Memo to the Ed Commish

To: Frank Edelblut
From: Flotsam and Jetsam
SUBJECT: The guy sneaking up on you

Now that it’s looking like, finally, Guv Chris will be clearing out of the Corner Office in ‘24 for a run at prez or who knows what else, we know you sure are glad you’ve kept your powder dry all this time.

But, just between us, it might not be a bad idea to keep an eye on someone else coming out from the back of the pack — nunuther than AG John Formella.

He sure has been making some interesting PR-packed moves lately, as if you hadn’t noticed.

Formella: What’s he running for?

Like his joining a bunch of other GOP AGs around the country who are taking aim at a USDOL rule that would boost the use of those “woke” ESG standards by managers of retirement accounts like 401(k).

Or the lawsuit he joined with 24 other similarly minded AGs that challenges the new ATF over a new rule limiting the use of short-barreled rifles. No need to get into it, but we both know exactly who he’s winking at when he joins a suit challenging the feds over the right to own certain weapons, don’t we?

And then there’s the ruling in a 13-state suit by a fed court in Alabama over the feds’ ban on using Covid grants for tax cuts, like NH did. The judge backed the AGs who claimed the ban was unconstitutional. Still more to come on that one, but that gives it even more legs, no?

You probably know all about these, after all you’re a smart guy who keeps track of such things.

Just looking out for ya.

“Did you see Marjorie Taylor Greene? What was she wearing there with that? She looked like she belonged on the top of Mount Washington. She had, like, this fur thing. I don’t know what was going on there. God bless her.”

— Guv Sununu fashion-policing the SOTU outfit of the notorious congressperson from Georgia

“I went to a fraternity … you can smoke marijuana out of darn near anything.”

— House Majority Leader Jason Osborne on a bill to legalize recreational cannabis

Wrong off the bat

Wow, that wasn’t a very auspicious start to the tenure of the NHGOP’s new top banana.

We’re talking about Chris Ager, the new head honcho over at the party. As one of his first acts in the new gig, CA had to find a replacement for him as Republican National Committeeman — a job, you may remember, he snatched from longtime Committeeman Steve Duprey a few years back. So CA, a longtime backer of the Florida Man, turned to nunuther than Corey Lewandowski, whose reputation precedes him, for better and worse.

Ager: 0 for 1 on RNC picks

In this case, it was definitely for the worse, since a nomination-killing number of NHGOP Exec Committee members said, “thanks but no thanks” to the idea that CL would be representing them on a national stage, complete with credentials. No need to go over those credentials, but let’s just say they include a battery charge (later dropped) stemming from an incident with a female reporter, a $1,000 fine after being charged by the wife of a major Trump donor for “unwanted sexual advances,” as some call ‘em. Let’s just say there’s tendency to have issues with women. Which is why ex-NHGOP Chair Juliana Bergeron — no CL fan — sarcastically referred to him as a “man’s man” during Exec Committee discussions. Although, to be fair, CA said CL’s “qualifications are superb.”

Just a matter of semantics.

‘L’ for labels and losing

A blast from the past emerged th’other day in the pages of the UL from nunuther than the former senator from Conn., Joe Lieberman.

JL, now with the group No Labels, took a few words in an op-ed to suck up to NH voters by comparing the political climate in NH to the climate in DC. JL prefers NH, he’s not afraid to say.

Which is interesting considering that he was far more successful on the DC political stage — where he served in the Senate for 24 years — than in NH.

The Wayback Machine reminds us of JL’s rather unremarkable stint as a Dem prez candidate in the 2004 NH primary, when the former running mate of Al Gore made a big magilla about running to win in NH. In fact, he even rented a place to stay in Manch to campaign 24/7 here to make his primary statement.

But it was the voters who made the statement. JL finished waaaaay back of the back, garnering 9% of the vote from his temporary neighbors, behind winner John Kerry (38% of the vote), Howard Dean (26%), Wesley Clark (12%) and John Edwards (12%). He did finish ahead of Dennis Kucinich (3%), however.

Guess it was that experience that JL was recounting in that UL op-ed:

“New Hampshire representatives can’t hide from their voters, which raises the bar for accountability. If a representative isn’t looking after their district, they hear about it and soon enough they get a pink slip.”

Same with prez candidates, huh?

MAKING THE ROUNDS

No other sign is needed that the fork is indeed in the NH prez primary on the Dem side than the prospect of a primary with two candidates: Marianne Williamson and RFK Jr. and no Prez himself.

And for NH Dems to make it sound like it would be an embarrassment for a prez with no real competition not to run and win in NH is on the deep-end side of disingenuous.

It’s nice to see the guv pushing for even more spending at UNH — led by his cheerleading to pump $8m of the state’s dough into the $24m renovation of the hockey team’s Whittemore Center arena. That’s a big chunk of change from a state that’s spending a whopping $88.5m this year to support the entire university system. For those who need reminding, that’s the smallest amount spent by any of the 50 states in the union.

The mess that Biden U.S. judge nominee, ex-NH AG Michael Delaney, is finding himself in was completely predictable. Makes ya wonder if the White House actually considered St. Paul’s rape case and then dismissed it as a nothingburger.

It’s interesting to note that the last time Chessy Prout — the victim in that 2014 St. Paul’s case — had an impact in DC was in 2018 when she was Annie Kuster’s guest at the SOTU.