Once again, NH has surprised me. In 2010, when the TeaParty/John Birch/Free Stater contingent took over our state it was a surprise.A lot of respected legislators were ousted, and replaced with people inpossession of varying degrees of competence and sanity. The new majoritypromised a laser like focus on job creation, yet created policy that cost ourstate jobs, and increased unemployment. They turned the laser on social issues,and worked tirelessly to regulate ovaries, homosexuals, and poor people. Theycut revenue streams, ensuring that NH would continue to be unable to afford thekind of investments in infrastructure and education needed to move our stateinto the future.
Thanks to the last legislature, NH became fodder forcomedians on late night TV. We went from being a small state that no one paidmuch attention to until presidential primary season, to being a national andeven international mockery. The volume knob on NH crazytunes was turned up alittle bit higher each week that the legislature was in session. That probablywasn’t what most of you were hoping for when you cast your ballots in 2010.
You were probably hoping for property tax relief. You didn’tget any. Instead you got Free Stater Jennifer Coffey filing a bill to put upwarning signs at the MA border. The voters in her district firmly ousted her.You got birthers – state legislators using their status to attempt to provethat President Obama is not a US citizen. Local birther Laurie Pettengill was gerrymanderedright out of her seat by her own party. Harry Accornero was not given a secondterm by the voters of Laconia. You also got a bill to put quotes from the MagnaCarta in new legislation, and a bill calling for vegetarian diets in ourprisons and jails. Sponsor Robert Kingsbury was ousted by his constituents inLaconia.
Rep. Gregory Sorg last year chaired a committee aimed atensuring NH received no federal aid for anything. In his report, he decriedweatherization and fuel assistance programs, saying that NH residents shouldarrange their affairs so that they required no such assistance. As I wrote atthe time:
“In short, we must all manage our affairs so that we do notget old, do not develop a serious health problem, do not lose our jobs, and donot suffer from sudden poverty caused by the destruction of the US economy.Based on these findings, Rep. Sorg should be expecting 3 ghosts to visit him onChristmas Eve. “
Apparently the voters in his district concurred. Rep. Sorgwas voted out.
On the local level, Frank McCarthy was ousted. In a one onone conversation, Frank can be quite personable. His public persona, however,is probably what cost him the election. For two years he’s written bellicosediatribes to the newspaper, filled with inaccuracies and right wing propaganda.At the House candidate’s forum I attended, he didn’t need the microphone. Hisbellowing was audible in the next county. On the next planet.
Extremist Norman Tregenza was soundly defeated in hisattempt to win the newly gerrymandered floterial district. Voters wereapparently not won over by his laser like focus on the issues of Ron Paul andthe John Birch Society – or by the ugly campaign he ran.
Ovide Lamontagne lost his second attempt at the corneroffice. In his concession speech, he complained that his positions on issueshad been distorted. That translates as: they told the truth about me. The mediawas intent on presenting him as some sort of moderate, but his stance on socialissues revealed him to be anything but. Lamontagne has now lost three electionsbecause he’s just too extreme for NH. That’s the take away from this election.NH is many strange and wonderful things, but we aren’t a state that is willingto be governed by far right ideologues.
On some level, I suspect that many local Republicans areaware that ceding their party to the extremists was a bad idea. They’ve paid ahigh price for allowing racists, homophobes, and misogynists to speak for them.
By far and away, the biggest mistake made by the GOP onevery level (state and national) was the war on women. They might have gottenaway with restricting abortion, but trying to restrict contraception proved tobe a bridge to nowhere. GOP spokesman Rush Limbaugh called college studentSandra Fluke a slut and a prostitute for testifying before Congress about a mandate that insurance companies cover birth control. That was spun quite successfullyand dishonestly as “taxpayer funded birth control.”
By far and awaythe most damaging move made by the GOP was allowing itself to become the partyof redefining rape. Missouri Congressman Todd Akin told us that in the case of“legitimate rape” a woman can’t get pregnant, because “the female body has waysof shutting that down.” Indiana Republican Richard Mourdock told us that apregnancy resulting from rape is something God intended to happen. All over thecountry Republican men were telling women that a rape baby was going to be alittle blessing for them – and one that they would be forced to bear. VicePresidential candidate Paul Ryan was part of an effort to redefine rape, attemptingto ensure that only victims of “forcible rape” would be eligible for federallyfunded abortions.
Women across the country proved that they have ways to shutTHAT nonsense down. They voted Akin and Mourdock out. A record number of womenwill be US Senators in 2013. New Hampshire has made history with an all womanCongressional delegation: both of our US Senators and both of our newly electedRepresentatives are women. We elected a female governor. Record numbers ofwomen will be serving in the US Senate and the US House.
There are women now serving in every single state legislativechamber. It’s shameful that it’s taken all this time to get there, but we arethere now. The GOP would do well to take notice.
© sbruce 2012
Published as an op-ed in the November 8, 2012 Conway Daily Sun newspaper.
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