Those who love the Tea Party philosophy have taken over the state government of NH. We still have a Democratic (sort of) governor but he is rendered almost powerless by the veto-proof majority of new incoming Republicans. Those GOP majority members have the Executive Council also. The EC in NH has approval power over every appointment by the Governor and every budget item. Anything these folks want to do, they can do with no one to stop them.
And what they want to do is totally frightening. Bills filed already on gencourt.state.nh.us/ns/ indicate they want to reject all Federal funding for health care, schools, Medicaid, etc. by rejecting any need to follow Federal regulations. They want to eliminate state aid to schools and hand out education vouchers rather than turn over tax money to public schools. Overturning equal marriage rights is a given. They also want to end any programs that work towards energy conservation or clean air. Before I go into more of the horror of these bills and the consequences to those who live here, I'd like to talk for a bit about how this happened. More over the fold --
Prior to this election, NH had two Democrats in Congress, a chance to replace one GOP senator with a Democrat, and a strong majority in both houses of the legislature. They also had a majority on the Executive Council. NH became the biggest target of the national GOP. As a result of this election, we only have one Senator still in DC, as she wasn't up for election this cycle and no representative in Congress. The state house has only a handful of Democrats remaining out of 400 representatives and 24 state senators. John Sununu, the head of the NH GOP went to DC and pointed out that there would be a presidential primary amongst the GOP starting in a year. As first in the nation, all eyes and cameras would focus on NH. Sununu argued that these candidates should be seen against a sympathetic background of GOP votes and government. The national GOP liked his argument and responded by investing 15 million dollars in the election just past. I don't know what the Democratic party leadership was arguing in response, but I do know that the investment by the national Democratic party in the election came to under a half million. I don't know why the Democratic leadership was unable to get more but I remember being told by the leadership that there would be no national money coming to NH for the election all the way back in mid 2009.
As a result, the conservative GOP, who also pretty much owns the mass media in this state, flooded the state with scary and misleading messages -- such as Obama was going to ruin the economy with the deficit caused by stimulus efforts, and "Obamacare" was going to cost citizens and small businesses so much more money than the status quo health care that we'd all go under and jobs would be gone, gone, gone. Too many voters bought these lies. The Democrats ability to counter these messages were heavily restricted by lack of funds.
Then there were a few mis-steps by the Democrats in power. There is no broad based tax base in this state due to the conviction of both Democrats and GOP that a state income tax is a sure way to not getting re-elected. Instead, when the budget crunch of the Bush recession came through, the budget was met by a hodgepodge of regressive taxes and fees. One fee that really hurt was a new tax on LLCs. It convinced a lot of business owners and their endangered employees that they needed to vote for someone new. Still, on the whole, the Democrats had done a hell of a good job while governing. For 2010, NH ranks best or in the top five states in management, lowest in unemployment, best in health, lowest in crime, lowest in corruption in government amongst all the states in the nation, best place to live, best place to raise children, etc. This is not the kind of job performance that usually provokes mass firing of those in charge.
But fired they were, including some of the brightest and most devoted public servants imaginable.
Now, as I look at the newly elected, veto proof majority's plans, I am frightened not just for others but for myself as well. State law requires that if the state doesn't pick up the bills for many services, the towns have to do so. The new majority plans of rejecting a boat load of money from the Federal Government. We already ranked towards the bottom of receiving back the money we sent to DC through our Federal income taxes. We have no state income tax.
We raise state revenue through business taxes, which the new majority plans to remove. We raise it through our state liquor stores, which the new majority plans to privatize. We raise it through real estate transfer taxes which should plummet due to the plans of the new majority.
Why will the real estate market, which has been limping towards improvement, plummet? It will plummet because the towns will have to drastically raise property taxes in order to meet the cost of services mandated by law for which they will no longer be receiving Federal or State funds. NH is already the state highest in property taxes. Yeah, I know that when you look at the list New Jersey ranks as number one but NJ has a significant program to help out anyone who owns property who earns under $45,000 a year. There is no similar tax relief program here. If you are owning your own home and live on SS disability, as I do, or Social Security is your primary income, you can kiss your home goodbye. The towns will own them for back taxes. Oh, I left out Wyoming, which ranks number two but there really aren't all that many people who live in Wyoming, so I'll discount them. Still even if you counted them number one, NH would rank ahead of 49 other states when it comes to highest property taxes. With the new tea party state legislature, we should leave the other states in the dust when it comes to being the highest property taxes. If you weren't already struggling and live here, you soon will be unless you are part of the really wealthy who own homes in this state to enjoy the low taxes here but never seem to get a comparable tax bill. Oh, did I mention that NH ranks last in the nation when it comes to charity? These rich folk not only don't pay taxes they don't give away anything either. Most of them don't even live here or spend their money locally. They keep their residence here for tax dodging reasons but spend most of the year in their other homes.
Why would anyone, except the already rich tax dodgers come to live here? Work force, which is needed to attract jobs to this state would be disappearing or deciding to live elsewhere where taxes allow you to own your own home and there would go the jobs.
The only good side I can see to all this is that the NH wilderness will probably be preserved as development will come to a halt. The old, the poor, and the sick will be forced to leave or die off prematurely (it gets really, really cold here in winter.) The tea party types, like the Nazi party types, don't seem to have any concern about this other than to think it is a good thing to get rid of those who require government aid even if it means killing them.
The good news is that national funds are supposed to come to NH for the 2012 election. There is a good chance that the average voter in NH will be horrified by what the state government elected in 2010 will be doing that the tea party types won't get re-elected. The bad news is that people will suffer and die before that happens. People will lose their life savings before it happens. People will lose their jobs before it happens. The GOP also has won a very nice back ground to support their primary candidates when the eyes of the world are most paying attention so perhaps they can improve their run for the presidency and control of Congress.
Don't let this happen to you!