Also on today’s menu:
Christie Concedes He Has No Way Forward
Lowest-Income Residents Pay Highest Level of NH Taxes
But first, this week’s lesson in health and wellness: The human body is not stronger than a brick stairway, even when that body is covered with multiple layers of clothing. Testing that hypothesis by stepping onto my ice-covered front steps on Tuesday, I felt lucky not to have hit my head, and the initial back pain faded away, tricking me into thinking that the winter coat covering a fleece jacket covering my everyday clothes had been enough to prevent broken bones. So confident was I that I went out and shoveled all the pathways covered with the heavy slush that appeared on Wednesday, with only minor incidents of stabbing pain. It was not until I went to bed Wednesday night that Level 10 pain struck — and not just from the area of the back that had come into contact with the bricks. Today’s CT scan revealed that, indeed, I have a closed-rib fracture. It has slowed me down, but I’m still functioning and grateful that the near-term forecast is calling for rain instead of snow — if you can imagine expressing that preference in January!
There has been a lot of press recently about the “culture of conformity and censorship” on college campuses, with some of the country’s most elite colleges being the most egregious offenders: Harvard University ranked as America’s worst college for free speech, fellowed by the University of Pennsylvania, Georgetown University,, Fordham University, and the University of South Carolina. The American Civil Liberties Union contends that restrictions on speech by public colleges and universities amount to government censorship, in violation of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, “depriv[ing] students of their right to invite speech they wish to hear, debate speech with which they disagree, and protest speech they find bigoted or offensive. An open society depends on liberal education, and the whole enterprise of liberal education is founded on the principle of free speech.”
Bucking that trend is Dartmouth College, which on January 10 announced the launch of “Dartmouth Dialogues” to “showcase Dartmouth’s commitment to programming across the institution that facilitates conversations and skills bridging political and personal divides”.
The announcement came from Dartmouth’s 19th president, Sian Leah Beilock, the first woman to be elected president of Dartmouth and who began her tenure there on June 12, 2023. Beilock previously served as the eighth president of Barnard College at Columbia University.
“Dartmouth has long championed dialogue across difference,” Beilock said in her announcement. “From the Great Issues course introduced by then-president John Sloan Dickey in 1947 to presidential debates held on campus since 1984, Dartmouth Dialogues brings a renewed focus on our ability to think critically, to question, and to probe and reflect, rather than blindly follow a predetermined ideology.”
The rollout will begin with the Dialogue Project, a campus initiative that “cultivates intentional training in the development of collaborative dialogue skills among students, faculty, and staff”. It will be led by Elizabeth F. Smith, dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, and Kristi Clemens, who is serving as the project’s director of student and staff initiatives. The Dialogue Project currently features four main components: a special topic series, a partnership with the nonprofit StoryCorps’ One Small Step program, workshops where faculty, staff, and students can practice the skills of collaborative dialogue, and guest speakers who specialize in dialogue-related skills.
Discussion: Marc Brackett, founding director of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence, will speak in Filene Auditorium on January 26 about the need to manage emotions when talking about challenging topics. That is one of the key elements that hampers understanding between people: an unwillingness to listen to other side and engage in meaningful dialogue. The college also will sponsor a special-topic series on the Middle East. “Educators around the world continue to seek advice from our Jewish Studies and Middle Eastern Studies professors on how to facilitate campus conversations about the current crisis,” Beilock said.
Christie Concedes He Has ‘No Way Forward’
The above ad, paid for by Make America Great Again Inc., says it all. Alone among the Republicans running against former president Donald Trump in the 2024 presidential primary, Chris Christie wants to hold Trump accountable for his crimes and to restore the Republican Party to true American values, rather than those of fascists. During the first Republican debate, all the other candidates pledged to support Trump if nominated, even if he were convicted of any of the 91 counts he faces in the criminal cases against him. Christie said no: “Someone has got to stop normalizing this conduct,” he said.
Shortly before he announced his decision to end his campaign on January 10 — a decision that is expected to boost former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley’s campaign — Christie was caught on a live microphone saying, “She’s going to get smoked, and you and I both know it.” Even with the ill-advised support from New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu, Haley knows it, too. Political observers say she is hoping to be Trump’s vice-president and, indeed, she has refused to rule out serving as Trump’s running mate later on.
Although Christie endorsed Trump in 2016 and briefly served as the head of Trump’s transition team, he said Trump violated his oath and betrayed the American people by claiming the 2020 election had been stolen and baiting the crowd that attacked the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, to prevent Congress from certifying Joe Biden Jr.’s victory.
Discussion: There is no question that Trump must be defeated if the United States is to remain a free country, but electing Haley or any of the other remaining Republican candidates will not preserve democracy, either, because by not refuting him, they are essentially keeping the fascist movement alive. Voting Democrat in the New Hampshire Primary is not an alternative as long as the Democratic National Committee continues its pledge to not honor New Hampshire voters’ decisions because they disapprove of the state primary date. Because it is a flagrant example of voter suppression, New Hampshire’s attorney-general has ordered them to cease calling the primary “meaningless” but that does not prevent them from sabotaging New Hampshire Democrats. Deprived of a good candidate on the Republican side and possibly any candidate on the Democrat side, it means New Hampshire voters’ only say will come during the general election in the fall.
Lowest-Income Residents Pay Highest Level of NH Taxes
New Hampshire is one of 42 states that require more taxation for residents with the lowest 20 percent of income than from the top 1 percent, according to a new report from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. Those making less than $35,000 per year in 2023 are paying about 8.9 percent of their incomes on state and local taxes, including the portions of property taxes passed through rent and motor vehicle fees. Those in the middle 20 percent have a total effective tax rate of 6.7 percent, and those with more than $721,000 a year in income paid about 2.8 percent in state and local taxes.
The institute analyzed state and local government tax systems in each of the 50 states. The state and local tax systems in Florida, Washington, and Tennessee showed the most inequality. Vermont, Maine, and Massachusetts were among the states that ask more of the top 1 percent than the bottom 20 percent of income earners, but all three ask more of certain groups of middle-income earners than of the top 1 percent.
New Hampshire families and individuals under 65 years old with incomes in the lowest 20 percent pay a tax rate approximately 3.2 times higher than those with the top 1 percent of income. Individuals in the middle 20 percent of the income scale, with between $62,300 and $104,100 in income during 2023, have an effective tax rate that is 2.4 times higher than their counterparts in the top 1 percent of the income scale.
Discussion: New Hampshire claims to be a low-tax state, but it disguises its taxation through hidden taxes and fees. This report is the first we know of that takes into account all of the costs.