DO THE DEMOCRATS SUPPORT O’BRIEN???

There is growing rumors that the Democratic leadership doesn’t want to see the bully out of the house. It is hard to believe; but, if this is true then there is a case to be made that the Democratic leadership is putting politics above people; that is no great surprise they play politics the same as the Republicans do.

The theory is that keeping O’Brien in office will help the Democrats win seats; in other words O’Brien is being used as a democratic recruiting tool, unfortunately it is working.

Talking to statewide Republicans, people who follow politics (and vote), claim O’Brien is a dirty word around the state. They are also afraid that he is bringing down the Republican Party in NH. Some of the political hoity toities do not want to admit it; but, it appears to becoming more recognizable in political circles. The sad thing is, many saw this coming and just kept drinking the cool aid admired the emperor’s clothes.

THE FIGHT IS ON!!!

I was reading an article today about the free stators fighting with the Occupy NH group and Occupy NH does want anything to do with them. The one thing that the free stators are good at is infiltrating legitimate boards and commissions then trying to move up to state politics like the legislature. It looks like Occupy NH nipped them in the bud. We can see that on the local levels, budget committees, planning boards, ZBA boards and gun clubs. It looks like the word is getting out at how destructive the free stators can be to the legitimate political agenda of a state and especially NH, we have to keep in mind their purpose of coming to NH is to take over and turn us into their idea of a no government utopian state.

WHAT IS UP IN THE LEGISLATURE???

Rumors will be rumors and the latest are very interesting. As if Republican State Party Chairman Wayne McDonald doesn’t have enough head aches with the bully bringing down the party, new rumors are rising. The biggest is that there is a small group of House Republicans talking about giving the Democrats a number of committee chairmanships if the Democrats are in the minority and are willing to support a, yet unannounced, Republican speaker candidate. They are hoping that O’Brien wins his local race for state rep and runs for speaker. If O’Brien is in the house and runs for speaker again the Democrats have a bargaining chip, if he loses then they don’t.

No matter what party was in charge of the house, neither party has given up chairmanships in the past while the logistics is mind boggling. If anyone does this will it mean we invite the Democrats to our majority leadership meetings?

My advice to the Democratic House Leadership is do not do this it will only hurt the house and an argument can be made that you do not care about good responsible government only trying to get back the power and control that the voters took away from you in the last election.

POLITICS CAN BE LIKE FOOTBALL!!!

There is no question politics in NH is a contact sport. Complete with varying teams that are mentally handicapped to physically handicapped. It just depends on which team you want to play on.

For example, we have two republicans running for governor, neither one seems to be all that appealing to the voters. Ovide has name recognition for losing all of his campaigns while Smith is known for running Cornerstone Policy Research, using this organization to attack those Republicans that disagreed with his philosophy; it is rumored that Smith is heavily supported by former governor Craig Benson.

On the Democrats side we have Maggie from PEA and then Jackie Cilley who got her start in a third floor tenement with mill worker parents in Berlin, NH. The choices are clear and defined if you’re a democrat.

If you are one of the thousands of NH Republicans who are also union members the choices are even clearer, both Republicans have no use of us and seem to be supporting Bill O’Brien who union Republicans have no use for. My big question is how do you get elected when you start out with, up to a 300,000 vote deficit when you get done counting family and friends? I guess you have to ask New Gingrich, after getting endorsed by O’Brien saw his poll numbers cut in half in NH. Newt didn’t want to listen either.

As a life long Republican I have a philosophy that we can beat the democrats; but only after fighting the republicans.

On a national level we have Obama and Romney. Again we have a decision, should we stay home on Election Day or hold our nose? Obama will not show the public his college records and Romney will not show all of his income tax returns. These two are like drinking warm beer.

Mike McCarthy, a super state rep and close friend, told me the republicans are like a non winning football team who can’t win because they keep tackling their own players; how true how very true.

RICK OLSON: SOCIAL SCIENTIST OR POLITICAL PERVERT?

We often think that pervert is used to describe weird sexual things or people so inclined. What we too often miss is how certain people with blatant insecurities lie and twist the truth and facts to try to bully other people into either doing or not doing something. In my opinion Olson is a political pervert and needs to do some fact checking when he makes false claims.

What the Republican (Rhino) Liberty Caucus is doing is perverting the Republican message that Republicans have used in NH since I got into politics in 1972. They do articles claiming THEY are the only true Republicans in the state. No they are either Free Staters or Free State supporters who have done a good job at destroying the Republican Party in NH with their crazy anarchistic ideas of dismantling government.

If you don’t agree with them they’ll attack you for not being a true Republican, a Republican in name only (rhino). It would be nice if they would just go back to where they came from.

NH Republicans are fiscally conservative, socially split on some of the issues dealing with abortion, gay marriage and those issues that belong to the individuals. We understand that there is a need for government, they don’t. They want some kind of Free State libertarian society without rules. They don’t need police, fire fighters or teachers. Real Republicans understand the need for what we have; we just need to limit its growth.

In my opinion Richard Olson fancies himself as some kind of political figure that uses the Granite Grok or Granite Crock as I call it to intimidate anyone who disagrees with him or the cult following that makes up the Liberty Caucus.

TYRANNY CAN ONLY BE REPLACED WITH KINDNESS!!!

In another unbelievable move of extremely poor behavior the speaker had a press conference today in his office at the State House and allowed all of the Concord Press Corps except Ann Marie Timmons from the Concord Monitor.  I guess the Concord Monitor does not buy into the speaker’s tyrannical smoke and mirror style of politics.

 This asinine and immature act of stupidity was caught on camera when Shannon Shutts Bettencourt allowed everyone else in but the Concord Monitor.  Bully and his leadership team are acting like little kids who refuse to invite other kids to their birthday party so they can hurt their feelings.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7qon2z_W34&feature=youtu.be

If anyone knows Ann Marie Timmons who is a political reporter for the Concord Monitor, she is like the Mary Poppins of the press corps, just a kind, super fine person and to be treated this way in public is an absolute disgrace to the O’Brien speakers office and an embarrassment to the hard working State Reps and staff who work at the state house.

I think we just keep track of this type of behavior and let the voters decide in the upcoming elections.

On behalf of those State Reps who are professional and caring, I want to apologize to Ms. Timmons for this cruel and abusive behavior on the part of the speaker’s office and staff.

EXETER TOWN HALL HEP C MEETING!!!

On Tuesday June 26th we had an Exeter Town Hall Hep C meeting (where else) at the Exeter Town Hall. Even with the bicycle race and parking issues, I stopped counting at 120 people in attendance.



We had Doctor Paolini a former heart surgeon and also an attorney who discussed legal rights and expectations. We had Doctor Chung in charge of the liver transplant division of MA General. We had Greta Cocco an insurance broker who discussed health insurance questions for those with pre-existing conditions and we had a room full of people with many questions.



You could feel the tension and anxiety from the people with Hep C, rightfully so; but, by the end of the meeting and a superior presentation from Doctor Chung and Doctor Paolini it was obvious people started to realize they can make it through this and everyone on the panel would be available to help them and answer question or help with any referrals they may need.



Dr. Chung talked about the new treatment regimens which are light years ahead of when I had Hep B in 1976. People left knowing they weren’t alone in this sad issue and there was life after Hep C.

WHERE DOES ONE BEGIN???

WHERE DOES ONE BEGIN???     

I guess we should start with the Hep C outbreak at the Exeter Hospital.  The rumors are running wild as to how it was caused, who caused it and how many people are infected.  Not helping seems to be the conflicting information coming out of our State Public Health Department.

First they thought it was equipment then they claim to have a suspect medical provider that was stealing drugs and injecting them into themselves then the patients or swapping syringes that the person used.  One of the reasons the health department knows this is how it happened is because this is what is going on around the country.  The only way the AG’s Office will get a conviction is if someone saw the medical provider do any of this or they have a confession.  Merely having a medical provider with Hep C is not going to send that person to the block.  There are a number of rumors about how this disease was spread; but, from the last meeting held at the High School with public health didn’t reveal  a lot of new information

I had a heart procedure done at the Exeter Lab, a number of years ago and I can say without qualification that Dr. Tom Wharton is one of the finest surgeons you’ll find; I had and have the utmost confidence in his ability and procedures.

It is frustrating when it seems there is more misinformation than information with an awful lot unanswered questions.

I had a lawyer tell me that each one of these medical malpractice claims is worth about 1-2 million $’s each.  When you think this all through to the end, health insurance=high risk pool, about 150% of your premium to increase; life insurance probably not.  This is not a good way to go through life.  Should they have a person who injected people with hep c, many years in jail would be fitting.

THE RACE IS ON!!!

Exeter now has four state rep seats with eight people running for them, four republicans and four dems.  I look at the candidates of both parties and see the same attitudes that have recently contaminated the state house.  When the democrats were in charge they blindly followed their leadership over a cliff and got thrown out on a monumental scale.  No matter what they say during the campaign the democrats want the power back with a big majority so they don’t have to deal with the republicans while the republicans want to keep power and not deal with the democrats.  After awhile the faces all start to look alike.

Matt and I are going to stick to our basic independent, “you before politics”, approach.  Working with constituents to resolve their problems is what we enjoy most, not abortion battles, school squabbling about who gets what money and or fighting with a leadership group that can’t tell the truth.  It is all about you, not us.

THE WEEK THAT WAS!!!

AT LEAST YOU CAN’T CALL the State House boring.  The Bettencourt fiasco kept everything in the news with all of its little twists and turns and it is too long and complex to try to explain in a blog posting; but, if you run a Google check it should all come up.

This past Weds. Session was more like a wake than a pre ending to the legislative session.  House leadership was, in my opinion, trying to run for cover not only on the Bettencourt; but, also who authorized Bob Mead to collect mileage for driving around the state trying to get republicans to run for state rep.  I think we all know who authorized it; but, I don’t think it will ever see the light of day.

The Seacoast Newspapers did an editorial board with the Speaker and Bettencourt and concluded they either lied or told half truths.  In fact it was probably one of the most negative editorials I have ever read; but, very accurate.  It was right after that the law school scandal broke with Bettencourt.

The political sign up period is a week away and I still haven’t seen anything positive being said about Republicans; unless it is we cut the budget and spending.  I think the voters know that republicans do that; but, what is problematic is what about our ethics and character?

This next election is going to be about keeping spending down (at least within our revenue estimates), truthfulness, character, integrity and moral fiber.  We have to bring civility and integrity back into the state house and the political discussions; there are times you can cut the tension in Concord with a knife.

I’m a firm believer that talking is always more fun than fighting and we are not always doing a lot of talking.  The house seems to run on orders instead of discussions; everyone in the house has the right to contribute to the process and by leaving people out is a huge disservice to them and their constituents who have a right to be heard and represented.

I think this is all going to change in the next election; most of the freshmen will be gone as well as others who have shown such a blind loyalty to the speaker.  I want to see people who can think, analyze and use common sense to come to a conclusion, not people who say, “What does leadership want?”  We don’t need PHDs in Concord just people who will listen and have common sense.

I’m a Republican (independent one at that) and want to see how the democrats are going to attack us in the next election.  There can be a case made that because of how the democrats ran the house when they had the majority is why they were thrown out and got us into the current mess. 

We need to think outside the box for lowering insurance costs (we will never curb their greed) but can come up with better ways of delivery.  We need to balance our budget cuts in education to what we want to accomplish in the long run and need to have the teachers involved in helping to keep costs down; without their input the budget cuts will be forced on them and that is not good.  We need to totally revamp our consumer protection laws, special interests have been attacking them for years and we need to dig in and fight back to protect our constituents.  If we can focus on just a handful of issues we can get more done with the right leadership.  There is nothing that we can’t do if we all work together.