Governor Affable

Last week Governor Chris Sununu was in New York on a right wing media braggadocio tour, boasting about the NH economy and claiming he regularly poaches companies from states like New York and Connecticut. He claimed he “could fix Connecticut in 20 minutes.” Sununu also suggested that California doesn’t manage itself properly, thereby failing “to put themselves in a position to be successful.” On Fox radio, he bragged that he was considering a run for the US Senate and he was sure he could win. 

A spokesperson for Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont pointed out, via Twitter, that Connecticut has 16 Fortune 500 companies, and NH has zero. California is failing, with the seventh largest economy in the world. As for the poaching claims, NHPR tried to find out the names of the companies he’s poached from NY and CT. Sununu’s office claimed they couldn’t answer on the grounds of confidentiality. I think we all know bunkum when we hear it.

Sununu’s been dancing around the possibility of running for US Senate for months, and has been rather obvious that he intended to. This week, that intention came to a screeching halt. In a rather peevish announcement, Governor Sununu announced he’d be running for a third term.

The announcement focuses on how he needs to stay in NH because of the “radical” agenda of Democrats. He said, “We all know that I would defeat Jeanne Shaheen, but others can too.”  He’s telling us that he could defeat Jeanne Shaheen with both hands tied behind his back…so…he’s not even going to try. He’s going to stay in NH because of the Democrats. He complained, “More Washington DC extremism is on the way.” What better way to fight DC extremism than to avoid it, by staying in NH? Again, I think we all know bunkum when we hear it. 

The “radical agenda” Sununu refers to is the paid family and medical leave bill that passed both the House and the Senate. The plan would give workers up to 12 weeks of time off, at 60 percent of their wages. This would enable workers to have time to deal with things like personal health emergencies, family illnesses, new babies or adoptions. Sununu supported a family and medical leave plan when he campaigned. When an actual bill was written, he called family and medical leave a “vacation” several times. I remember how giddily I packed for “vacation” trips to transport my husband for chemo or radiation. When that gambit blew up in his face, Sununu began calling it an “income tax.”

The paid leave plan was going to be paid for by a small increase in the payroll tax. This is what the governor called “an income tax,” and the propaganda worked well for those who don’t ever consider that the property tax is also an income tax. Adults know that nothing is free – or at least adults in other states know this. NH remains deeply committed to not ever paying for anything, which is why we have so many red-listed bridges, and why no one ever answers the phone at the DMV. 

The governor vetoed the family and medical leave bill, scribbling childishly on it with his red pen, “No Income Tax. Not Now! Not Ever!” Sununu was so proud of himself, that the image was sent out for all to see, bearing a red signature that looks rather unfortunately like “Chicken T. Sununu.” 

During Sununu’s first term, he was the poster child for photo-ops. A media darling, he was most often described as “affable” or “avuncular.” This year, midway through his second term, the mask of affability is crumbling, and what lies underneath is increasingly reminiscent of Grumpy Governor Papa Sununu, who was perpetually arrogant and irascible. Papa had to resign as President George HW Bush’s Chief of Staff because he was using Air Force One as his personal taxi. We cared about stuff like that back in the olden days.

Do we still care about corruption? Keep an eye on the investigation into Governor Chris Sununu’s inaugural fund. It was set up as a non-profit, took big donations from corporate funders, and used as a slush fund to funnel a great deal of cash into the pockets of his family members. If this sounds familiar, it’s because Donald Trump did exactly the same thing with his inaugural fund. 

A month ago, I quoted comments Sununu made on right wing talk radio about how “the people” were going to “take back” the US Senate seat currently held by Jeanne Shaheen. Something happened between last week and this week to convince the governor that he isn’t “the people,” and his announcement reflects just how sulky he’s feeling about it.

This doesn’t bode well for the rest of the legislative session, which includes the budget. We can look forward to more red pen hijinks masquerading as leadership. Governor Affable has left the building. 

NH Death Penalty Optics

Michael George Haddad

The last time the State of New Hampshire executed anyone was in 1939. For the last 20 years, there has been a bill every biennium to repeal the death penalty. In 2000, a repeal bill passed both houses and was vetoed by Governor Jeanne Shaheen. 

In 2019, there is an impressive bipartisan coalition supporting HB 455, a bill that would change the death penalty in NH to life without parole. It seems likely that the bill will pass in both the House and Senate. Governor Sununu has said that he will veto it. There could well be, for the first time in 20 years, enough support for repeal to override the governor’s veto.

I’ve written about the death penalty several times over the years. We know it is expensive – more expensive than life in prison. We know it is not a deterrent. We know that people of color are more likely to be sent to death row. We know that a great many people have been wrongly convicted, spent years on death row, and then exonerated. We also know that at least one innocent person has been wrongly murdered by the state, in the name of “justice.” Above all, we know…well, not all of we, but most of we know that the death penalty is not about justice. It is about vengeance.

As the old saying goes, we kill people to show them that killing is wrong. The state should not be in the business of killing its citizens.

A big public hearing resulted in hours of testimony this week. There was testimony from murder victim’s family members. There was testimony from people who were wrongly convicted and sent to death row.  There was also testimony from former US Senator Kelly Ayotte, who breezed in to emphasize how important it is that we kill Michael Addison, the only person on death row in NH. Ayotte the NH Attorney General vigorously pursued the death penalty case against Addison, and used it as a springboard to a single term in the Senate. 

Michael Addison was charged with killing Manchester Police Officer Michael Briggs in 2006. In 2006, a millionaire named John Brooks was convicted of capital murder for his role in hiring people to kill his former handyman, whom he believed had stolen from him. In New Hampshire, contract killing is a capital offense.  John Brooks was given two life sentences without parole. In 1997, Gordon E. Perry killed police officer Jeremy Charron in Epsom, NH. After pleading guilty to capital murder, he was sentenced to life in prison without parole. 

When repeal advocates talk about how the death penalty isn’t equally applied, this is exactly what they mean. Gordon E. Perry is white. John Brooks is rich and white. Michael Addison is black. John Brooks was convicted the same year as Addison, in the same state. Kelly Ayotte did not zealously pursue his case. Gordon Perry and Michael Addison both killed police officers. Only one is on death row. 

Our Governor has said that he will veto a repeal because he “stands with law enforcement.” Our governor stands with law enforcement when it’s convenient. Sununu’s first legislative priority after being elected to his first term was to eliminate concealed carry licenses for firearms. Law enforcement vigorously opposed that bill. Sununu didn’t listen to them, never mind stand with them. Governor Sununu is a Trump acolyte, and we know that Trump loves the death penalty. Even after the five young black men known as the Central Park Five were exonerated after falsely being convicted of the rape, assault, and attempted murder of jogger Trisha Mieli, Donald Trump continued to call for their executions.

Civilized countries don’t engage in execution. The United States is increasingly uncivilized, particularly in the area of race and religion. We don’t hear any discussion of how, exactly, the state will kill Michael Addison. The methods sanctioned by our state are hanging and lethal injection. Lethal injection drugs are no longer available. The countries that manufacture them don’t sell them to us any more, because they don’t believe in the death penalty. Will New Hampshire purchase other, questionable drugs? Or will New Hampshire rebuild the gallows that was dismantled at the state prison in 1994?

We should, perhaps, take a moment to consider this.  New Hampshire hasn’t conducted an execution since 1939. Will we bring the death penalty out of mothballs to kill a black man? Would we hang him? Tiny, white, New Hampshire proudly clings to the first in the nation presidential primary, despite rumblings from other states that we’re tiny, white, and clueless about the rest of the country. If the moral arguments against the death penalty don’t sway folks, perhaps the very real potential of losing that exalted primary status will. 

Published as an op-ed in the February 22, 2019 issue of the Conway Daily Sun newspaper 

Dirty Little Secret

New Hampshire does things that other states do not. We’re the only state with a 424 member volunteer legislature. We’re the only state that funds our state park system with user fees. There’s a reason other states don’t do these things – they don’t work. 

NH is also the only state where people who have been civilly committed to the state psychiatric hospital can be transferred to the Secure Psychiatric Unit (SPU) at the state men’s prison even if they haven’t been charged or convicted of a crime. If they are considered a danger to themselves or others, they can be transferred to the men’s prison, even if they’re women. Once there, the patients intermingle with the inmates.

The state prison is home to male inmates. The SPU is part of the prison. NH is the only state in the union that imprisons people with mental illness who have committed no crime; just because there is no place else secure enough for them.

This practice began 30 years ago. It was touted at the time as a temporary solution. Thirty years ago, the mental health system dismantled by Ronald Reagan and his acolytes. Institutions were emptied, with no planning for the now de-institutionalized patients. A month before Reagan was elected, President Carter signed the Mental Health Systems Act, which proposed to continue the federal community mental health centers program, and funded federal grants. This was all trashed when Reagan took office. Meanwhile, the folks who had been institutionalized often wound up living on the street, with no supports or treatment.

In 1986, the NH Supreme Court ruled that putting people in the SPU was not a violation of their constitutional rights. It was all too easy to forget all about those folks. If there’s one thing that the legislature hates, it’s spending money. And so, the practice of putting non-criminals behind bars in the name of treatment was ignored for a couple of decades, while the legislature blithely kicked the can down the road.

In 2004, there was an audit, and in 2005 a House study committee. In 2010 there was another study committee. For some years, State Representative Renny Cushing has been filing legislation to try to end this practice, as he did again this year. A few weeks ago a story in Fosters quoted Speaker of the House Gene Chandler as saying that lawmakers weren’t familiar enough with the situation to speak about changing it. It’s only been going on for 30 years.

In that same Foster’s story Associate AG Anne Edwards claimed that patients aren’t treated like inmates at all. The patients have prison numbers, can’t use the phone, and visitors have to go through background checks. Nothing I have ever read or heard suggests that patients at SPU are not being treated like prisoners. They are locked in wire cages for “therapy sessions.”  They are civilly committed to a prison. If this were normal, if this were considered therapeutic, other states would be doing it. 

They don’t. Only NH does this. 

In Colorado, psychiatric patients in crisis can be held in a jail for 24 hours if there are no psychiatric beds available. Colorado is a big rural state, and that 24 hours began to turn into 48 hours, or more. Sheriff’s tried to have the hold time lengthened. The governor vetoed the bill. A task force was created to look at the problem, and it actually did – and that work led to change. It’s now against the law to hold anyone in a county jail for a mental health problem. A bill was passed to increase funding for community based mental health treatment. Much of the funding will come from the state’s marijuana tax.

The difference, of course, is that in Colorado there was law enforcement and legislative support for ending the barbaric practice of imprisoning the mentally ill. In NH, there is no support for change. NH is perfectly happy to continue to sweep the criminalization of the mentally ill under the rug.

It’s been our dirty little secret for a long time. Social media can be a force for good, and in the case of SPU it has been. Nancy West of InDepthNH.org, an online news site, got a grant to investigate the SPU, and has been covering it for some time. Those stories led to coverage in the mainstream NH media. A young man named Andrew Butler is currently incarcerated in the SPU, and his case is getting a lot of attention. The legislature is finally paying attention, and recently moved to require the Department of Corrections to have the SPU accredited as a behavioral prison unit.

This is not a solution; it’s a way of normalizing the practice of incarcerating the mentally ill, in the 21^stcentury, in the state of New Hampshire, the seventh wealthiest state in the nation. Shame on us. 

Published as an op-ed in the May 25, 2018 edition of the Conway Daily Sun Newspaper

Edited to add this press release that the Treatment Advocacy Center sent to me. This is a snippet:

"New Hampshire's treatment of people with serious mental illnesses makes it a poster child for hypocrisy," Treatment Advocacy Center executive director John Snook added. "Instead of 'live free or die,' their credo should be 'go to prison and die'. The Governor and the Legislature need to fix this."

Using prevalence rates for schizophrenia and severe bipolar disorder, the Treatment Advocacy Center estimates that there are 36,000 people in the Granite State with serious mental illnesses. In the event of a psychiatric crisis, however, there is virtually no place for that population to receive inpatient care. As of 2016, New Hampshire had a total of 158 state hospital beds, or less than 12 per 100,000 people, which falls far below the minimum standard of 50 beds per 100,000 people.

Please read the whole thing.

Alternate Realities

It’s that time of year – when it’s time for our state representatives to file bills for 2018. At this larval stage, they’re called LSRs, or Legislative Service Requests. A legislator has an idea for a bill, and so they come up with a title and may begin drafting it, before turning it over to Legislative Services where the intent and language will be fleshed out. Some will be withdrawn by the sponsors. Some will make it all the way to being on the House docket in 2018. Right now, the fledgling LSRs are titles only, and available for viewing on the NH General Court website. There are currently 685 LSRs proposed by House members. Sixteen have already been withdrawn.

In preparation for this column, I took a quick, unscientific poll, asking people for their top 3-5 issues that badly need to be addressed in New Hampshire. The number one concern was health care (includes dental, mental health, and addiction), followed by a broad based tax (property tax relief), affordable housing, funding higher education/supporting public education, infrastructure, livable wages, and climate change/the environment. Other high ranking concerns: ending voter suppression, childcare, gerrymandering, legalizing marijuana, public transportation, and protecting water. 

This was not a scientific poll, but it’s likely that most voters in our state have some of the same concerns. Worried about health care? Representatives Josh Moore and Jeanine Notter are sponsoring a resolution to affirm the state’s religious heritage and constitutional right to practice religion and fee speech. Desperate for property tax relief?  Jeanine Notter and Victoria Sullivan are sponsoring an LSR, “relative to information regarding abortion.” That’ll help you hang on to your house.

Concerned about the lack of housing? This very newspaper has pages of help wanted ads and about a column and a half of rentals. If affordable housing is one of your issues, you’ll be glad to hear that Rep. Dave Testerman has an LSR that would include “sexual reassignment” under the definition of child abuse. Worried about our failing roads, bridges, sewer, and water systems? Rep. Dan Itse wants your driver’s license or non-driver ID to include your citizenship status.

Is the cost of higher education and the loss of young people worrying you? Rep. Brian Stone would like to establish the University System of NH as a political subdivision of the state. Because putting the legislature, a place of science denial, where at least 40 representatives don’t know how to use email, in charge of the university system is a brilliant idea.

Worried about low wages and income inequality? Rep. Dan Itse is sponsoring a resolution calling for the pardon of Jerry DeLemus who was convicted for his role in the armed standoff at the Bundy Ranch, where he was “protecting” Cliven Bundy who owed the government over a million dollars in grazing fees.

You get the idea. The issues that are most concerning to NH residents are not reflected in the 2018 LSRs. Rather than deal with the real problems facing our state; the Republican majority is throwing a Tea Party. They know, of course, that this is may be their last chance to do the kind of social engineering that the basest of their base drools over. They have a Republican governor for the first time in decades, and Trump acolyte Chris Sununu is their best chance at passing some of this dreck.

Abortion, gender reassignment (three LSRs so far), eligibility for public assistance, coercive abortions, voter ID, domicile (seriously – more of this?) …. none of these are issues that even came up in my survey. There is an LSR proposed by Rep. Steve Smith to eliminate the commission that studies the recommendations of the National Transportation Safety Board. One can see why that would be a priority.

There are LSRs that do deal with pressing issues. Rep. Renny Cushing is sponsoring a bill to require the secure psychiatric unit at the state hospital to be accredited as a psychiatric hospital. As it is now, we put people who have committed no crimes behind bars at the state prison because we don’t have a secure psychiatric unit in a hospital anywhere, and we’re too cheap to build one.  

Rep. Mindi Messmer is sponsoring an LSR aimed at protecting our water from PFOAS, and remediating the Coakely Landfill in Greenland – a superfund waste site. Rep. Travis Bennett is sponsoring an LSR establishing a committee to study the fiscal impacts of repairing or replacing our water supply systems, aka our crumbling infrastructure. None of these are likely to go anywhere in the coming session.

The entire point of our foolishly large, volunteer legislature is to provide real, accessible representation. Because they are unpaid, we get the rich, the retired, and the crazy.

They’re having a tea party at the legislature in 2018. Let’s hope it will be the last.

This was published as an op-ed in the September 29  edition of the Conway Daily Sun newspaper 

Bqhatewvr

Scott Brown - the former US Senator from Massachusetts who moved to NH half an hour ago is the gift that keeps on giving. Steve Peoples via the AP:

Outside after a breakfast of corned beef hash and eggs, Brown acknowledged the challenge.

"Do I have the best credentials? Probably not. 'Cause, you know, whatever. But I have long and strong ties to this state," he told The Associated Press. "People know." Brown spent the first year and a half of his life living in New Hampshire before his family moved to Massachusetts.

Bqhatewvr, indeed Scottachusetts. 

But wait, there's more!

Brown told Pratt that "carpetbagger is a derogatory term" in New Hampshire given that roughly 60 percent of its people were born elsewhere, including the current and former Democratic governors. Gov. Maggie Hassan moved to the state in 1989. Shaheen, who was born in Missouri, has lived in New Hampshire for more than 40 years.

"Sen. Shaheen is not from here, but apparently it's a problem with me?" Brown asked during a brief interview outside the diner.

Treason's Greetings

New Hampshire’s junior US Senator has been in the news lately, full of outrage at the new budget deal being struck. Sadly for us all, she’s not outraged about it for the right reasons. Senator Ayotte is all puffed up about cuts to military pensions. The NH mainstream media, in their role as GOP stenographers, trumpeted the outrage with no critical analysis and little fact. They howled their horror that Senator Shaheen would vote for this! OMG!!

The abhorrent “bipartisan” budget deal trims military pensions by about $6 billion over a 10-year period. It’s a reduction in cost of living increases for retirees that applies only while they’re still of working age. These are frequently retirees on their second careers – many working for defense contractors. This isn’t taking food out of the mouths of the poor grunts stuck in Afghanistan. Like many things, it sounds bad, until you know the details.

Our Kelly counts on an uncritical media, and she is rewarded for her devotion most of the time. The GOP media panderers have failed to point out that she hasn’t voiced any objection at all to cutting off benefits for the long term unemployed – many of whom are also veterans.

Ayotte, in her explanation of why she wasn’t voting for this budget wagged a finger and said that surely we could find $6 billion elsewhere. She’s absolutely correct about that. One aspect of the budget she agreed with is increasing defense spending by about $22 billion. Take that increase away, and there’s no reason to commit austerity against any veteran. The Pentagon doesn’t need an increase. Their budget should be shrinking, and Ayotte should be fighting against Pentagon waste. The F-35 fighter plane that doesn’t fly is still being lavishly funded with our tax dollars. The M1A1 Abrams tanks are still rolling off the assembly line and going straight to storage, because the Army doesn’t want them. The C-27J Spartan cargo planes are still being built, and going right to boneyards. The Air Force doesn’t want them. There have been 16 built, and five more scheduled to be produced in 2014, at an estimated waste of $432 million.

Ayotte an only pay lip service to Pentagon waste, because actually looking into it won’t make Senator Ayotte popular with her supporters or her financial backers. Ayotte’s #1 donor industry is the securities and investment sector. Goldman Sachs is her fifth largest donor. Many of the same investment companies that back Senator Ayotte also fund defense contractors. Goldman Sachs touts their socially responsible investment practices, while loaning money to nuclear weapons manufacturers. Fidelity, another Ayotte funder also is very generous in loaning to big defense contractors. A closer look also reveals that BAE Systems, Honeywell International, Lockheed Martin, and Raytheon are also Ayotte donors. They all have the distinction of being the recipients of the largesse of the big banksters like Goldman Sachs and Fidelity. It’s a nasty little circle, and to keep all of them filling her campaign coffers, Ayotte has to continue to increase the defense budget. A cynic might also add that she has to continue to increase the number of veterans as well.

Senator Ayotte would much rather take food away from low income children, which is rather short sighted, given that some of them will grow up to be the kind of cannon fodder required to fight the endless wars that she and her ilk would like to inflict upon us.

The uncritical, GOP toadies of NH media continue to fail us, by not even bothering to look at the reasons behind Ayotte’s vote.

They’ve failed us a lot lately. The wheels are coming off the clown car known as the NHGOP, and that, too is going unreported. The freedumb/libertea faction is at war with the more traditional members of the party. The traditional Republicans are aware that they don’t have any kind of a bench, and that the people signed up to run against Senator Shaheen are silly candidates. The campaign of Jim Rubens was over the same day he announced his candidacy. The campaign of former Senator Bob Smith is an embarrassment to the party. They’re working to recruit and squeeze as much out of former Senator Scott Brown of Massachusetts as they can. He’s got name recognition and he’s got money. That interests them. That he was only able to finish out a term before getting kicked to the curb doesn’t seem to be an issue. He was elected in current century and doesn’t have a bad toupee, which makes him a star already.

The freedumb and libertea crowd hates him, because he’s actually in favor of putting some restrictions on gun ownership. Brown was scheduled to be appearing at a fundraiser, even as the NH media debated whether or not he’d run for Senate, if he was moving to NH, and if they could hang his picture in their lockers. This led to State Rep. JR Hoell of Dunbarton talking about how Brown was unacceptable, and it might be time for armed insurrection, just like “it happened in the Revolutionary War.” Even the worst students are aware that the Revolutionary War was not fought over a political candidate that a faction of the Republican Party objected to. This is the equivalent of a toddler having a tantrum because he is told he can’t have candy for dinner. The NH media did not report this story. It was mentioned by out of state news groups, and even reported internationally, but the only NH media outlet that reported Hoell’s rather treasonous threats was the online Patch news group. 

Hoell has since gone on to bellow that Scott Brown has BROKEN HIS OATH to uphold the Constitution at least 3 times. In Hoell speak, that means that Brown discussed banning some semi-automatic rifles. Try as I might, I can’t find any mention of semi-automatic rifles in the 2^nd Amendment. In fact, I can’t find the right to own as many guns as one wants in that rather brief amendment. Brown, at least, was a part of a well-regulated militia, which is more than we can say for Rep. Hoell.

It’s generous of the NH media to gloss over Ayotte’s vote, or give Hoell the gift of not reporting on his lunatic pronouncements. It’s also deeply unfair to voters who deserve to be well informed. A simple explanation of the $6 billion in cuts to military pensions should have been included in the news stories. And everyone who lives in NH should be aware that there is a dangerous faction of the NH GOP that threaten “revolution” every time they don’t get their way.

© sbruce 2013  published as biweekly column in the Conway Daily Sun newspaper.