Prog Blogs, Orgs & Alumni
Bank Slate
Betsy Devine
birch, finch, beech
Blue News Tribune (MA)
Democracy for NH
Live Free or Die
Mike Caulfield
Miscellany Blue
Granite State Progress
Seacoast for Change
Susan the Bruce
Tomorrow's Progressives
Politicos & Punditry
The Burt Cohen Show
John Gregg
Krauss
Landrigan
Lawson
Pindell
Primary Monitor
Primary Wire
Scala
Schoenberg
Spiliotes
Welch
Campaigns, Et Alia.
Paul Hodes
Carol Shea-Porter
Ann McLane Kuster
John Lynch
Jennifer Daler
ActBlue Hampshire
NHDP
DCCC
DSCC
DNC
National
Balloon Juice
billmon
Congress Matters
DailyKos
Digby
Hold Fast
Eschaton
FiveThirtyEight
MyDD
The Next Hurrah
Open Left
Senate Guru
Swing State Project
Talking Points Memo
50 State Blog Network
Alabama
Arizona
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Delaware
Florida
Georgia
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Missouri
Missouri
Montana
Nebraska
Nevada New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
New York
North Carolina
North Dakota
Ohio
Ohio
Oklahoma
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Texas
Utah
Vermont
Virginia
Washington
West Virginia
Wisconsin
(How wonderful for Grafton 6 that she's on the ballot. Oy vey. - promoted by Dean Barker)
The contested Republican primary in Grafton 6 is over, and Ms. Shwaegler narrowly managed to secure a place on the ballot in the State Representative race for one of the two seats representing Campton, Ellsworth, Orford, Rumney and Wentworth. This Tea Party supporting blogger, whose own words concerning marriage equality drew Dean Barker's attention back in June, has expressed some other curious views on her blog: Take Back Orford NH (TBONH).
But the real question is: To what time would candidate Schwaegler have us return?
I'm wondering what moment in Orford's past embodies such utter perfection that it must be imposed on us all again. Clearly, it is before the election of President Obama, and it also must be prior to Democratic control of our legislature. I'm guessing, given the constant whine about taxes, that there might be a particular era that is covetted. Perhaps it is the era when Meldrim Thomson from Orford was Governor. According to the National Governor's association:
As governor from 1973-1979, serving three two-year terms, he drew devoted support from ultraconservatives with positions that included suggesting nuclear weapons for the state National Guard. He once called Martin Luther King "a man of immoral character whose frequent association with leading agents of communism is well-established." But he also drew votes for his strong antitax stance...
I won't dwell on the warmth he felt for apartheid in South Africa. But it is probably the case that "Taking Back Orford" is more about taking it away from other people than about traveling back in time. It is really about denying other people the progress and successes that Orford and NH have made under Democratic governance and through the slow but continuous societal acceptance of change. There is something truly mean spirited in the notion of "Taking Back" and that mean spiritedness can be seen all over TBONH. The Valley News reported:
As for the post implying that Republican women are more sexually attractive than their Democratic counterparts, Schwaegler said she was simply passing along a gag sent to her in an e-mail. "People are very creative," she said. "I don't like to put a lot of offensive things out there ... I have a two-and-half year old."
This calls to mind another Tea Party supporter in NY, who also thought it was just fine to pass along offensive e-mails. It is true, that not everyone shares the same sense of humor, but that doesn't excuse clear instances of misogyny or bigotry. Just a little time at TBONH reveals little humor and a richness of nastiness. The tone at TBONH is clear, and one would have to be tone deaf to miss it. I can't imagine it is a tone that the majority of voters in Grafton 6 would like to have representing them in Concord. Just like I don't think that we're in a big hurry to go back to calling Martin Luther King Day, Civil Rights Day for that matter either.
Finally, one of the Republican women featured in the e-mail posted at TBONH is Ann Coulter, who has the dubious distinction of saying she wishes women would lose the right to vote. I guess that was probably a joke too, but maybe we should be setting the DeLorean for the early twentieth century before women could vote, or there was a Civil Rights Act, or there was an income tax, or there was a social safety net of any kind.
