The race for Speaker of the House is almost concluded, and it was in many ways an even more hotly contested and more comprehensive political struggle than the general election battle against the Democrats. So, to wrap it up, I want to tell about a personal conversation I had with Bill O’Brien not too long ago. And I don’t think (I hope, at least) that he would see this as betraying a confidence. After all, it shows the essence of the man, and the difference between a New Republican and the GOP of yesterday….
Articles tagged as
Speaker of the House
Bill O’Brien: This is the way it is, and what you see is what you get. Damn this guy is good.
by Tim Condon
Here’s a statement put out by Speaker of the House candidate Bill O’Brien today: As with all Republicans who will be sworn in as state representatives for the upcoming session, I ran to promote the principles of our party as providing the foundation for the legislative agenda for the upcoming session. As I hope is the case … Read more
This Week’s GrokTALK 11-13-2010
A mixture of politics, culture, current events, and well, politics, it is an Internet Radio show streaming live audio and video directly from GraniteGrok. Using a solidly Conservative and Rational Libertarian lens, we’ll take on almost any topic and have notables from the news, political figures, authors, and other opinionated folks for your edification and amusement.
Why Bill O’Brien for Speaker: Reason #3
by Tim Condon
As promised, I now turn to the third reason—actually a "bundle of reasons"—why the new Speaker of the New Hampshire House of Representatives should be Bill O’Brien.
But first, I must state that it is not my intent to launch a personal attack against Gene Chandler. He was the last "real" Republican Speaker of the House in 2003 and 2004, and is now running for that position again. He led his party honorably in the past, but unfortunately not ably. In addition, he fell victim to what can only charitably be called "glaring mistakes of judgment." Because of those mistakes, he was convicted of political corruption, fined $2,000, sentenced to community service in a court of law, driven out of the race for Speaker of the House in 2004, and in 2005 nearly driven from elective office itself. The result was chaos in the Republican Party, the election of a Democrat-supported turncoat Republican to Speaker of the House in 2006, and the eventual destruction of the Republican majority in 2006.
It is not pleasant to dredge up this past political history, but it is necessary. There is an unprecedentedly large freshman class of state representatives, almost all elected as New Republicans upon their promises to fix the damage wrought upon our state over the past four years of rule by the Democrats. Most of these freshmen Republican representatives—and many other Republicans—are unaware of this history. They are also unaware that it would be extremely unwise to elect Gene Chandler to be Speaker of the House of Representatives. Or why.
Accordingly, and unfortunately, all must be explained….
BREAKING: Gene Chandler asserts he 100% Republican and 100% loyal to his party
by Tim Condon
Just a few hours ago Union Leader political columnist John DiStaso came out with an apparent clarification of the intent of Republican Speaker of the House candidate Gene Chandler, after the GraniteGrok posting below created a political firestorm among the new majority Republicans. Chandler indicated that he will not run for Speaker with Democrat support if he loses … Read more
The plot THICKENS! Is Chandler plotting with the Democrats to seize the Speakership?
by Tim Condon
In the latest twist in this fast-developing story, it turns out that Rep. Bill O’Brien, candidate for Speaker of the House, wanted to insert a new rule for GOP Caucus which will be held next week on the 18th. But the other main candidate for Speaker of the House, Gene Chandler, opposes the new rule. What is it? Read on….
Surprise! Democrats Support Chandler Over Bill O’Brien for Speaker of the House
by Tim Condon
This from BlueHampshire, a favorite NH blog of the Democratic Party that has fiscally destroyed New Hampshire over the past four years:
Speaker Of The House
Granite Grok has already endorsed Bill O’Brien for Speaker of the House, and you can see our video interview of Bill to get some idea of his priorities. But since we happen to be here at the NHGOP convention we have the opportunity to find out what the other candidates for speaker deem as priorities for the next session.
I’ve grabbed some of their literature–everyone is in the convention at the moment–to get a taste of their priorities and one in particular caught my attention–and not in the most flattering way. Susan Emerson’s hand out to the GOP delegates includes the following bullet points which I have taken to be so important to her in her quest to get the job that they have received this much prominence.
I would…like to continue establishing bipartisan relationships to work collectively on bills that will include the following.
-To provide equal opportunities for students.
-To provide access to adequate health care
-To create and promote tax relief incentives for businesses.
Given the wide range of damage done by liberals this is the best we can expect from Susan Emerson as Speaker of the House? Given her otherwise impressive voting history, this is not impressive at all.
Obama’s Big Boehner
There are very few people who still believe the House will not flip–it is mostly a matter of how many seats. But the people who will make this shift possible are not entirely enamored of Boehner who is a career politician and whom many suspect will sell them out to make deals if given the opportunity. If the latter is accurate, given the odds that the new wave of Republicans will be less inclined to make deals, Boehner is the best hope Obama has, given a bad situation, of having any leverage whatsoever with that caucus.