Miscellany Blue - New Hampshire Politics

One year ago, congressional Republicans threatened to force the government into default by refusing to raise the debt ceiling. In a letter to the editor, Herb Moyer reminds us of Congressman Frank Guinta’s complicity in this “dangerous partisan stunt” — and the lasting damage it did to the nation’s economy.

Congressman Guinta was a fan of letting us default on our bills, telling us that we could just choose which bills to pay and default on the rest; no harm done.

His recklessness was astounding. Last July, the US Chamber of Commerce warned House Republican leadership not to play brinksmanship games with raising the debt limit, saying, “Failure to increase the statutory debt limit in a timely fashion could have significant and long-lasting negative impact on the U.S. economy.” They were right.

In a crisis engineered by House Republicans, Speaker Boehner refused to increase the debt limit, and consumer confidence plummeted faster than during the economic crisis in late 2008. Businesses lost confidence and dramatically reduced hiring for the next four months. Our credit rating was downgraded, the stock market crashed, and it took a full year for confidence to recover.

All three senators voted to continue the Bush-era tax cuts to millionaires and billionaires. By opposing cuts to the military, they reveal that their preference is to balance this budget entirely on the backs of the poorest and most vulnerable among us.

— Will Hopkins, New Hampshire Peace Action, on Sen. Kelly Ayotte and two other Republican senators who participated in a Merrimack forum to publicize pending cuts in defense spending.

In February, Sen. Jeanne Shaheen publicly urged the Democratic Party to include a marriage equality plank in the 2012 party platform. “Any Democratic statement of core beliefs about the importance of families,” she said, “must include all our families, gay and straight.”

Today we learned that platform language supporting same-sex marriage and condemning the Defense of Marriage Act has been approved by party officials and is expected to go before convention delegates in September for final approval.

Shaheen praised this historic action. ”Equality and freedom are at the core of who we are as Americans,” she said, “and that means freedom for all of us, not just some of us.” 

“Our party has long been a leader on issues of justice and this reaffirms to the country that we are working on behalf of all our families, gay and straight,” Shaheen continued. “I am proud to see the Democrats take an important step in standing up for the rights of same-sex couples.”

Republicans in the House have already rejected this Speaker’s anti-gay agenda, with a majority voting against repeal last time. What is driving his anti-gay obsession? He is not representing his constituents, or the interests of the Republican Party. His fixation will weigh down the GOP heading into the elections this fall and will risk other very important items on the Republican agenda.

— Sean Owen, New Hampshire Republicans for Freedom and Equality, on state House Speaker Bill O’Brien’s vow to outlaw gay marriage if he is re-elected.

Friday, DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz criticized Mitt Romney and congressional Republicans for advocating policies that would “turn Medicare into a voucher program” and would shred the “health care safety net for seniors into tatters.”

State Republican Party chair Wayne MacDonald responded with a discredited, but oft-repeated, GOP talking point:

“Debbie talks a good game, but her rhetoric ignores reality. To help pay for ObamaCare, the Democrats cut Medicare benefits by $500 billion, a plan supported by Annie Kuster and Carol Shea-Porter. At a time when seniors face increasing costs, it’s outrageous that Democrats not only cut this important program, but they also have no plan to prevent it from going bankrupt.” [emphasis added]

It’s a lie. The Affordable Care Act does not cut Medicare benefits. Period. Trudy Lieberman, a Center for Advancing Health fellow and contributing editor to the Columbia Journalism Review, explains:

The health reform law, aka the Affordable Care Act, does call for cutting $500 billion from Medicare to help finance subsidies for the uninsured. … But the important take-away is this: the law does not cut a dime from the basic Medicare benefits seniors receive. All seniors will still get hospital benefits, coverage for physician services, lab tests, hospital outpatient care, prescription drugs, and so on….

Most of the $500 billion in cuts aim at reducing payments to health care providers—hospitals, nursing homes, home health agencies, though not doctors. And about one quarter of the cuts target Medicare Advantage Plans to reduce the amount of government overpayments insurers have gotten. … [P]olicy experts found these payments were unwarranted, wasted money, and jeopardized the finances of the Medicare trust fund that pays for hospital care. [emphasis added]

An editorial in today’s Concord Monitor urges legal action to bar implementation of New Hampshire’s voter ID requirement and calls on the next legislature to repeal the “onerous new law.”

The voter ID laws enacted by legislatures in New Hampshire and at least nine other states have nothing to do with fraud and everything to do with a Republican campaign to suppress the vote and steal elections. …

Photo identification laws unfairly discriminate against voters who are young, poor, elderly or members of a minority. … They also tend to vote Democratic. Disenfranchising them is the whole point of tough voter identification laws.

The contention that voter fraud compromises the integrity of elections is fraudulent. After the last three elections, New Hampshire’s attorney general’s office investigated every instance in which a first-time voter without an ID cast a ballot after signing an affidavit attesting to his or her identity. Not one person wasn’t who they claimed to be.

GOP state House Rep. Andrew Manuse has a message for the sneaky bureaucrats at the state Insurance Department. He’s onto you.

When the legislature prohibited the state from creating a state-based exchange for residents to evaluate and purchase health insurance, it permitted the state Insurance Department to perform regulatory functions, such as licensing and rate review, within a federally-facilitated exchange.

This week, Deputy Insurance Commissioner Alex Feldvebel met with members of the legislature’s joint Health Care Reform Oversight Committee and recommended that the state enter into a partnership with the federal government to do just that. The plan management partnership would allow the state to continue conducting regulatory functions that have traditionally not been the purview of the federal government, he explained, and would be consistent with state law.

Manuse responded with a big raspberry. That’s just a sneaky way to implement a state exchange, he declared:

We had a Health Care Reform Oversight Committee meeting today, and we heard the Insurance Department’s pitch to form a “partnership exchange,” which is basically a state exchange that the federal government is now calling a federal exchange, to get around HB 1297. Well, thankfully, we have the votes on the Oversight Committee to stop it from happening. N.H. is not going to comply with Obamacare, and only that way, with other states joining us, will Obamacare be repealed.

To make his point, Manuse and his partners in crime are willing to cede regulatory authority to the federal government. If they get their way, the federal government will perform all plan management functions within the exchange and — because many Affordable Care Act requirements extend beyond the exchanges into the entire insurance market — the state’s regulatory authority will be compromised even for health insurance sold outside the exchange.

Mitt Romney’s trip to Europe was clearly intended to contrast his “statesmanlike” demeanor with President Obama’s “messianic” tour four years ago. Oops. The Guardian noted a contrast, all right. “The comparisons … are almost too embarrassing to mention. Obama wooed a quarter of a million people in Berlin while Romney was mocked by the British prime minister.”

If Barack Obama were dreaming up the ideal start to Mitt Romney’s first overseas visit as the presumptive Republican nominee, the president might wonder whether his rival could offend the US’s historic transatlantic ally.

That would obviously be rejected as impossibly ambitious, so the president might then ask himself whether Romney would fail to remember the name of one of his hosts in London.

Surely a successful businessman would never make such a basic error. So the president would wonder whether Romney would breach convention by saying in public that he met the head of MI6, Britain’s overseas intelligence agency.

To the undoubted joy of the White House, Romney stumbled on all those fronts in London on Thursday, the first day of his visit to three of the US’s closest allies — Britain, Israel and Poland.

Occupy New Hampshire has splintered into two separate factions in a disagreement over participation by Free State Project supporters.

As alleged Democratic Party propagandist Annmarie Timmins reported, members of the anti-FSP group incorporated as a nonprofit and require members to sign a Solidarity Statement and a Commitment to Respectful Conduct.

All this was too much for Comedy Central blogger Ilya Gerner, who noted the irony of this action from a group “opposed to the insatiable greed and undemocratic influence of corporations and the authoritarianism embedded in non-consensual decision making.”

The Free State Project is an alliance of libertarians relocating to New Hampshire to create a libertarian state but who can’t afford the airfare to Somalia. Many have been joining in Occupy protests because New Hampshire is weird that way, making this the most significant schism since the People’s Front of Judea vehemently opposed the Judean People’s Front.

Tensions between Free Staters and some Occupiers have risen after the realization that building a social movement based on shared cultural preferences, rather than policy goals, ends in tears as both groups return to occupying their parents’ basements.

The Union Leader, a newspaper not likely to make Bill O’Brien’s list of Democratic Party propagandists, has joined the chorus calling on Mitt Romney to release his tax returns. “It’s time to get the inevitable over with,” concludes today’s editorial. “Release the tax returns, explain them, take the heat, and move on.”

Maintaining the secrecy creates the impression, justly or not, that there is something there to hide. No escaping that reality. The impression is there. And it will cost Romney votes he cannot afford to lose. Those voters might not cast their ballots for Obama, but not voting can be just as damaging. And yes, for using the tax dodges and loopholes legally available to him, he might lose votes as well.

But there is no place for secrecy or, indeed, privacy in a Presidential campaign. If you want the job, you have to subject yourself to the scrutiny.

You have to be prepared to stand and explain, indeed, justify, your actions. If they are legal, then so be it.

So why is Romney continuing to stonewall it, despite the calls from even his strongest supporters? As George Will noted, “The cost of not releasing the returns are clear. Therefore, he must have calculated that there are higher costs in releasing them.”

This is another hateful and unsubstantiated attack on New Hampshire families by Bill O’Brien. It is time for Ovide Lamontagne and Kevin Smith to stand up to this type of bigotry and hate speech. As we heard from Republicans so many times before, marriage can strengthen families and can it strengthen families economically — that’s true for all families. All New Hampshire families deserve respect, not discriminatory lies from the Speaker of the New Hampshire House of Representatives.

— Ray Buckley, New Hampshire Democratic Party chair, on House Speaker Bill O’Brien’s claim that marriage equality weakens families and will lead to an “unlimited call on government resources.”

In the latest update to its 2012 gubernatorial projections, Governing has changed its rating for the New Hampshire race from lean Republican to tossup.

We’re shifting this race from lean Republican to tossup — not because of any significant partisan movement, but rather because New Hampshire’s race is the least well-formed of any on this list. … Despite some historical difficulties in the state, Obama has chalked up a series of modest leads over New Hampshire resident Romney in recent polls. In addition, some voters may appreciate the idea of a Democratic brake on a GOP-dominated Legislature. But the tenor of the race is likely to remain a question mark until at least the September primary.

The ratings are based on interviews with state and national analysts and are updated throughout the campaign.

The Romney campaign held a series of events today “to allow small business owners the chance to respond” to President Obama’s assertion that businesses have benefited from government investment and support.

One of these “We Built This” events was held at Secure Care Products, a manufacturer in Concord. The owner, Harold Baldwin, said “he was pretty upset” by Obama’s suggestion that the government helped him build his business.

For the record, Secure Care is a member of the Granite State District Export Council, an organization that “supports the U.S. Government’s export promotion efforts throughout the country.” Just two months ago, Sen. Jeanne Shaheen delivered a speech on the Senate floor relating how the federal export program was critical to Secure Care’s expansion.

Secure Care has developed a technology that protects Alzheimer’s patients who may wander or newborns who are still in maternity wards. Grace Preston, the international sales manager for Secure Care, told us that the company has significantly expanded its growth by selling overseas. Grace also told us that Secure Care couldn’t have done that without federal and state export programs working together. In New Hampshire, our state and federal export services work seamlessly, which has helped exports grow our economy. [emphasis added]

The company has also received $521,000 in 146 government contracts from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.

It was quite a performance from State House Speaker Bill O’Brien this morning on New Hampshire Public Radio. In just one hour with Laura Knoy on ‘The Exchange,’ O’Brien claimed the tobacco tax cut has not reduced revenue, attacked UNH professors as inefficient and unproductive, defended guns in the State House, criticized police for opposing “stand your ground” legislation, defended gay marriage repeal as an act of fiscal responsibility, accused Democrats of a war on religion and labeled Concord Monitor reporters as Democratic propagandists.

[View the story “Radio Daze: Speaker O’Brien’s Encore Performance” on Storify]

Radio Daze: Speaker O’Brien’s Encore Performance. Storified by William Tucker · Tue, Jul 24 2012 15:39:19

Bill O’Brien on the Exchange on NHPR right now. I’m sure he wants to hear from us! Brookline Democrats

Speaker O’Brien on Exchange now: State budget cuts were one of his biggest achievements. “It’s a great budget.” #nhpolitics Annmarie Timmins

Speaker O’Brien says reducting in cigarette tax did not mean any decrease in revenue. #nhpolitics Annmarie Timmins

Spk.O’Brien on Exchange: He’s “disappointed” UNH increased tuition 8.7 percent after budget cuts.UNH workers are “unproductive.” #nhpolitics Annmarie Timmins

Speaker O’Brien: “We are disappointed w/ the USNH Trustees for raising tuition” Mr. Speaker, you cut 50% of their funding! #NHpolitics Gene Martin

Spk. O’Brien: He’d invest state $ into community colleges, not state universities. University workers R “inefficient.” On NHPR. #nhpolitics Annmarie Timmins

Speaker O’Brien: USNH workers are “unproductive” so he cuts them 50%, but he likes Community Colleges only cut them 20% #nhpolitics Gene Martin

Spk. O’Brien: Privatizing at least some of corrections will save money. If a private business does it for less $, state should 2.#nhpolitics Annmarie Timmins

Speaker O’Brien says reducting in cigarette tax did not mean any decrease in revenue. #nhpolitics Annmarie Timmins

Spk. O’Brien says Leg. resumed allowing guns in State House bc lawmakers needed way to protect themselves. On NHPR Exchange now. #nhpolitics Annmarie Timmins

Spk. O’Brien: Emphasis of this Leg. session was on jobs and economy. #nhpolitics Annmarie Timmins

LOL! Speaker O’Brien makes the false claim his #NHHouse majority spent their time on financial issues. #NHpolitics Gene Martin

NH House Spkr. William O’Brien defends stand your ground law as “reasonable,” says Zimmerman FL case not “good analogy.” #nhpolitics Kevin Landrigan

According 2 Spkr O’Brien on Stand Your Ground: Police Community doesn’t know what they talking when it comes to public safety. #NHpolitics Gene Martin

House Spkr O’Brien hopes bid to repeal same-sex marriage comes back in 2013, favors civil unions for gay couples. #nhpolitics Kevin Landrigan

Spk. O’Brien:Gay marriage cannot create finacially solid families. “That is not meant to demonize anyone who has alternative lifestyle.” Annmarie Timmins

Ban on partial birth abortion, parental notification bills “we needed to do,” House Spkr. O’Brien tells NHPR “The Exchange” #nhpolitics Kevin Landrigan

House Spkr. O’Brien denies war vs. women (abortion, birth control), says NH Dem Party “war on religion…Catholic Church.” #nhpolitics Kevin Landrigan

Concord Monitor reporter blocked from media avail cuz paper is “propagandists” for NH Dem Party, House Spkr O’Brien claims #nhpolitics Kevin Landrigan

Speaker O’Brien on NHPR’s The Exchange this AM, starts sounding very friendly, saves crazy for the late part of show. Brookline Democrats

Even before all the reviews came in on his attention-grabbing EBT-restrictions show, he stands before the TV cameras to announce an “investigation” into nepotism in state departments. One thing: He has zero-zip-nada authority to do such a thing. Perhaps it’s time for an intervention for what appears to be a grandstanding addiction.

— Jeff Feingold, New Hampshire Business Review editor, on state House Speaker Bill O’Brien

Last week, during the back-and-forth over President Obama’s assertion that government plays a valuable role in supporting business, the Romney campaign released a web video, followed by a television ad, featuring Gilchrist Metal Fabricating in Hudson.

In the video, owner Jack Gilchrist is adamant that he, his father and his son built his company without any help from the government.

“My father’s hands didn’t build this company? My hands didn’t build this company? My son’s hands aren’t building this company? … President Obama, you’re killing us out here. Through hard work and a little bit of luck, we built this business. Why are you demonizing us for it?”

Yesterday, John DiStaso reported — and Jack Gilchrist confirmed — that Gilchrist Metal Fabricating had a little help from the government after all.

• In the late 1980s, Gilchrist Metal received a U.S. Small Business Administration loan totaling nearly $500,000.

• The company received matching funds from the federally-funded New England Trade Adjustment Assistance Center (NETAAC).

• In 1999, Gilchrist Metal received $800,000 in tax-exempt revenue bonds issued by the New Hampshire Business Finance Authority.

• Ten percent of the company’s contracts are defense-related including two U.S. Navy sub-contracts last year and a 2008 Coast Guard contract.

State Rep. Lucy Weber, who sites on the House Judiciary Committee, writes on Blue Hampshire of an incident in which now-Speaker Bill O’Brien accused her of attempting to introduce Shari’a Law into state legislation.

In 2009, I sponsored a bill to amend our statue about who may officiate at marriages in NH. It would have eliminated references to “ministers of the gospel” and would have made it explicit that members of all faith traditions could solemnize marriage in accordance with their teachings and have those marriages recognized by the State of NH. Rep. O’Brien then accused me of trying to introduce Shari’a law into NH.

State House Democratic Leader Terie Norelli says a CNBC study, “America’s Top States for Business 2012,” confirms state budget cuts are damaging New Hampshire’s economy. In a Concord Monitor op-ed, she points out the Republican claim that their budget cuts and legislative priorities are good for the economy “flies in the face of independent analyses.”

According to the study, New Hampshire’s ranking dropped in infrastructure, transportation, and education — all areas that received devastating funding cuts in the GOP’s state budget. New Hampshire’s overall “economic” ranking suffered the biggest drop of all, plummeting from 10th to 34th nationwide.

What is frightening is the GOP’s promise to double down on their failed policies if re-elected this fall. Despite the job losses that would follow, O’Brien wants to cut another $400 million from the budget if he returns as speaker next term.

Like the economists who conducted CNBC’s “Best States for Business” study, Granite Staters know that quality infrastructure and an educated workforce are critical elements to a growing economy. If New Hampshire is to regain its role as a national leader in economic development, the Legislature we elect this fall needs to share those values.

The Sununu connection adds a curious element to this latest turn: what is it, exactly, about New Hampshire campaign surrogates talking drugs? Apparently the Live Free or Die state’s live and let live ethos makes an exception for campaign gambits at moments of slowly mounting desperation.

— Alec MacGillis, on comments by former Gov. John H. Sununu this week, and Billy Shaheen in 2007, regarding President Obama’s acknowledged drug use as a young man.

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Maggie Hassan today announced that former President Bill Clinton will endorse her candidacy next week.

Politico’s Charles Mahtesian writes that the endorsement is just the latest “reminder of the lingering tensions and loyalties that still exist from the 2008 Democratic presidential primary.”

Hassan, a former state senator who is running for the Democratic nomination against another former state legislator, Jackie Cilley, was a vigorous supporter of Hillary Clinton in her 2008 presidential run.

Hassan’s backing came at a time when it mattered — in Sept. 2007 — and in a key state that Hillary Clinton ultimately won. Bill Clinton’s endorsements this year reflect a pattern of rewarding those who backed his wife.

Cilley backed Obama in 2008, which will invariably frame the primary as the latest Clinton-Obama proxy war.