The Week in Review for July 7: Romney’s working vacation

It was a near-perfect vacation week wrapped around the Independence Day holiday for lots of folks here in New Hampshire, including Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

He managed to mix a lot of presidential campaign work with relaxing alongside his very large extended family at his Lake Winnipesaukee home in Wolfeboro.

There was Romney eating ice cream, hanging out at the water’s edge and watercraft riding with his wife, Ann.

And there was Romney giving an interview with CBS News, making headlines on his interpretation of the health care law decision by the U.S. Supreme Court, and marching in the Wolfeboro Fourth of July parade with family and with Republican U.S. Sen. Kelly Ayotte. That reignited national speculation once again about where she ranks among his list of potential vice presidential nominees.

In fact, Romney’s Granite State vacation brought some criticism from within the GOP ranks, with certain conservative pundits and commentators saying the presumptive Republican nominee for what they believe is a play-it-safe strategy and for sending mixed messages about certain issues, including health care.

Legislative scraps and scrapes

The bulk of the New Hampshire Legislature’s work is done for this 2012 session, but there were still a few scraps -- and a few scrapes -- for this week.

Democratic House and Senate leaders held a press conference on Tuesday during which they looked back on the session and pointed to the “simple tyranny” of Republican House Speaker William O’Brien “and his Tea Party majority.”

The day before, O’Brien, in his continued opposition to the enactment of any portion of the Affordable Care Act here, removed the only Democrat from the House’s health care oversight committee.

Gov. John Lynch allowed HB 1354 - a revised voter ID bill -- to become law without his signature on Friday.

The measure that passed on veto day last Wednesday changes the affidavit a voter must sign from a “qualified voter affidavit” to a “challenged voter affidavit.” It sought to address concerns raised by Lynch over a photo ID law that became law despite his veto.

The challenged voter document asks a voter to attest to their name, residence and eligibility to vote.
The qualified voter form is the same people must submit when they register to vote and requires them to give their place and date of birth or naturalization.

“While this bill fixes one problem with SB 289, the underlying problems with the photo ID requirements commencing in September 2013 remain. It is my hope that the next Legislature will make it a priority to restore appropriate photo ID criteria to the law,” Lynch said in a statement.

On Friday, O’Brien held a press conference to announce that the Legislature will look at possible welfare changes in the wake of news about a store clerk who was fired for refusing to allow a welfare recipient to buy cigarettes using an EBT card.

The issue with the clerk generated a lot of discussion among our friends on Facebook.

But in the process of holding his press conference, the speaker barred reporters from the
Concord Monitor newspaper from attending.

At issue was a political cartoon that ran in the Monitor several weeks ago depicting O’Brien with the same kind of mustache worn by Adolf Hitler..

And then this ...

We found this bit of interesting news, via Foster’s Daily Democrat: More beer is sold per capita in New Hampshire than any other state in the country.

According to data cited by Foster’s from the Beer Institute, “43 gallons of beer were sold in New Hampshire in 2011 for every one person of legal drinking age. That figure eclipsed the nationwide average of 28.3 gallons per person.”

Have a good week. Don’t forget your SPF 50. See you next time.