“Don’t
believe everything you read” was the mantra of one of my high school history
teachers. As hoary a maxim as it may be, it is one that we should recall when
reading through any letters to the editor section of a newspaper. (Or when
reading opinion columns, for that matter.)
Two
weeks ago I wrote about HB 1573, a bill before the NH House that would
eliminate the 9 regional planning commissions in our state. I described the
hearing I attended, where a lot of people spoke about how zoning and planning
will lead to the takeover of the country by the United Nations. Several people
wrote pithy responses to that column. Careful readers discovered that in all of
the pith were no incidences of overreach by NH RPCs. There was plenty of hand
wringing, but no proof, coming from conspiracy buffs that pore over documents,
looking for sinister portent. It’s somewhat reminiscent of late 60’s
Beatlemania. (Newsflash: Paul wasn’t dead!)
The
writer of one such letter huffily informed us all that the ACA lists fishing
tackle as medical equipment. A
simple Google search reveals that his claim was debunked long ago. It started
because of a glitch in the cash register system at Cabelas. The mistake was
rectified and anyone overcharged was given a refund. But - that receipt was
spread all over the internet, and sent out on the endless stream of propaganda
emails that conservatives send around to one another. All of us read things
that we want to believe because they confirm our worldview, and we don’t always
take the time to verify. We should. Don’t take my word for it. Do your own
search. This is one link: http://www.factcheck.org/2013/09/cabelas-medical-tax-mistake/
The Municipal and County Government
Committee has recommended to the House that HB 1573 should be voted ITL, which
stands for inexpedient to legislate. The vote was 15 -0. From the House Journal:
HB 1573 has come before this committee in numerous forms
over the past several sessions. This time we heard testimony that regional
planning commissions are tools of the United Nations and its Agenda 21, and
that the RPCs, by conforming to the department of Housing and Urban Development
standards, are violating our local property rights.
Membership in a regional planning commission is entirely
voluntary. No community is forced to join or required to remain a member.
This is a part of the
recommendation from a bipartisan committee. It was their finding that “abolishing
the RPCs would be foolhardy.”
Other recent letters to the paper
illustrate a level of unfamiliarity with how things work in the NH House. That
one of those letters came from a former member of the House is especially
unfortunate. The GOP is all ginned up about HB 1589, a bill that requires a
background check for all firearms sales. Given the ongoing slaughter taking
place across the nation, one might think that our GOP brethren might applaud
background checks, to make a start at keeping guns out of the wrong hands. One
would be wrong. Any attempt at regulating guns is cause for screams about their
RIGHTS. In their minds, the Second Amendment was written by God and gives them
the right to stockpile nuclear weapons if they so wish.
It seems likely that most of the
screamers wouldn’t pass a background check, and that’s why they fear them so.
We are expected to tacitly accept the growing pile of small coffins as
collateral damage because …freedom. The tree of liberty must be watered from
time to time with the blood of 5 year olds.
HB 1589 is before the House
Commerce Committee. Rep. Ed Butler is the committee chair. A simple search of
the bill on the legislative website http://www.gencourt.state.nh.us will link you to
the text and the sponsors of the bill. The recent spate of letters about this
bill suggest that Rep. Butler is a sponsor of the bill and is somehow
responsible for the fact that the bill was assigned to his committee. Neither
is true. There are 8 sponsors listed. Butler isn’t one of them. Committee
chairs don’t pick out what bills they want to work on. Bills are assigned to
committees by leadership.
Gun bills are a huge time and resource suck for a
committee, and are accompanied by threatening phone calls and harassing emails
from the libertea crowd. No committee wants these bills.
The bill goes through the committee
process, including public hearings, committee work sessions, maybe a
subcommittee session, and an executive session where the full committee votes
on whether to recommend that the bill ought to pass or ought to be deemed inexpedient
to legislate. The folks on the committee vote the way they want to. It’s not as
if the chair is…holding a gun to their heads to make them vote his/her way.
Frank McCarthy should know all
this, given that he spent one term in the House. He has chosen to misrepresent,
insinuate, and even outright lie about this bill and Rep. Butler. Why? As you
can read for yourself in his letter this week, Frank McCarthy has some
unpleasant prejudices that he is unafraid to trumpet in public. This was his
excuse to make a lot of ugly comments about Representative Butler being gay,
none of which have anything to do with HB 1589.
There’s nothing in the bill
about a gun registry, or any of the other sky-is-falling nonsense that McCarthy
insists will be next. The purveyors of propaganda hope desperately that you
won’t do your homework. They want you to don a shiny chapeau and repeat their
lies.
I’ve said it many times, and will undoubtedly
have to say it many more - NH has a media problem. We are not well served by a
statewide media that consists of one network TV station and one newspaper that
both serve as stenographers for the Republican Party. The further north one
travels, the less statewide news there is – and with good reason. The small
dailies and weeklies can’t afford a “Concord bureau” to report on the
legislative session every year. They’re struggling to stay afloat. Most people
from our area don’t go to the State House on a regular basis, they’re too busy
working. That lack of trustworthy media means that people rely on the bits and
pieces they see in the paper and what they hear from family and friends. When
distortions and dishonesty are passed around enough, eventually the lies become
truth. Just ask the Kenyan socialist, fascist, Marxist in the White House.
Or, as Ronald Reagan used to say, “Trust,
but verify.”
3 comments:
I made note from reading the letters to our Sun regarding this bill that NO details of the bill were given at all. Rather, reference, inference, and slanted personal opinions. As to our state media. It's a downright disgrace. Were we to watch any TV news station it would be one out of Maine. NH media is pitiful, one sided and a clear example of purist Capitalism at work which is not to report the facts, but to pay attention to your very own job, wallet and MO.
Great article. It truly is sad that so many people in today's world take everything they read in the paper or see on politically slanted (both ways) TV as gospel instead of doing their own homework. Amazingly, some conservatives will rip the "liberal national media" as being untrustworthy, yet to defend that viewpoint they point to biased right-wing media like FoxNews! Regardless of which side of the isle you support, do yourself a favor and stop following these news outlets blindly and do some research. It has literally never been easier thanks to the internet. The facts are out there, you just have to take the time to look.
The Hon. Frank McCarthy(ism) has a letter in todays Sun about Right to Work Legislation. He is clearly anti-Union and in his world these are Socialist and left wing Pinko Commie outfits. The same outfits that had to be organized to prevent women from jumping out of windows to their deaths and children from dying horrible deaths in machinery.
In his world, I was fired from a job for breathing the idea of Union. His perfect world is designed only for his high living elbow rubbing few. The few that still believe in slavery.
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