"Power List"

[FightinNewDem]

NH Business magazine came in the mail today, and inside is a list of NH's most powerful poobahs.

If they are close to accurate, we are, in a word, screwed.

What a dismal lot. Here the top 10:

Bob Baines (Mayor of Manchester): The epitome of milquetoast. The only time he seems to come to life is when he is pushing for some arts initiative (nothing wrong there) or when he is blaming the city legislative delegation for the city's financial problems (big problem there).

Judd Gregg: Pork barrel princeling.

Joe McQuaid (publisher, The Union Leader): A right-winger and an establishment suck-up. Great. At least when Jim Finnegan was the op/ed guy, the paper had a quirky, maverick streak. Now, it's a house organ for corporate dead wood from Bedford.

Tom Eaton (senate president): Bob Clegg's sock puppet.

Jeff Bartlett (general manager, WMUR-TV): Whatever.

Dick Flynn (state safety commissioner): A thuggish, corrupt fossil who is about a decade past his sell-by date.

John E. Sununu: Bob Smith with better hair.

Jeb Bradley: Nice guy, lousy, wimpy and ineffective congressman.

The Shaheens: Please, please shut up and let someone else emerge as a leader, for god's sake! "L'etat, cest moi"!

John Lynch: Well, he is the governor.

Others cited:

Bob Clegg: New Hampshire's version of Jabba the Hutt, a bloated, bullying blowhard, hyperpartisan obstructionist, and public enemy number one on environmental issues.

Alyson Pitman Giles: CEO of Catholic Medical Center. Don't know her.

And, in a separate feature called "Making it in New Hampshire", they trot out Justin Nadeau, the incomprehensibly inept Democratic nominee for Congress last November. You remember, the guy who got around 35% of the vote while Kerry and Lynch were carrying the state? Criminy.

[maxanne]

1. screwed

You got that right, FND.

Nice of them to trot out one woman for the list.

Love the description of Bob Clegg.

Thank heavens Stretch Kennedy isn't included.

[FightinNewDem]

8. My Dream Team

Personally, I'd like to see a list that included Stretch, if only (as the Union Leader says about its horoscopes) for entertainment purposes only.

Why stop there? Let's add a few more:

Rep. Dick Marple of Hooksett, who brings committee meetings to a screeching halt with his bizzare rants about gold fringe on the flag (apparently that means we are under martial law...ask Dick);

Mercifuly now former Rep. Henry McElroy, who introduced legislation to put NH on the gold standard;

Rep. Richard Morris from Seabrook, a non-veteran with a strange obsession about having a military presence on the seacoast to guard the nuke plant;

Rep. J.J. Manning, the semi-pro Elvis impersonator from Salem.

[Redneck Socialist]

2. How dare you insult bob smith...

by suggesting subooboo has better hair! On entertainment value alone smith has subooboo beat hands down. Smith was (is) a wanker, but he was an independent minded, entertaining wanker. Sununu is just a wanker.

I love your description of clegg.

[maxanne]

3. good point redneck

Boob Smith has one of the worst combovers ever - far more interesting than Saynono's hair.

I'm still apologizing, all these years later, to people who remember Smith's abortive presidential campaign and taunt me about it, when they find out I'm from NH.

[Redneck Socialist]

5. Why apologize?

That was a moment of high political comedy.

[FightinNewDem]

9. Point well taken

Smith was actually a likeable oaf, despite his strange politics. I always found him to be rather pleasant in a gooofy sort of way. Baby Doc Sununu has that smug spoiled-yuppie-from-Bedford thing going that leaves me cold, although he still is much more bearable than Papa Doc, who was an insufferable, arrogant horses ass.

[Ray Buckley]

4. Jeb a god man????

I find it difficult to comprehend how anyone would consider Jeb Bradley a good man. I could go on at great length but let's just look at a few points.

Does anyone remember the sleazy attacks on Martha Fuller Clark in 2002? Smearing her distinguished legislative record? Altering her photo to make her look substantially obese?

Does anyone remember his pro-choice, pro-gay, pro-pot record in the state legislature? Now he is in congress he voted against a abortion rights, for a constitutional amendment on gay marriage and increasing marijuana laws. A hypocrite!

He chaired the legislative Ethics Committee and in congress votes to elect Tom Delay the US House Majority Leader. A hypocrite!

Can anyone name a single accomplishment of Jeb Bradley III? A professional back-bencher if there ever was one.

Oh yeah, let us not forget this new-found self-proclaimed champion of the Veteran and anything relating to the military - never wore the uniform. What exactly was that child of great wealth doing at his "Natural Foods Store" in the early 70s??

[FightinNewDem]

6. Jebby the Dem?

You mean back in the days when he was a registered Democrat who supported Ted Kennedy? Before he realized that nobody in Wolfeboro would vote for a Dem?

I also fail to recall Jeb ever taking any interest in veteran's issues in the legislature. He was too busy pimping for PSNH, wasn't he?

[maxanne]

7. I remember

I have no use for Jeb Bradley at all. His campaign against MFC was a disgrace.

He doesn't have a clue about what goes on in his own state, and diseminates false information. It's easy to embarass him at his town meetings, because he knows so little. Unfortunately, those meetings are very sparsely attended. Democrats could certainly organize groups of people to attend those meetings, and prepare them with questions to ask.

Maybe next time 'round the party will have a candidate who can actually beat him. Justin Nadeau was a poor choice.