. Those folks could easily be on a Leftist-progressive ticket and fellow Republicans would never really know the difference, mush less miss them.
As the RINO report moves forward, ROTW now segues into a considerably more ambiguous analysis. For example, This weeks RINO REPORT took a hard look at Rep. Lawrence B. “KOKO” Perkins, Rockingham 14 to be featured. When one drills down into his voting record, however, it is easy to see that Perkins voted predominantly with Conservatives on Guns, Liberty and Families. While he took a walk on Right to work and voted for spending measures that favor Unions over regular working class folks, being a firefighter gave us no illusions about what he would or would not support. Morover, he gave the PFFNH cover. Their campaign contributions to Perkins allows Davind Lang and his ilk to say they are, “non-partisan” when in fact, they overwhelmingly support Democrats. And that is… when he showed up. While he might have voted on issues important to me, the fact is he still voted for Unions. Does it make him a RINO? Readers must judge that for themselves.
“Remember that a government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take away everything you have.” ~Barry Goldwater THE RINO OF THE WEEK is four term House Representative William J. Remick. Representative Remick’s voting record reveals a demonstrated pursuit of the moderate label by voting with his liberal pals … Read more
When one reads the Shrill Kathy’s latest diatribe in the Union Leader, there is one theme that plays like a broken record: Tax, Tax, Tax…Spend, Spend, Spend. The Shrill Kathy complains, “a 10-cent cut in the cigarette tax, did not change prices for smokers because the tobacco companies raised their prices…” I think I missed something because the former argument of the day was that the tobacco tax reduction would increase youth smoking. So, now here’s Kathy Sullivan arguing the ill merits of a tax typically inflicted upon Granite Staters who earn the least….a tax on the poor…which of many, smoke.
Next, the Shrill Kathy complains that, “House budget writers ignored every signal that the federal government was about to impose a $35 million penalty for Medicaid errors dating back to the Benson administration…” adding that, “Their irresponsibility has caused a gaping hole in their ballyhooed ‘balanced budget’.” How conveniently she ignores the fact that her beloved Democratic party, led by Teri “Billion-dollar deficit” Norelli had two full terms to reconcile and fix this issue, but did not do so. Instead, they created more layers of government, increased over one-hundred fees and taxes and put into motion record unsustainable budgets, creating the fiscal mess this state now faces.
The Shrill Kathy whines, “New Hampshire hospitals are laying off hundreds of employees because O’Brien and his Republican colleagues took away federal money that had paid hospital costs for the poor…” Yet it hard to ignore the countless millions of construction dollars hospitals are using to competitively outspend one-another in an unquenchable drive to be better than the next facility. Now that the Democrats have created yet another constituency cash cow that becomes as angry as any other when bloated coffers are not being filled, The dependable Shrill Kathy is all too willing to step into the limelight and pimp their cash loss off onto the poor. Isn’t it about time we stop the demagoguing and manipulation of the less fortunate? Let’s be honest here; You don’t really care about poor people, Kathy.
Mayor Gatsas is no different than any other cash cow constituent, be it Republican or Democrat. Every entity that gets some form of funding for something from the state or federal government cries, cut theirs…but NOT MINE! Cuts made to the at-risk juvenile program, shows no indication of any highly-paid hacks taking any pay cuts or losing their jobs. Nope! self-preservation trumps program delivery.