My long two-pointed ladder's sticking through a tree
Toward heaven still,
And there's a barrel that I didn't fill
Beside it, and there may be two or three
Apples I didn't pick upon some bough.
But I am done with apple-picking now.
Essence of winter sleep is on the night,
The scent of apples: I am drowsing off.
I cannot rub the strangeness from my sight
I got from looking through a pane of glass
I skimmed this morning from the drinking trough
And held against the world of hoary grass.
It melted, and I let it fa...
Tuesday we will have a new photo ID law that slows down the process for checking in to vote, whether the voter presents an ID or signs an affidavit. We don't have a lot of additional election workers; the workers we do have are new at this. There will be longer lines than usual and more confusion than usual.
Here are some suggestions on what each voter may be able to do to help.These are based on my experience working at the polls for the past couple dozen elections. The process can vary from one town to another - your mileage may vary.
Know where y...
Ira Glass looks at divisive politics - in particular, New Hampshire politics. The show thanks a lot of familiar names: Gene Chandler, Philip Galanes, Elizabeth Garrett, Jessica Garrett Mills, Christine Hamm, Shawn Jasper, Corey Lewandowski, Terie Norelli, Robert Rowe, Amy Silver Judd and Tony Soltani.
Bill O'Brien doesn't get a thank you. But he appears to be the subject of the episode.
It's on at 4PM today (Saturday),
I got a press release yesterday - worth posting in full:
New Website NHVoterProtection.org Educates Granite Staters of Voting Rights, Responsibilities
Sunday's Sentinel includes an editorial endorsement of Kuster.
It is the wide gulf between the policy aqendas of the two candidates that most heavily influenced our decision to endorse Ann McLane Kuster for the 2nd District post... Too many times, [Bass] has allowed partisan pressure to steer him away from his centrist leanings.
...
Earlier this week I mourned the decline of locally focused public television in the state. Independent voices, based in and focused on New Hampshire are precious and easily lost.
Today New Hampshire Public Radio's seasonal fundraiser is wrapping up and they are below target.
Ira Glass has one spot where he says, "Sure, even if you don't give, the station will continue - but giving your fair share is the right thing to do."
He's sugar-coating it. When local stations don't get enough support, ...
I heard a Democratic candidate the other day observe that New Hampshire has a "low tax burden." Fortunately my copy of George Lakoff's book was handy to bang against my head.
New Hampshire does indeed have a low level of taxes. That's a fair statement. But if you say that this level of taxation, even when it is below that of 46 other states, remains a "burden," you might as well collect a paycheck from the Free Staters and other fringe libertarians. You are doing their work, spreading their message.
How much are you burdened by the cost of putting food on your ...
The election is coming up in two and a half weeks. We have all had plenty of opportunities to hear all sorts of information and misinformation about the candidates for President, Governor, and Congress. There will also be two constitutional amendments on the ballot.
These questions haven't received much media attention - they certainly haven't been promoted or opposed in major ad campaigns. I haven't seen any yard signs or bumper stickers about them.
So, how does one decide how to vote on those questions? There's one simple key.
The amendments come out of Bill O'Brien's House. ...
Here's that champion of equality, who supposedly launched a search for qualified women to join his administration as Governor of Massachusetts:
Somehow when he built his own company they didn't get to play.
Wait, that's unfair: they are probably off-camera, making coffee and photocopies.
I mean the debate, not the 4.6 Richter scale event.
Town hall format - meaning: questions from the audience, empathy gets the most points. Will Romney be able to dodge and spin in his answers?
The show begins at 9PM. This is an open thread.
...
You can't advance as a Beltway Pundit without earning your "inflict pain on the middle class" merit badge. In particular, Serious Persons agree: we must Raise the Retirement Age, by which they mean: don't let workers draw on Social Security until they are a few years older: perhaps mid-seventies.
(The Serious People who write this crap all have desk jobs.)
Meanwhile, we are now "down" to 7.8% unemployment. Keeping old workers on staff means, fewer slots available for kids getting out of college. That means continued high unemployment rates - you have replaced a retired senior with an out...
The other night I watched a debate on Channel 11, New Hampshire's public TV station.
It wasn't Hassan-Lamontagne, or Bass-Kuster, or Guinta-Shea Porter. It was a debate between Scott Brown and Elizabeth Warren, held in Lowell Massachusetts.
The debate was carried on Channel 11 because New Hampshire Public Television has been forced to cut its budget and programming in response to pressure and laws from the state legislature, which forbade the University System from providing support to it. Since August the channel survives as a junior partner to Boston's WGBH, providing a couple of loca...
This morning NPR interviewed several Colorado college students. One was a conservative woman who supports freedom of choice but is working for Romney. "Abortion rights are determined by the Supreme Court, not the President," she explained.
Shew knows that the President nominates new members of the Supreme Court, but she somehow sees that as a more remote concern. Let's shine a light on that.
If John McCain had won in 2008, abortion would now be illegal in the United States. Maybe nearly all of the states, which would be free to outlaw it; maybe all of the states, after a Court rul...
It's probably a little arrogant to offer this - but every Monday morning quarterback should suggest plays on Saturday once in a while....
Folks, I am not surprised that Governor Romney and Congressman Ryan are doing well in the polls lately. Their message is appealing! They tell us:
"We can all pay less in taxes. When the wealthy get still bigger tax cuts, they will hire more workers. We can spend more on our military and not make tough choices about which weapons programs don't work. When we do this, the economy will grow, and we won't have to cut back ...
of Healthcare."
He is running ads claiming that Annie Kuster, who supports the Affordable Care Act, is endorsing a "government takeover of health care."
The fact checkers rate this as Untrue. I think that's because the health insurance industry, the hospitals, the clinics - the whole medical industry - are all still under the same ownership as they were five years ago. Doctors are in private medical practice, they are not collecting government paychecks. Nothing was taken over. So the fact checkers said, WRONG.
But you need to look at it from Charlie's point of view.
He wants to end Medicare and Social Security. Those programs offend him - I think partly because he is a right-wing ideologue who thinks they are socialist, and partly because even the wealthiest may have to chip in a little to fund those programs. Not on their stock portfolios and off-shore accounts, but on - for example - that trifling $340,000 in speaking fees that Romney was paid. (As the 99% try to get better jobs, or any jobs, the 1% tries to avoid the inconvenience of receiving "ordinary income.")
From Charlie's perspective, any program that helps the sick and injured get medical care, provided in private clinics by private doctors, is a Government Takeover.
It interferes with the pestilence and death that a truly free market can provide.
Ovide Lamontagne had Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal as a guest speaker at his unity breakfast this morning. Jindal praised Lamontagne's extreme right wing economics and said, that's the key to making states succeed. But hey, he added: "I'm happy to be in a race with New Hampshire!"
Here are the current race statistics, for John Lynch's New Hampshire and Bobby Jindal's Louisiana:
Unemployment rate: NH 5.4% vs LA 7.6%
Household income: NH $65,880 vs. LA $40,658
Completed high school: NH 90.9% vs. LA 81.2%
If we want to race to claim the Louisiana Disadvantage, Ovide is the man to get us there!
Of course, if he succeeds, we'll have a problem. Louisiana manages to avoid sinking still further because it gets a lot of money from the rest of the country: $1.78 back for every dollar they send to Washington, while New Hampshire gets back only 71 cents. If Ovide brings us down to Bobby's level, who will write the checks?
(The return-on-tax numbers are getting old. The right-wing Tax Foundation hasn't updated their data recently - maybe because it's too embarrassing for their followers.)
The scam began even before the primary votes were counted.
Ovide Lamontagne confirmed his opposition to marriage equality, to even civil unions, to Planned Parenthood. He called for "teaching" creationism in public schools. But then he said, "Wait, wait! My priority is New Hampshire jobs!"
Let's take him at his word for just a moment.* But then let's ask, what New Hampshire Governor has the luxury of focusing on his own supposed priorities? What New Hampshire Governor gets to set the agenda for the state?
Did we spend eight years on civil unions, medical marijuana, Planned Parenthood, and marriage equality because those were John Lynch's priorities? No. The legislature and Executive Council put those issues on the table. Lynch didn't have the option of saying, "Sorry - that isn't my priority. Com back two years from now."
Whatever Lamontagne claims his priorities are, the agenda will be set by the General Court. We have seen over the past two years that the Governor's role is often that of zookeeper: just keeping the most dangerous creatures from doing too much damage. And Ovide likes presiding over that damage.
It doesn't matter what his priorities are - it matters whether he will stop the O'Brien crazies.
And he won't: those are his allies.
* When he's in front of a different crowd, he tells them about his real top priority: ending Obamacare.
are listed here. (There is also a polling place search on that site, check the menu bar at the top.)
We just went through re-districting; your voting place may have changed.
Please don't cut things too close. If you're in line at the right polling place when the polls close, you'll be able to vote - but if it turns out you've gone to the wrong ward you could be out of luck.
It helps to know somebody in the town offices, capisce? You don't want to get bogged down in line with the wrong sort of people. (More on this below - it isn't really the main point of the diary, just a pet peeve.)
I'm an election official. I'll be working at the polls Tuesday, probably at the table for same-day registrations. I attended training from the Secretary of State's office on the new voter suppression "identification" laws a couple of weeks ago.
The process of voting has changed in New Hampshire this year. It will be a bit more difficult and take longer to vote - and that makes it all the more important that you exercise that right and responsibility.
YOU WON'T BE TURNED AWAY AND YOUR VOTE WILL BE COUNTED.
Here is a summary of the process, with some notes on what has changed. Please also look at Susan's recent diaries on voting, and at the comments in those diaries.