NoCoPolitics.com

Rove's Take on NH Sounds Familiar

Karl Rove in yesterday's WSJ:

But more interesting than dissecting the pollsters is dissecting the election returns, precinct by precinct. Sen. Hillary Clinton won working-class neighborhoods and less-affluent rural areas. Sen. Barack Obama won the college towns and the gentrified neighborhoods of more affluent communities. Put another way, Mrs. Clinton won the beer drinkers, Mr. Obama the white wine crowd. And there are more beer drinkers than wine swillers in the Democratic Party.

That sounds familiar:

Hillary won the cities with the blue collar democrats, Obama won the cities with the liberal democrats.  It's pretty striking.  Obama won Concord, Portsmouth, Keene and Hanover.  Hillary won Rochester,  Nashua and Manchester.

The Problem with Campaign Finance Reform

You have judges deciding whether or not your independent documentary is "political speech." 

If you have a conservative movie with conservative commentators talking about their disagreements with Hillary Clinton, it's "political speech" and can be regulated.  If it's Mike Wallace and Andy Rooney talking about their disagreements with a Republican, it's "journalism."

I used the example of 60 Minutes, because that's the tactic the defendants used.

McCain-Feingold: making political speech illegal.  If you follow the judge's logic, wouldn't half of the political books that are published be "political speech?"

(Hat Tip: Instapundit)

The Trib's Wish List for the Session

Hold onto your wallets.  The legislature is back in session.

Here's a pretty good editorial from the Greeley Tribune, highlighting their wish list.

Even More Health Care

I need to note that I've been collecting a lot of these from openmarket.org, the invaluable blog of the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

From Investors Business Daily:

The London Telegraph reported Tuesday that the British government has a "plan to save billions of pounds from the NHS budget." But it won't come without enormous pain.

"Instead of going to a hospital or consulting a doctor, patients will be encouraged to carry out 'self-care' as the Department of Health tries to meet Treasury targets to curb spending," the Telegraph explained.

Huckabee, Edwards and the Rest

From Daniel Henninger, on the eve of the Iowa Caucuses:

Let me describe a pre-election moment of perspective this way: Later today some people who will start their evening with Iowa's caucus by watching angry Lou Dobbs--convincing themselves, again, that they and this country are getting shafted, and coming to this conclusion while watching a $700, 32-inch Samsung flat-panel, high-definition TV with Lou's sad song flowing through Monster digital coax cables to five Onkyo HT-SR800 home theater speakers.

And from George Will, immediately following:

He [Huckabee] and John Edwards, flaunting their histrionic humility in order to promote their curdled populism, hawked strikingly similar messages in Iowa, encouraging self-pity and economic hypochondria. Edwards and Huckabee lament a shrinking middle class. Well.

Economist Stephen Rose, defining the middle class as households with annual incomes between $30,000 and $100,000, says a smaller percentage of Americans are in that category than in 1979 -- because the percentage of Americans earning more than $100,000 has doubled, from 12 to 24, while the percentage earning less than $30,000 is unchanged. "So," Rose says, "the entire 'decline' of the middle class came from people moving up the income ladder." Even as housing values declined in 2007, the net worth of households increased.

Neoprotectionism

I don't even know if "neoprotectionism" is a word.  If not, I'm hereby declaring it one.

There's a temptation for local government to build a fence around local business.  In Fort Collins, that's taking place with the fight against development along the I-25 corridor.  The neoprotectionists (See how that works so well here?) on the City Council believe that any competition from I-25 retailers will hurt Old Town shops and retailers in the urban core.

Of course, that's not what the Old Town shops and retailers in the urban core say.  Mayor Hutchinson correctly pointed out in a recent Council meeting that they actually welcome I-25 retailers.  They see it as a net positive for the financial health of the community and believe it will create entry points to the city. 

So what does hurt these local retailers?  Reason Online has an article up by Radley Balko entitled: "The Death of Main Street: Are big chains to blame, or is excessive regulation?"

Go and read.  Here are some key graphs:

People who decry the Wal-Mart-ification and Gap-ificaiton of America need to realize that regulation often does more harm to local businesses than predatory pricing, loss-leader business models, or some other imagined corporate evil.

I've lived in or near Old Town [referring to Old Town Alexandria, Va. -ed] for most of the last 10 years. It's not at all common to see an independently-owned antique shop or art gallery get boarded over, only to be replaced in ensuing months by a franchise. It's not difficult to see why. Franchise operators can tap the resources of the parent company, particularly when it comes to accessing legal help with experience navigating through and working with local zoning laws and business regulations.

Local officials who simultaneously decry big box stores and national chains while doling out burdensome regulatory structures and complicated permit processes should understand that regulatory burdens hit the smaller, independent places hardest, because they're the places that have the smallest amount of discretionary cash to hire legal aid (or, if you're really cynical, to make the appropriate campaign contributions). They're on a tighter budget and, therefore, have a smaller margin of error when it comes to hassles like delaying an opening because some bureaucrat determined their signage is a couple of inches out of compliance.   

Center Square

This is a pretty good ad from Rudy, running in Florida.

Of course, Rudy's ad team is having a laugh over who they put in the center square.  (Note the client list).

New Hampshire

Here's how it broke last night.

Romney did well in two areas: Suburban commuter towns and post-industrial cities.  He won the big towns like Salem and Derry (and by "big," I mean they're bigger than many of the small cities).  He also won Nashua and held his own in Manchester, two cities that have seen hard times and yet now often end up on national rankings as "great places to live."

McCain did well in three areas: Liberal bastions, cities that are still struggling and rural New Hampshire.  McCain won Concord, Keene, Portsmouth, the Upper Valley and the Seacoast handily, as expected.  He also did well in places like Somersworth, Rochester and Claremont.  He won in the North Country.

If your urban neighbors are liberals, if you live in a small, struggling city, or if you live in a rural community, you voted McCain.  If you live in an "up and coming" city or on a two-acre lot, you voted for Romney.

On the Democrat side,

Hillary won the cities with the blue collar democrats, Obama won the cities with the liberal democrats.  It's pretty striking.  Obama won Concord, Portsmouth, Keene and Hanover.  Hillary won Rochester,  Nashua and Manchester. 

I understand that I have Manchester and Nashua listed as "up and coming" cities for Republicans and "blue collar" cities for Democrats.  They're not mutually exclusive.  They're post-industrial boom towns, but their union roots run deep.  Places like Concord, Portsmouth and Keene don't have nearly as strong a blue-collar base.  They're just liberal.