Seeing him standing next to that great defender of American working men and women, ATR boss Grover Norquist, made for a beautiful picture.  A proud John Stephen trying to get a leg up, or whatever, over former Congressperson Jeb Bradley by showing he's even more conservative.  Brave man this Stephen guy is, willing to sign this "pledge" not to raise any taxes, ever.  Seeing how honest Republicans have been in recent years, one does have to wonder about the value of a signature anyway.

At his grand signing event, John Stephen was quoted as saying, "The tax cuts of the past decade are absolutely critical to the long-term success of our economy and our growth."  Read that to say that if we let the wealthy keep more of their money, they'll make more low-paying jobs for some of us so they can make even more money, as if the incentive isn't there for them to do that already.  (For those of us who remember, President Ronald Reagan put a term to it -- the "trickle-down theory," where us peeons got wet having the economy drip down on us.  Any questions?)

John Stephen is a funny guy.  

"Economy" and "growth?"  Tell that to many Americans -- the 99 percent of us who don't happen to be in the top one percent of the "wealthy millionaire class," many of whom never worked a day at one of the Walmarts or McDonalds or gas stations they own or hold stock in.

With people really hurting, and a winter coming in a few months when people won't be able to pay their heating bill, and kids not getting the education they need to compete in a 21st Century world with kids from other nations, and the need for investing in alternative energy to get off the reliance on Bush's oil friends, it's interesting to see Republicans like John Stephen stumbling over one another to show how "conservative" they are so that government will spend less so that the rich can get richer and keep all their money, and the poor will get poorer.

Corporate America underpays those who work for them, and the CEOs of those corporations get their multi-million dollar golden parachutes, and the Republicans are their servants.  A lot of Republicans seem to want to hold a yard sale for our government and have it just go out of business.  They want to stay in Iraq, they want to attack Iran, they want a 12 foot wall from the Gulf to the Pacific, and they want to have government peering into our library books, listening to our telephone calls, and checking into our bedroom activities.  But they just don't want to pay for it.  

Isn't it neat the way "politics" works among the Republicans?  One hand washes the other.  Fortunately for New Hampshire right now, Carol Shea-Porter, who has an eye out of "the rest of us" 99%, and Paul Hodes, who stands up for people who need help, will be re-elected this November because we need them more than ever.

Yes, John Stephen is a funny guy.  But governing is serious business, and people's families and lives and futures are at stake.  Carol Shea-Porter knows that, and will be re-elected over a John Stephen or Jeb Bradley or whomever because New Hampshire voters aren't going to be laughing this November.  

John F. Kennedy's challenge is an ideal we should all be willing to accept to make our nation, and its people, as great as we can be.