Making exceptions to general rules can seem harmless or even essential in the moment. When exceptions are made to achieve a short-term goal, the argument is that this one little violation of our collective standards or norms will quickly fade into history and everything will soon return to normal. Life doesn’t always work that way. […]
Three renewable energy bills awaiting action by Gov. Chris Sununu are in conflict with the state’s revised 10-Year Energy Strategy, which the governor championed in April. A veto of these bills would be consistent with the state’s energy plan and with the governor’s goal of fighting increases in New Hampshire electricity rates. Letting the bills […]
If you live in New Hampshire and enjoy wine, there’s something you should know (besides how approach a tasting). Your own state government, which sells wine, wants to be your primary supplier. Really, it wants to be your only supplier, but the Legislature won’t allow that. So to satisfy its impulse to smash all enemies, […]
The case advocates make for reauthorizing expanded Medicaid is exactly the same as the case for rejecting it: Nearly 53,000 Granite Staters are now dependent on the program. Supporters don’t use the word “dependent.” They say people “rely on” Medicaid. Functionally, the meanings are the same, like “inebriated” and “intoxicated” or “asparagus” and “disgusting.” Expanded Medicaid […]
Housing and utilities comprise the largest portion of household budgets. In only nine other states and the District of Columbia do residents spend more on those two items than Granite Staters do, per Bureau of Economic Analysis data. Yet legislators have not been keen to reduce those costs for the people who elect them. On […]
Can you define “art therapy?” More specifically, can you define it well enough to criminalize the unauthorized practice of it? The state Senate thinks it can. This coming Wednesday, the House Executive Departments and Administration Committee continues its hearing on Senate Bill 535, to establish state licensure of art therapists. (The bill passed the Senate […]
The Josiah Bartlett Center for Public Policy announces the creation of a new event series, Civil Discourses, to promote public discussion of civics, policy and the humanities. The series will launch on Thursday, April 19 — the anniversary of the start of the Revolutionary War — with a lecture by Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Gordon S. Wood […]
Did you know that you’re the target of multiple state schemes to transfer wealth quietly to a handful of politically favored businesses scattered around New Hampshire? Well, you are, unless you live off the grid and are receiving this email on a home-brewed server built with whittled sticks and hand-mined silicon and powered by hungry […]
A report by the Josiah Bartlett Center for Public Policy and EdChoice shows that New Hampshire public school spending and staffing increased much more rapidly from 1992-2014 than student enrollment did, and the staffing increase came overwhelmingly in non-teaching positions. The study also calculates that of the $16,205 in per-pupil revenue New Hampshire public schools […]
The bill reauthorizing Medicaid expansion passed the state Senate on Thursday when half of the 14 Republicans joined all 10 Democrats in voting to extend the Obamacare entitlement program for five years. This is why the #Headdesk Twitter hashtag was invented. One of the Republican selling points was that the bill pays for for Medicaid […]