We Remain Undeterred

The Governor and the Executive Council comprise the executive branch of our state government. The Council has veto power over pardons, contracts with a value greater than $10,000, and nominations. Executive Councilors earn a yearly salary of $12,354 plus an additional $4000 per year for expenses, in Districts 2-5. The District 1 Councilor gets $5800 per year for expenses. It should come as no surprise that NH is the only state that does the executive branch this way. We’re the only state with a ridiculously large House full of unpaid legislators. Neither one of these things actually works all that well anymore, but that does not deter us.

The Executive Council was intended to be a check on the governor’s power. Instead, it’s become a home for some angry men who don’t give a fig about what’s right for the state. Their figs are reserved for what is far right, as in their ideology. The Executive Council has become just another parade ground for ideological posturing by the members of the GOP as they use the position as a springboard to higher office.

Last summer the Executive Council voted against funding Planned Parenthood on the basis of the bogus videos that have since been discredited. Republicans seized on those videos as a way to play politics with women’s health and bodily autonomy, while pretending to have great concern for life. That Planned Parenthood saves lives didn’t factor into their grandstanding.

Planned Parenthood saved my daughter’s life twenty some years ago. Low wage working women in the north country didn’t have many choices when it came to their health care back then. The choices haven’t expanded all that much in the ensuing years, though the ACA has improved access for some. My daughter could afford Planned Parenthood, thanks to their sliding fee scale. An annual pap smear came back showing precancerous cells in her cervix. They were removed. She didn’t get cervical cancer. About 15 years later, she had a baby, because she didn’t get cancer and die, thanks to Planned Parenthood.  

It is worth pointing out that Planned Parenthood is not just a provider of birth control. Planned Parenthood also provides STD testing and treatment, breast exams, and cancer screenings.

When Executive Councilors Joe Kenney and David Wheeler start grandstanding about Planned Parenthood, I take it personally. Women’s lives and women’s health are of no concern to these men. Women are just pawns to be used for grandstanding purposes.

Last week the Executive Council voted to restore funding to Planned Parenthood. Republican Chris Sununu was the swing vote this time. He’s supported Planned Parenthood in the past, and after a foray into political expedience last summer, he’s returned to his original stance. His own political party has already begun to excoriate him. There is no room for differences of opinion in today’s Republican Party.

David Wheeler brayed about “Planned Parenthood selling baby parts.” This has been disproven (at the same time the videos were debunked) but in the fact free age we live in, that is unimportant. He knows that the NH media won’t hold him accountable for his lies. Only two states (California and Washington) had fetal tissue donation programs. The program was completely voluntary. The tissue wasn’t sold – it was donated. Some (not all) of the clinics were reimbursed for the cost of shipping and handling. The tissue went on to be used for scientific research.

Joe Kenney put on his sad face to declare that the money for Planned Parenthood should be spent on the opioid crisis. Family planning is not a crisis, he opined, in the way that one might if they had zero chance of ever becoming pregnant. Women’s lives don’t matter in Joeworld, but suddenly, addicts lives matter? Try as I might, I can’t ever remember Joe having any concern for them in the past.

At the Executive Council meeting, Kenney said that there is never an unwanted child. There are orphanages and adoption agencies, he said. Does he even know what an orphanage is? (Spoiler Alert: warehouse for unwanted children.) Fauxlifers love to pretend concern for children, while begrudging every dime spent on their education, and doing nothing about child poverty and homelessness.

The 2015 data from NH Kids Count shows that in Carroll County, 10.5% of families with children under the age of 18 live below the federal poverty level. In Coos County it’s 19.2% of families, and in Grafton it’s 11.8%. Given that NH is the seventh wealthiest state in the nation, those numbers are shocking. Joe Kenney has yet to put on his sad public face to discuss the need to do anything about the increasing percentage of child poverty in his district.

According to the nhgov website, “The Executive Council plays a vital role in improving the state's infrastructure, especially roads and bridges, via management and oversight of the state's 10 year Highway Plan.” The website does not list “overseeing women’s reproductive parts” as one of the EC responsibilities. Ponder that next time you drive on East Conway Road.

NH typically has about 500 bridges on the state’s red list for structural impairments. We have 1,2000 bridges that are over 75 years old. New bridges are added to the red list every year. We add more bridges than we take off, though one way to remove a bridge from the red list is just to close it. The wait list for new municipal bridge projects is about 17 years. Our 10 year transportation plan is a farce. But hey, that’s not sexy. Talking about bridges doesn’t get your face on WMUR or get you written up in Breitbart. Doing your damn job doesn’t get your name up in lights.

According to the Executive Council website, Council members are supposed to be advocates for the people. Check out their responsibilities at
https://www.nh.gov/council/about-us/index.htm , then ask questions of your local EC candidates accordingly. You might ask about that “vital” role they play in improving our infrastructure. Ask the incumbent what he’s done in that regard. Be sure to ask which people they intend to advocate for.

 Published as an op-ed in the July 8 edition of the Conway Daily Sun newspaper.

Chris Sununu - Impervious to Facts

Back in August, Chris Sununu voted to defund Planned Parenthood in New Hampshire, after the big fake video uproar:

With Planned Parenthood, “you have a criminal investigation on a federal level,” Sununu tells National Review, referring to a congressional probe into the organization launched by House Republicans. “If this had been any other business with this type of legal and ethical scrutiny, there would be no question about cutting state funds.” The state’s elected council voted to cut $639,000 in funding for Planned Parenthood. Their success may have been partly due to New Hampshire’s unique process, in which its elected council works with the governor to approve large state contracts.

(Note: The Executive Council is one of many processes unique to NH - like using user fees to fund our state park system. They are unique for good reason - they don't work well.)

There was a criminal investigation. Planned Parenthood has been exonerated. Here's the thing. Abortion is legal. Tissue donation is legal. Patients have to agree to it, just as survivors agree to organ donation when their family member dies. It's a choice. 

Not only has Planned Parenthood been cleared of any wrong doing, the videographers were indicted in Texas.  That's right, Texas. Not exactly the home of abortion friendly politics. 

Despite the exoneration and subsequent indictment, Chris Sununu is staying the course:

Chris Sununu, an executive councilor and Republican candidate for governor, said he will not change his position against funding two Planned Parenthood state contracts, after a grand jury in Houston, Texas, Monday found no wrongdoing by the organization relative to a fetal tissue program in that state.

Nor, he said, will he be influenced by the GOP-majority New Hampshire House’s vote Wednesday not to investigate the women’s health care provider. 

The facts aren't going to sway this guy! Nosiree Bob! 

In interviews Wednesday and Thursday, he said his continued opposition to the contracts is based on Gov. Maggie Hassan’s refusal to investigate Planned Parenthood of Northern New England and because of attacks against him by the women’s health care provider following his vote against the contracts. 

Sununu wants the governor to spend state money on an investigation of ....what, exactly?  Planned Parenthood has been exonerated. NH has never been part of the tissue donation program. 

“They proved themselves to be bullies and I don’t do business with bullies,” Sununu said.

An inability to handle pushback from opposition doesn't bode well for him should he be elected governor of our state. 

 Chris Sununu once had some cred as a pro-choice Republican, but now he is running for Governor. He's going to need a LOT of money to fund that campaign. Let us all ruminate on how many GOP funders will be willing to fund a "pro-choice" Republican. Sununu made a very calculated decision to choose money over facts. Money over women's women's lives. 

Allergy Warning

Members of the NH House have filed most of the bills for the 2016 session of the legislature. The deadline for filing LSRs was September 18. LSR is the acronym for legislative service requests. Legislative Services helps state representatives and senators with research into these fledgling ideas that may become bills. There have been 639 LSRs filed by House members thus far.

The Senate’s filing deadline is November 3. There are only 32 LSRs filed by senators thus far. It’s a safe bet that a big bunch will be filed at the last minute. Also listed on the NH General Court website are the 56 LSRs that have already been withdrawn. Only the titles of the LSRs and the lead sponsors are available, so it can be difficult, in some cases, to know what the bill is really about. In others, there is little doubt.

We all know that NH has some serious issues that need to be addressed. In looking at the House LSRs, it seems that the most important problems we face in NH appear to be guns and abortion. Get ready for the non-budget session of the biennium, with a side order of special sauce on account of the presidential election. Avoid the sauce if you have allergies, since it was prepared in an area contaminated by nuts.

State Representative Michael Brewster represents Epsom and Pittsfield. He appears to be the winner in this years “most LSRs filed contest,” after filing a whopping 37. It seems that Brewster has some grievances with our judicial system, regarding the custody of his child. Most of the 37 LSRs Brewster has filed involve judges or the judiciary system. Brewster has also filed an LSR calling for the impeachment of Governor Hassan, and another to remove the five executive councilors from office. But, so far, my absolute favorite of Brewster’s LSRs: “prohibiting the general court from filing legislation in the second year of the session.” Well done, sir.

There are several bills calling for a registry of drug dealers to be created. House Majority Leader, Jack Flanagan, has one that would establish a registry for people convicted of heroin related offenses. There isn’t a registry for the bankers who destroyed the US economy, but Flanagan wants to put some poor junkie who gets caught buying a bag on a registry that will forever impede him from turning his life around. (A gun registry would be tyranny!) Jack Flanagan is pondering a run for Congress in the second district.

Rep. Gene Chandler is one of the sponsors of an LSR aimed at amending the NH Constitution on the issue of domicile. The Republican dedication to limiting voting rights continues unabated. Other states are looking at expanding voter rights. New Hampshire is not one of them.  

State Representative Don Leeman would like to require drug testing for public assistance recipients. This has proven to be a big waste of money in other states, where the only winners were the companies who raked in the big bucks for finding a tiny percentage of people who failed the test. One wonders how far this would go. Would the families who receive assistance for their children with disabilities be required to pee into cups? Leeman filed another LSR that would restrict the use of food stamps in convenience stores. Many SNAP recipients live in areas where there are no supermarkets and there is no public transportation. Apparently it was a long, hot summer in Rochester, with nothing to do but think about ways to demonize the poor.

Self-styled Constitutional scholar, Rep. Dan Itse did not disappoint. He may have been overshadowed by Rep. Brewster in the number of LSRs filed, (Itse only filed 28) but he did manage to bring his usual level of peculiarity to the process. Itse has filed an LSR that would change the marriage license requirement to a requirement that couples obtain a certificate of intent to marry. He would also like to proclaim the second week of September as Patriot Week.

An LSR was filed calling on the US House and Senate to consider a constitutional amendment prohibiting campaign contributions, unless the donor is eligible to vote in that election. Free Staters Ed Comeau and Max Abramson didn’t utter a peep when a libertarian millionaire from Texas inserted his “free speech” into the special election in March that gave Yvonne Dean-Bailey a seat in the NH House, but both are sponsors of this LSR.  Continuing on in the tradition of legislating personal grudges, Abramson has also filed an LSR requiring the testing of law enforcement officers for steroid use. Abramson was arrested and charged with felony gun charges for attempting to break up a party at his house (in a residential neighborhood) by firing a gun.

There are at least 8 LSRs regarding firearms, but most of them aren’t coming from the gundamentalists. One would create a criminal penalty for providing a firearm to an individual that is prohibited from having one. Another would require firearm owners to have liability insurance, something that might go a long way to cutting back on stupid. For example, Max Abramson’s party trick would have caused his insurance rates to go up.

There are also 8 bills aimed at either hindering or ending a woman’s right to bodily autonomy. The faked up videos done by an anti-choice group got the GOP all wound up into thinking they can somehow ride to victory in 2016 by forcing women to serve as involuntary incubators. NH has never been a part of Planned Parenthood’s fetal tissue donation program. (Only 2 of 48 states are). Demonizing Planned Parenthood means demonizing the thousands of women who rely on their services. Planned Parenthood saved my daughter’s life. They are often the only health care low income women in rural areas can afford to access.

It’s a wonderful bit of hypocrisy to see how many Free Staters support the various bills. These are people who claim to be all about freedom and libertea, but as always, when the surface is scratched, libertarian freedom applies (and appeals) to white, heterosexual men. And as always, the sponsors of these bills vote against any programs that help women, children, and families.

This is just a small snapshot of what will be coming up in 2016. It’s a mere thumbnail of the bad and the bizarre, but there are a number of LSRs that sound good. Some originate right here in Carroll County. In the coming weeks, I’ll cover those, too. Meanwhile, watch out for the allergens.

Published as an op-ed in the October 30, 2015 edition of the Conway Daily Sun

Fauxlifers

Jeb! Bush recently spoke at the Send North America conference, a large evangelical gathering. Jeb! said he wasn’t sure we need half a billion dollars for women’s health issues. His handlers have been getting tons of aerobic exercise trying to backpedal on that statement. It’s not wise to be so honest about the fact that women are regarded as the disposable gender. Jeb! and the rest of the GOP candidates have seized on defunding Planned Parenthood as a way to stand out from the rest of the pack (who all have identical ideology) and ride to the White House on a wave of loathing for women. Oh, wait – those loathers call themselves “pro-life.” The only “life” they care about is that of an imaginary fetus. Once it becomes real, they lose interest in it. They certainly have no interest in making sure it has access to health care, food, housing, or education.

Jeb! distinguished himself when he was Governor of Florida, by defunding Planned Parenthood.  He further burnished his fauxlife cred by getting involved in the end of life decisions of the Schiavo family. The fauxlifers don’t usually bother much with the born, until the end of their lives approaches. They really love a chance to get involved in a big right-to-die situation, and especially if the patient involved is female. Terry Schiavo wasn’t the only one. Remember Karen Ann Quinlan or Nancy Cruzan? More recently the fauxlife crowd scored a twofer, by trying to force the family of Marlise Munoz to keep her on life support. Munoz was ghoulishly kept on life support, against the wishes of her family, for two months because she was pregnant when she died. Fauxlifers are also intent on making sure we all suffer as much as possible rather than choose to end our own lives with medical assistance in the event of a terminal illness.

Some anti-abortion terrorists doctored some videotapes about Planned Parenthood, and now the GOP is using this as another weapon in the ongoing war against women. It’s the equivalent of Jimmy “the pimp” O’Keefe’s highly edited sting against ACORN. You remember ACORN – the community based organization that advocated for health care, housing, and voter registration in low and moderate-income neighborhoods. ACORN was completely destroyed by those fake videos. By the time they were exonerated, the damage had been done. In August of 2013 Congress was gearing up for a 13^th vote to defund ACORN. ACORN had been defunct for 3 years at the time. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn they’re STILL voting on ACORN. They’ve voted 56 times to repeal the Affordable Health Care Act, and there’s talk of another vote in the fall.

The Planned Parenthood videos are similar in that respect. Highly edited, for the most emotional possible ginning up of the fauxlifers. Planned Parenthood is selling body parts of the BAYBEEZ!  It’s not true, but truth doesn’t matter to this crowd.  These people don’t care that some BAYBEEZ grow up to be homeless, or hungry, or get lead poisoned as the result of a sleazy slumlord. They’ll vote against any kind of funding to protect children and families. They’ll vote against “inconveniencing” landlords by forcing them to eliminate lead paint from their buildings. After all, landlords are in business! Congressmen and Senators who can’t lift a finger to do anything that needs doing in the US House or Senate have all kinds of energy to spare for interfering in women’s lives. They are desperate to ensure that low and moderate-income women have even fewer health care options.

Imagine how much better things would be going here in the USA if these elected officials were interested in finding a way to repair our failing state and national infrastructures. Roads and bridges aren’t sexy, we are told. (Apparently making women’s reproductive decisions IS sexy.) What if our alleged leaders were all about finding a way to be competitive in telecommunications infrastructure? The US ranks far behind other countries in terms of internet speed, connectivity, and the availability of public wifi. South Korea has the fastest internet speed and the cheapest prices in the world. The best speeds that consumers can buy in major US cities are half as fast, and cost $300 a month. One would think that the boosters of “American exceptionalism” would be interested in ensuring that there is, in fact, such a thing. One would be wrong. As long as we have more guns, sell more weapons, and have the biggest war machine, we are exceptional. The country is falling apart, but hey – we can force women to serve as involuntary incubators! USA! USA!

In Texas, Governor Smart Glasses and the Texas legislature cut the state’s family planning budget by 2/3 as a way of “wiping out the abortion industry.” They succeeded in closing 53 women’s health clinics around the state. Not a one of those clinics that closed performed abortions. All those closings succeed in doing is to make it harder for women to access screenings and health services. The other unspoken goal is to ensure that women don’t have access to contraception, either. After all, he who has control of women’s reproductive decisions has control of women’s lives.

In civilized countries, women’s health and reproductive decisions are their own business. In civilized countries, there is universal health care, family leave, subsidized childcare, and no wage gap for women. In civilized countries children don’t die every day because they found a gun in the bedroom. This is another issue that shows the fauxlifers for what they are. They don’t have any problem accepting the idea that the tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of infants and children.

Women having bodily autonomy is unacceptable. Guns and moar gunz? Now that’s REAL freedom.

Published as an oped in the Conway Daily Sun newspaper on August 7, 2015