From The Citizen of Laconia, Saturday, April 24, 2010:
By JOHN KOZIOL
Saturday, April 24, 2010
Politically speaking, there are a number of similarities between Jim Bender and the three other candidates vying for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate.
But it's doubtful that Kelly Ayotte, Ovide Lamontagne or Bill Binnie ever told the lead singer of "America's Greatest Rock and Roll Band" that said band wasn't getting its full pay because it performed at less than full strength.
Yet that's what Bender, a businessman from Hollis and a graduate of the then Lowell Technological Institute — now known as the University of Massachusetts-Lowell — said happened when Steven Tyler of Aerosmith, which is a quintet, demanded that he pay them as such even though the band fielded only a quartet at a show that Bender helped put on while a student leader at LTI.
Stopping in for a few words Thursday afternoon at The Citizen with his wife, Susan, as part of their tour of the Lakes Region, Bender recalled that the mid-'70s were a heady time at LTI.
Major bands and acts like Aerosmith, Frank Zappa, Judy Collins, Cheech and Chong and Jethro Tull, all of which did the bulk of their performances on weekends, could be enticed to come to Lowell on a weekday, he said, not for cheap, but at a good price; and, for Aerosmith, that price was $10,000.
In Bender's mind the fee translated into five performing musicians so, on the night in question, when only four-fifths of the band showed up, Bender paid them 80 percent of the agreed-upon wage, and later had to explain the rationale to an irate Tyler.
Flash forward a number of years and Bender finds himself next to Tyler on a commercial flight and, before the plane lands, Bender said he "reminded him of our encounter at Lowell." This time, there were no unpleasantries — which is more than Bender can say about the current state of affairs in Washington, D.C.
"Government's become much too big," said Bender of the overarching theme in his campaign for Senate, and it has become "toxic to our economy and to job creation."
America, by his count, has lost some 8.4 million jobs despite so-called economic stimulus programs under both presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama.
American government has become filled with back-benchers and career politicians, he said, both of which have seen the nation's capital achieve "a level of corruption" that Bender, who bills himself as a business "turnaround specialist," has never witnessed in his more than three decades of observing it.
While he said he knows how things work in Washington, Bender claims not to be an insider and he has no agenda, except good government.
A supporter of term limits, Bender would limit the amount of time a senator or congressman could serve to 12 years, noting that the U.S. Constitution was amended to restrict presidents to two consecutive terms.
Like a modern-day Cincinnatus, Bender wants to go down to D.C., do his job and then come back to where his real friends are, in the Granite State. He wants to shake up a Senate and Congress whose members spend too much time planning for their next election and not enough time studying the past or preparing for the future.
The three New Hampshire representatives who signed the Declaration of Independence joined with their colleagues from across the colonies to pledge their lives, fortunes and sacred honor, said Bender, adding, "this is the standard we need to get back to."
A combination of liberty and capitalism has made America great and could do so again, said Bender in calling for less government, starting with the elimination of earmarks which he said were tantamount to bribes.
He said he also would eliminate the departments of energy, agriculture and education and seek to repeal healthcare reform — although Bender acknowledged the logistical difficulty in overriding a presidential veto.
Bender, who has a complete list of his positions on major issues of the day at www.benderforsenate.com, supports a balanced budget, the right to bear arms and the Constitution above all. While fiscally "very conservative," Bender said he is more moderate on social issues like abortion and he said states should decide for themselves what constitutes marriage.
Citing the old, conservative credo, Bender wants to "get government out of our wallet, out of our bedrooms and out of our lives."
Asked about the current anti-corporate mood in the nation, Bender thinks it's possible to promote capitalism while protecting consumers, although, in his opinion, the pendulum has swung far left in recent years.
The president and Congress must lead the nation away from what Bender called "a sense of entitlement in Washington that knows no bounds," and he thinks he can be part of the solution.
Recently, Bender hired Beth Lindstrom, who guided Scott Brown to his recent upset Senate win in Massachusetts, as his campaign manager.
