The Granite State, along with GOP governor Chris Sununu are currently stuck with a 4-1 Republican majority on the five-person Executive Council that has done their level best to sabotage any bit of legislation that any rational person would jump at the chance to pass for their constituents.

Last October, the Council majority, ignoring the urging of Sununu, refused to accept the $27 million federal dollars from the Biden Administration to help foot the bill for statewide COVID-19 vaccinations and testing, instead incredibly questioning whether the dollars were even needed despite the death counts and rising positivity percentages. Only an avalanche of behind-the-scenes arm-twisting by US Senators Jeanne Shaheen and Maggie Hassan, along with House members Annie Kuster and Chris Pappas, joined by the only rational Council member, Democrat Cinde Warmington, overturned this preposterous vote and saved state budget coffers and Chris Sununu’s bacon simultaneously.

Another aberrant vote by this Ship of Fools was their December defunding of 80% of our state family planning centers’ state funding. This included Planned Parenthood, already decimated by the Trump Organization and their Title X “gag rule” laws which cut off federal grants to these organizations.

The Joe Biden Administration as promised restored the monies and eliminated the Trump gag rule last year. But with the Supreme Court currently on a collision course with their Roe vs. Wade decision due later this year, women’s reproductive health concerns including contraception, family planning health (not just abortion) and wellness checkups may be in line to be degraded even more.

Cinde Warmington has admirably attempted to stem the right-wing tide caused by her ultra-conservative compatriots, a cabal that has consistently voted against any and all measures that would be considered even marginally-citizen-empowering. She represents District 2 out of the state’s total of five. The other four districts are “helmed” by Janet Stevens, Joseph Kenney, David Wheeler and Theodore Gatsas. And District 3 (Rockingham County) last election blew a chance to add another great Executive Councilor, scientist, environmental consultant and former state representative Mindi Messmer, when they installed Stevens instead by a 52%-47% vote.

All thinking people in that district should be rueing their choice by now., as Messmer would’ve been infinitely preferable intellectually and ideologically to Stevens, a point that even Chris Sununu would probably approve of after all the haggling he’s had with this crew that is supposed to be on his page.

New Hampshire has a chance this Nov. 8 to redress four huge prior electoral mistakes. It doesn’t matter what side of the aisle you’re on for these choices, as New Hampshire, Gov. Sununu and Granite State voters are all saddled now with a motley crew who are more adept at head-scratching decisions instead of following either side’s set of principles. And the four of them have to go.