New Hampshire is an unusual state. It is a magnet for libertarians. A significant number of them have been elected to the legislature, where they use their clout to “free” people from government.

Their current goal is to eliminate all vaccine requirements. Diseases that were long ago eliminated will come roaring back. People will die of diseases that could have been avoided. But they won’t be subject to government mandates.

At the same time, with no sense of irony, Some New Hampshire legislstors are demanding greater state control over what is taught in the classroom.

Garry Rayno of InDepthNH reports:

Two bills coming before the House this week are indicative of the New Hampshire Legislature: where it is heading and where it has been for the last three terms.

It is not a pretty picture unless you want to end government as we know it, or you want to use the sledgehammer of government to force everyone to believe what you do.

HB 1811 would repeal the immunization requirements for children in state statutes. All of them.

They include, diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis (whooping cough), polio, measles, mumps, rubella, chickenpox, and Hepatitis B.

Last week the House passed a bill to remove the Hepatitis b vaccine from the list.

The “compromise” position, said the prime sponsor of the bill, Rep. Matt Drew, R-Manchester, is to retain the polio vaccine requirements.

House Bill 1792 or the “Charlie Kirk Act,” which would fittingly prohibit public schools from teaching critical race theory, LGBTQ+ ideologies and other alleged Marxist derived educational theories.

The bill also gives those who believe the law was breached, the right to bring a civil suit against the school and educators as well as code of conduct allegations against the teacher which could result in loss of license.

Over the last several years, the US District Court has struck down laws passed by this legislature on critical race theory or divisive concepts, and outlawing diversity, equality and inclusion programs calling them overly vague putting educators in harm’s way.

It is hard to imagine this law would pass muster either.

In the broader picture, most of the childhood diseases that plagued school children 60 or 70 years ago have been, if not eliminated, made negligible.

But measles is making a comeback in the last few years as is whooping cough because the vaccination rates in children have been trending down as parents seek to opt them out for religious or medical reasons.

In the past, immunizations were not an issue. People had their children vaccinated to protect them from the ravages of the diseases and ultimately to protect the population in general from the newborns to the elderly.

It was the responsible thing to do.

People like Health and Human Services secretary Robert Kennedy Jr. have long disparaged vaccines, as he and others gaslighted many into believing they cause autism.

The vaccination question found a red hot burner with the new COVID 19 shots when the decade began.…

It didn’t matter that the protesters were never going to get the COVID vaccine, they wanted to block the state’s most vulnerable to the disease from having a jab.

Two years ago, lawmakers passed a bill that would have taken away the Department of Health and Human Services’ authority to determine what vaccines children need, and would have had the legislature set the list, but it failed to become law.

These same folks also wanted to eliminate the state’s free vaccination program in conjunction with insurance companies, but had to settle for a study committee instead.

The prime sponsor of House Bill 1792, Rep. Mike Belcher, at the public hearing on the bill alleged a straight-line connection between Karl Marx’s theories and ideologies to the education system that fosters concepts like critical race theory, the oppressor and the oppressed models, LGBTQ+ ideologies, identity based ideologies and systemic inequity based on identity groups, or anti-constitutional narratives.

He claimed these ideologies undermine learning and unity, and the right of parents to direct their children’s upbringing.

He claimed these worldviews are responsible for the divisions in this country and have fostered the view that white Americans are inherently racists.

Belcher claimed his bill does not infringe on a teacher’s free speech, noting a teacher has no right to say anything he wants to children who are captive.

Legislation reaching down into classroom curriculum, which always has been the responsibility of local school boards and administrations, has been a recent trend with book and material bans, anti-abortion requirements and just plain interference and requirements meant to disrupt the system while many public schools struggle to provide a quality education under the burden of high property taxes, while the state fails to meets its constitutional obligation to fund an adequate education.

Before these attempts, bills targeting public education had always been quickly dismissed, but that was before there was an organized effort to end public education.

The chair of the Education Policy and Administration Committee Kristin Noble, R-Bedford, is a co-sponsor, as is Majority Leader Jason Osborne, R-Auburn.

Noble recently posted on social media that schools should be segregated to separate Republicans from Democrats and called public schools Marxist indoctrination centers, while Osborne called them black boxes where children go in, but you don’t know what comes out.

Not that long ago, people followed the concept of the public good, or the long established “Social Contract” espoused by philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau.

The concept is that people surrender some of their freedoms in exchange for protection of their remaining rights, security and social stability, with the sovereign power residing in the people as a whole.

Under that concept, the industrialized world has been able to eliminate polio and other deadly diseases to benefit society as a whole.

But that concept has been eroding along with what was once considered the moral responsibility to look after your neighbors and the most vulnerable as well as yourself. Now it’s just yourself.

The idea of individual rights overriding the greater good is not new, but the founding fathers sought to protect against the tyranny of the majority overriding the rights of the minority.

What we have today is a tyranny of the majority in the legislature driven by Free Staters and Libertarians who want to impose their will on the people of New Hampshire in education, medicine, local planning and zoning, religion and social services. It is tyranny of the minority of New Hampshire residents.

One Republican representative, Travis Corcoran of Weare said in a social media post: “The point of Republican legislation is not just to change the laws, it’s to demoralize the left . . . and encourage them to leave.”

He is a co-sponsor of the Charlie Kirk Act.

If you are passing laws for reasons like that you do not belong in New Hampshire which has always been a welcoming state with a live and let live attitude.

Maybe we should have been more discerning about people moving here who claim to be for freedom, while they trample the freedoms of those who disagree with them.

That is the definition of hypocrisy.

And voters need to be more discerning about who they send to Concord.

Yesterday, the New Hampshire legislature voted on the bill to ban all vaccine mandates: it was defeated, 192-155.

However, the bill to prohibit “woke” curriculum passed by 184-164 and now goes to the State Senate. The bill is called the Charlie Kirk Act, after the founder of the rightwing Turning Points America, who was assassinated last year.

The bill prohibits the teaching of critical race theory, LGBT ideology, or other allegedly Marxist materials. Citizens can file civil suits against teachers found teaching prohibited ideas, and teachers might ultimately lose their license.

A similar law was previously struck down by the federal district court on grounds of vagueness.