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Updated, 1:01 p.m. A poll commissioned by the liberal Daily Kos web log shows signs of trouble for Democratic Rep. Paul Hodes at this early stage of the 2010 U.S. Senate campaign, but it also shows that Republican frontrunner Kelly Ayotte is in a competitive race for her party's nomination with Ovide Lamontagne.
Updated, 1:25 p.m. Republican U.S. Senate candidate Kelly Ayotte will be endorsed later today by all nine of the state's county sheriffs.
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With third quarter federal fundraising reports now public, details are now emerging and charges are flying.
Updated, 3:07 p.m. The congresswoman has $295,957 on hand. Would-be opponents Bob Bestiani and Frank Guinta released their numbers today.
Updated, 2:25 a.m. A new ad from FixItNowNH says it's time for expanded gambling.
Updated, 1:34 p.m. Also, a UNH poll shows that most New Hampshire men aren't pleased with the President.
TUESDAY UPDATE: Nashua Republican Jennifer Horn is expected to run for the 2nd Congressional District seat in 2010.
The moderate Republican represented the 2nd District for six terms until his ouster by Paul Hodes in the Democratic landslide of 2006. Among the big names on his exploratory committee: Tom Rath, Chuck Morse and Scott Hilliard.
►Foster's: Former state Supreme Court justice won't seek U.S. Senate seat
►Gatsas, Roy will debate on October 7 (7)
Reader comments: 21
Updated, 2:19 p.m. The congresswoman says she's under fire from FOX News, Glenn Beck fans and Tea Party protesters.
Laura Van Hove has worked for Bob Dole, Steve Forbes and Rudy Giuliani.
A key senator has high praise for the former attorney general -- but stops short of an endorsement.
Kelly Ayotte already finds herself on the defensive, mostly over her "relationship" with the Washington-based National Republican Senatorial Committee.
The Devine Strategies director says Lamontagne will decide on a U.S. Senate candidacy by the end of the year.
What do they say Charlie Crist, Sarah Palin and Kelly Ayotte have in common?
Outgoing Attorney General Kelly Ayotte continued to attract much political attention in New Hampshire and Washington yesterday.
All of a sudden, Republicans are on the offensive. From Washington to Concord.
Linking state Republican candidates to George W. Bush obviously has been a winning formula for New Hampshire Democrats in the last two election cycles.
Both parties say they are going all out in phone banking and door-to-door efforts to get out the vote on April 21.
Shhh! It's being kept very quiet, but we understand veteran Manchester criminal defense attorney and former prosecutor John Kacavas is in the running.
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen is a member of a new "Moderate Dems Working Group" of 15 Democratic senators, led by Evan Bayh of Indiana.
John DiStaso's Granite Status: Nashua man's two cents worth $100,000
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By JOHN DISTASO
Senior Political Reporter
Thursday, Feb. 12, 2009
 John DiStaso, the New Hampshire Union Leader's senior political writer, began writing "Granite Status" in 1982. His influential reports on behind-the-scenes politics in the first-primary state are must reading every Thursday for insiders from Concord to Washington, D.C. Watch for "Granite Status" updates on UnionLeader.com whenever New Hampshire political news breaks.
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A GRASSROOTS EFFORT. Fred Tausch of Nashua is a frustrated, well-to-do businessman who got tired of watching politicians of both parties spending taxpayers' money. And so, spending $100,000 of his own money, he's trying to do something about it.
In big ads today in this newspaper and others, in radio advertisements and on a new Web site (link fixed), the 37-year-old entrepreneur and investment manager emerges onto the political scene to provide an avenue for others upset about the size of the stimulus package and likely more spending measures on the horizon.
Tausch is a registered independent who, after voting Republican for most of his life, supported Barack Obama in the last election, even contributing $2,300 to the cause.
Tausch said he "got excited about his message. There was not a lot of fiscal discipline in either party, and I thought that when Obama talked about change, he was including that he would be more cautious about how we spend money. And that's just not the case."
Tausch says the federal government should have a limited role in trying to turn around the economy. He supports tax cuts for "working class" families and government purchase of government-backed securities to stabilize the mortgage industry and "keep people in their homes."
But he said he considers much of the spending in the stimulus plan excessive and fears it will have "a profound effect on the American economy. We're responding to a bad financial situation by borrowing a tremendous amount of money and spending it in a way that I don't think will help the economy very much."
Tausch said he wanted to do something to express his opinion and provide a place for people to talk about government fiscal policy, regardless of their political leanings.
He started up an organization he is calling STEWARD, an acronym for Stimulate the Economy Without Accumulating Record Debt. Not the most streamlined group name we've ever heard, but unique.
The site contains a blog, a link to an explanation of the stimulus and several other sections including an "ideas center."
"If I can get people to participate in the process and help provide a voice to people who are concerned, maybe we can help those who represent New Hampshire understand that we care not only about this package but also about what will probably be continued dramatically increased federal spending in the future," he said.
Tausch said he has no interest in running for office, but is just "trying to play a role in the process."
THE STATE OF THE STATE. As Gov. John Lynch prepares to deliver his all-important budget address today, the UNH Survey Center has a new poll out showing that most Granite Staters aren't following the state's fiscal woes.
In a poll of 619 New Hampshire adults between Feb. 5 and 9, only one-third said they have heard or read a lot about the state's budget problems, 48 percent said they have heard a little and 18 percent said they have heard nothing. Yet, nearly half believe the state's budget problems are "very serious" or "serious."
The state's political demographics have certainly shifted from Republican- to Democratic-leaning in the past few years, but this poll indicates a traditional anti-tax sentiment remains.
Some key results:
--87 percent are more likely to vote against a state Senate candidate who favors increasing property taxes as a long-term funding solution for the state.
--64 percent are more likely to oppose a pro-income tax state Senate candidate.
--57 percent would oppose a pro-sales tax candidate.
--Expanded gambling remains the most popular of revenue options.
The poll showed that 41 percent would favor a state Senate candidate who favors legalized gambling, while 37 percent said they would be more likely to oppose such a candidate.
Asked to choose among revenue options, 40 percent chose legalized gambling, 25 percent chose a sales tax, 19 percent said an income tax, 3 percent favored increasing the property tax and 6 percent favored cutting state spending.
"The percentage of New Hampshire adults who favor legalized gambling as a revenue option has increased steadily since November 1999," UNH Survey Center director Andrew Smith said, "while support for an income tax or sales tax has remained relatively flat."
LET THE DOGS OUT! A separate section of the UNH poll, commissioned privately by the anti-greyhound racing group, Grey2K USA shows support for banning the practice.
The same 619 Granite States were asked about two competing bills before the House. One would outlaw live racing at the two remaining dog tracks in Belmont and Seabrook. The second would allow the tracks to continue OTB-style simulcasting without mandatory live racing, as required by current law, and instead leave it to the discretion of the track.
According to the poll, 54 percent back outlawing greyhound racing under the proposed Greyhound Protection Act, while 33 percent oppose such a ban and 12 percent have no opinion.
The poll found that 37 percent support the "track option" bill, 49 percent oppose it, and 15 percent had no opinion.
At a committee hearing on Tuesday, Rick Newman, a lobbyist for The Lodge at Belmont, told lawmakers that if the option bill is adopted, his client would not have live racing this year.
"We're not making any judgment for the future," he told us yesterday, "but it would be likely that we would not run in 2010 as well, or if we did it would be a limited schedule around the Fourth of July."
Live racing, Newman said, "is certainly not profitable at this time."
Karen Keelan of the Seabrook Greyhound Park told the committee that her track intends to run racing in 2009 if it remains legal.
The committee is expected to vote its recommendation to the full House next week.
THE DOMINOES, PART 2. Judd Gregg and Bonnie Newman remain under the radar.
Gregg still isn't saying why he has decided to essentially drop out of Senate activity while awaiting his confirmation hearings, which won't be held at least until the week after next.
After a week of silence, we did hear yesterday from U.S. Sen.-designate Bonnie Newman's camp. Not from Bonnie herself, mind you, but from her personal assistant.
Stephanie Harrison said Newman is tending to personal business and will not conduct interviews or speak about her position on issues "until we know more" about Gregg's confirmation hearings.
She said Newman "does not want to be presumptuous" and wants to "be respectful of" Gregg. Harrison said she did not know who was helping Newman organize her office and staff.
We've heard elsewhere that the Gregg New Hampshire staff will remain largely intact for Newman but there will be changes in the Washington staff lineup because many of them are oriented to the committees on which Gregg serves, and Newman will not inherit Gregg's committee assignments.
►AP: Battle brewing over removal of Census from Gregg's responsibilities
►Congressional Quarterly: Some in Congress say fill-in senators shouldn't be appointed
NEW NAMES. Meanwhile, Democratic former state Supreme Court Associate Justice Joe Nadeau of Durham made it known he's considering running for the Gregg seat.
Also in the Strafford County-Seacoast area, supporters of Carol Shea-Porter are privately telling Democrats that she is certainly not ruling out a Senate run.
If she does jump, expect former Democratic Portsmouth Mayor Steve Marchand to jump as well -- into a candidacy for the 1st District U.S. House seat.
On the Republican side, Manchester attorneys Ovide Lamontagne and Jim Merrill are fielding and making calls about possible candidacies for the Senate, the House or governor, depending on John E. Sununu's plans and other variables.
TARGET HODES. The National Republican Senatorial Committee is taking its first shot at the lone announced Democratic Senate candidate, U.S. Rep. Paul Hodes.
A 45-second Web ad posted on YouTube.com yesterday has some unflattering video of the congressman with graphics charging that he supported "the largest tax increase in history, twice," and the $825 billion stimulus, which, it says contained "waste" such as $335 million for sexually transmitted disease prevention, $34 million for government office remodeling and $150 million for "honeybee insurance."
"Paul Hodes' support for higher taxes and bloated government spending in Washington will not help the families and small businesses in New Hampshire, and it's a record he'll need to explain to voters during his campaign for Senate," said NRSC spokesman Amber Wilkerson.
Hodes spokesman Mark Bergman said such "partisan attacks won't help our economy recover" and Hodes "remains focused on creating jobs and helping Granite Staters in this economic crisis."
POPULAR MOVES. North Carolina-based Public Policy Polling has been doing its own surveys in New Hampshire in the past week, focusing on the Gregg and Newman appointments and resulting fallout.
A Feb. 6-8 telephone poll of 1,326 Granite State votes showed:
-- 67 percent approved and 21 percent disapproved of Gregg becoming the commerce secretary, with 71 percent approval among Democrats and 62 percent approval among Republicans.
-- 68 percent approved and 18 percent disapproved of how Lynch handled the naming of Republican Newman as Gregg's successor, with approval at 70 percent among independents, 65 percent among Democrats and 62 percent among Republicans.
-- 56 percent of voters have not formed an opinion of Newman, yet, while 32 percent have a favorable opinion of her and 12 percent are unfavorable.
-- On a separate issue, 50 percent supported and 40 percent opposed the economic stimulus plan.
The same poll found Hodes in only slightly better shape among voters than Shea-Porter as Senate candidates.
Hodes' favorable/unfavorable rating was 42/34 percent. Shea-Porter's was 43/40 percent, and John E. Sununu's was 46/43 percent and former U.S. Rep. Charlie Bass' was 33/37 percent.
With the poll's margin of error at 2.7 percent, potential matchups are virtual dead heats at this very early stage.
Hodes bests Sununu, 46 to 44 percent, and Bass, 40 to 37 percent. Shea-Porter barely trails Sununu, 46 to 45 percent and Bass, 43-42 percent.
QUICK TAKES:
--The Republican State Committee has a full-time communications director. Ryan Williams, a former communications staffer for Sununu's Senate campaign and a former press aide to Mitt Romney on Beacon Hill and in his gubernatorial and presidential campaigns, joined the party on Monday.
-- The New Hampshire Association of Police Chiefs voted 56-0 on Tuesday to confirm its long-held opposition to expanded gambling.
-- The New Hampshire Citizens Alliance, a 30-year-old nonprofit, has joined the Granite State Coalition Against the Expansion of Gambling.
John DiStaso is the Union Leader's senior political reporter.
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YOUR COMMENTS
Mr. Tausch won't be the first to cry "foul" when all this spending starts to catch up. Although it's honorable that he puts forth this effort..it's a hard lesson to learn that he "voted in this pork bed...now he must lay it!" for many, many years to come. Unfortunately, he took us with him. to Mr. Tausch: Please spare me your tears, you should have "listened" instead of "watching" the politicians. They were pretty clear which way it was going to go. Based on results, you chose NOT to listen.
- nhyitbos, laconia
Mr Fred Taush is full od it. Does he have a plan that is better than Obama's. Like the rest of the GOP, they are full of it and we no longer trust them.
- jo rossi, Andover, Ma
Sue, where exactly are the republican answers to the problems?
If they had any, they would not have gotten creamed in the last two elections!
Tax cuts have NOT created jobs; just put more money in the pockets of people who were already wealthy.
It's time for a new approach and if you are unable to understand that then get out of the way and let others solve the problems that we face. Voting "NO" on everything is not solving the country's problems.
The country has spoken and it does not believe that republican ideology is the answer. Deal with it!
- Frank, Manchester
Frank: I would never ever expect a handout -- since I'm not a special interest liberal group.
I am having a good laugh at anyone who thinks giving money to ACORN, or to handout condoms is going to do anything to bolster the economy.
Might as well throw the money in a river somewhere. Also, your friend Barney Frank and Maxine Waters insisted that FM/FM were just fine.. even as GOP admonished them -- even Bubba Clinton admitted it was Democrats. You can't keep up the johnny one note 'Bush' mantra forever, it just doesn't work.
There's gonna be a LOT more of 'buyer's remorse' you will see.. and it's been barely a month! Frank, What is it about Obama working for the bankers that you don't get?
- Sue, Manchester
You asked for it. You got it. Obama.
- David Govett, Davis, CA
Being called obtuse by someone named "Spike" is really pretty comical!
Beyond all the ignorant comments from people who think tax cuts will create jobs......that made my day!
- Frank, Manchester
No, Chris, unemployment premiums, payroll taxes, and mandated benefits are paid for by the EMPLOYEE. If I have a job, for which my boss pays me $7 per hour plus $5 in government mandates, his cost to employ me is $12. He doesn't care whether I get all the money or some goes to the state. I have to make him $12 (plus the cost of his overhead) or I will be fired. If the state imposes additional duties on my boss, MY productivity must increase or my wage must decrease or the boss must find a machine to do my work.
This is perhaps an excessive response to Frank's obtuse sarcasm, but you fell into a fallacy that needs to be rebutted in this era of employer-bashing.
- Spike, Brentwood NH
So this guy voted for Obama-Pelosi, and now is shocked, shocked at the biggest spending spree in American history. Fred Tauche, how many Nigerian kings have you given your bank account numbers too?
- Dave, Saint Paul, Minn
Frank, unemployment compensation is paid for w/ an insurance policy whose premiums are paid by your employer.
- Chris, Manchester
Don't worry Brad, if you're not working then you're not paying any taxes anyway. Just make sure to turn down your unemployment compensation. Nobody needs a safety net in this economy.
- Frank, Manchester
This is not a stimulus package, it is a spending package. Nothing new here! No "change" here except the outrageous price tag to future taxpayers. Obama is helping his buddies and hanging the working class out to dry. One sure fire way to stimulate the economy is to eliminate the income tax completely across the board. That alone would encourage companies to do business here in the United States and would provide jobs and lasting economic growth. The way things are going now I give us two more years to hit the bottom, the credit card companies will be in line for their bail outs, Gm Ford and Chrysler will be finished since no one will be able to afford a car, China stops buying our debt. Our currency becomes toilet paper, food shortages not for lack of food but more the lack of money to transport it where it needs to go. Hungry, homeless families, then WAR! Bloody revolution! So Union Leader, are you going to censor me again with this one?
- JOSEPH, Mishawaka, Indiana
Hope and change? BAIT AND SWITCH! I knew a con man when I saw him. But too many people wanted desperately to believe.
But in all honesty McCain wasn't much better. If the republic is to survive we need a new political class and urgently.
A lot of people I know wrote in Ron Paul. I thought of doing that myself. But voting FOR Obama? That was for suckers.
- Rowland, Fremont
"The stimulus package should have a caveat added to it; all the idiots who are against it should be prohibited from receiving any benefits from it.
- Frank, Manchester"
I'm all for that idea, so long as we also get a caveat that prohibits us from bearing the enormous cost.
Unfortunately, we're not allowed to opt out.
- Brad, Olathe, KS
Obama spent almost exactly as much yesterday as Bush spent on 8 years of war.
I was not for the war, but the stimulus spending is just as asinine.
- Kevin C, Nashua
Thank you Mr. Tausch for being honest enough to admit you got swept up in the pop culture fever that exists in our election standards today. It seems we have a process that has gone from electing those with actual experience and a record of success to electing based on Gender, race, or Hollywood stardom.
We owe everything we now have from our weak criminal system, to gangs, to being a society who has been told having standards and accountability from ourselves, our neighbors, and our leadership is wrong on ourselves for electing the leadership we do. We even allow ourselves to be called racists when our leaders fail to enforce our own immigration laws regardless of the obvious strain on our society from our leaders turning a blind eye and pretending to care about our security.
All I would ask Mr. Tausch is that people such as you keep speaking the truth as you see it and be willing to step forward and lead. Finding someone willing to take a position of leadership is hard enough, but finding someone with a successful background and knowledge of economics and common sense seems to be even harder. What we end up with are activists who have ideas that seem to be based on feel good emotions rather than proven beliefs. Help us keep America as the founding fathers intended and not as we have slowly destroyed be following bad leadership for decades and throwing common sense out the window.
One does not have to be a Democrat or Republican to know when things are not working. They just need to face the truth and admit it and bring back standards to live by. The standards we've been stripped of. The standards of the generations who came before us before we got to this point.
- Ross, Derry
Wow. A Republican with a catchy acronym, vague discontent, and no solution other than getting more people to "participate in the process." Play this out and we will have another batch of pork-and-favors candidates, and they will all lose.
Because look at the opposition: Frank says, "I hope you're VERY secure in your job....all the idiots who are against [Obama's spending bill] should be prohibited from receiving any benefits from it." A storm trooper for the hope-and-change revolution. Here's a better idea, Frank: Let's agree that everyone receiving a government check has an inherent conflict of interest and ought not vote.
- Spike, Brentwood NH
Sure, republicans are the answer! What a joke. It was their deficit spending throughout the bush years that got us into this mess.
- Frank, Manchester
Tausch ... , after voting Republican for most of his life, supported Barack Obama in the last election ...
Tausch said "... I thought that when Obama talked about change, he was including that he would be more cautious about how we spend money."
Are you frakking kidding me??? Where in the dictionary does the word "CHANGE" have this meaning?
How in the name of all that's good and honorable does someone this gullible, naive and oblivious to recent current events amass a fortune large enough to blow $100,000 on such pointless grandstanding?? The stimulus is a done deal, Fred. It's been on Nancy Pelosi's desk since late 2006. It was guaranteed by YOUR thoughtless vote! Now you get to live with the consequences. I hope you enjoy seeing your business and most of your future income absorbed by the State.
All you dupes who blindly voted for "CHANGE" are going to get it: change from a Constitutional Republic to a Socialist Plutocracy. The so-called "stimulus" is just the first step.
- R. Romano, Hartford, CT
You commenters need to grow up. I hope you're VERY secure in your job.
The stimulus package should have a caveat added to it; all the idiots who are against it should be prohibited from receiving any benefits from it.
- Frank, Manchester
Well, thanks Tausch, for supporting this idiot to begin with. You're a day late and a few dollars short, I'm afraid. Save us the trouble and vote Republican next time, OK?
- mike s, eugene
You are sitting in your kitchen.. the grass is getting very high. YOu think? I can either go out and cut the grass myself, or borrow money and go more into debt so the little bobby across the street who is a lazy do nothing can have a job he does not deserve... If your name is Nancy Pelosi or Sen Reid? You borrow the money.. wait: not "your" money, the guy down the street's money.. then you hire lazy bobby, pay him with someone else's money, and tell everyone how great you are... WE ARE DOOMED.
- tom, manchester, nh
I found the site and it's great. Good for this man to start this. I am scared about this spending. My kids will be repaying this to China for decades. www.stewardofprosperity.org.
- Beth, Manchester, NH
Tausch is a registered independent who, after voting Republican for most of his life, supported Barack Obama in the last election, even contributing $2,300 to the cause
Tausch said he "got excited about his message. There was not a lot of fiscal discipline in either party, and I thought that when Obama talked about change, he was including that he would be more cautious about how we spend money. And that's just not the case."
What the heck were you expecting buddy? Seriously the guy said he supported every silly liberal cause there is an you expected him to be a fiscal conservative????? Well maybe you should ask for your $2300 back and use your organization "STEWARD" to steward folks into actually knowing who the hacks they vote for actually represent. Good luck it sounds like you wasted $2300 on a "hope and Change" bumpersticker.
- Andy, Milford
Why is it that people write articles about websites but never include the URL? I can't find this site anywhere. No offense but this guy can't be too bright if he believed ANYTHING Barack Hussein Obama said in the first place.. Sheeesh, what did he think?
Besides the spending giveaways to all the liberal special interests, (frisbees, ACORN, condoms, ATV trails, lightbulbs, and every bad group out there) there is a universal health care and gun grab hidden inside as well. We are doomed people, doomed!
*** Editor's note: The URL will be added. ***
- Sue, Manchester
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