As an abutting neighbor of the Granite State, an owner of rental properties in NH (who would be stupid enough to be a residential LL in MA), and a thoroughly kindred spirit of the “ole Yankee farmers” of NH, I ask you to come to the aid of your brothers in kind south of your border.

The taxpayers of Dunstable and Groton are on the verge of getting a Louisville Slugger shoved into their anterior orifice sans lubricant. We are facing a HUGE prop 2 1/2 override bill precipitated by our regional school district’s outrageous budget request.

It is my opinion that the administration of the school district is a puppet and tool of the teachers’ union, as well as being inveterate woke lefties to the core. It is my understanding from several “public discussion forums” held by our town administrators, which, by the way, are correlated with similar “public discussion forums” being held in our partner town of Groton, that the school district’s administrators refuse to cooperate with any detailed investigation of the facts. They apparently have erected a granite wall against such audacious behavior by the serfs who toil in their fields to pay their rent burden. At best, we are to be allocated a small plot for our potato patch.

A town meeting is scheduled in BOTH towns for 3/26/24. How convenient is that? A mere coincidence, I am sure. The main article to be voted on is the question of placing the override on the concurrent 4/2/24 town elections. I am guessing the purpose of that coordination is so that the rebels in neither town will be able to use a NO OVERRIDE verdict by the other town’s electorate to influence the second town’s voters. The town administrators of both towns have worked closely hand in hand to put forth this agenda.

We want to thank Brian Flynn for this Contribution – Please direct yours to Steve@GraniteGrok.com.
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My daughter Erica and I have worked diligently to assemble a significant amount of data from the MA DOR and Dept. of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) websites, which, in our opinion, completely repudiates the need for additional funds. These facts have been assembled into spreadsheets with attendant notes, and a PowerPoint presentation was made by Erica to the Dunstable Select Board (talk about an arrogant name) on Tuesday, 2/20/24. A number of other taxpayers were present, the majority of whom supported our efforts.

Back in 2017, our town investigated the possibility of secession from the Groton-Dunstable Regional School District (GDRSD), but the matter was eventually dropped. The possibility of such a break up was mentioned earlier this year by our Town Administrator. I raised the question again at this meeting. Naturally we heard a lot of excuses why the matter isn’t being diligently pursued.

Immediately after the meeting, my daughter posted the PowerPoint presentation on both the Dunstable Facebook site and the Groton Facebook site. The video of the meeting is available on Dunstable’s website. Additionally, we are both working with as many Dunstable and Groton like-minded taxpayers as we can find. We need many, many more. I am sure both town administrations, as well as the entire school administration in conjunction with its union members, will be exerting great effort to have a record turnout for their team. I ask your help in doing the same for our side. If you need ready access to more of our data, just email me, and I will send you additional charts and spreadsheets for your review.

I don’t know how many followers this publication has in the border towns, but we need every hand on deck to beat this thing back. The school district has made it clear they “need” similar increases in their budgets for the next 4 -5 years.

On May 22, 1775, the patriots of your state joined ranks with those in our state to fight our common oppressor. We need your help again, about two months earlier this time. Any assistance you can lend us in getting out the vote will be greatly appreciated and returned in kind, as your need may dictate.

The post Massachusetts Border Towns Ask New Hampshire for Help appeared first on Granite Grok.

Here is the latest nonsense from New Hampshire’s fast-talking Sun-King, Chris Sununu … GOP voters don’t support Trump because of his policies but because they believe he is a fighter. I know it is just anecdotal evidence, mighty Sun-King, but you are a fighter and I certainly do NOT support you … because you fight for all the wrong things: boys participating in girls school sports, DEI, COVID-tyranny, destroying local zoning laws, doing nothing about stratospheric local property taxes, etc., etc. etc.. Roll the tape:

Sununu on Trump: “It’s quite simple, the enemy of my enemy is my friend” is why Republicans stick with Trump when Dems/liberal elites attack him. “It’s literally that simple of a psyche. It’s not about policy…at least someone’s putting up a fight.”#POLITICOGovernors https://t.co/NxP6wGNzYy

— Kevin Baron (@DefenseBaron) February 22, 2024

Oh mighty Sun-King, you are such an entitled, spoiled, privileged bloviator. GOP voters support Trump because of his policies … securing the border, no endless wars, actually getting tough (as opposed to just talking tough) on China. That is why Trump destroyed the field in the 2016 primary. The other candidates were talking about “immigration reform” (recall John Kasich telling everyone illegal immigration was essentially like jaywalking … “you pay a fine”), still defending the senseless and stupid Iraq War, regurgitating globalist pablum about “free markets.”

Whether he is just an idiot or a liar, what’s undeniable is that the mighty Sun-King despises, loathes, hates actual GOP voters.

The post Night Cap: Chris Sununu … An Idiot Or A Liar? appeared first on Granite Grok.

As we embark on the latest city budget fiasco that’s going to cost us where it hurts, as a taxpayer who has to balance a home and business budget, here are some tips. First, I implore you to stay under the tax cap or, even better, below. Second, the key to successful budgeting is to start with income and work within those numbers backward, not the other way around!

Tips from personal observation with this city (and perhaps your town or city as well)!

1. When you leave a room, and no one is in there, turn out the lights and monitors. Energy and water conservation efforts are huge savings. Fix dripping faucets, etc…
2. Close all computers and detach chargers at days end
3. Turn down the thermostat to 68 and wear a sweater in winter. On this topic, I was at a meeting at city hall in a conference room not used all day. It was HOT, so hot the person who opened the room put the AC on. This was in January! In summer, open windows (especially at night) and use fans until it’s unbearable before turning on AC. Maybe some thoughts on insulation!?
4. Optimize staff to multitask. Instead of waiting for so and so, just do the job.
5. Stop trying to embark on new businesses when you cannot keep the basic city budget under control. The land/river development, electric company, waste management etc.
6. Stop pandering to the school board. At this point, the numbers enrolled are declining as fast as the test scores…. Ten years of this is enough. Say no.
7. Don’t say yes to everything right away. Pause and reflect. Sleep on it. Ask the people. Think how you save money in your home or business world!
8. Business development on existing facilities, ice arena, and schools during downtimes is underutilized!
9. Sandpits, it fries my butt that we own our own sand yet pay for it and allow a subcontractor to use it!?
10. Limit overtime.
11. Travel restrictions and don’t let city employees take city vehicles home or for personal use, period!
12. Riverfront development aka Dovers Big Dig is a bust, a money pit of despair, stop the bleed, sell it.
13. We supposedly have mechanics, yet seem to buy new equipment all the time… You should at least keep them until they are irreparable, then sell them for metal.
14. We pay a librarian(s) huge salaries, and they don’t read books!?
15. This city and schools are top heavy with Admin…need a serious audit on essential necessary jobs and cull the rest. Worth the consult fee.
16. Your tri-city homeless band-aid is a total mess and money pit. Enabling these mentally ill drug addicts has our city police and EMTs tapped out to the point where tax payers in need are now in line waiting while Dovers finest chase them around town.
17. Install time clocks or whatever time management tools are out there… Track specific jobs so you can be more efficient
18. Don’t leave vehicles running
19. Get trash compactors
20. Employees of the city need to be on a performance scale, especially teachers. There needs to be check and balances on the job performed by the measurable outcome. If a class is failing, then the teacher needs to be put on probation. If students continue to fail, fired. All this pandering has got us dumb kids and huge budgets. It’s time to fix that and aside from good/better curriculum, teachers who can teach. Same for all employees. You won’t find a production company keeping a slacker or poor performer. You may actually get measurable results!

Some purchasing tips

1. The lowest bidder is not always the cheapest, get solid references
2. Do not fall prey to the illusion of electric vehicles! And I hope you charge people to use the chargers in the parking garage and that money goes to the city electric bill!!
3. Get a Costco card for bulk
4. Use more UNH students in schools
5. You have a whole technical high school, start using it more for city projects
6. Start “go fund me’s” or baked sales for stuff like athletic fields and other things like new city hall clock that broke after a year.

There is a point to the following…

.Here’s a true story of my years engineering with government contractors, in the late 70s. I was part of the Total Quality Management team for Navy contractors. We wanted a way for the workers to understand that through their good “quality” work, in turn, they were saving their own tax dollars! So we did a movie on a submarine that was “dead in the water” the reason was a faulty bearing. A $50 item. The cost to fix it was $75,000. We showed this movie to contractor employees right down to the foundries. It worked. We saw less problems. The workers started paying more attention to their work. The city employees remind me of the contractor workers. They didn’t care until they realized they were hurting themselves, in a sense. City workers should realize every decision cost money from turning a light out to quality time on the job. Maybe they need a TQM course!

You’ve been overspending the city and school budget for years. Our city is overinflated with waste and people. If it were your personal money you were messing with, you’d lose your car and house and end up at Willand Warming Center. Be responsible with my money. I’m tapped out, and if you keep upping our “taxes,” the levy will break because there aren’t that many “rich” people here yet who can afford it.

The above consultation is on me (as in free) in an effort to save me money by lowering everyone’s taxes.

 

Editor: email to the town of Dover, lightly edited.

 

The post 20 Budget Tips for My Town, and Yours! appeared first on Granite Grok.

Being the small world that it is, I often run into familiar people on “our side” at Market Basket, and today’s encounter person was former Nashua GOP chair Chris Buda.  I asked him if he read my latest piece on Chuck Morse, and he said no and followed up with “I’m sure it’s not flattering.”

I said that I made the obligatory PSA in the beginning but added some animal-themed levity and ultimately went into the current school mask bill, HB 1093.  I went on to say how I expect the Damn Emperor to veto it, and he cut in with a supposition that I haven’t given any original thought to.  The conversation went something like this:

CB: “There’s a good chance that he won’t veto it.”
JS: “That would be great, a win-win for everyone, but WHY?”
CB: “He wants higher office.”
JS: “He already eschewed a federal senate run and the Oval Office.”
CB: “Oval Office for 2024, that is, but I’m thinking 2028.”
JS: “That’s possible, but why would you bet the farm?”
CB: “He just sent troops to Texas.”
JS: “Yeah, but so did other governors, it could be peer pressure.”
CB: “I don’t think so, plus he’s going to Texas to be a speaker at the NRA.”
JS: “He’s a narcissist and an attention-seeking ham.”
CB: “He’s building out-of-state exposure and recognition.”
JS: “But he’s been doing that for a few election cycles.  Again, the ego.”

At this point, Chris went on to explain how ALL presidential candidates have a pattern of putting their big egos on full display and that it’s a multi-year and multi-election cycle process building their campaigns.  He went on to talk about some out-of-state Gilmore (or is it Gilmour?) guy from several years ago.

I turned into a deer in the headlights when I heard that name because my mental knee-jerk thought was about Peggy Gilmour, that decaying old lobbyist and enemy camp event hostess who dyes her hair an unfortunate orange and looks just about ready to start using a D’Allesandro wheelie walker.

I should have taken notes or at least paid closer attention.  If you want to know more about the guy Chris was talking about, reach out to him.  Meanwhile, I need to take some Pepto Bismol over thinking about Peggy.

Back to His Excellency; much has already been discussed, surmised, and speculated as to what his next move might be.  He even pointed out to the whole legislature that he had time to change his mind about retiring from the Corner Office.  It was in his recent State of the State speech, and he even poked fun at Warmington when everyone in Reps Hall presumably gasped.

Because he’s in bed with CNN, MSNBC, and their ilk, it’s common to think that he’s got some pundit gig waiting for him in January.  I doubt he’ll quietly go back to his ski area and quietly live out his post-50 years in obscurity. He thrives on attention and is addicted to relevancy.

So my parting comment is to say don’t be so quick to dismiss Chris Buda’s prognostication.  And I’m interested in thoughts from a Grokster who’s gifted at calling a spade a spade.  That’s the one and only Ed Mosca.  Consider this a request.

The post His Excellency’s Long Term Plans … Don’t Be Thinking CNN or MSNBC. appeared first on Granite Grok.

Claims in a special counsel report that the president’s neurological decline has progressed to the point where he is too incompetent to be held accountable for alleged improper handling of sensitive documents drew rather furious responses from Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

Still, it seems obvious to a great many Americans that their president cannot possibly serve a second term. That the Biden campaign criticizes the integrity of the report further tarnishes his credibility, amplifying the national anxiety about the 2024 presidential election.

An Awkward Offensive

The race to rewrite special counsel Robert K. Hur’s report about Biden’s handling of classified documents reveals an awkward, if not Orwellian, effort. Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) labeled the findings “right-wing extremism,” while the president’s personal lawyer, Bob Bauer, claimed, “This is a report that went off the rails … A shabby work product.” Biden and his defenders found the report’s criticisms of Donald Trump legitimate while condemning any negative observations about Biden.

The mainstream media has rallied to the president. The New York Times proclaimed that “[t]he report … cleared Mr. Biden of criminal wrongdoing,” and the commander-in-chief made similar assertions at his Feb. 9 press conference:

“I’ve seen the headlines since the report was released about my willful retention of documents. This [undiscernible] assertion is not only misleading, they’re just plain wrong.

“That’s the counsel’s decision to make … And they decided not to move forward. For any extraneous commentary, they don’t know what they’re talking about. That has no place in this report. The bottom line is the matter is now closed.”

This effort to sweep clear prosecutorial conclusions under the Oval Office rug instead kicks up more dust. Hur found that Mr. Biden illegally handled documents; the special counsel’s comments about mental acuity were necessary to determine whether he could establish that such actions were intentional. The two factual issues – mishandling of documents and the mens rea (criminal intent) to knowingly have done so – are both essential elements for prosecution. Democrats’ efforts to separate these facts from the report’s conclusions are even less credible than the administration’s claims that Republicans won’t permit Biden to secure the Mexican border.

Hiding Biden

Tellingly, as the chief executive addressed the nation, he railed against a prosecutor conducting required work:

“I know there is some attention paid to some language in the report about my recollection of events. There is even reference that I don’t remember when my son died. How in the Hell dare he raise that? Frankly, when I was asked the question I thought to myself it wasn’t any of their damn business.”

This indignation invites concerns over the president’s thinking processes – he is an attorney and surely understands that it is standard practice to ask such questions when assessing mental competence to stand trial or prove the intent element of a crime. The president defended himself against the faulty memory allegations by saying he never forgets because he wears every day “the rosary [Beau] got at Our Lady of …, ” unable to recall the name of the church. The Hur report noted other lapses and errors, including an inability to recall the name Roe v. Wade and the years when he was vice president.

Lying Again, or Forgetting Again?

There is little reasonable doubt that the president suffers from persistent memory problems. The special counsel report found “Mr. Biden’s memory was significantly limited, both during his recorded interviews with the ghostwriter in 2017, and in his interview with our office in 2023.” Those lapses formed a substantial basis for the decision not to prosecute Biden for mishandling documents. Now Democrats and the White House dismiss the weak memory evidence that rescued him and claim he was somehow “proved innocent.”

In his public statements, Biden snapped back:

“I did not share classified information. I did not share it. [Reporter in background: With your ghostwriter?] … with my ghostrider [sic]. Guarantee you did not. [Reporter: But the counsel said you did.] No, they did not say that. They did not say that.”

Small wonder the White House seeks to bury that statement by omitting it from the transcript. The Hur report found that various documents – including notes and notebooks containing sensitive information – were recklessly kept in bags, boxes, and other unsecured means at several different locations. The prosecutor specifically determined that Biden had provided classified material to his ghostwriter:

“Our investigation uncovered evidence that President Biden willfully retained and disclosed classified materials after his vice presidency when he was a private citizen. These materials included (1) marked classified documents about military and foreign policy in Afghanistan, and (2) notebooks containing Mr. Biden’s handwritten entries about issues of national security and foreign policy implicating sensitive intelligence sources and methods …

“Mr. Biden shared information, including some classified information, from those notebooks with his ghostwriter …

“[W]hile reading his notebook entries aloud during meetings with his ghostwriter, Mr. Biden sometimes skipped over presumptively classified material and warned his ghostwriter the entries might be classified, but at least three times Mr. Biden read from classified entries aloud to his ghostwriter nearly verbatim …

“Mr. Biden’s lapses in attention and vigilance demonstrate why former officials should not keep classified materials unsecured at home and read them aloud to others, but jurors could well conclude that Mr. Biden’s actions were unintentional. We therefore decline to charge Mr. Biden for disclosure of these passages to his ghostwriter.”

Contrary to the president’s and the media’s claims that Biden was “cleared of any wrongdoing,” the report concluded, “The practices of retaining classified material in unsecured locations and reading classified material to one’s ghostwriter present serious risks to national security, given the vulnerability of extraordinarily sensitive information to loss or compromise to America’s adversaries.”

Ignorance Is Bliss?

Either the president is a savvy dissembler who outsmarted the prosecutor by playing stupid, or his current behavior exhibits precisely the neurological/memory problems documented by Hur as (1) a hurdle to establishing intentional (rather than negligent) mismanagement of files, and (2) a problem for a sympathetic jury: “[H]e is someone for whom many jurors will want to identify reasonable doubt. It would be difficult to convince a jury that they should convict him – by then a former president well into his eighties – of a serious felony that requires a mental state of willfulness.”

The Democrat response reflects how far fact-deniers will go to advance their power – their ends justify their means. But the end for America is the 2024 candidacy of a man with obvious memory struggles. Biden ironically lashed out at Republicans on Feb. 9: “Time and again, Republicans show they’re a party of chaos and disunion. This is not your father’s Republican Party. They shout about a problem but then do nothing to solve the problem.”

Presumably, the president’s deficiency will serve him equally well when he denies memory of his foreign dealings with son Hunter. This is not your father’s Democratic Party.

 

John Klar is an Attorney, farmer, and author. Mostly farmer… And Regular Contributor to GraniteGrok and VermontGrok.

The post Biden’s Innocence Based on an Inability To Recall How Guilty He Is appeared first on Granite Grok.

I’m sure that the response of New Hampshire’s free-marketeers to this post would be something along the lines of … Google is a private company and as such has an absolute right to bias its search results any way it wishes, … has an absolute right to employ as may ex-CIA as it wants … if you don’t like it, build your own Google, … blah, blah, blah.

The reality, however, is that Google is a monopoly that has the ability to sway elections AND is being run by ex-CIA, AND rigging elections is exactly what Google (and other Big-Tech except for Elon) is doing.

Google’s algorithm (I don’t even know if that is the correct term) is weighted to disproportionately produce “news” from the hard-Left such as the New York Times and CNN. And as I discussed in a recent post:

… you can have voter ID, paper ballots, get rid of “early voting,” etc., etc., etc., and still not have a functional democracy if the government can censor the information available to voters (e.g., Hunter-laptop) and plant false information (e.g., Russia-bounties, the military are “suckers and losers”). America does NOT have a functional democracy because of government censorship.

Here is the data that shows the bias:

Google News' bias has gotten more pronounced since 2022.

63% of articles came from media outlets AllSides rates as Lean Left or Left. Just 6% were from the right.

Thread https://t.co/2U6I6GwRdf pic.twitter.com/ZyE1L6XMsv

— AllSides (@AllSidesNow) February 22, 2024

Even more ominous is that Google (and Facebook) is run by ex-CIA. But just keep pretending “land of the free,” that America is not a Police State, that our elections aren’t rigged, etc., etc., etc.:

1. Google & Meta function as extensions of the US Intelligence Community. With Jacqueline Lopour, Google's Head of Trust & Safety, and Aaron Berman, Meta's Head of Elections Content/Misinformation Policy, both being career CIA officers, it underscores the CIA's substantial… https://t.co/LdxZLGfekv pic.twitter.com/SpDlz5AGBj

— Name Redacted (@NameRedacted247) February 25, 2024

The post How Google Is Run By The CIA And Is Rigging The Election appeared first on Granite Grok.

Hundreds of millions of pounds of beef are imported into the US every year. Consumers believe because an American company is on the label, the beef is from the USA. As US farmland disappears, we slow down on exports with dwindling farms, imports are rising. The main sources of imported beef are from Australia, Brazil, Uruguay, and other countries.

Even if the label says “USA,” it only means some value was added to the meat in the US. Slicing, packaging, and shipping all qualify it to have the label “product of USA.” That means the cow may have been raised and slaughtered in another country under their rules, not our USDA and FDA rules. There is no way to know…

During the last millennial, there’s been a move from local farms to grocery store food produced in mass quantities. This brought about additives, coloring, fillers, and chemical preservatives. You need a chemistry degree to try and figure out the ingredients. Yet, we trusted the USDA and FDA to do right by us. At fIrst many chemicals were used as preservatives. Then “natural spices or flavoring was labeled without details of what exactly they were. We bought the food anyway.

We want to thank Julie P. for this Contribution – Please direct yours to Steve@GraniteGrok.com.
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Remember “mystery meat” at school lunch? Today, supermarket meat is a mystery. You don’t know if the animal was fed growth hormones, antibiotics, and during processing, preservatives, red dye 40 coloring, Pink slime fillers, carbon monoxide, or even if the cow was raised in the USA. You won’t find any information on the label. How do you even know if it’s fresh!? They inject carbon monoxide into the air during packaging, then heat seal it to give and keep that fresh reddish pink look. It is banned in Japan and Canada because it can mask spoiled meat and fish, but not here. Much of our meat from Canada, Australia, Brazil, and Uruguay is a long way from farm to table. The USDA and FDA do not require a point of origin on the label as long as it was trimmed or cut in the USA.

Move over cows; there are other options!

Redefine Meat:  Lab meat.

The USDA approved lab-grown meat and chicken in June 2023. A factory in Holland prints 500 tons of steaks per month through 3D printers.

The Redefine Meat company will supply printed fillets to German restaurants. Around 110 German restaurants are already buying “meat” from Redefine Meat.

“To begin the process of 3D-pressed meat, scientists biopsy a sample of animal stem cells depending on the desired type of meat: beef, pork, poultry, or even fish. These cells are then subjected to a proliferation process and are immersed in a nutrient-dense serum in a climate-controlled bioreactor. Over several weeks, these cells multiply, interact, and differentiate in the fat and muscle cells that make up the bioink.

This is how a robot arm uses a nozzle to spread this filament of baked meat over each other in thin layers. The arm follows the instructions of an uploaded digital file with computer-aided design software (CAD) to replicate the correct shape and structure of the desired meat. The 3D-printed meat material must be viscose but solid enough to achieve a full structural model of accurate vascularization of tissue depending on the type and cut of meat.” Enjoy your meal! This is the direction the globalist, WHO and WEF are moving toward for “the people.” I’ll bet Bill G (his last name rhymes with hates), doesn’t eat 3D meat or has it in his Hawaii farm/bunker. I doubt any globalists do.

Impossible Foods (impossible burger)

Plant-based meat: Impossible Burger and Beyond Meat sell plant-based concoctions. Using soy, oils, minerals or proteins, flavors, fats, and binders to imitate ground beef. An ingredient called “Heme”, a gene made using yeast and genetically engineered, that gives it the flavor of beef, is controversial for vegans and possible health risks. One has to wonder if the efforts and “processing” involved in an “impossible” burger are more about the “feels” than healthy eating!? Their biggest hype is no animal was hurt and saving the planet. Highly processed food, such as Impossible Burger, reports trouble with digestion due to a lack of enzymes to digest certain carbs and soy. The amount of water used and other environmental impacts in processing have become a question that remains unanswered.

I’m not a geneticist, chemist or biologist, just a consumer looking for answers. I encourage everyone to do their own research and ask questions about their food source. I’m not saying any of the following is safe or not. Just saying you may want to know where your food comes from, when, and how. I’ve been buying beef from a neighboring farm for many years. There is a distinct difference between store beef and the beef I buy from them. The hamburger is infinitely better! The cows are grass-fed and a mixture of silage treated very well, live in open pastures and have shelter. Their fecal waste is made into highly sought-after fertilizer. Every part of the cow is used for byproducts. When their time comes, they are ethically euthanized, and a New Hampshire USDA butcher processes the meat.

Save a farm and buy local!

The post Where’s The Beef? appeared first on Granite Grok.

Tulsi Gabbard, a former U.S. representative for Hawaii’s 2nd congressional district and a decorated military veteran, has emerged as a fascinating potential candidate for the vice-presidential spot in Donald Trump’s administration. Her background, unorthodox political stances, and broad appeal marked by a unique blend of military experience, legislative understanding, and a distinctive foreign policy stance offer a compelling narrative for her potential role in the Trump administration.

Tulsi Gabbard’s political career has been marked by a strong focus on legislative achievements that resonate with a broad spectrum of constituents. During her tenure in Congress, Tulsi Gabbard demonstrated a multifaceted approach to governance, focusing on several key areas:

Environmental Advocacy: Gabbard cosponsored the Coral Reef Sustainability Through Innovation Act of 2016, aiming to promote coral reef research and conservation through federal grants. She supported green energy policies, including transitioning to near-zero greenhouse gas emissions and 100% clean renewable energy.

Affordable Housing Initiatives: Addressing Hawaii’s high cost of living, Gabbard focused on affordable housing issues, highlighting her commitment to economic development and social welfare.

Health and Food Policy Advocacy: Gabbard was a leading advocate for mandatory labeling of genetically engineered (GE) food, earning recognition from Food Policy Action for her efforts to improve the nation’s food system and fight against the DARK (Deny Americans the Right to Know) Act.

National Parks Conservation Support: Gabbard was honored with the “Friend of the National Parks” award from the National Parks Conservation Association for her support of the National Park System, underscoring her commitment to preserving the natural and cultural resources of the United States.

Gabbard’s legislative achievements reflect her dedication to serving the needs and interests of her constituents, showcasing her commitment to environmental protection, economic development, and social welfare.

Military Experience and Foreign Policy Stance: Gabbard’s distinguished military career and experience in the United States Army Reserve have shaped her unique foreign policy views, setting her apart from mainstream Democratic or Republican positions. Her service in Iraq and Kuwait has given her a deep understanding of military operations and strategy.

In this regard, her interactions with the Trump administration have also been notable. Gabbard has met with President Trump and has been critical of specific policies while supporting others.

The potential impact of Tulsi Gabbard’s inclusion in the Trump administration must be considered. The speculation around Gabbard’s possible candidacy for the vice-presidential spot in the Trump administration is intriguing. Her ability to appeal to women, military personnel, and Democrats presents a unique opportunity for the Trump campaign to broaden its support base.

Gabbard’s calm and logical approach could balance Trump’s aggressive style, potentially mellowing his rhetoric and making his administration more appealing to a broader range of voters. Her background in Congress and military experience could help reshape the administration’s policy and public engagement approach.

However, Tulsi Gabbard’s relationship with the World Economic Forum has raised serious concerns among conservatives. WEF is a globalist organization established by Klaus Schwab.

Gabbard’s willingness to support authoritarian regimes under certain conditions has both been criticized and contributed to her distinct foreign policy stance.

Gabbard’s foreign policy views are characterized by a critical view of “regime change wars” and an advocacy for a more diplomatic approach to international relations and a focus on environmentalism. She has shown a willingness to support authoritarian regimes in certain contexts, such as her meeting with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, which was controversial due to her defense of his authoritarianism and his use of force against civilians. Additionally, she has expressed support for brutal authoritarian repression in places like Egypt in the name of counter-terrorism, placing her outside of the mainstream of American progressives.

“Gabbard was scrutinized for a 2017 meeting with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, whom the United States government blames for deadly attacks against Syrian civilians during the country’s civil war.”

“Gabbard endorsed independent senator Sanders’ run against Clinton for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination. Gabbard ended her presidential candidacy in March 2020 and immediately endorsed Joe Biden.

Here is a long list of  Rep. Tulsi Gabbard’s (2013-202) Congressional Report Card. Conclusion

Is Tulsi Gabbard picture-perfect? No, she is not. Can Republican voters trust her should she become a VP nominee? That’s the question that is still lingering. But, hypothetically, let’s assume Trump chooses her as his running mate; what should we expect?

In a hypothetical situation, Tulsi Gabbard’s potential can be seen by some as a game-changer for the Trump administration. Her selection as Trump’s vice president could bring many benefits, including unifying the Republican base, appealing to a broader range of voters, and balancing influence on Trump’s more combative approach to governance.

“Tulsi Gabbard’s odds of becoming the 2024 Republican vice-presidential candidate surged with a leading bookmaker after Donald Trump said she was on his short list during a Fox News town hall on Tuesday.”

Her legislative achievements, military experience, and distinct foreign policy stance make her a compelling candidate for a vice-presidential role. The benefits of her selection, including her broad appeal and potential to influence the administration’s approach, warrant serious consideration.

In short, her candidacy remains speculative, and further developments will provide more insight into the direction of the Trump administration. Gabbard’s unique blend of experiences and perspectives could significantly influence the Trump administration’s policies and approach to governance, setting a new precedent for the role of vice president in American politics.

 

The views and opinions expressed by contributors are those of the author and may not reflect the opinion or position of  Grok Media, GraniteGrok.com, its authors, advertisers, donors, or sponsors.

The post Tulsi Gabbard As Trump’s Running Mate? appeared first on Granite Grok.

No one, including (I suspect) the lone Democrat Rep who sponsored the legislation, New Market Democrat Ellen Read, expects HB1102 to get very far. The Bill would modify the state’s animal cruelty law to effectively ban English and French bulldogs, bull mastiffs, Boston terriers, boxers, pugs, shih tzus, Lhasa apsos, and Pekingese.

By ban, I mean the breeding for sale of Brachycephalic Dogs. These are flat-faced pups with shortened snouts that can lead to a variety of pre-ordained health issues. According to this source,

While not all of these dogs have associated health problems, the shape of the nose and head of a brachycephalic dog can place them at risk for a condition called brachycephalic airway syndrome, says Dr. Cheryl Yuill for Veterinary Centers of America. VCA Hospitals. There are four distinct upper airway abnormalities that can cause this condition, and a brachycephalic dog can have one or more of these abnormalities.

Read’s Bill would prohibit their sale in the state, their breeding being statutorily defined as animal cruelty, changes that include two or more of “an animal that has a birth deformity that causes suffering.”

No matter your thoughts on Bull Dogs, Pugs, or any other related varieties, labradors, for example, tend to be born with hip dysplasia. It may or may not cause suffering, but the odds of it are not low, while treatment can be reasonable and noninvasive. My dog, Cosmo, was diagnosed with hip dysplasia around the age of one. He’s been on joint supplements since (a daily chewable tablet), and, as he approaches his 8th birthday, has never once shown any discomfort, lack of mobility, or disinterest in testing his speed or agility at the dog park (or chasing critters in the yard) since diagnosed. But, technically, were the breeder to have had two such instances in that litter (his was eight pups), I believe they could be said to have violated the statute as modified by HB1102.

It’s absurd. The quality of his life, and ours for having him in it, have been exceptional. And while I’ve never owned a Brachycephalic Dog, I know people who have or do, and they love each other a great deal, experiencing the joys of pet and owner (not to mention the added commerce created by pet ownership in general).

In other words, whether a constituent requested this Bill or it came to Rep. Read in a progressive fever dream, it is a ridiculous proposition. Two of the (would be) banned dogs are in the top ten most popular breeds in the US, with the French Bulldog at number one (the other is the English Bulldog at No. 6). Related: The Climate Cult is “Coming” For the Family Pet – Dogs and Cats Contribute to Global Warming.

The Bill does not ban your getting a breed outside New Hampshire and bringing it home, but that then encourages prospective pet owners to take their business outside the state. The actual message is anti-local dog breeding, which you’d think might make them more accountable to their customers than those outside the state. I assume that HB1102 would also end the ability of rescue services to bring them here for adoption to good, happy homes.

If you are inclined to appear and express your doubts about this as an exercise of state authority, a public hearing is scheduled on 03/05/2024 01:00 pm LOB 301-303, with a Full Committee Work Session scheduled for 03/06/2024 10:00 am LOB 301-303

The post NH Dem’s Dog Ban Bill appeared first on Granite Grok.

Many Presidents have tempered their policy positions while campaigning for or during their second term. Bill Clinton was praised by many for his move toward the middle, allowing him to get much accomplished in his second term. What Joe Biden has been doing the last few weeks is evidence his reelection staff is in panic mode.

They will say or do whatever is necessary to counter the damaging polls coming out of swing states that will determine the winner in 2024.

Michigan is an excellent example to analyze because the President has to win Michigan and is currently behind Trump in one-to-one polling. Joe Biden’s Green Policies and his mandate to phase out internal combustion vehicles are destroying the auto industry in Michigan and thousands of good-paying union jobs. Green Energy has been the number one policy of this Administration, and Biden has been unyielding in his focus until now. The difference today is that the impact of Biden’s premature and poor policy decisions has been devastating enough to break Biden’s support by the Michigan voters. With his policy no longer set in stone, Biden will reassess exhaust emissions that will delay the death of gas-driven automobiles. Biden’s difficulty securing the support of the powerful UAW and the recent announcement that the Teamsters are backing Trump has forced Biden’s hand. This Teamster decision will mark the first time they have supported a Republican in nearly fifty years.

This policy change is good news for the autoworkers in Michigan but leaves automakers questioning their future focus. Do they continue shifting their attention to electric vehicles, or is this a short-term flip solely for votes, and Biden will return to his pro-green push? Nobody except Biden can answer that question, and who would believe his answer? The Radical Left will pay close attention to this issue as any deviation from his green policies will bring stiff resistance.

The other issue generating interest and debate is also a high-wire act for Biden as he does not want to alienate one block of Democrats as he satisfies another. Michigan has a significant Muslim population that has been critical of any sign of Biden’s support for Israel. This Muslim pressure, along with the Radical Left, in other words, The Squad, has been having an impact on Biden’s tempered support of Israel as they defend themselves against Hamas and Hezbollah.

Joe Biden has sent billions of our tax dollars to Ukraine and consistently demands more funds. There are reports of kickbacks from Ukraine into the Biden Family accounts. Biden tells us how important it is to give Ukraine the resources to protect its borders while ours remains completely open. When it comes to Israel, his message is very different. Instead of funds, he sends Secretary of State Antony Blinken to Israel to urge them to stop their attack on Hamas. He publicly denounces the push into Gaza by Israeli ground troops on their mission to retaliate for the Hamas attack of October 7 and to eliminate the potential repeat of such a breach of their sovereignty. Israel was once our strongest ally in the Middle East. Still, Biden is doing irreversible damage to that relationship if only to appease his connection with the Radical Left and to buy Muslim votes in places like Michigan. It is a transparent and shameless act but one we have come to expect from our Shadow president.

The post Biden’s Policies And Swing State Polls appeared first on Granite Grok.

The man who occasionally (rarely?) sits behind the Resolute desk in the Oval Office (photo ops?) can’t seem to find his way onstage. He has difficulty making it to the podium.

He appears to shake hands with people who aren’t on the stage. He frequently speaks to or about people who aren’t there—because they’re dead (e.g., Francois Mitterrand, who died in 1996, Helmut Kohl, who died in 2017, or Rep. Jackie Walorski who died before a conference that she had convened).

He just spoke of asking President Lopez Obrador of Mexico to open the gate between Gaza and Israel. He continues to repeat tall tales about various events that have been fact-checked as false. He slurs words together.

When he is finally done. he can’t find his way off of the stage. Does he seem OK to you?

The latest buzz? The report about the classified documents about Afghanistan and Ukraine found in cardboard boxes in Mr. Biden’s garage and in his office at the Penn Biden Center. As Mr. Biden was the vice-president or a senator at the time, he was not legally allowed to declassify and retain those documents.

Will he be indicted? Per special counsel Robert Hur—no. Why?

Mr. Hur noted that Mr. Biden’s memory was so poor that he couldn’t remember when he was vice president or when his son Beau died, among other things. Mr. Hur stated that Mr. Biden would be a sympathetic elderly defendant and a jury wouldn’t convict. Not that AG Garland would actually issue an indictment against his buddy. C’mon, man

Are you still planning to vote for this person as president of the United States?

The post Night Cap: Biden Couldn’t Find Memory Lane With … appeared first on Granite Grok.

Nationally, Trump is ahead by nearly 60 points. Yesterday, Trafalgar had Trump up by 20+ points in SC. Today, inevitability has again raised its head as the real numbers finally roll in from South Carolina—another sweeping victory with what looks like 60 percent of primary voters choosing President Trump.

One thing I’m noticing as results from the primary continue to come in is Nikki Haley’s relative strength in Columbia and Charleston — two of the most Democratic-leaning areas in South Carolina. We don’t yet know just how many Democrats skipped their party’s contest on Feb. 3 in order to support her tonight. But it seems her campaign message has broken through to some.

Donald Trump has claimed all but three counties in the entire state (Charleston, Richland, and Beaufort), which has inspired the New York Times to update this headline.

Trump Defeats Haley, Delivering a Crushing Blow in Her Home State

 

It’s not a surprise; from what I recall, she has never polled well enough there to come even close. Sadly for the party, losing in her home state by double digits – typically an embarrassing drubbing in any other circumstance – is not a reason to acquiesce. She’s convinced that 60+ percent of Republicans isn’t the message. The other 39% are – keeping in mind that were it the other way around, it would be a different story.

But Haley has gobs of Deep State cash to burn and no reason to stop. She won’t be out by Super Tuesday or after. Her backers won’t want that. Every dollar they spent that forces Trump to spend money improves the odds that his Democrat opponents win in November.

That’s my take from here. The Republican moderates are more interested in losing, and the American people should take note.

As for Nikki Haley, what she should be thinking is about the words of Russ Kahn (Carolina in the Morning)

Dreaming was meant for nighttime
I live in dreams all the day
I know it’s not the right time
But still, I dream away
What could be sweeter than dreaming
Just dreaming and drifting away

They aren’t the most memorable lyrics from the 1922 song, but if you’re on team Haley, plenty could be finer than to be in (South) Carolina the morning after the 2024 primary – no matter how you spin it.

[Update] As the Carolina morning breaks Trump’ “crushing blow” is slightly under 60% (59.8)

And with 44 out of 50 Delegates allotted Trup has 107 to Haley’s 17 (with DeSantis and Ramaswamay Trump’s count is 129).

Michigan has a primary on Tuesday, the  27th. Michigan, Idaho, and Missouri have Caucuses in two days (March 2nd). DC votes on March 3rd, and North Dakota on March 4th. Sixteen primaries happen on Super Tuesday (March 5th). A total of 1077 delegates are up for grabs from now until then.

Not enough to sew up the abomination was Trump to sweep, but you only need 1215 to ring the bell and there are 12 more primaries in March.

The post Night Cap: Nothing Could Be Finer, Than to Beat Haley in ‘Carolina’ … With 60% of the Vote [Update] appeared first on Granite Grok.

My neighbors in Vermont passed a law allowing illegal aliens to vote in local elections, probably because all the cool progressive “kids” are doing it. Not far from the Green Mountains, New York City did something similar. Local Law No. 11, as it was called, would have stuffed ballot boxes with non-citizen votes.

It would, had it not just been struck down.

Appeal Court Justice Paul Wooten struck down the insane law, writing that, “We determine that this local law was enacted in violation of the New York State Constitution and Municipal Home Rule Law, and thus, must be declared null and void.”

The goofy, irrational 2022 law, supported by New York City Mayor Eric Adams, also lost at the trial court level. The City appealed that earlier decision, and has now lost again. Back in 2022, the Associated Press estimated Local Law 11 would create over eight hundred thousand new non-citizen voters.

New Hampshire doesn’t have anything like that in the queue, but there is a bill (SB501) that would allow the state to give non-citizen driver’s licenses to anyone “Who has been granted conditional or permanent residence by the United States government.” That sounds like anyone the Biden Admin let in, but even if that’s not true,  a driver’s license is a ticket to same-day voting in the Granite State. State ID is proof of residency. Out-of-state college kids can still use Dorm IDs, so a state-issued license to drive suggests a desire to expand the Democrat’s “Love the One You’re Wit” approach to voting rights. And once you’re on the checklist, you can vote in every election as long as you have a valid driver’s license.

The narrative is that everyone should be able to vote by mail unless they are in New Hampshire on election day, in which case such demands are vote suppression. And we know they want them to vote in our elections, so it’s useless to deny it.

Meanwhile, back in the Big Crapple.

Oh, the Democrats in NYC are going to be madder than hornets. They have been importing these illegals for votes and now they can’t use them. They are stuck with criminals that are of no benefit to them.

A state appeals court ruled that a New York City law that would allow… pic.twitter.com/B1BJvOF14j

— Tired of being politically correct (@USBornNRaised) February 22, 2024

 

New York’s been bitching about the huddled masses teeming on its shores (and taking up hotel rooms that could be filled with paying tourists). After the Trump fine, businesses have fled, investment dollars are looking for a way out, and now this?

A problem that solves itself if, for some reason, they were all going to vote for Trump. Adams and the Bidenistas would have them on every boat and plane they could find, back to anywhere but here.

 

The post Judge Says Law Allowing Non-Citizens to Vote is Unconstitutional appeared first on Granite Grok.

The beleaguered girls’ varsity basketball team from Mid-Vermont Christian School in Quechee, VT, is headed to the New England Association of Christian Schools Championship game.  This is a year after they made international headlines for taking a principled stand against playing a school boasting a biological male athlete, identifying as “trans,” standing nearly 6’3” tall.

The school is currently awaiting a trial hearing for the suit brought on their behalf by Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), a non-profit legal firm.  The suit names head coach Chris Goodwin and his wife as the chief plaintiffs, especially on behalf of their children, who have been unfairly punished as a result of Vermont athletic policy being levied against them rather than on behalf of their constitutionally protected religious freedom of conscience.  Among the defendants are Vermont Principal’s Association Executive Director Jay Nichols, Interim Secretary of Vermont Agency of Education Heather Bouchey, Chair of the Vermont State Board of Education Jennifer Deck Samuelson, Windsor Southeast Supervisory Union Superintendent Hartland School Board, Orange East Supervisory Union Superintendent Randall Gawel, and the Waits River Valley School Board.

The irony escaping many in Vermont is the call for tolerance and inclusion by those in power somehow doesn’t extend to the small private school.  The same oppressor versus oppressed ideology the state of Vermont has imbibed and adopted from its political activists, including those crafting policies and laws, somehow misses the very obvious power of the state oppressing a tiny Christian school with even smaller girls playing against a well-funded private school that recruits from across the country.  However, this philosophical argument is not the crux of the matter, but rather the constitutional protection the school and students have per the first amendment.  This is the case being made by the ADF lawyers, who are no strangers to battling case law against the state of Vermont, which has repeatedly violated the rights of its citizens.

After speaking with ADF’s Media Relations Manager, Jaqueline Robeiro, she sent along the press releases and case filings as presented to the Vermont District Court, as well as other cases ADF has taken in the state.  Among them are parents and the Burlington Diocese case, which was won back in 2022, changing a twenty-year history of religious discrimination by the state. At the root of this case was the state withholding tuition from students of religious schools while offering them to other students who were eligible for the same benefit, the only difference being the religious nature of the student.

As a tax-payer and Christian myself, the stunning arrogance of public officials living off the largesse of tax money we, the earners, provide the state, to then deny us the very money we provide over constitutionally protected religious freedoms is the height of political oppression.  Specifically, the government is an institution built from the money of the people for the will of the people and supports itself with armed enforcement to enact that will.  To use the enforcing power of the state against religious people who simply want equal rights to an education violates true equity and is also tyranny.

Luckily, the ADF has a record of winning these cases, even in Vermont.

Also with a record of winning are the young ladies representing MVCS today (Saturday) in the championship game held at the Central Christian Academy in Southington, CT, at 1pm.  Though embroiled in an international story of controversy, the bantam team known as the Eagles has soared above the fray to win the NEACS Northern division and will face off against the champions of the Southern division from Central Christian.

The Eagles’ continue their David vs. Goliath saga as they bring not only an undersized team with only eight of a possible twelve players, they have no seniors while having to bring up more than one eighth grader to fill out their starting five.  MVCS Assistant Coach Helen Jenks is encouraged by the team’s growth over the season and ability to scrap with bigger and more experienced teams.

On their road to the championship, they have had to come from behind on more than one occasion carried by sometimes sharp-shooting guard, eighth-grader Myranda Goodwin, who hit three three-point goals in the Northern finals to bolster the Eagles to victory.  MVCS inside game is shored up by Lydia Dickey, who stands a solid 6’ and has the physical strength to dominate in the post.  Her 17 points, 15 rebounds, 5 steals, 2 blocks, and 1 assist in the semi-finals led to her being awarded the tournament MVP.

Though many schools may have succumbed to the media pressure and social ostracism so common in today’s cancel culture, the Eagles prove their faith is at least the size of a mustard seed, if not as big as a full-grown tree.  The story of this team reminds one of yet another Bible lesson taught by Joseph to his brothers, whom he admonished, “What you intended for evil, God intended for good.”

With any luck, the defendants who’ve used the power of government in Vermont to violate the rights of these girls will come to the same realization.

but those who hope in the Lord
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint. (Isaiah 40:31)

The post Mid-Vermont Girls Team Headed to Championship Despite Legal Battles appeared first on Granite Grok.

If you support ending new human life up to the point of birth, then I doubt there’s much hope of convincing you that a heartbeat is something worth protecting.  Democrats (at least most elected ones) fit into that box, and if they don’t, their party crams them in there or harasses them until they quit.

And ironically, they don’t really have a choice.

The “people before the politics” party does not brook dissent on the matter. You follow their lead, or you are the enemy. So, politics before people, not that you didn’t know that or see it coming. That is why they are unhappy about a recent ruling out of Alabama regarding the personhood of frozen embryos. It pute people before politics by giving personhood status to the unborn.

The state’s highest court decided that “extrauterine children” – or unborn children “located outside of a biological uterus at the time they are killed” – are children, and they are covered under the state’s Wrongful Death of a Minor law.” It is an obscure example that does not exactly apply to unborn children inside the uterus, but it has opened a door that the conception to live-birth abortion advocates can’t abide; if Alabama got that, it could spread like a virus.

If the unborn are recognized as people, they have rights, and you can’t indiscriminately kill them. If they can’t kill them, all that tax money laundered to Planned Parenthood returns to Democrats as campaign contributions dries up. How, then – given the complete disregard for young women’s privacy and safety (transwomen) – do they keep them voting for team blue? Related: The Baby Killers in the Lump of Cells Collective Just Had a Narrative Aborted

Personhood is a recurring problem for the political Left, where it is more likely to take precedence on the right. Parents before politics, if you like. Part of which is the rights of the unborn recognized in the Alabama decision.

A local constituent of Democrat NH House Rep Tommy Hoyt asked if he would submit legislation in New Hampshire to advance a similar position in the state to protect the unborn.

Hoyt, a proper lockstep Democrat, responded as you’d expect but with a narrative bonus that could have legs all the way to November.

For those unfamiliar, hamburger is ground beef.

You grind beef, after which you can create something that might look like this.

As opposed to this.

Hamburger heart? It’s an interesting assumption, which I assume means that Mr. Hoyt objected to illegal fetal organ harvesting by groups like Planned Parenthood (busted in 2015) because what possible good could that hamburger be to some other ‘baby’? And if the heart is hamburger, what are the other organs collected as viable transplants?

Not hamburger. Liver, that seems easy enough. Kidney, Lung tissues that our baby-making elites might need in the event their newborn children (Wagyu beef) need some sort of biological enrichment.

I didn’t have the time to chase down Hoyt’s reaction, if any, to the practice, but if I had to guess, he defended it without contradiction or any sense of hypocrisy. Choice and all.

I could be wrong.

The post Dem Rep on Unborn Baby’s Heart: It Is No More a Heart Than It is a Hamburger appeared first on Granite Grok.

White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre recently blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin for inflation in the US. Much like blaming the border crisis on Republicans despite years of Trump wrangling to “Build That Wall,” this effort to project American inflation onto Putin’s shoulders rings hollow.

Examining this false claim exposes greater truths – Biden policies, including sanctions against Russia, gargantuan spending bills, COVID-19 lockdowns, and attacks on fossil fuels … All these have directly fueled US inflation without any help from Vlad.

Habitual Russia-Blaming

In her January 30 iteration of the “Putin did this!” stance regarding inflation, Ms. Jean-Pierre stated:

“Putin’s war …  has caused prices to go up, and so the President took action to make sure gas prices went down, which they have, and we’re coming out of this pandemic, so all of those things have been part of where inflation is, but inflation is moderating….”

This is hardly the first time the Biden White House has cited Russia’s invasion of Ukraine (or the pandemic) as the cause of US inflation, and certainly there is more than one factor that can influence price hikes. Yet Biden’s sanctions against Russia have spiked prices (and somebody blew up the Nord Stream Pipeline). Sanctions have had no measurable effect on Russia’s economy but have pushed up global inflation.

Stimulus Spending Increased Inflation

However, ignoring the impacts of at least two massive Biden spending initiatives – the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) and the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) – disregards basic monetary theory as well as statements by Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen that the surge of money into the economy had boosted inflation. Former Obama National Economic Counsel head Larry Summers strongly warned that such a huge stimulus package as ARPA dangerously threatened to fuel inflation, but he was disregarded.

Economist and monetary policy expert Milton Friedman emphatically urged that “Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon:” Nothing is more directly impactful of monetary value than money supply.  Famous examples of reckless currency management that unleashed vicious hyperinflation include Robert Mugabe’s  Zimbabwe, Germany’s Weimar Republic, and post-WWII Hungary. Printing money excessively dilutes the value of any currency.

Biden Blame Game

This possibility persistently eludes President Biden, who has also repeatedly scapegoated “supply chain disruptions” as the inflationary culprit. Yet these disruptions resulted from excessive payments to American consumers under ARPA. Steven Rattner, a former counselor to the Treasury Secretary during the Obama Administration, observed in 2022 that supply delays were caused by “vast amounts of government rescue aid (including three rounds of stimulus checks),” and that “Blaming inflation on supply lines is like complaining about your sweater keeping you too warm after you’ve added several logs to the fireplace.”

National Public Radio conceded that ARPA spending seeded inflation but ironically sought to defend Biden by blaming the citizenry:

Had everyone gotten vaccinated, or had the Delta and Omicron variants not burst onto the scene, the economy and President Biden’s approval ratings might well look a lot better. Economists have been telling us since the beginning of the pandemic that the best way to recover from the pandemic is to end the pandemic. It’s hard to end the pandemic when large chunks of society aren’t cooperating.

On the contrary, many argue that lockdowns caused economic harm and that vaccines did not perform as advertised. These would constitute additional Biden failures, which compounded the inflationary impacts of overspending.

The IRA that followed exploited the monetary crisis caused by overspending to … spend more! Cloaked in the name of reducing inflation, the spending spree for renewable products that were the real goal did nothing to reverse inflation. The purchase of solar panels, EVs, and heat pumps under IRA was regressively provided to those who could afford them while running up the national debt for workers and retirees who couldn’t. Later, the president himself abandoned all pretense that the IRA would reduce inflation, arguing at a New Mexico fundraiser that it “has nothing to do with inflation. It has to do with the $368 billion, the single-largest investment in climate change anywhere in the world, anywhere.”

Joe Biden’s open war against fossil fuels, pipelines, and oil and gas drilling clearly drove gasoline and fuel prices high – before Russia invaded Ukraine. Then the administration claimed the president rescued Americans from gasoline inflation (allegedly caused by price-gouging energy companies, not efforts to eliminate fossil fuels by government edict) when he released supplies from the nation’s emergency reserves.

Stop the Spending!

The federal government has steadily gouged the real value of Americans’ savings, retirement accounts, and fixed-income payments by essentially printing too much money. The interest payments required to service the nation’s $34.2 trillion debt will drag down the economy and reduce the resources available for public services. Every penny of IRA and ARPA spending was borrowed money, adding to that intergenerational tab.

Blaming Putin for US inflation is like trying to blame Republicans for the open southern border with Mexico. Voters can easily see that Biden’s policies have contributed to both problems. But it’s easier to secure the border than it is to reverse inflation: Both Janet Yellen and Jerome Powell recently stated the consumer price increases of the last few years are very unlikely to come down – ever.

 

 

John Klar is an Attorney, farmer, and author. Mostly farmer… And Regular Contributor to GraniteGrok and VermontGrok.

The post Biden Administration Blames Putin For US Inflation appeared first on Granite Grok.

It is a classic tale of progressive woe; years of lousy policy create a problem that those responsible insist needs more funding … for them to fix it. The correct course of action is to fire all of them, take back your money and power, and do something different, but it is a hill they are prepared to die on.

Bad pandemic policy did a world of damage, but nothing is as insidious as telling a child with no concept of sex and gender that they might be in the wrong body. These narratives are ubiquitous in public education, which is using the damage they’ve done to permit schools to operate like mental health clinics. As if you would give an institution that can’t teach kids to read and write carte blanch to treat the mental illness they created.

Public Schools, with few exceptions, exist to break things, your children, then put them back together in the progressive image. It kills some of them, ruins many, and sterilizes some while forever claiming they need more resources. More money, more personnel, more of everything but parental rights or involvement.

It’s a nationwide act of kidnapping where the ransom money is your tax bill, and everyone pays it forever. Here in New Hampshire, they get unelected judges to create rights for which other people must pay. Pro Tip: if it’s a right, it’s free.

Over in Vermont, they’ve got problems, too, not the least of which is deciding the next phase in their multi-generational mission to f*** with the children. It’s expensive and has a lot of moving pieces, and to keep the wheels coming off the bus, the legislature is going to have to piss some people off.

Lucky for Vermonters, those are the lawmakers they’ve been electing.

“Vermont is challenged by the fact that we have a foot in the past and a foot in the future,” said Jeff Francis, executive director of the superintendents’ association. “We’ve really wanted to hang on to small schools as the center of every community and, at the same time, make sure that we have robust opportunity for every child in the state.

Francis said Vermont’s values of “rural, bucolic and local” are at odds with running an efficient, modern educational system.

Montpelier Roxbury Public School District superintendent Libby Bonesteel provided one example. In her district, Roxbury Village School has 13 full-time staff for just 42 students. From an operational standpoint, it would be easy to close the school and bring those students to Montpelier’s Union Elementary without any additional costs, Bonesteel said. But it’s not a decision school board members can make quickly or unilaterally because of how important the school is to members of the Roxbury community.

School boards “need legislators’ help and support and backing when they come to a community with a decision that might be hard,” Bonesteel said.

Roxbury Villiage can probably solve this themselves, beginning with asking why they need a full-time staffer for every three students. It seems like they could do this with less and a little ingenuity because sending them to Montpelier Union Elementary sounds like an intellectual death sentence—one that follows the mental health vein, according to the same experts.

[Superintendent Libby] Bonesteel said most districts in the state, including hers, are now offering alternative programs for students whose behavioral and mental health challenges make it impossible for them to be in a traditional classroom. She said her district doubled its spending on social-emotional and mental health services in the past three years, from $1.5 million to $3 million. It’s yielded positive results, including a reduction in hazing, harassment and bullying investigations, and suspensions. But those results come with a price.

“We need high-quality staff to help these kids with what their needs are,” Bonesteel said.

A more accurate assessment would be, we’ve screwed up your kids, and we’d like to expand our funding, power, and influence, but we need you to pay for it. It’s like a mugging that never ends. A Mafia extortion racket. Protection money. You pay us, and we won’t hurt you. Your kids, on the other hand, are doomed, but if you try to take them back, that might not end well for you either.

But it will. Vermont needs Education Freedom Accounts. It needs to link the money to the student, and the success will likely follow for a fraction of the cost. That’s what Roxbury Villiage likely needs. Find a few parents willing to homeschool, create your own cooperative, schedule learning based on ability, and get other parents involved to help kids get caught up.

They could probably hire tutors or a private operation for a thimble full of what Vermont is currently milking them to screw with their kid’s heads while failing to teach them anything approaching academics.

The Public school model is broken. It has lost its way and fails to provide value. In America, that is an invitation to innovators, and they are out there. So, the problem for voters is not how to fix public schools but how to force them to fix themselves.

Just say no. No more money. No new duties or responsibilities. We’re stripping some from you until you show competency at the core purpose of teaching children to read, write, and do math, and not what to learn but how to learn.

You’ve failed your assessment again. We should no longer reward you for failure.

The post School Funding and Mental Health – Another Example of Government Trying to Grow to Fix A Problem it Created appeared first on Granite Grok.

Beginning in 1789, America’s Constitutional form of limited governing took effect. As our new country became established, its authority was limited, as was its revenue – due to its meager tariff-based revenue – so if there was debt back then, it was minor and of brief duration.

Our travails from then till today’s outlaw authority, which finances a slew of unconstitutional domestic and foreign expenditures, is at such a depth that it must waste hundreds of billions just to satisfy its interest on the debt!

Such indebtedness presents the harsh truth of a government that has long since shed those limiting shackles. A small item, but never-the-less attributable to this monstrous authority, is the inflated salaries of our handsomely paid “public servants.” In theory and reality, the term “public servant” is only applicable to those days of horse and buggy travel since, back then, one’s service involved personal sacrifice for the betterment of America. Not so today!

A normal outgrowth from such corrupt and inefficient governing, is the lesser quality in many of the many elected. Selfless service disappeared when the glitter of gold transformed those former “servants” to that of being career minded while eyeballing a more than affordable lifetime of benefits. This has become so lucrative that contestants for office usually begin under the tutelage of one’s local political “machinery.” After all, the posts being offered are not only prestigious but lucrative, so while many apply, only a few of the eager and manageable are chosen!

Sadly, this devalued quality in the elected merely shadows the public ranks from which they are selected. I do not intend to insult, but it’s plain to see from this governmental reversal from a limited authority to our current “in-the-red” version that all this has happened without a peep from our citizens!

Other players, such as academia and our former “free press,” had to be included so that this ongoing and unheeded governmental transformation could effectively continue. This effort has operated at a gradual pace so as not to spark public attention. From a before and after comparison, what began as “limited” is now a full-throttle pedal to the metal abuse!

Usually, pursuits that are illegal lack any overall merit. This is one reason why they are forbidden by law; they lack any benefit or any betterment for our Country. As such, these criminal actions feed into the immediacy of the group’s demands, which espouses an ideology that is immoral, unGodly, and, of course, anti-American. Basically, this is the current revisionist agenda with its aim to blanket our countryside. Therefore, this wide-ranging undertaking necessitates collaborations with players holding national prominence and influence. This can be validated by the corruptive designs and effective influences from the two willing and complicit examples previously mentioned: academia and the media. Both have been deeply entangled over a very lengthy period of time and have been highly influential with their unfounded opinions at the student and throughout the variety of public information levels.

In the former case, an area in which the government lacks any legal claim to be, fundamental learning has been slowly revamped to the point that it now has invaded the inner sanctuary of the American family while at the same time attempting to challenge mother nature! In the second case, what has evolved, and it’s not just a recent development, can be adequately characterized with its new and very accurate logo of “fake news.”

Today’s Americans are living in what might be a “never-never land,” that is, a momentary existence between freedom and slavery. What else is there to think when all these societal and cultural revisions carry the same anti-American banner? If this fails to convince, explain this state of indebtedness while defiantly championing trillions to foreign countries!

Common sense is the only requirement to see that this latest act of unconstitutional spending is just a shorter and more direct path to a national state of dependency! However, what this move also suggests is that these revisionists might just be getting impatient, given today’s political landscape and its increased questioning by an awakened citizenry. So, as we remember George Washington’s birthday, its appropriateness must not be overlooked. He managed to achieve a “limited government,” so he and his memory may again fuel America’s embrace of renewal, one that would require sanity and sacrifice for limited governing!

The post Complicity Galore appeared first on Granite Grok.

According to people who think this sort of thing matters, the fashion industry produces more emissions than international flights and maritime shipping combined. According to a climate minister down under, the solution is to launder money from clothing makers (consumers) into government programs.

This is the way.

The clothing industry is … the fourth-most polluting industry in the world, generating somewhere between 4 to 8 per cent of global emissions.

The minister is currently considering whether to intervene in the sector to improve its recycling and reuse efforts, which could include minimum design standards or mandating fashion brands contribute to a green fund for every piece of clothing they make or import and put to market.

A few paragraphs later, the fashion industry is responsible for 10% of emissions, so we might save the planet by writing shorter articles about clothing “emissions.” Had they stopped at 4-8%, we would have saved 2-6% off the top without fees, fines, or revolving government green funds (green meaning money).

Under the scheme, members must pay a 4 cent contribution to the Seamless program for every piece of clothing they make or import, though footwear, single-use protective wear and accessories are excluded.

Seamless funding would then go towards clothing collection and sorting, research and recycling projects, education campaigns and other work to help coordinate the industry’s green efforts.

The Fashion Council estimates the scheme will raise about $36 million each year, and up to $60 million if it became mandatory for the sector to contribute.

Let me translate. The government will drive up the cost of clothes to fund political friends and family pretending to save the environment (also known as “donors”). Maybe they should skip all the foreplay and start handing out Mao Suits.

 

The post As Australia Considers Clothing Regulations (To Save The Planet), Who Doesn’t See Where “This” is Leading? appeared first on Granite Grok.

In spite of all MAGA resistance, Joe Biden continues to cancel student debt in spite of the fact that the United States Supreme Court ruled that Joe Biden could not forgive student loans. Biden continues to find the money to bribe students and buy millions of votes. Joe Biden is shameless in securing one of the few remaining blocks of voters he has not lost. He is not canceling student loan debt. He is transferring the burden for these loans to people who do not deserve the responsibility but have no choice in the matter.

Biden may be buying a specific group of voters, but he alienates many others. People who have already paid their loans or students entering college today will not benefit from Biden’s transfer of wealth. People who opted not to go the college route but took up a trade and spent years paying their dues while they worked towards a license will not realize forgiveness in their investment but will instead be asked to settle the debt of others. Strike that. They were not asked. Joe Biden told them to ante up and pay their fair share for college grads unable to pay their way.

On Wednesday, Biden spent time with a Black family who will benefit from his executive order to forgive their student loans. I specify a Black family, for they were not chosen by chance. He was scoring a double win. Look at me forgiving debts that are unconstitutional and doing it for Black families. Make sure you get your mail-in votes early.

Joe Biden is destroying this country, and the student block is his Bull Run. He destroyed the economy with 19% inflation for the first three years of his presidency. He has let 7 million unvetted illegal migrants come across the border he opened and watched as they spread across the country, making every state a border state. He has weakened our stand on the international stage as he botched the Afghanistan retreat, abandoned Israel as they retaliated against an assault by Hamas, and continues to send billions of our tax dollars to Ukraine to fight a winless war but benefits from personal kickbacks of American’s money. He has turned his back on police as his supporters installed DAs who refused to prosecute crimes destroying many of our great cities. He has allowed our homeless numbers, specifically the military, to explode and stood idle as 100,000 die each year from poisoning from Chinese Fentanyl. He has destroyed our energy independence with the stroke of a pen and has secured the support of the UAW as he kills thousands of jobs pushing for conversion to electric vehicles.

This shameless, feeble old man spent the day sucking up to smiling college grads who now enjoy a free ride for their useless education. At the same time, most Americans look at the last three years and ask what happened to the retirement and life we worked to secure, only to see the worst President in our lifetime destroy it all to finish the transformation of America promised by Barack Obama. Biden may have tried to wipe out all student debt, but instead, he destroyed America and the American dream.

 

The post I Tried Wiping Out All Student Debt appeared first on Granite Grok.