Also on today’s menu:
Paid In The Nick Of Time
The Case Against Trump
Differences Among Supporters
High winds and flooding are expected to accompany the one to three inches of rainfall predicted for today into tomorrow, with a chance of widespread power outages across New Hampshire.
National Weather Service hazardous weather alerts warn of the potential for slick, nasty driving conditions statewide, with a flood watch in effect through 7 a.m. on December 24.
Meteorologists also issued a high-wind warning, predicting steady winds of 20 to 30 mph, with gusts up to 55 mph possible, during the day.
Paid In The Nick Of Time
Town Administrator Ken Robichaud was worried that the town might not be able to make its payment to Merrimack County on time because of delays in setting the tax rate, but enough revenue came in for him to meet the December 19 deadline.
Property tax bills had not gone out until late November because, while the town had filed its paperwork with the Department of Revenue Administration on time, the Winnisquam Regional School District was late filing its forms, and there was also a delay because of a court-ordered special meeting to address the contract dispute between the Tilton-Northfield water and fire districts.
State statute requires county tax assessments to be paid by December 17 each year. Because that date fell on a Saturday this year, the deadline was extended to December 19. Robichaud drove Northfield’s payment to Merrimack County on the 19th.
The Case Against Trump
Former U.S. Attorney and federal prosecutor Joyce Vance did a preliminary review of the final report of the January 6 committee which was released last night. “The first seven chapters discuss core aspects of a conspiracy to overthrow our democracy that began long before January 6. The committee goes through Trump’s efforts to hold onto power after losing the election, starting with the Big Lie and ending with Trump’s refusal to do anything to stop the violence on January 6 until after it was clear the attack would fail. The Eighth Chapter is an analysis of the attack itself,” she writes.
Vance highlighted the second section, Chapter 2, The State Pressure Campaign (“I just want to find 11,780 votes”). “The scope is mind boggling,” she writes. “Everyone knows about the January 2 call to Brad Raffensperger but there’s a lot more to the story and the report includes lots of detail. This is the chapter of the report to start with if you’ve only got time for one right now. Kenneth Chesebro, a name you may not yet be familiar with, surfaces here as someone who is an early adopter of the Big Lie and willing to push out marginal legal theories and urge them to take on a life of their own.”
Vance again warns that, as damning as the report is, it does not mean that federal prosecutors will be able to build a solid enough case against the former president to bring charges. “The report is more opening statement than prosecution memo. We get potential charges and the evidence for them, but we don’t get the arguments the defense would make. And we don’t know what different evidence — whether better or worse — DOJ has in its possession. All that to say, it’s still difficult to assess whether we should expect a federal prosecution on some or all of the counts the committee recommends. Whether or not that happens, the report is a compelling document that should aid people with common sense in understanding how we process Trump’s conduct following the 2020 election.”
Differences Among Supporters
People trying to understand events around them tend to group others into categories, failing to recognize that each person is an individual who may share certain beliefs with those around them but disagree on other matters. Mike Wendling, writing for the BBC, makes a distinction between the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys, both of whom supported the former president and gathered at the Capitol on January 6, 2021. Wendling reports that there was animosity between the two groups stemming from a 2019 demonstration in Portland, Oregon.
Oath Keepers were providing security for the event, and their founder, Stewart Rhodes, told the January 6 committee that he learned that a white nationalist was among the Proud Boys who also attended the event. Rhodes said that, upon learning that, he pulled his members out. He said his group defended peaceful protesters and aided people of many different backgrounds. Earlier, when right-wing protesters clashed with anti-fascist groups during protests in Berkeley, California, in 2017, Rhodes said he told white nationalists to “take a hike”. He accused the Proud Boys of failing to properly vet its members to exclude white nationalists.
Enrique Tarrio, a Florida man who led the Proud Boys at the time of the riot, told the committee, “After that event in Portland, I didn’t want to … have anything to do with Oath Keepers or militias or anything like that.”
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