Guns and Grifting

The new legislature has been sworn in, and will be back in session on January 2. 

As I write this, there are 894 LSRs. An LSR is a fledgling bill that is written by the sponsor, and then sent to Legislative Services to be fleshed out and checked out. It is assigned a number and published. It will be assigned to a committee, have a hearing, and be voted on. House members have submitted 609 LSRs, and 204 have come from the Senate. Another 71 LSRs were withdrawn before they ever became bills. There are ten proposed amendments to the NH Constitution.

Some are predictable. One wants to change the NH Constitution to stipulate that taxpayer funds can’t be limited to supporting public schools. As we learned last biennium, taking money out of the public schools will mean dramatic increases in property taxes, but our libertea brethren don’t care about that.

There’s a proposed amendment that would stipulate that any broad based tax should be prohibited. Another would alter the state constitution to prohibit a tax on personal income from being enacted. A recent report finds that NH has the third highest property taxes in the US. This kind of GOP policy will help ensure that we reach first place. 

Another amendment would reduce the number of representatives in the House, and another would allow compensation for legislators to be determined by a joint resolution with the approval of the Executive Council. It seems our “live free or die” legislators want a bigger paycheck. Another would enshrine the right to hunt, subject to laws promoting sound wildlife and conservation management.

There is also a proposed amendment that would allow no-excuse absentee voting for NH residents. Perhaps the most important amendment would establish an independent redistricting commission to draw boundaries for state and federal offices. Why does this need to be a constitutional amendment? So that neither party can undo it on a whim. The state senate districts have been ridiculously gerrymandered. NH Republicans have historically opposed the creation of an independent commission, probably because they’ve done most of the gerrymandering. All of the proposed amendments have a long way to go before we ever see them on a ballot.

The first year of the biennium is the year that the next state budget is worked out. The House and Senate have both decided to continue to have Thursday voting sessions, something that began during the last biennium. Former Speaker Terie Norelli introduced mixed party seating during her second term. Her hope was that legislators would get to know one another and form relationships that transcended party affiliation. That’s been the custom since. The Republicans asked Speaker Shurtleff to restore party segregated seating, so that they can sit together, and maintain the kind of discipline needed to meet Minority Leader Dick Hinch’s stated goal of disruption and delay. Shurtleff has agreed to their request.

The GOP gundamentalists are getting all ginned up to fight about a proposed rule change that would forbid concealed carry firearms in the House chamber, anteroom, coatroom, or in the House Gallery. It’s understandable. Republicans who carry have shown an inability to holster their guns properly, as we saw when Kyle Tasker’s gun fell to the floor in a meeting of the Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee. He’d been playing quick draw out in the hallway, and failed to secure one of his holsters. Tasker carried a gun under each arm, because you can’t be too safe in dangerous NH. The last gun drop was made by Representative Carolyn Halstead whose gun fell out of the back of her pants in a hearing on full day kindergarten that was filled with parents and children. Kyle Tasker is in prison on felony charges and Halstead was not reelected, so there is an opening for a GOP gun dropper. In most public buildings where unstable persons are likely to be present (courthouses, planes, NRA conventions) concealed firearms are not allowed.

As anyone who has ever attended a demonstration at the State House knows, a sign on a stick is not allowed inside the building. That’s right – the State House is a stick free zone, and I’m certain we’re all safer as a result. The last stick massacre was a national tragedy. 

There’s going to be a lot to pay attention to in the coming biennium. Keep an eye on the story of the funds raised for the governor’s inauguration, and how the unspent funds were dispersed to the governor’s family members, advisors, and – of course, to himself. It appears to be near Trumpian level grifting, right here in River City.

It’s a shame we’ve abandoned all interest in expecting our elected officials to avoid the appearance of impropriety. Let’s insist they do better in 2019.

Happy New Year, everyone! 

This was published as an op-ed in the December 28, 2018 edition of the Conway Daily Sun newspaper 

Impropriety

Once upon a time, people who held elected office used to strive to avoid the appearance of impropriety. Back in those halcyon days, we were concerned with corruption and ethics. There were big public investigations. There were legal charges and fines. People went to prison.

Wherever there is any kind of power there is the possibility of corruption. During the Grant administration, the Whiskey Ring scandal was exposed in 1875. Whiskey distillers were bribing government officials who, in turn, helped the distillers evade federal taxes on their product. Millions of dollars in federal taxes were diverted. Orville Babcock, private secretary to President Grant was indicted as a member of the ring, which contributed (along with other scandals) to his administration being seen as emblematic of corruption.

The Teapot Dome scandal also involved bribery, and took place between 1921-1922, during the Harding administration. The US Navy converted from using coal to fuel oil. President Taft designated several oil producing areas as Naval Oil Reserves. In 1921, President Harding issued an executive order that turned control of the Teapot Dome Oil Field in Wyoming and the Elk Hills and Buena Vista Oil Fields in California from the Dept. of the Navy to the Dept. of the Interior. This was implemented in 1922 at the request of Interior Secretary Albert Fall. Later in the year, Fall leased oil production rights at Teapot Dome to Mammoth Oil, a subsidy of Sinclair Oil. He leased the Elk Hills reserve to Pan American Petroleum and Transport Company. There was no competitive bidding in either case. Fall became a wealthy man, after receiving gifts from the executives in both companies that would today be worth $5.42 million. The sudden improvement in his standard of living brought about his downfall. The leases themselves were not illegal. The secret deals and the bribery were.

There was an investigation. Other oil companies were miffed about the no bid licenses that had been granted, and Senator Robert LaFollette of Wisconsin led an investigation by the Senate Committee on Public Lands. Fall had done a good job of covering his tracks, but Edward Doheny of Pan American Petroleum had given Fall a no-interest loan of $100,000. Once that loan (bribe) was discovered, Fall was finished. He was found guilty of accepting bribes. Edward Doheny was acquitted of paying bribes to Fall.

Corporations will always find ways to bribe public officials into aiding their pursuit of lining their pockets. Coal, oil, and uranium aren’t the only natural resources that are being mined by the unscrupulous. Right in our own back yard, the largest food and beverage company in the world is mining water, and seeking to expand their extraction operations in Fryeburg, Maine. Local elected officials have failed – and failed mightily - to avoid the appearance of impropriety.

Nestlé’s lack of ethics became national news in the 1970’s when we learned that they were aggressively marketing baby formula to third world mothers. They handed out literature, had women dressed as nurses to discuss the benefits of formula, gave out baby bottles, and free samples. After the mother’s own milk dried up, they were forced to purchase formula, and often had nothing but contaminated water to mix it with. Many diluted the formula to stretch it out, because they were so poor. They weren’t told that diluting the formula, especially with contaminated water, could lead to malnutrition and the death of their infants. 

The ensuing scandal and Nestle boycott brought about the creation of the International Code of Marketing Breast Milk Substitutes in 1981. The code states that baby food companies may not promote their products in hospitals or shops. They may not give free samples to mothers or give gifts to health workers or mothers. They may not give misleading information, and must explain the cost of using the formula. 

Nestle is still under scrutiny. The boycott was called off for a few years, but it is back in place, because, naturally, they’ve found ways around the code. The opportunity to make money from some of the poorest people on the planet was too alluring. Nestle exploits, creates misfortune, and then profits from that misfortune.

In Michigan, where Flint residents were poisoned by their tap water, Nestle is working to increase the pumping of spring water in Osceola Township. They pay nothing for the water they pump there. Nothing. In Fryeburg they pay next to nothing, and that isn’t enough. They always want more. Nestle always finds unscrupulous elected officials to help sell their town down the river – a river they’ll suck dry, just as they sucked the original Poland Spring dry.

Dear Fryeburg: there’s always a quid pro, as Fightin’ Bob LaFollette found when he investigated Albert Fall. Find it. And oust those who would sell your town.

Published as an op-ed in the October 13, 2016 edition of the Conway Daily Sun newspaper 

Quaint Notions

Avoiding the appearance of impropriety used to be a matter of concern, especially for elected officials. Back in the olden days, a mayor or a congressman wouldn’t appoint his biggest campaign donor’s wayward progeny to a high paying job they were utterly unqualified for, because of ethical issues AND the appearance of impropriety.

Every now and then we give ethics a workout. Congressman Frank Guinta’s foolish acceptance of campaign funds from mommy was a thorny ethics problem for him, especially when he so vociferously called former Congresswoman Carol Shea-Porter a liar for actually pointing out HIS lies.

On the big stuff we sometimes pay attention. But when it comes to the small, ongoing questionable matters of ethics and conflict of interest, we don’t pay that much attention. Especially when it comes to New Hampshire’s 400 person volunteer legislature. The sheer number of legislators is problematic in itself. The other big problem is that there aren’t many investigative reporters working in our state any more. Newspapers are cutting back on staff, and trying to figure out how to survive and go forward into a very uncertain media future. In other words, nobody is really watching over the conflicts of interest our 400 state representatives and 24 senators may or may not have.

Are there conflicts of interest? Let’s take a look at a few bills.

HB 1554 is a bill to establish a sports lottery in NH. There would be lottery games for which one would purchase a ticket. There would also be lottery game machines.  The licenses for this sports lottery would be issued to individuals who have valid liquor licenses.

As it happens, the lead sponsor of HB 1554 is Representative Adam Schroadter, who owns a place that has live music, serves food and liquor.

HB 1252 is a bill that would permit employers to pay their employees either weekly or biweekly. An employer could petition the labor commissioner to pay even less frequently than that, although it would have to be once a month.

Many low wage workers work a couple of part time jobs. These are folks scraping to get by. Paying them even less frequently isn’t going to help them out any. Worse, though – is the impact this can have on tipped employees. Some restaurant/bar owners include credit card tips left for servers in their paychecks. This means a server might have to wait 2 weeks to get their tips. Given that the tipped wage is 45% of the minimum wage of $7.25 in NH, these folks aren’t paying their rent with their hourly wage. It does, however, benefit the employer who will spend less doing payroll and cutting checks for employees.

The lead sponsor of this bill is Representative Laurie Sanborn. She and her husband, State Senator Andy Sanborn own a sports bar in Concord. Representative Adam Schroadter is a sponsor, and so is Representative Keith Murphy. He owns a bar in Manchester.

HB 1540 is an act relative to shipments of beer. Sponsors? Murphy and Schroadter. HB 114 establishes beer specialty licenses. Sponsors? Murphy.

Murphy is a member of the Free State Project, those wacky armed miscreants moving to NH to take over our state government and threaten secession. The Free State Project party line is that the libertarians are coming to leave you alone! They want small government! Government small enough to benefit their own businesses and those of their allies.

No one said boo when Rep. Dan McGuire (R. Free State) sponsored a bill that would have caused taxpayers to foot the bill for the millions that would be required to move the Suncook River back after it jumped its streambed during a big storm. It wasn’t a feasible project, according to engineers, but McGuire went ahead. That his house is on the bank of the former riverbed was surely just a coincidence. It seems we don’t really pay much attention to conflicts of interest, and the “appearance of impropriety” is a quaint notion from the past.

The New Hampshire General Court Ethics Booklet is a useful publication. From Part One:

Public Office As A Public Trust
Legislators should treat their office as a public trust, only using the powers and resources of public office to advance public interests, and not to attain personal benefits or pursue any other private interest incompatible with the public good.

This sounds as if legislators shouldn’t be writing bills to benefit themselves or their own businesses. Hmmm. Will these restaurant and bar owners abstain from voting on their own bills? The odds that they will are slim to none – and slim is out of town.

There are a number of minimum wage bills, including bills that would increase the tipped minimum wage. All business owners should abstain from voting on these bills – especially owners of businesses in the hospitality industry. It’s the only industry where customers are expected to directly pay the wages of the staff. Imagine if you had to tip your bank teller or pharmacist. Owners love to howl that if they had to pay employees a decent wage they’d have to raise their prices sky high. As anyone who has ever traveled knows, other countries seem to make it work. Not only does it work - they all have single payer health care. Damned socialist hellholes.

In other news, the first in the nation primary is upon us. The calls, the door knocking, the mailings, and the ads…oh, it’s almost over.

Given that this is NH, I expect most readers have met at least one candidate, and been to events, and done some reading and talking and thinking about who to vote for.  I hope you’ll all find time to exercise the franchise on February 9^th. The NH legislature continues to try to solve the non-existent problem of voter fraud by attempting to make voter participation increasingly difficult. Vote while you still can. 

The primary circus will leave town, and we can get down to the serious business of our state elections. As big and colorful as the primary stuff is, the folks we elect to our local, county, and state governments have a much bigger impact on our daily lives than the president does. Thanks to Citizens United, the cash spigot will be flowing in ways we’ve never seen or imagined. We will all need to pay close attention.

This was published as an op-ed in the February 4, 2016 issue of the Conway Daily Sun.