Articles tagged as

Spending

Norelli Tries To Feed You The Blue Pill (again)

Democrats latest rallying cry is that we can’t cut the state budget if it means downshifting costs on the towns.  But they didn’t seem to care too much about all the downshifting when they were doing it. 

But that is what you get when you let left wing clowns run your state.  Larsen/Norelli/Suckley Investment Advisers Inc, the Fat Cat Executives of the Tax and Spend Democrat Party of New Hampshire, gave the state government a one billion dollar bonus ($1,000,000,000.00) on the backs of the towns and the taxpayers during a job shedding, wage declining recession.

And we are now to believe this concerns them?  The only thing that concerns the Democrats is if and how they can blame someone else for their destruction, and find a way back into power so that the lefts only solution to a billion dollar deficit can be enacted as swiftly as possible.

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The One-Trick Tax-And-Spend Donkey By Any Other Name…

No Good Dancing DonkeyThe New Hampshire democrats have a name for their new 501(c)(4) non-profit.  It’s the July Fourth Forum. What, “We just lost The Whole Damn State” was already taken?

As with most things named by democrats it presents a notion diametrically opposite its true intention.  We see this same naming tactic in their legislation  (at least in DC).  Their bills always have the words American, Freedom, Rights, Choice, or Affordable in the name, usually including two or more at any given time.  This is meant to serves as a warning to anyone who dares gaze upon the hundreds of thousands of words that follow the name of their bill (not that they want anyone to actually read them).   If allowed to become law it will hurt Americans, deny freedoms, infringe rights, cost a fortune and leave you with whatever choice the government has decided is best for you and few if any other.

So the only word in any name of any Democrat bill that has any hope of being remotely accurate must be the word “Act.”  As in, that American-Freedom-Rights-and choice-stuff  is all just an act.

Which brings us back to Kathy Sullivan’s ‘”July Fourth Forum.” 

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DON’T RAISE THE DEBT CEILING

While it is true that the political/government/ruling classes will attempt to cause as much pain and dislocation to society as possible (they’ll be looking for political gains, as always), America can actually handle a debt freeze pretty easily. Here’s why, and how, from RedState.com: Might Someone Please Educate Fox News and the Rest of the Media? … Read more

Facebook Doodlings – How WOULD you cut Federal spending?

Back in November, my friend Jim started a bit of a discussion on FB with this video that explains how big government ultimately destroys a nation’s prosperity.  Idiots guide to public sector that produces no wealth

Another friend, Scott, issued a challenge:

There’s certainly no doubt that republicans and democrats alike (or conservatives and liberals alike, if you prefer) have built an enormous, expensive and unwieldy government over the past 50 or more years; or that, as a county, we’ve been …living beyond our means (or at least beyond what we’ve been willing to pay for) for at least the past 30 years. It’s time to pay up, America.

Now the question is what to cut and I look forward to that debate. Waste, fraud and abuse is the popular refrain but, even if we eliminate that (which would amaze me), the effect will be negligible. 

What substantial, popular programs will we eliminate?

<insert cricket chirps>  and then he adds, after some time:           

It seems the surest way to stifle a conversation about overgrown government is to try & bring it around to specifics.  C’mon, folks. No ideas?

Of COURSE I rise to the bait!

OK, I’m game! Ground rules – it enhances individual freedoms from the current structure, decentralizes control back to more local control, and enhances accountability.

Why shouldn’t Education be more localized…

 

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A Modest (Budget Cutting) Proposal

Public Sector Unions SuckThere are plenty of towns like mine trying to figure out where they can cut costs.  But every conversation seems to end at cutting education or safety services.  While I find it hard to believe that there is nothing else in a budget you can trim, I think I have come up with a reasonable compromise (if not just for the sake of our own rhetorical amusement) that can cut at least a little bit of money from the budget without affecting staffing or resources.

Any teacher, support staff, officer, firefighter or public employee who currently pays union dues will have the total amount of dues paid calculated and that amount removed from their respective department budgets (aka:paychecks).  This will do the one thing no one ever seems willing to do; include the unions in the burden of cost cutting.

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Can we be saved? Or is it too late?

Given the REAL state of the union (see below), can our nation be saved? MAYBE, says John Stossel. Probably NOT, says Prof. Walter Williams. Impossible, says the New York Times (which hates America anyway), as noted by Reason magazine’s Jacob Sullum…but then there’s a WILD CARD. There’s Freshman Senator Rand Paul….  

Mark Fernald as “Hugh Jihass”

Does Democrat Mark Fernald do the letters to the editor follow up over at Fosters Daily Democrat or is he just complicit?  Amidst a series of letters posted on January 14th at Fosters.com is a smarmy bit of left wing drool authored by one Hugh Jidette.  Fernald liked the letter so much that he shared it on his email distribution list saying…

Here’s an excellent letter from Foster’s Daily Democrat.  I encourage all to write their own letters to expose what the right wing is up to.

Mark Fernald

Forget what the right wing has been up to, what has Fosters and Mark Fernald been up to? 

Hugh Jidette is a false name.  Huge Jidette (Huge Debt) appears as a fake Presidential Candidate to deliver awareness ads about out of control spending and the risks of borrowing on the scale the democrats embraced.  Hugh was all about borrowing money.  But Some on the left spun that and sold it to their peeps as proof that the Republicans were lying about taxes and using the campaign to justify slashing the deficit to punish hard working civil servants.  That exact same theme has found its way here in the letter published in Fosters, by a Hugh Jidette from Rochester, but with a local spin. The national left wing meme viewed through a granite state filter.

But we have no way of knowing if it was written by Fernald himself, Kathy Sullivan, Ray Buckley, The Center for American Progress, ‘Norris Cotton’ over at Red Hampshire, or by Fosters Editorial Staff.  

One thing we do know is that the person vetting letters over at Fosters should change their name to Hugh Jihass, and that by forwarding it as if it were written by an actual local resident, Fernald looks like a Hugh Jihass as well.

 

Once you have finished giggling, and before some democrat named Huge Jidette from Rochester comes forward to take credit, the text of Fernald’s Email is available on the jump, followed by an example of some original video put out in the debt awareness campaign.

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Michele Bachmann leads the charge!

"I have launched a petition drive calling for Members to vote no on raising the debt ceiling. And as a result of your hard work, we’ve collected nearly 100,000 signatures for our Don’t Raise the Debt Ceiling petition drive." I signed it. Feel free to join the fun!

A request from Frank Guinta (R-NH) on the Debt Ceiling

We sent him to cut spending, cut the size of Government, and cut its intrusiveness as well.  Already, Frank and his staff are putting things into place to try to keep his promise: to be the peoples’ Representative. 

He completed one item – he voted to repeal the deficit inducing / Government Growing / Liberty killing Obamacare:

“I repeatedly told the people of New Hampshire last fall that I would vote against this misguided piece of legislation, and today I delivered on it…It exceeds the limits of the Constitution, places unfair and unrealistic burdens on small business owners, inserts the government into your relationship with your family doctor, and sinks Washington even deeper into debt.”

An associated item that Obamacare does is accelerates the growth of the Debt Ceiling (remember, it was sold on 10 years of revenue but only 6 years of spending – TILT!).  We are now over $14 Trillion in debt and the Obama Administration is on track to add another $1.3 Trillion this year – 3 years of Trillion+ dollar deficits!  The problem is that Obama is framing this as an all or nothing venture – either we keep spending at that rate or the Government shuts down.

Nonsense – they could do what my family does or when I ran a small biz when money got tight – line up the bills, schedule them as needed, pay those on time, and cut the rest.  Certainly, Obama could do the same thing; just ask yourself -> when it snows in DC, why are all non-essential US Govt workers told to stay home – and then DC looks like a ghost town?  If they are non-essential then, why have them the rest of the time?  If the jobs they do are not absolutely necessary (want, not need), isn’t that a sign that Govt is doing too much with too many at too high of a cost?

In this case, Frank is looking input:

  • Vote a higher debt ceiling?
  • Shut it all down?
  • A better answer?

Frank and his staff have reached out to GraniteGrok and asked us to spread the word – he wants to know what you think and how YOU would handle the problem in a typical NH common sense way.  We’ve asked, however, that if you do send in your ideas and suggestions, that he list them so you can see yours and your fellow NH citizens’ ideas.  You can be sure that the ‘Grok will be doing the same!

The request:

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The Debt Ceiling Vote: STOP THE MADNESS NOW!

There’s a heated discussion going on all over America. It’s about the upcoming vote on whether to "raise the debt ceiling" so that Congress and the political/government/ruling classes can continue spending money we don’t have…WE DON’T HAVE IT! But…there are always "excuses" to continue DOING THE WRONG THING. NH Republican Reps. Charlie Bass and Frank Guinta will show who they are, what they are, what they believe in, and what they don’t believe in, with their votes on this issue.

And let there be no doubt about it: There can be only one decent, honorable, intelligent way to vote….

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“…it was like a spaghetti bowl…”

No, was not at TMEW’s most favorite restaurant (Olive Garden) where that spaghetti bowl appears, it is from here: How much federal money, all told, does NPR receive? Lamborn doesn’t know. "The funding is so convoluted and opaque," he says. "We asked the Congressional Research Service to look at the books, and a senior analyst … Read more

Budget Committee season comes to a close – tonite

One more official night for the Budget season….Public Hearing on the School Board budget was Tuesday and the Town Budget one is tonight.  Then my elected responsibility is done for the year.  At the last regular meeting, I sorta tied things up for a bunch of people who might have thought it was going to … Read more

Hey, it isn’t costing US anything…

Three Shell MonteThis is the vast "Three Shell Monty" played at the governmental level.  You send me your taxpayers money for my project, and I’ll send you my taxpayers tax monies for your projects.  We’ll hide it using other governmental agencies, but we politicians (wink, wink) have set the rules – just watch our hands.   And we’ll sell this game as "Free Money" – hey, it doesn’t cost US anything, right?

Once again, we run into the case that when the locals either don’t have the money or are unwilling to ask their taxpayers for more to pay for what they want, they go for the "free money".  From yesterday’s Laconia Daily Sun (P. 9):

Pulling together the funds to buy Colonial is going to be complicated

In the next town over, Laconia, there is an old building that houses what used to be an old style stage theater that, now that its run as a converted "multiplex" is over, has now sat vacant for a number of years.  Simply, no entrepreneurs wanted to buy it for any purpose.  Yet, there are those in town that just want to see it restored to its former magnificence and start doing plays and such.  However, I do think that the sub-head says it all:

Formation of non-profit corporation seen as needed because for profit business is not going to step forward

Ya think?  If folks, over the years, are not willing to ante up their own personal money (most people, even the uber-rich, are loathe to just throw their money away) for a project, it generally means it is a loosing proposition.  Loosely put, if there is no profit, there is no need there for which people are willing to spend (unless it is flat out given to him).  Yet, there are those that still want to City to buy it?

“Where do we get the $1.4-million to buy it?” asked City Councilor Bob Hamel (Ward 5). “It’s not coming from the city.”

No one questioned Hamel’s presumption that the city would not contribute to the cost of purchasing the property.

So what does it say when even the City Fathers won’t ante up?  In short form,

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What Would We Do Without Studies Like These?

Riding in on the heels of the UNH/Hirshberg cow fart research we have other news from the research front of which is just begging to be made fun.

Someone has discovered that oral sex is a gateway drug to intercourse among teenagers. A three-year study determined that teens who have oral sex are more likely to have intercourse than teens who do not. And if you ask the Baptists they will tell you that intercourse leads to dancing, or was that the other way around?

“I see most of the health policies out there and guidelines for preventive services talking about sex generally, but they do not specify oral sex. That is an important distinction because teens don’t consider oral sex to be sex, and many are not aware of the risks involved,” Halpern-Felsher said.

So oral sex leads to intercourse and intercourse leads to unwanted pregnancy.  Who is surprised?  The experts, of course.

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Why I Need Your Tax Dollars, by Gary Hirshberg

Gary Hirshberg CE-Yo of Stonyfield Farms wants you to know what he thinks about a recent taxpayer investment in organic farming. His editorial in this mornings Union Leader goes on at great length extolling the virtues and benefits of organic farming. It will create jobs, better food, help grow the organic farms footprint and provide fresh local dairy products.
He never mentions that his fresh local dairy farm is owned by a huge multinational French conglomerate of which he is a prominent international player. (Big Dairy!)

Data Point – the 111th Congress liked to spend money – a LOT of money!!!

From CNS News: 111th Congress, Democrat controlled, has accumulated more new debt–$3.22 trillion than the first 100 Congresses combined 111th Congress, Democrat controlled, has given each American $10,429.64 in new debt. Each American is now in debt to the tune of $44,886.57 for the total national debt of $13.859 trillion. 111th Congress, Democrat controlled, has … Read more

Breaking The Addiction To Government

Image: thesassyminx.comThe December New Hampshire labor report, period ending October 2010, is not all that remarkable.  Coos County is still suffering while overall the state is hanging in at 5.4%.  This number is still reflective of issues with the size of the labor force versus mid 2009 numbers.  We have to watch that as we head through the November and December reports into January, where holiday hiring will add to the labor force, and then most likley drop off.

What may have been the most interesting aspect of the new report however, was this paragraph from the first page.

In New Hampshire private industry GDP growth was below that of government. The current dollar change in private industry between 2008 and 2009 was almost non-existent. less than a $1 million dollar difference.  When adjusted for inflation private GDP saw a 1.5% percent decrease.  Government however (this is New Hampshire State Government) saw a 4.6% increase in current dollars.

This is how Democrat-controlled states feign growth. 

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For Quite Some Time

For quite some time more than a few of us out here in the private sector have been paying into our own retirement plans–if we can–for years.  After the Housing bubble burst many of us began reducing the amount we contributed as a lousy economy consumed opportunities, wage growth and jobs–our neighbors jobs or even our own. 

Companies, small businesses in particular, that were once able to provide some benefits and 401K matching dollars shifted gears, re-directing that revenue (if they had it) to keeping the business afloat so they could pay enough remaining core employees to keep the company "a company"–with desks, paperclips, sticky-notes, and a space to keep them in.  We paid for our own retirement plans, owners and managers paid for theirs, took pay cuts, employees took pay cuts, millions accepted reduced hours, part time status, or were overcome by the recession and had to be let go.

At the same time various levels of government were handing out (or handed) billions and billions of dollars that did not exist, to prop up the public sector unions.  These unions, collective bargaining groups (emphasis on collective) were the primary benefactors of the past two years accumulation of debt.  Government rules favored them in opposition to all else and in contradiction to common sense, not just for cash handouts but the hand out of sparse jobs as well.  Even at the local level, the public sectors union handlers, who are really nothing more than fat cat capitalists selling shares in human flesh for a profit, in the from of a dues check each pay period, have fought against the tide to raise union salaries, benefits, and keep or create more jobs that must be paid for by the people going the opposite direction.

So the public sector unions, operating as nothing more than a private business, whose goal is to grow revenue, continued to do just that at taxpayers expense, all the while whining about private sector greed and malfeasance. We need to call them out for this. 

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