Marc Comtois

Governor Chafee, DOT make right call – NO Transportation Bond Ballot Item in 2012

By Marc Comtois | August 6, 2012 |

It’s about time, via the ProJo: For the first time in memory, the state won’t be asking voters’ permission this year to borrow tens of millions of dollars for the state’s transportation system – and running up borrowing costs each time. The change will save many millions in interest, with the savings to increase until…

Barone: Intellegentsia Got the Partisanship the Asked For

By Marc Comtois | August 4, 2012 |

Michael Barone: I ascribe much of the partisan tone of today’s politics to two changes urged by the political scientists I studied in college nearly half a century ago. One was the idea that we should have one clearly liberal and one clearly conservative party. This was a popular enough argument in the 1940s and…

One Graph Says it All

By Marc Comtois | August 3, 2012 |

Hm. So what this says is we’d have been better off without the stimulus? Well, at least we’re in our 3rd “recovery summer“, ’cause one just wasn’t enough! ADDENDUM: Woops, almost forgot. It’s Bush’s fault.

National Poll Shenanigans

By Marc Comtois | August 3, 2012 |

Take a look at the Real Clear Politics’ 2012 Presidential poll averages and you’ll see, for the most part, Obama and Romney are within 2-4 pts of each other with Obama leading most of them. Then Pew released a poll showing Obama with a 10 point lead. How’d that happen? Well, several experienced and astute…

Technology and Education Then and Now

By Marc Comtois | August 2, 2012 |

The family and I recently spent a long weekend in Washington, D.C. and we visited the Smithsonian Museum of American History. The “America on the Move” exhibition included a 1939 Dodge school bus from Martinsburg, Indiana, which served as a platform for explaining how technology (the bus) affected education. In rural areas, the introduction of…

How Whitehouse Serves Rhode Islanders

By Marc Comtois | July 24, 2012 |

WPRI uncovered a 2009 speech made by Republican Senate Candidate Barry Hinckley in which he told the audience that running for political office will also garner “tons of free PR” for your business. In reaction, Tony Simon, the campaign manager for Hinckley’s opponent, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse sought to make a distinction between his boss and…

Like it or Not, Red Team/Blue Team is the American Way

By Marc Comtois | July 19, 2012 |

I’m tired of playing the same old Democrat versus Republican game. It’s like watching professional sports, only it will seriously impact your life. Our modern political culture has been shaped in such a way that we debate our politics like we root for our favorite football team. Doesn’t matter that the candidate may not share…

DCCC Lies About Doherty & Beacon Mutual Role

By Marc Comtois | July 17, 2012 |

As reported by GoLocalProv’s Dan McGowan, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) has a dossier on CD-1 Republican candidate Brendan Doherty that it compiled as opposition research. Creating such a report isn’t surprising, nor does it contain anything new, but it does try to re-frame items to put Doherty in the most negative light. As…

Obama: Businesses Are Lucky & Should Thank the Government

By Marc Comtois | July 16, 2012 |

President Obama: [L]ook, if you’ve been successful, you didn’t get there on your own. You didn’t get there on your own. I’m always struck by people who think, well, it must be because I was just so smart. There are a lot of smart people out there. It must be because I worked harder than…

Unintended Consequences: ACA’s Negative Impact on Workers

By Marc Comtois | July 13, 2012 |

Deroyal Industries is a manufacturer of a wide variety of medical devices. They have over 2000 employees in 26 states and 5 countries. According to their President/COO, both the company and its employees will be negatively impacted by the ACA’s new tax on medical devices (h/t). July 12, 2012 The medical device tax constitutes the…