Tag Archives: new hamsphire

Sep 16 2012
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Law, legal, NH Politics, Opinion

Incomplete Democracy = No Democracy

Just Kidding!

Today the editorial brain trust at the Union Leader decided to weigh in on the Voter ID law and its “practice run” during the primary.  For those who didn’t vote in the New Hampshire primary or don’t live in New Hampshire, its worth pointing out that although the law won’t go into effect until the general election in November, the legislature decided to mandate a practice run at the polls.  Yes, of course you’re thinking, “what a wonderful idea let’s practice all laws out first!”  then if you are stopped, arrested or ticketed the cop can tell you, “Oh geez, just kidding, now watch out in November!”

Dispensing with all the other problems with that issue, one wonders how many people might get the idea that the law really already is in effect and thus abide accordingly.  I mean, I guess it would be up to the goodwill of those empowered with enforcement to give up the gag before the damage is done right?  One wonders when exactly that might occur? After said individual absent an ID walks out of the polls? Its their fault they can’t hear the “Oh shucks, just kidding!” all the way from the parking lot?

Well, basically the Union Leader chooses to overlook that problem, while of course having to make the odd construction that Democrats were protesting the Voter ID law by refusing to give up their ID’s, that oh wait! really isn’t a law yet.  Bet that’s a first.  But its all good right? No one lost their voting privileges that day right?

Nope not at all, unless you talked to people who went to the polls, who were confronted with the patently illegal signage that wards had no business posting that led people to believe that the law was in fact in effect.  Nope not all unless you talk to the people who knowing their rights, refused to produce an ID and were not given the Voter Challenge Affidavit until after they had surrendered their ID.  Funny thing, guess the workers at the polls need some more training, including those poll watchers.

But, it seems clear by testimony from those who experienced the denial of their voting privileges unless they provided satisfactory proof of ID, they had reason to believe they weren’t voting.  So, let’s take your average citizen who works full time, probably has a family to care for and has about a one hour window that they carved out for a week or more to be able to perform their democratic duty.   Is it reasonable to assume this individual would in good faith turn around and say, “Oh, let me call my boss and see if I can more time off to get my ID I left at home/work/in the car.”  or, “Let me see if the person who gave me a ride here will be available to shuttle me around to the DMV, fill out a form, stand in line for an hour and then go back?”

Or, the person who says, “You know what, I knew voting was stupid, I’m going home.”

Or the person who, in the case of one person in Manchester who has a strong Spanish accent, of being further humiliated by having to answer to the question, “Where are you from?” So much for that old folksy New Hampshire.  Let’s just dispel that right now.  Manchester is a city, just like Nashua and Portsmouth.  There aren’t docile dairy cows roaming between white clapboard farmhouses or farmers with red and black checkered hunting caps leaning on fences saying “Ahyup!”.  Unlike the charmed sentiment of the editor, New Hampshire has had its influx of newcomers, of which many who don’t fit the New Hampshire ideal citizen, aren’t exactly given the welcome mat and a pint of New Hampshire maple syrup.  But of course these folks mostly settle in the larger communities and their participation in the polls just might change some things up old Concord way.

Never mind that the other segment of voters that the those at the Union Leader editorial board and Keepers of All That is White and Right in New Hampshire also probably only fret about property taxes in the sense that they know they are paying too much and there’s a small segment of large landowners not paying their fair share.  They’d probably vote Democratic, just a hunch, but since that conversation has only occurred on a meaningful basis within the Democratic party, one might safely conclude that.

Much better to keep those folks home and why wait until November when the Voter ID law becomes an actual law, how about have a practice run, heck what could it hurt if this election some folks don’t turn up or go home without getting to exercise their right to perform the most important civic duty in the nation.

In the accompanying report on how the practice run went, it is explained that those who did in fact challenge the law will be chased down by mail, then if there’s a letter sent back they’ll send agents out we assume to track these people down and the Secretary of State’s office will pour over each and every affidavit to verify whether the voter exists or not.  Looks like the Secretary of State’s office will be hiring folks pretty soon.  Amazing how that works; legislation that grows government comes from an administration that claims to do just the opposite.  Guess the work will be done by special little Fairies for Freedom, to find those practically non-existent fraudulent voters.

But what about the people who walked away from the polls unable to vote? What does that do to our election?  Uh-oh, thinking too much.  In the Union Leader/Republican world those little people don’t matter and the results.  We just gotta live with it, because dammit, there are brown people, poor people, aged, students and disabled folks who we know vote overwhelmingly Democrat and who cares if they stay home?

Of course the richest misunderstanding of the law is encapsulated by the editorial writer’s comment, “Well, the constitution gives qualified voters the right to vote.” Yup, that’s right and there’s nothing in the constitution about presenting an ID.  More than likely the framers never envisioned a system would develop in which certain individuals would work and live in this country and not be eligible to vote — oh wait! We tried that too didn’t we? How did that work out?

One has to wonder, with all the fervor that never seems to end about “qualifying” voters, what exactly is the motive?  Could it be that not only a threat exists from the millions of truly “qualified” citizens actually exercising their right to vote enmasse, what would happen if those who fall between the cracks of citizenship, living, working and contributing to businesses and the economy, like the many that work in Manchester, Nashua and elsewhere in the state starting suddenly voting? Yes, its a scary thought indeed.

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Aug 30 2012
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NH Politics

The New Hampshire Immigrant Problem: The Free State Project

Bienvenue à New Hampshire, où nous avons des impôts et des frais. Si cela ne vous plaît pas, retournez chez vous, préférablement pas sur nos routes publiques.

Copied from Counterpunch, apparently there’s more if you subscribe, but Progressive Action NH alas, has no budget for subscriptions right now.

April 27, 2009

The Far Right’s Plot to Capture New Hampshire

by PAM MARTENS

One of the most audacious and cynical corporate-backed social experiments in living memory, the Free State Project in New Hampshire, has now shifted into damage control mode.  Free State operatives learned this past week of my article that appears in the current subscription edition of CounterPunch, taking the first in-depth look at their plan to entice 20,000 out-of-state ultra libertarians and anarchists to move to New Hampshire and implant an extremist brand of free market capitalism: a brand the corporate backers hope will lead to a gutting of business regulations, environmental laws, and return the state to the right wing of the Republican fold.  (Currently, all three branches in New Hampshire, known for its pivotal first primary status, are controlled by Democrats.)

An effort at damage control is playing out in the Free Staters’ internet pummeling of this author and a reporter at the Keene Sentinel newspaper in southern New Hampshire, Phillip  Bantz, who made reference to the revelations in the CounterPunch piece along with an eyebrow raising quote from a Free Stater on legalizing cannibalism, a demand of some fringe Free Staters.

The attacks have not gone as planned.  Over 128 reader responses are now registered in the Keene Sentinel, founded in 1799, which typically receives less than 20 responses to an article.  Area residents, known for tolerance, are displaying pent-up fatigue and anger with the agenda of the Free Staters.

Some of the Free State participants call themselves anarcho capitalists, promoting an embrace of free markets and individual freedoms unencumbered by authority of the state.  Free State members must formally agree to the premise that “government exists at most to protect people’s rights, and should neither provide for people nor punish them for activities that interfere with no one else.” [1]   This premise is widely interpreted by Free Staters to mean all tax supported social welfare programs must go, along with zoning and planning and building inspectors.  Public education would be replaced with home schooling or private schools.

What has been able to fly completely under the radar for the last seven years, is the role of shadowy think tanks and their corporate money backers in the Free State Project strategy.

On the morning of Friday, February 27, 2004, at the Washington D.C. corporate headquarters of the free market think thank, the American Enterprise Institute, this far-fetched plan was carefully rolled out to the national media.  The key speaker at the event was Jason Sorens, founder of the Free State Project. Dr. Sorens is currently an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the State University of New York at Buffalo.

The following are excerpts of remarks made by Dr. Sorens at that event, according to a transcript available at the American Enterprise Institute:

“The Free State Project started as an effort to identify the best state in the country for people who favor smaller government and stronger individual liberties to move to…

We started signing up people in September 2001, and our growth was slow in our first few months.  However, growth picked up dramatically in late 2002 and 2003, and by August 2003, we had 5,000 signed members…

New Hampshire doesn’t have large metropolitan areas, which tend to be left-leaning…

The Free State Project is related to market-preserving federalism in two different ways.  First, New Hampshire is poised to benefit if the United States returns to a true model of market-preserving federalism.  One example is Social Security.  New Hampshire could do much better if it were taking care of its own Social Security program because its residents pay much more in Social Security taxes than they receive back in benefits…

The Free State Project can also contribute to market-preserving federalism and its beneficial workings in another way.  Once New Hampshire moves dramatically in a free market direction, we are going to continue to attract individuals and businesses from other states.  And other states are going to have to reform their own laws in order to avoid losing their tax base to our state.

So the Free State Project, in more ways than one, I think, is the thin end of the wedge in increasing liberty throughout the United States.” [2]

(Notice what just happened here: unfettered capitalism has been conflated with “stronger individual liberties.”   Are we not currently living the economic nightmare that proves the opposite is true? )
One of the most astute questions at this conference came from a man identified in the transcript as William Kelly of Cox Newspapers:

KELLY: My question is for Jason.  I was wondering, when you sign people up, do you do any kind of background check on them or anything, to make sure that you’re not importing rapists and thieves to New Hampshire?…

SORENS:  No background checks.  I think libertarians wouldn’t like that, too privacy invading and too resource consuming as well.  So to some extent this is built on trust.  Everyone I’ve met has been normal and well adjusted.”

Jenna Wolf of the Union Leader out of Manchester honed in on another obvious area:

“Have you talked to residents?  What are their feelings about this?”

Dr. Sorens assured Ms. Wolf:

“…we have solicited the opinions of people who live in New Hampshire in our forum…And the responses I have gotten have been overwhelmingly positive, conditional.  So long as you are good neighbors and really support the political ideals that you talk about, then they are supportive.”

In just four months, both the lack of background checks as well as resident reaction would blow up in Dr. Sorens’ face.

Just nine days before Dr. Sorens gently rolled out his case to a strategically selected group of free market think tanks and reporters viewed as market friendly at the headquarters of the American Enterprise Institute, Tim Condon, at the time the Director of Member Services at the Free State Project, had mapped out an offshoot strategy.  The plan was to create a Free Town Project as well – “a low-population town in that same state where Porcupines can congregate….”  (Free Staters refer to themselves as Porcupines – upset them at your own risk.)  The tiny town of Grafton, New Hampshire was chosen. [3]

Tim Condon is a Tampa, Florida lawyer and one of the original organizers of the Republican Liberty Caucus (RLC) in 1991, a group that says it works “to advance the principles of individual rights, limited government and free enterprise within the Republican Party” according to its web site. Unbeknownst to most rank and file Free Staters, Mr. Condon was receiving funds from the RLC.  According to the First Quarter 2005 minutes of the RLC of Florida, “On Jan. 4, the National Board of Directors of the Republican Liberty Caucus agreed to pick up some of the expenses of Florida RLCer Tim Condon of Tampa who – in conjunction with his efforts on behalf of the free state project…has been working to develop the New Hampshire RLC, one of the fastest growing RLC chapters in the nation.” [4]

According to Mr. Condon’s own account of how the Grafton plan came about, an “exploratory trip was launched in early February, 2004.  This time Porcupines Tim Condon and Zack Bass flew to New Hampshire from Florida, and had help from resident Free Staters in exploring.  Also present was Robert Hull, who drove up from New Jersey to join us.”
Zack Bass, according to a June 20, 2004 article in The Boston Globe was actually Larry Pendarvis of Brandon, Florida: “A computer analyst who also goes by the alias Zack Bass, Pendarvis was convicted in Polk County, Fla., in 1997 of more than 100 counts of downloading child pornography, a conviction later overturned on appeal. His other enterprises include a website that peddles mail-order brides from the Philippines with the slogan, ‘Date Locally, Marry Globally.’ ” [5]

According to the Free State Project, it was Mr. Pendarvis who was responsible for setting up a web site targeting local residents [6] and one establishing the goals of the Free Town Project as follows:

The Free Town Project intends to liberate either a New Hampshire Town, or a Western County, by moving in enough Libertarians to control the local Government and remove oppressive Regulations (such as Planning & Zoning, and Building Code requirements) and stop enforcement of Laws prohibiting Victimless Acts among Consenting Adults, such as Dueling, Gambling, Incest, Price-Gouging, Cannibalism, and Drug Handling. [7]

Hostilities flared against the Free Staters in Grafton by residents, followed by a large town meeting and unflattering press.  Dr. Sorens has persistently blamed all of this on Pendarvis and dismissed it by noting that Pendarvis was expelled from the Free State Project.  Dr. Sorens fails to note that it was he who declined to do background checks and it was his own Director of Member Services at the time, Tim Condon, who has acknowledged in his own article that he was part of the conception and planning of the project and made the exploratory trip to Grafton with Pendarvis (aka Zack Bass) in February 2004.

Dr. Sorens has additional explaining to do.  The Mercatus Center lists him as an Affiliated Scholar.  It, and its sister organization, Institute for Humane Studies, have funded Dr. Sorens research since at least 2002 according to public records. [8]

Mercatus is the Latin term for markets.  Thanks to an in-depth report published in September 2006 by the public interest nonprofit, Public Citizen, and OMB Watch, we know a great deal about the agenda of the Mercatus Center.  [9]

Richard Fink, executive vice-president of Koch Industries, Inc., founded Mercatus (then called the Center for Market Processes) at his alma mater, Rutgers University, in the early 1980s.  Later, he moved the organization to George Mason University in Arlington, Virginia, where it resides today.  Mercatus blossomed at George Mason in 1997 after receiving a $3 million grant from the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation, which was founded by Charles G. Koch, chairman and chief executive officer of Koch Industries.  Koch Industries, an oil and gas giant, is the second largest privately held company in the United States…

The Charles G. Koch Foundation is one of the largest corporate donors to George Mason University, donating over $15 million since 1998 to the George Mason University Foundation, which accepts and manages tax deductible donations on behalf of GMU and its affiliates.  The Charles G. Koch foundation frequently earmarks these donations for the Mercatus Center, and in the past two years alone has donated over $2 million to Mercatus…

[As part of its anti-regulatory agenda] Mercatus staffers were pushing rollbacks that would directly benefit their corporate patrons.  BP Amoco, Exxon Mobil, and the Kochs, for example, would benefit from 14 of the suggestions…filed in 2001 to weaken the Clean air Act.  These petrochemical companies would also benefit from four of the Mercatus Center’s 2002 submissions calling for the weakening of the Clean Water Act…

By far the biggest corporate contributor to the Mercatus Center, and the group with the clearest personal ties to it, is the Koch group of foundations and, through them, Koch Industries.  A privately-held $25 billion petroleum, chemical, and agricultural company based in Wichita, Kansas, Koch Industries has good reason to angle for a rollback of environmental standards.  In 2001, the company’s petroleum division pleaded guilty to violating the Clean Air Act for releasing benzene, a known carcinogen, into the air at a Texas refinery.  Koch agreed to pay $10 million in criminal fines and further agreed to spend $10 million for environmental projects in the Corpus Christi area.  In addition, Koch must complete a five-year term of probation and adhere to a strict new environmental compliance program.

In a separate incident, Koch agreed to pay a $4.5 million penalty to settle other Clean Air Act violations at its Minnesota refinery.  The EPA also forced the company to spend an estimated $80 million to install new pollution-control equipment at two refineries in Corpus Christi, Texas, and one near St. Paul, Minnesota.

Koch also has had a problem playing by the rules of the Clean Water Act.  The EPA found that during a seven-year period in the 1990s, a Koch pipeline subsidiary allowed 300 leaks to remain unstopped, spilling three million gallons of oil into waterways across six states.  In January 2000, the EPA leveled $30 million in civil fines against Koch, then the largest U.S. civil penalty, and required Koch to spend an additional $5 million on environmental projects. [10]

A former director of the Mercatus Center’s regulatory program was Wendy Lee Gramm.  As former chairperson of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) from 1988 to January 1993, Ms. Gramm’s deregulatory stance toward credit derivatives is widely regarded as a key element in today’s financial market meltdown.  According to Public Citizen, “In 1992, as the first step in its business plan to profit on the speculation of energy, Enron petitioned the CFTC to make regulatory changes that would limit the scope of the commission’s authority over certain kinds of futures contracts.  Immediately before leaving the CFTC, Gramm muscled through approval of an unusual draft regulation that would do just that – it narrowed the definition of futures contracts and excluded Enron’s energy future contracts and swaps from regulatory oversight.  Although her actions were criticized by government officials who feared the change would have severe negative consequences (as, in fact, it did), Gramm was rewarded five weeks after she left the CFTC with a lucrative appointment to Enron’s Board of Directors.  Between 1993 and 2001, when the company declared bankruptcy, Enron paid Gramm between $915,000 and $1.85 million in salary, attendance fees, stock option sales, and dividends.”

How much exactly has Dr. Sorens received from the Mercatus Center, the Institute for Humane Studies, and George Mason University Foundation?  Requests for specific dollar amounts to Dr. Sorens, the State University of New York at Buffalo, and each of the nonprofits was met with silence.  Dr. Sorens did take the time to send a seven-page letter to the Editors of CounterPunch demanding a retraction of this author’s first article.

A notice on the web site of the department of Political Science at the State University of New York at Buffalo, a public funded institution where Dr. Sorens now teaches and conducts research, notes that “Jason Sorens and his co-author William P. Ruger, an Assistant Professor at the Texas State University, San Marcos published a study on Freedom in the 50 States: An Index of Personal and Economic Freedom with the Mercatus Center of George Mason University.  The study presents an evidence based ranking of the 50 states in terms of both their provisions for and protection of personal and economic freedoms. Professor Sorens also continues to oversee a grant from Donors Trust.  The grant supports a series of research workshops on ‘Markets and States.’ ” [11]

Exactly 13 days after the study on Freedom in the 50 States was released, the 1851 Center for Constitutional Law at the Buckeye Institute for Public Policy Solutions in Ohio, another free markets nonprofit, used the document in testimony on a House Bill in Ohio threatening to “initiate legal action” if the bill was signed into law. The testimony noted, from the report, that “Ohio recently ranked 38th in an index of economic freedom amongst the 50 states.” The bill would have eased mortgage loan modifications to prevent foreclosures. [12]

DonorsTrust, now funding Dr. Sorens “Markets and States” workshops, explains itself this way: “DonorsTrust was established as the sole donor-advised plan dedicated to promoting a free society and serving donors who share that purpose.  To date, DonorsTrust has received $230 million from these donors who are both dedicated to liberty and to the cause of perpetuating a free and prosperous society through philanthropic means…Know that any contributions to our DonorsTrust account that have to be reported to the IRS will not become public information.  Unlike with private foundations, gifts from your account will remain as anonymous as you request.” [13]

These promises of more freedoms from uninvited liberators who are secretly backed by special interests sound eerily familiar.  Hopefully, this particular plan has been outed in just the nick of time.

PAM MARTENS worked on Wall Street for 21 years; she has no security position, long or short, in any company mentioned in this article.  She writes on public interest issues from New Hampshire.  She can be reached at pamk741@aol.com

Notes.

[1] Free State Project web site
www.freestateproject.org

[2] Transcript of Jason Sorens speaking at the American Enterprise Institute

[3] Tim Condon maps out the plan for the Free Town Project in Grafton

[4] First Quarter, 2005 RLC of Florida Minutes (See page two.)

[5] “Grafton’s Messy Liberation,” Boston Globe, June 20, 2004

[6] Blood Bath & Beyond, Grafton Locals Targeted

[7] Web site of the Free Town Project

[8] Jason Sorens affiations with The Mercatus Center
http://www.mercatus.org/SearchResult.aspx?SType=Basic

[9] “The Cost is Too High,” Public Citizen, OMB Report: Pgs 43 – 55,
“Meet the Mercatus Center”

[10] Ibid, pg 52

[11] Jason Sorens’ funded work at the State University of New York at Buffalo

[12] 1851 Center for Constitutional Law Cites Sorens Research

[13] DonorsTrust

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Aug 30 2012
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Economics, Education

Save Public Education – The Core of Democracy!

Save Our Schools! Rally – September 22, 2012

Veteran’s Park, Manchester New Hampshire

4 – 6pm

For more info: See Facebook

The Corporate Education Reform Agenda

by Tom Crean for Socialist Alternative

It is becoming increasingly clear that the future for working class and poor youth in the United States is bleak. Three years into the most severe economic and social crisis of the capitalist system since the Great Depression, the unemployment rate for teenagers 16-19 years old is 26 percent. A recent study by Northeastern University’s Center for Labor Market Studies points out that the employment-population ratio-the ratio of the number of people employed to the total working-age population- which is a broader measure of labor market health than the unemployment rate, has fallen by about 20 percentage points over the past decade to 25.6 percent for teenagers. This is a record low in the post World War II period.

The picture is even worse when looking at the situation for poor black and Latino youth. The employment-population ratio for African Americans ages 16 to 19 was 14.4 percent in July. Since middle class youth will still go to college and one way or another find their way into jobs, albeit perhaps jobs that pay less than the ones they would have expected to get in the past, the picture is not as grim for them. But a whole generation of poor youth now essentially has no experience of paid employment. This is truly a lost generation.

Why begin a discussion of the state of education with unemployment statistics? This is the right place to start because most people would agree that a key aim of education should be to prepare young people for a better life than their parents had. The corporate elite that dominates our society also looks at education in relation to the future, but from the more narrow perspective of training the next generation of workers.

Continue reading: Save Our Schools!

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Aug 21 2012
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NH Politics

Right Under Their Noses

On Monday morning scores of New Hampshire residents traveled to the St. Anselm’s campus to hear the newly minted Romney/Ryan duo speak.  They were in for a little surprise when they found out that actually, their tickets were not meant to get them into the door; they only served to identify them as the people they wanted out.

Like the rest of the Republican platform, Romney and Ryan’s substance lies somewhere within a computer file, within the confines of a paid staffers.  Apparently those staffers figured that having their employers stand before truly curious and inquisitive voters might prove a bit taxing.  And we know how Republicans hate anything that’s taxing; on the wallet or the brain.

The right-wing Union Leader apparently had some good connections for camera shots because the one they plastered all over the Tuesday edition and online made the event look like a Billy Graham revival event.  Responsible journalists would have mentioned that New Hampshire voters were turned away and replaced by Massachusetts bus-ins.  But those of us from New Hampshire know full well that to expect news from the Union Leader is a bit like expecting Ryan to just come out and admit he’s a selfish, brainless prick just like his running mate.

But what the staffers didn’t realize and the story the Union Leader missed was the truly grassroots support they had outside from the newly minted organization Americans for Inequality.  Formed apparently out of the mold of Rockefeller, Carnegie and the Koch Brothers combined, three of their acolytes were on hand to espouse Romney and Ryan’s economics.

Brave enough to just say it.

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Aug 16 2012
1 Comment
Healthcare

Should New Hampshire Expand Medicaid?

Medicaid could cover many working families that cannot afford private insurance.

The primary goal of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare)* is to reduce the number of people without health insurance. One strategy to reach that goal is an expansion of Medicaid, so that more people will qualify for the government program.

In its recent decision, the US Supreme Court ruled that Congress cannot force states to expand Medicaid because states will pick up some of the cost of the expansion.

Many New Hampshire Republicans, including gubernatorial candidates Ovide Lamontagne and Kevin Smith, and House Speaker William O’Brien, have lined up to oppose any expansion of Medicaid. If this becomes the law in New Hampshire, it will be the triumph of ideology over common sense, and New Hampshire will have lost an opportunity to improve the health of its citizens, lower the cost of private health insurance, and boost the state’s economy.  Our state budget would not work without money from Washington. Federal funds make up 30% of the budget, while state tax revenues make up 34%.  User fees, licenses, court fines, and other non-tax revenue make up the rest.

In the past, politicians from both sides of the aisle have worked to take full advantage of federal dollars when crafting the state budget. Federal money usually comes with strings attached—some state dollars have to be contributed in order to qualify for the federal funds. Typically, the state and federal dollars are in approximately equal proportions, but sometimes one state dollar can leverage two or more federal dollars.

Medicaid is a federal/state program to provide health insurance to the needy. The vast majority of those on Medicaid are children, the disabled, and the elderly, including elderly in nursing homes who are unable to afford the cost of their care. The uninsured in America are primarily the working poor who lack health insurance because their employers do not offer it, or because the cost is beyond their budget.

Obamacare The ACA calls for Medicaid eligibility to be expanded to 133% of the federal poverty level. This means a family of four with household income up to $30,657 would qualify. Under current New Hampshire law, a poor family is eligible for Medicaid only if its income is less than 68% of the federal poverty level ($15,674). The federal government will pay 100% of the cost of the Medicaid expansion for the first three years, 95% in the next three years, and 90% in the following three years.

Medicaid expansion would have three major benefits for New Hampshire. First, it is estimated that 20,000 people would become insured. Studies have shown that people with health insurance incur less in healthcare costs because they seek care earlier, before a condition has become acute. Better access to health care means healthier citizens. A recent study that compared states that have already expanded Medicaid (Maine, New
York and Arizona) with neighboring states that have not expanded Medicaid (New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Nevada and New Mexico) found that deaths dropped over 6% among those who gained Medicaid coverage.

We also should consider the benefits to New Hampshire businesses. Healthier workers are more productive, and take less sick time. Second, the cost of private health insurance will decrease as cost shifting is reduced. Under current federal law, hospitals cannot turn
away the uninsured who seek care at emergency rooms. Caring for the uninsured is not free. Those costs are included in the cost structure of hospitals, and passed on to those with private health insurance. Third, tens of millions of dollars of new federal money will be pumped into New Hampshire’s economy. Currently, New Hampshire gets back only 68 cents of each dollar in federal taxes paid by New Hampshire citizens. Accepting the Medicaid expansion money will help change that number, particularly if some states don’t take the money (and it appears that the states most likely to refuse the Medicaid expansion money are some “red” Republican states that get far more in federal dollars than they pay in federal taxes.) The economic impact of the new Medicaid money will be equivalent to the opening of a major new employer, with the benefits spread throughout the state and its 26 hospitals.

The debate over Medicaid expansion come down to this: should New Hampshire spend about $10 million a year in order to receive $90 million in federal dollars, if the new money will decrease the number of uninsured, improve the health of New Hampshire citizens, reduce costs for employers, decrease the cost of private health insurance, and boost our state’s economy?

To ask the question, you know the answer is “yes.” And you wonder how Ovide Lamontagne, Kevin Smith, Speaker O’Brien could possible say “no.”

– Mark Fernald

[We removed the right-wing label “Obamacare” and replaced where necessary with the proper descriptor, Affordable Care Act or ACA.  We at Progressive Action NH, strongly encourage writers to not adopt right-wing labels and talking points and although Obama has been the president during the proposal of this program, he personally did not think up the ACA  — his staffers copied Republican plans.]

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Aug 07 2012
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NH Politics

Freedumb and Libertea

Excellent summary of the current state of New Hampshire’s higher education under the unwatchful eyes of the conservative legislature who never saw a penny they didn’t want to keep for themselves — at the expense of growth to the state:

Freedumb and Libertea by Susanthe

One surprising bit of information from the report is that NH’s high school dropout rate has continued to decrease, reaching a low of nearly 1%. I was skeptical of Governor Lynch’s plan to keep kids in school when they didn’t want to be there, but clearly, the plan is working. A high school diploma is essential these days, and so is some form of higher education or training, if one wants to be able to live indoors.

As I’ve written before (endlessly) NH ranks in last place for state funding of higher education. That was true before the last biennium when the Freebaglicans cut the already embarrassingly low level of funding in half. Tuition at our two and four year colleges is amongst the highest in the nation. NH may be in 50th place for state funding of higher education, but we are number one in student debt. Yay! We’re number one!

The report shows that 5% fewer NH students are staying in state for their education than did a decade ago.  click here for the rest…

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Jul 31 2012
2 Comments
Occupy, Protecting our Environment

Protesters in Vermont Subdued with Pepper Spray and Rubber Bullets

Very good article written by Dylan Kelly on the Vermont Commons blog on the unexpected police action against protesters who gathered against Tar Sands at the Governor’s Conference in Burlington this past weekend. Continue reading at the site, link below…

Peaceful Protesters Put Down by Militarized Police Force

Burlington- Unprovoked, the Burlington Police Department opened fire on unarmed civilians with pepper spray, rubber bullets, and brutal force in order to crush dissent and political opposition to the Northeast Governor’s Conference in Burlington. In addition to Gov. Shumlin, the Conference was composed of Jean Charest, Premier of Quebec Province; and the Governors of New Hampshire, and Maine as well as numerous other delegates who gathered in Burlington to discuss regional economic and security issues.

Arriving in great numbers from locales as far afield as Connecticut, Northern Quebec, and New York City as well as turning out in droves from Burlington itself, the protesters were determined to bring issues such as natural resource extraction, affordable housing, student debt, indigenous peoples’ rights, and a wide array of other issues to the forefront of the conversation between regional elites.

Click here to continue reading at the Vermont Commons site.

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Jul 16 2012
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Occupy

The Occupy Movement – In Purpose and Conflict

Posted on the Occupy New Hampshire General Assembly Facebook today, so well said we couldn’t resist to re-post it here.

by Michael Joseph

I am writing this note for Heather Feather and Theresa Earle who were both disappointed in my stand on Sunday, July 15, 2012. They have expected more words of unity from me than those of division. I am attempting here to lay out what outreach I can do and also outreach that I see as less meaningful to the Occupy process in general.

When the Occupy Wall Street movement started, it had a clear purpose. This mission continues in the present time. Its mission is to draw attention to and to educate the masses in the great imbalance and hording of wealth by the megabanks and therefore the wealthiest 1% of Americans. The movement took off rapidly due to that great frustration with this infringement all over the world.

There has never been attention paid to limited government, but in a strong federal government that is fair and works for everyone. Professor James Pope’s testimony at the Occupy NH trial laid out the clear causes and effects of this power grab by the 1% at the expence of the 99%. His research showed that there is a direct correlation between the strength of organized labor and the ability of the 1% to control national dialogue. When organized labor has been strong, the ability of the 1% to control the agenda was significantly reduced. Additionally, those periods when the government had less power were correlated with those same periods of runaway wealth by the 1%. This note includes a link to his research. I believe that our acquittal on curfew violations and arrest hinges in large part on his testimony. He referred to the moments of change as “republican” with a small “c”, moments when the angry and disenfranchised populous rises up and exerts its full control.

I read “The Lord of the Flies” years ago for an example of how dangerous limited (or free) government really is. I also read Hobbs and Locke in my study of political science as an undergrad music student. I believe that Hobbs’s reasoning, for why society puts self-government in place to be the best argument for the cause of the Occupy Movement. Most of the Occupy participants have been progressives such as me. While the 1% are largely small government, fiscal conservatives and a call back to the old “Golden Age” when the average American could only dream with little hope of obtaining the luxurious pinnings of that elite. Whenever this structure prevails, delights of the wealthiest increase by leaps and bounds while those who struggle to make a living suffer more. The direct change in that old system was the rise of organized labor working for new legislation on work rules and benefits. So the clear remedy to our present situation, is a progressive movement to give the 99% a fair shake.

While the Free State Project aspires to a some of the ideals for opportunity enshrined in the Occupy Mission, its desire to eliminate central government services for the needy, the disenfranchised, the handicapped, the elderly, healthcare and the directed education of the young makes adoption of its principals almost completely incompatible with that of the Occupy Movement. In that there are minute areas of agreement, the free state project members might be consulted with the consensus of the General Assembly of the Occupy Movement. This is however, my singular opinion only and would need to be brought to the table for approval by members of the Occupy Movement embrasing the principals of Occupy Wall Street.

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Jul 16 2012
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NH Politics

Danny Keating Runs for 2nd Congressional District

In keeping with our mission at Progressive Action NH of disseminating information that comes from or involves, alternatives to the existing choices, we present to our blog readers a candidate for the 2nd Congressional District, Danny Keating.  Danny as an independent,  is running a bare-bones campaign under the Socialist Alternative banner.  We commend Danny for his courage in putting forward an agenda that offers an alternative for working people everywhere, to the present bicameral, corporate political choices.

Why I’m Running for Congress in New Hampshire

Danny Keating

Danny Keating

I am running for U.S. Congress in New Hampshire’s 2nd Congressional District. I am a construction worker and U.S. Army veteran who has lived in Nashua, NH since I was a child. I am running as an Independent and a member of Socialist Alternative to give a voice to the 99% during these corporate-dominated elections.

The two parties of big business, Democrats and Repub­licans, have carried out budget cuts, attacks on civil liberties, and an assault on women’s rights, all while strength­ening corporate control in this country. They cut programs while scapegoating immigrants, union workers and others. Every cut and attack is another attempt to force working people to pay for the economic crisis, a crisis created by the bankers, speculators and their system.

I am running because the two parties refuse to deal with the burning issues facing working people in any meaning­ful way. We need a massive jobs pro­gram to hire workers with union wages, benefits and rights to rebuild infrastruc­ture, stop environmental destruction and provide the social services we need. We could pay for this by closing corporate tax loopholes and increasing taxes on corporations and the top 1%, as well as slashing spending on the wars and occu­pations in Iraq and Afghanistan while improving veteran services.

We can only win a jobs program through mobilizing unions and commu­nity groups in a movement that protests and educates, while building demo­cratically run organizations. A mass movement for jobs and services against racism, sexism, layoffs, home foreclo­sures and budget cuts needs to be linked to political struggle in breaking from the two corporate parties.

We need a party of working people, run democratically, with elected representatives who are accountable and only take the wage of the average worker. Real change will never come from the puppets of big business. To get change in the past, we needed a big protest move­ment. My campaign will build a voice for the struggles against the capitalist system, and for a better future – a demo­cratic socialist future.

For more information on Danny’s campaign, he can be contacted via Facebook.

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Jul 16 2012
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Occupy

Not Just One Voice

Some Occupiers meeting for sandwiches after.

Since apparently some who opposed the Occupy NH break-off over the gun issue have attempted to point the finger at a few more outspoken Occupy NH participants, we have posted here some of the comments and statements of solidarity concerning the break-off decision:

Read the Declaration of Occupy Wall Street that Occupy New Hampshire resolved to stand in solidarity with.

We welcome you to submit your statement, we will transfer this over to the Occupy website once we have re-established one.

Why I decline attending the Occupy NH GA.

This issue of gun toting yahoos has gotten out of hand. I was a police officer from 1977-1980. I open carried a Smith and Wesson 357 magnum for purposes of protecting myself and the community from gun toters who would use them for their stated purpose. I trained and know how to use it for those purposes.

I equate the notion of carrying any such weapon on a bright and sunny Sunday to pure arrogance. Arrogance carries its own punishment. What goes around will always come around. An innocent teenager was killed in Florida last winter by this same arrogance. George Zimmerman is going to get what he deserves. I will not acknowledge this sham!

– Michael A. Joseph

The Choice for Occupy

As a gun owner and outspoken advocate of an armed population, I would like to clarify that my opposition to the Free State Project (an umbrella term I will use to represent all FSP, Anarcho-capitalists and related ideologies) does not rest upon their insistence that they will bring guns to the statehouse today.  My rejection of their twisted ideology is systemic and my call for them to be ejected from the Occupy movement in NH is without qualification.

The “gun issue”, as it has become known is but a convenient porthole which we can use to inspect and criticize the greater movement.  The fundamental insistence on the primacy of individual sovereignty will forever cause the group to reject making their individual wishes secondary to the community.  It is because of this fundamental tenet that the FSP can never stand in solidarity with Occupy Wall Street.

There are no solutions to the problems of the world we live in today which do not involve the combined work and sacrifice of all people toward the progress of humankind.  The degree of that sacrifice must be democratically determined by all people (and by people alone) and cannot be voluntary or subject to the trump of any individual.

It is for this reason that Occupy New Hampshire must not call for “change”, but must call for specific and pointed change that confronts and combats the myriad abuses of rampant greed and selfishness in our society.  It is praise for this selfishness, which Ayn Rand called “rational self-interest” which sits at the heart of the Objectivist worldview that informs modern Right-Libertarianism.

It is self-evident that a revolutionary movement cannot succeed by including those who disagree with the aims of that movement and who work against those aims.  There is no “common ground” in these circumstances because the mere inclusion of members of this ideology in the steering of that movement will limit the scope of that movement and prevent it from reaching its revolutionary potential.

For this reason, if Occupy New Hampshire does not issue a statement which sets itself clearly on a path opposed to selfish and abusive individualism, I can no longer participate in Occupy New Hampshire.  This will not be because I will abandon the movement, but because the movement will have abandoned solidarity with Occupy Wall Street, a worldwide movement of people struggling against greed, and the historic significance of this moment.

– Shawn Girard

Choosing Nonviolence

Originally I planned on going to the GA but then changed my mind when I saw the various feeds on FB blow up with gun language. I didn’t involve myself in the feeds because of the vitriol; I didn’t want to become a target. But I was convinced by respectful members of ONH to attend and it was the right decision.

Being surrounded by the armed citizenry was terrifying, more terrifying than being surrounded by thousands of police and their weapons of mass destruction, aggressively trained dogs and horses, LRADs, and snipers on rooftops. It more terrifying than being assaulted by the police as I was in Chicago. ONH members comforted me, helping me to ease my fear; not a single member of FSP tried to comfort me, to ease my anxiety. Rather, they strutted with their weapons, some out for all to see others (vaguely) concealed in attempts to intimidate ONH members into silence or compliance (I’m not sure which). Instead of actually engaging in dialogue, they brandished their weapons and dodged eye contact yet expected the peaceful to sit next to the armed as if we were all friends working toward the same goals.

I walked myself out out of imposed circle and sat across the lawn so I could observe from afar. I had to get away because I was afraid of my fellow “occupiers”, that is those who identify as FSP or are formulating that identity, of those with firearms strapped to their hips. I was not afraid in Chicago of my fellow Occupier. I found comfort from them, kinship. I did not find that with the FSPers today. I never have in the decade I’ve lived in this state, no matter how many I’ve met and engaged with Freestaters over the years.

What I saw today, their show of aggression and disrespect was deplorable on the part of the FSPers. Aggression and disrespect are not Occupy traits. I have sadness this occur because, like many Occupiers, I want peace and harmony and to work together building bridges. Whether the FSPers and Occupiers can work together has became moot.

I made my choice. I am comfortable with choosing peace and nonviolence. It is the choice I will *always* make.

– Michelle Cunha

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