Is Democrat Office Staff Unionized? Is The Pope Protestant?

With Democrats unanimous in their opposition to right to work legislation, with Democrats united against any serious pension reforms which would the system solvent at the expense of bloated unions, with Democrats slavishly devoted to big labor at every step along the way, can I possibly be the only person who has wondered--

Is the Raymond Charles Buckley/Kathleen Sullivan generation of paid Democrat staffers, an ever-expanding lot it would seem  (how much did that help in the 2010 elections), is the entire crew unionized with the full plate of pension benefits and a  generous health package ($25,000 a year for a family plan)?

I'm just asking.  One would think that if Democrats are to avoid the hypocrisy of pushing others to do something which they themselves fail to do, the answer would be, "Mais, oui.  But of course, Democrat personnel are unionized!"

Only in your dreams.

Prove me wrong but let me assert my firm belief that Buckley/Sullivan have not offered to unionize their minions.

It wouldn't be the first time that Democrats are caught in a web of hypocrisy.

Remember the godfather of the Democrat party, Ted Kennedy who spent half a century crying for more government spending and taxation to help poor people.

Yes, this would be the same Ted Kennedy who, to avoid Massachusetts taxes when his beloved mother Rose went to that great compound in the sky, pulled all the strings he could to probate her estate not in her home Bay State but rather in Florida where the tax situation was...how you say...kinder to the rich.

Until Buckley/Sullivan decide to unionize their ranks (that would include Rep. Michael Brunelle--I've promised myself to avoid using that euphemism which so many in Manchester came to love--and Harrell The Humorless Hack--I've made n such promise for him), lets all turn a deaf ear to their pleas for unions.

Put your money where your mouth is Democrats.  Stop asking those in the public domain to do what you apparently are unwilling to do in the private domain.

Happy Memorial Day, all you non-unionized Democrat Hacks and to everyone else as well.

My Spider Senses Tingled, Convincing Me Right To Work Is A Good Thing

            Until the last few weeks, right to work has always been a close call for me.  In years past, I have opposed the bill after buying into the argument that one should not benefit from union contracts unless one pays the cost of negotiating them.

            It was a close call because then as now, I believe the individual should control his or her own life without being coerced into joining anything.  Thus, I have always seen a conflict of two principles and have to weigh their importance.

            This year, with the Daniels amendment, the conflict was removed, and I voted for right to work.  It remained a close call, but the Daniels amendment tipped the scales to supporting the bill.

            Even with the Daniels amendment gone, I continue to support the right to work bill, and guess what. 

            It’s no longer a close call.

            I’m now a staunch supporter of the bill and urge all my Republican colleagues, especially those who like me have been on the fence in the past, to vote to override the Governor’s veto.

            Clearly, unions were using the payment for negotiation argument as nothing more than a red herring.  How do I know this?  Because, when they refused to budge in their total opposition to the bill, even when the Daniels amendment was added, my Spider senses startled tingling.

            That’s a phrase I use to describe when I begin to realize that I’m being taken for a fool, that those trying to convince me are in fact being less than totally honest.

            When my Spider senses start to tingle, I begin to delve in depth into an issue and I usually come down totally for or totally against the issue involved.  Research produces clarity; there can be no middle ground or fence sitting any more.

            There’s nothing worse than being taken for a fool.  I now confess that for a decade, I have been played for a fool by big labor which is not at all concerned about what’s best for our economy, our state, or the majority of the people in it.  They are only concerned about perpetuating their hold on membership; a hold which includes taking dues and fees and using the monies to promote an agenda those forced to pay it may or may not agree with.

            That’s wrong.  Most union fees go not toward negotiating contracts but into campaigns to elect big tax and spenders, in other words, to elect Democrats.  Even if I were a big tax and spender (I most assuredly am not); even if I were a Democrat (I was at one time, until I realized how slavishly the party is devoted to bloated bureaucracy at the expense of taxpayers); I could not in good conscience oppose right to work any longer.

            Government must never be in the business of forcing people to do things against their will, no matter who benefits from the coercion. 

            The hallmark of my philosophy, now more than ever, is that the individual is paramount.  The collective mentality must never prevail over individual rights.  Communism and socialism failed miserably by placing the collective ahead of the individual.

            In a real sense, right to work is like gay marriage.

            The individual should be able to decide whether or not he or she wants to marry a member of the same sex.  As I tell heterosexuals who fear gay marriage, don’t worry, you won’t be forced into a gay marriage.

            Union members need to be assured now.  Fear not.  If this bill becomes law, you will not be forced to leave your union.  No one who wants to join a union will be prevented from joining one.

            Let freedom right, both in choosing whether or not to enter into a same sex marriage and in choosing whether or not to join a union.

            Freedom must always be our paramount concern.  That’s why I find it absolutely astounding that not a single Democrat, most of whom supported gay marriage, is opting for freedom in this case.

            Freedom is not something you can stand up for only when it helps your cause.  Men (and women) cannot be free just some of the time.  They must be free all the time.

            Since my Spider Sense started tingling, I’ve looked into the economic arguments as well and am absolutely convinced that right to work passage is probably the single most important thing we can do to improve the New Hampshire economy.  Yes, our unemployment rate is only five percent, but it will go down, not up, when right to work becomes law.

            No one can deny that we are losing the best and brightest, our young people, to right to work states.

            Correction…only those with a slavish devotion to the collective mentality, only those who choose to place special interests ahead of individual interest…only those who would sell their and our freedoms for--to borrow a line from Cabaret--a mark, a yen, a buck, or a pound (or a Euro today)…only those can deny that our economy demands we pass right to work.

            Freedom issues come first, but on this occasion, issues of freedom and economy are in perfect alignment.

            Thanks to my Spider sense, I am freed from those who have deceived me in the past. 

            To those still wavering, I ask—aren’t your Spider senses tingling--just a little perhaps?   Follow your senses.  Let the force of freedom be with you.  Join me in creating a two-thirds coalition to override the Governor’s ill-founded and highly selfish veto of the House Bill.

            Out of fairness, I’m sending this to all constituents who have asked me to vote against right to work.

            Fear not.  This is not union busting.  No one will prevent you from joining a union. 

            Far from union busting, this is laying a new marker down…a marker for freedom, for individuals to decide their own destiny.  Certainly you can see that.

House Leadership Pushes Corporate Welfare

We should have expected this.  House Republican committee whips are trying to drum up support to bring the telephone poles and conduits bill off the table and pass it Wednesday.  This is corporate welfare of the worst sort.  After the bill passed by a narrow margin a few months ago, I led a fight for reconsideration and we won by an even wider margin.  Rumors (Shawn Jasper) then were that leadership would try to slip this in the trailer bill, House Bill 2.  Apparently, the latest effort will be to bring it off the table (only a simple majority would be required) and to pass it.

Leadership is deceiving House members with half truths and outright falsehoods.  This verges on shameful. 

Here's part of an email I just sent to all House Republicans.

 

"I do not support the telephone pole tax exemption.  As I said on the House floor, this is not a new tax.  It is a special exemption--aka corporate welfare--for one group of companies.  We give exemptions for the blind, veterans, the elderly.  We should never be giving them for one group of companies.  This is the kind of social engineering I would expect from Democrats, but sadly, I expected something like this would happen.

 

The whip on my committee sent out misinformation asking me to support this.  He suggested that the House voted ought to pass as did the Municipal Committee.  As Paul Harvey says, you need to know the rest of the story. 

After the House voted to pass it, by an even wider margin, we voted to reconsider it, thus indicating more opposition than support and a transcript will indicate that I supported the tabling motion only to kill this bill, not to bring it back at the last moment or slip it into House Bill 2.  At a time we're trying to bring Republicans together to get 2/3 on right to work and to get photo ID passed, this strategy, and the misinformation is hardly helpful.

Also, the whip suggests that cities and towns would need to spend thousands on assessing.  Most, if not all, have already spent that money--it was, after all, to take effect April 1--so to pass this bill would be to throw away money already spent.

It would also amount to downshifting costs ($5-10 million) depending on whose estimates you trust, to cities and towns, something we promised not to do.

It is not a new tax.

It is not a new tax.

It is not a new tax.

Saying that it is won't make it so any more than if you call a tail a leg, then you could say a cow has five legs.  Calling s tail a leg doesn't make it a leg.  Saying this is a new tax does not make it true.  It only makes those who continue to say so little more than blatant deceivers.  It is corporate welfare of the worst sort.

Rep.Steve Vaillancourt, Hills. 15

 

May Revenues Are Looking Even Better

We're coming to the end of May, and revenues will undoubtedly exceed expectations by $5-10 million.

With two days and a long weekend still to go, business taxes are already nearly 13 percent ahead of plan, $16.7 million versus $14.9 planned.  I'm told that refunds have already been accounted for, so this number will likely be up another couple million by the end of the month.

Another $1.3 million came in for real estate transfer taxes after the midmonth report, so we're 22.2 percent over plan there ($8.8 vs. $7.2 million planned).

Tobacco and liquor, while still shy of plan, look like they'll come in ok, maybe up a little with tobacco and down a little with liquor.

Meals and rooms is off 4.3 percent ($17.6 million vs. $18.4 million planned), and probably will come in just shy of plan.

The only real weakness seems to be in lottery receipts, 24 percent shy of plan ($5.1 vs. $6.7 million planned).  Bonus monies from a big jackpot this weekend should not be reflected in this month's numbers; they are already in for May.

Overall, May receipts as of the 26th were $3.8 million shy of plan, $92.2 million vs. an expected $96.0 million.  We usually pick up a couple million in the "other" category at month's end.  Other currently is running $3.7 million vs. $5.6 million planned.

We're dramatically ahead of last month's numbers and may well vindicate the $40 million Senate Ways and Means added to revenue projections. 

Don't blame me, House Republicans rooting for lower numbers.  I'm just reporting facts here, and I've long been on record as saying we'd come in between what Ways and Means Republicans and Democrats were projecting.  The Senate numbers look good to me although my Senate insiders--very reliable sources--say that Demcrat Lou D'Allesandro is furious with Chairman Bob O'Dell for not going even higher.  Put me in the O'Dell camp.

Reality always trumps the rosy or gloomy scenario in my book.  Look straight ahead for projections...not to the sky as Democrats did...or to the ground.

Democrat Hypocrisy Outed--A.G. Must Act!

            Congratulations to Concord Representative Lynn Blankenbeker, who in the process of pulling Senate Bill 51 from the consent calendar Wednesday, made a point about blatant hypocrisy by a vast majority of Democrats when it comes to whether or not the Legislature may compel the Attorney General to do something.

            Earlier in the year, Democrats argued long and hard and then long again that the Legislature violated the Constitution by compelling the Attorney General to join the lawsuit against Obamacare.  Democrats insisted that, contrary to all tradition, the Legislature could not compel the Attorney General to do something.

            Along came Senate Bill 51, a rather popular measure regarding establishment of an inter-departmental team to address developmental disability issues.

            There’s only one problem…well two actually…with the bill.

            In not one but two places, as Rep. Blankenbeker aptly observed, it compels the Attorney General to take a certain action.

            On line four it requires the attorney general to “enter into a memorandum of understanding establishing” the team.

            On line 22, it requires the attorney general to “submit an annual report” on recommendations of the team.

            Rather innocuous, one would think, but clearly Democrats who voted for this bill are in agreement that the attorney general can in fact be required to do certain things.  Democrats must be saying that we can require the attorney general to do things we want him/her to do, but can claim we don’t have the power to require him/her to do things we don’t like.

            Absurd!

            It’s like the punch line in the old joke about the prostitute, “We already know what you are; now we’re only haggling about the price.”

            We already know we can require the Attorney General to do certain things; we’re only haggling about which things now.  Certainly, if we can require him/her to do Thing A, we can require him/her to do Thing B!

            In a recorded vote, the House voted 350-28 to pass the bill.  All but 26 Democrats went back on their earlier stance that we could not require the A.G. to do something.

            Good work, Rep. Blankenbeker, and there’s a kicker.  The House voted to put her comments in the permanent journal, so posterity will know the hypocrisy of the majority of Democrats regarding how legislators interact with this or any Attorney General.

            Does this story fit the category of things you’ll find only in this blog but will be covered up by the lame stream media who are more concerned with maintaining their credentials as fellow travelers with Democrats than in reporting the truth?

            Time will tell, but I didn’t find the matter reported in Thursday’s editions.

            Did you?