Denver was spoiled last time out with a wonderful convention and a winning presidential candidate. The Democratic National Convention for the same winning President will be held in North Carolina, a right-to-work-for-less state with the requisite right-wing Republican wackos Virginia Foxx and Patrick McHenry, and endangered Blue Dog Democrats like Heath Schuler. Convention sites are picked for a multitude of reasons, but having the convention in a state that supports labor unions and middle class workers usually a prime factor in the choice.
The Democratic National Committee had other priorities this time. Trying to have a positive affect on North Carolina's voters might be too much to ask for with this, but getting unions to overlook yet another snub by Democratsis too much to ask:
Democrats' self-imposed ban on corporate donations has made it tough to raise cash for the Democratic National Convention, and their hope that unions would step in to fill the void appears to have hit a snag, the Wall Street Journal reports.
Wary of their budgets and upset that the convention will be hosted in right-to-work North Carolina, organized labor won't be giving Democrats the money they're requesting for the Charlotte festivities, union officials told the paper. Some unions, including UNITE HERE, the large service workers union, will not contribute to the convention at all.
The obsolete notion that Democrats have to triangulate away from their base to be successful once elected should be dead by now. It's been proved wrong for years now. Barack Obama and the DNC have done it at the national level. Bill Ritter and Michael Bennet have done it in Colorado. If you pivot away from your base, or negotiate with those who have no intention of compromising, or triangulate away from your voters to those who will never vote for you, you are a political fool.
I applaud the fact that unions won't give their full measure of support for the DNC convention in North Carolina. Have they gotten the same from Democrats?
The current Republican view of tax collection is that this is a hostile taking by government against the liberty and free-market wealth creation of each and every individual. They also say, with a straight face, that "50% of Americans don't pay any taxes." The tenets of Jesus Christ Himself can't get Republicans to waver on these. Praise be to the Apostate Paul Ryan.
Democrats in the Colorado House, including bill sponsors Dan Pabon and Joe Mikloski, are proposing a tax holiday for school supplies and such to help middle class families during that frantic time before school starts. The Post poo-poos it. Chris Howes, of the Colorado Retail Council, likes the tax holiday idea and gets his say in the Post, too.
What this minor tax debate ignores is the Gorilla in the Room: fair and equitable taxation that would relieve these pressures, would support Colorado-based businesses, and would more than fill the void of a 3-day tax holiday. A prime example of this is Amazon.com's hostility to taxes and its ruthless response to local businesses when Colorado made noise about collecting sales tax from the book-selling beast. Their guilt, or a persistent policy, has resulted in Amazon pitching in $200 million in Texas:
Dear Women of Colorado (And The Men Who Love Them),
While you've been busy raising your children, going to work, and caring for everyone around you, Tea Party crazies have been trying to take away women's rights and plunge us back into a previous century.
In 2010, Tea Party extremists gained power in Washington DC, and in many parts of this country. They've presented more than 1100 separate legislative provisions aimed at making women second-class citizens, of which, more than 135 have been passed. These are the kinds of things they've been trying to do:
* Defund Planned Parenthood, an organization which offers cancer screenings, mammograms, well-woman visits, contraception, treatment of STDs and family planning services.
* Slash Medicaid for 21 million poor women, so women cannot have health care.
* Prevent access to birth control and cancer screenings.
* Repeal ObamaCare, which was the single biggest advancement in women's health in generations. ObamaCare prevents discrimination based on gender, and makes sure insurance companies pay for the things woman deserve, like contraception, pregnancy services, etc.
* Make women wait days or weeks to have abortions. (Sometimes even, when waiting could cause injury to the woman.)
* Force trans-vaginal ultrasounds on women who do not need them (government sanctioned-rape).
* Make women get permission from their husbands or boyfriends in order to get abortions. (What are women and girls who are raped supposed to do?)
Republicans on the radio continue to use the airwaves to insult women, degrade women, and abuse women. Remember Rush Limbaugh who called college student Sandra Fluke a slut and a prostitute eleven times, simply because she had premarital sex with her fiance? How about the conservative radio talk show host who told a father he should have a friend rape his daughter to make sure she didn't turn out to be a lesbian?
Colorado women and the men who love them will not stand for this lack of respect for women anymore. Join us in a revolt.
Show up to their offices, and make them talk to you. Send them your (clean) underwear to remind them you exist, you vote, and (over your dead body) will they continue to abuse, degrade, mock and insult women in Colorado. Bring your daughters, and granddaughters, and their girlfriends with you.
Picket outside their office with signs, banners, and underwear flags. Call them, fax them, email them, show up to meetings, and generally hound them, until they get the message that they need to go back where they came from.
Raise money for the candidates who seek to replace them (the good guys).
Two thousand Colorado men and women participated in "We Are Women" events on Saturday, which included a Rally, a March/Parade, pre- and post-event concerts, and a flashmob at the Colorado State Capitol.
Numerous simultaneous events were going on in Denver on Saturday, yet the following community leaders stood proudly with Colorado women. Some, like House District 35 Democratic Candidate Armando Valdez, drove hundreds of miles to attand. Some of the high-profile attendees managed to attended the funeral of Democrat Paul Sandoval, and still attend the March afterward.
Public federal spending and private enterprise relate symbiotically. They stimulate each other. During the Eisenhower presidency in the 1950s, a huge public works project linked our nation through the interstate highway system. Entrepreneurs formed start-up companies to supply the government, creating jobs for many citizens.
During John F. Kennedy's presidency, our nation raced to the moon. NASA formed networks of federal think tanks working in tandem with capitalistic risk-takers. Again, business and government worked hand-in-hand.
Harvard Law professor Elizabeth Warren, former presidential adviser on consumer finance who Time Magazine in 2010 touted as one of the 100 key people to watch, believes the Federal government acts like an incubator in which wealthy people thrive. Nobody gets rich because of an individual's sole efforts. Government boosts workers along the way.
The Apostle Paul used the analogy of our bodies to make Warren's point. The torso gives stability, helping legs and arms move. "... in one body we have many parts..." the Bible teaches (Romans 12:4). Like public works and private enterprise joining in common efforts, so do our body parts.
It's taken out of context, but we all know The Lord is the only context required:
I admire this compilation of snippets from these white male senators because after all, if you can reconcile numerous citations of Jesus, your inability to "hide" your "love for your Lord and Savior", morality, AND the Constitution all while being an elected official under the umbrella of a separation of church and state, you're one step closer to reconciling your own homosexuality with the idiotic, closed-minded, abusive and oppressive cycle that's been shat upon you and your predecessors since before Jesus was nailed to a tree.
The former chair of the American Legislative Exchange Council's recently disbanded Elections and Public Safety Task Force said most of the committee's work on voting and gun issues probably will not continue elsewhere within ALEC, but said some could be pursued if they have ties to economic issues.
"The criminal justice area has been one where we have had consensus in doing the kinds of things we're doing with justice re-investment and with the things like our smart on crime initiatives and those things I hope don't get damaged by these actions going on now to break up what we've been able to put together," said Republican Texas State Rep. Jerry Madden, former chair of the committee.
The National Rifle Association, a longtime member of and donor to ALEC, reportedly objected to the change.
During the previous week at least 10 companies left the organization following Color of Change's campaign that encouraged corporations to cut ties with ALEC due to its promotion of such laws.
Last week Denver Post Editorial Page Editor Curtis Hubbard fired back at all those people who've said The Post's commentary pages favor right-leaning points of view over left-leaning ones, or vice versa.
Hubbard presented the results of a bean-counting project conducted during the first quarter of 2012. He categorized editorials and columns on the Post's commentary pages as being left of center, right of center, or "nonpartisan or centrist."
In his weekly column, Hubbard wrote that the majority of the opinion content was "nonpartisan or centrist" (43 percent of "local columns," 55 percent of editorials, and 54 percent of syndicated columns).
Partisan opinion content was found to be mostly left of center according to Hubbard's admittedly subjective count. Local columns were 32 percent left-of-center versus 25 percent right-of-center, editorials 26 percent versus 19 percent, and syndicated columnists 29 percent left-leaning versus 18 percent right-leaning.
Betsy Markey and John SalazararewereBlue Dog Democrats in the House. Their professed reason for calling themselves Democrats, yet voting for and with Republicans throughout their tenure, was to "vote their district"; that is, to vote for the bills that the many undecideds and Republicans in their district would want so they would re-elect their faithful dog the next time out. That foolish DC Beltway "truism" was proved wrong once twice more when both Markey and Salazar were booted out of office for not being Republican and not voting like a Democrat.
That's what Blue Dogs do, and that's why Blue America has been working against this insidious Blue Dog species - and more often than should be the case - the DCCC (Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee), to get these people out of office and prevent them from harming Democrats and the Democratic brand further.
Blue America took on another Blue Dog in Pennsylvania recently and sent Tim Holden packing. They went after this "Democrat" because he supported Republican Speaker Boehner's agenda an astonishing 64%, has been virulently anti-Choice, anti-gay and anti-health care, and routinely supported the Republicans on just about every other critical issue.
A Democrat, who will truly vote his district, and will hold to Democratic principles to boot, won the PA primary against Blue Dog Holden yesterday. Here's AMERICAblog's take:
U.S. Rep. Tim Holden, Pennsylvania's longest-serving congressman, lost his re-election bid in the Democratic primary[.] ... Holden, who was elected to Congress in 1992 and was one of its conservative, so-called Blue Dog Democrats, lost Tuesday to personal injury attorney Matt Cartwright, who spent nearly $400,000 in the race.
Something very rare happened tonight, something that will send a chill down the spines of members of the Democratic establishment: a true blue progressive unseated a tired Blue Dog congressman. We were told it was impossible. Pennsylvania's Matt Cartwright just proved them all wrong. ...
They had a choice and they chose the progressive candidate who would stand up for working families instead of corporations and who believes that individual liberty applies to women as well as men.
Markey and Salazar, if they mattered, would dismiss Blue America's strategy here. But they never seemed to understand that most Republicans in Colorado would never vote for a Democrat even if they were to vote 100% with Republicans in Congress. That's the undeniable glitch in the Blue Dog philosophy.
Real Democrats, in the form of Blue America and Democratic voters around the country, are running the Blue Dogs out of congress one by one. Republicans will attack any that Blue America misses. It'd be a benefit to the nation if those remaining public servants who have a (D) behind their names would learn the message of that increasingly rare, yet not extinct, congressional breed, The Blue Dog Democrat.
In a follow-up to a previously written paper, Levitus et al. 2012 (subs. req'd) shows that the world's oceans continued to absorb heat through 2010:
Two interesting things to point out: most of the heat from 1990 through 2005 stayed in the 0-700m layer (visually subtract the 700-2000m from the 0-2000m time series: the lines diverge), then most of the heat from 2005 through 2010 went into the 700-2000m layer (the lines didn't diverge nearly as quickly as before).
Republicans say they're on your side, but they're eliminating a department that serves you daily and that employs your friends and neighbors in a vital function of government. Yes, there's the internets, there's Fedex, there's UPS and DHL. But they won't do this business as efficiently or as cheaply as our postal employees do. They don't give a crap if you and yours can communicate through the post. They care about profits, paying employees as little as possible, and charging as much as they can for shipping or mailing whatever you might mail. And Republicans in congress have done their bidding and trying to kill the Post Office as we know it.
Rush, exercising his First Amendment rights jaw on Clear Channel-provided, Public-Owned, Amplitude Modulated airwaves at 850KOA in Denver, recently went on a sexist jihad against Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke.
The DailyKos put together a video of Rush's 53 consecutive attacks on Ms. Fluke, all of which surely ran on our beloved 850KOA. They are contractually obligated. Rush did not like the compilation, because he makes money from every lie, every attack, and every abuse the First Amendment grants and 850KOA advertisers fund. So Rush Limbaugh had his trial lawyer force YouTube to pull Markos' video compilation of the anti-Fluke tirade.
You really have to watch it to understand the depth of the vitriol and the fact that Our Neighbors at 850KOA broadcast this stuff daily:
I don't listen to this crap, but I imagine there are still some local merchants paying money for Rush to have his say about women, birth control and other issues in Denver. Like Rush, they probably want you to forget what he said just a few months ago. But he said it, we won't forget, and this compilation of his attacks on Sandra Fluke in particular, and women in general, will never go away.....no matter which lawyer or radio station wishes it were so.
Radio host Ken Clark didn't sugar coat the GOP's problem in his first question to Pauline Olvera, a board member of Colorado Hispanic Republicans, whose website features the Reagan quote above.
"So the biggest problem I've seen in the Hispanic community and the black community is that they share our values; they just hate the Republican Party," said Clark. "So what are you doing about that?"
Olvera gave a big broad answer, as she's done before on the radio, practically bereft of specifics, saying her organization is trying "to connect with those communities' values of 'faith, family, and freedom.'" (Olvera is also a vice chair of the Denver Republican Party.)
Then Solomon Martinez, the Northern Colorado Chapter Chair for Colorado Hispanic Republicans, explained how Hispanics mindlessly cling to the Democratic Party because that's the way they've always been. He cited his own parents.
How does he deal with these stubborn Hispanic Democrats?
Martinez: "I tell people, 'Take the test.' There's websites you can go onto. You know, it's Republican Democrat Test. Take the test. If it still shows that you're a Democrat, then stay the Democrat Party. But you're going to find that you'll probably be a Republican, in most cases."
So now you see how the Reagan quote fits in.
It may sound condescending for Martinez to say that Colorado's Hispanics are so clueless about politics that they don't know the difference between Democrats and Republicans. But just take the Republican-Democrat test anyway. It's about being open-minded. Hispanics will probably find their inner Democrat and forget any possible condescension involved in getting them there.
Supporting Women's Exclusive Right To Make Own Decisions
On April 28th, 2012, at 9:30am, thousands of Colorado women and their family members will gather at Civic Center Park's Greek Amphitheater for a Rally to protect women's access to health care, and for the right of each woman to make her own health care decisions. State and federal legislators, musicians, poets, community leaders, and ordinary Coloradans will be addressing current legislation in Colorado and other states. Following the rally, attendees will march around the State Capitol and back around Civic Center Park to where they started.
Fracking in Colorado and all around the Country has been speeding up at an alarming pace. I had the chance to talk with Activist Sonia Skakich Skirma about some of the terrible things that have been happening to residents in Colorado, but also some good news for the November Ballot.
WASHINGTON -- A White House official says President Barack Obama has been briefed by the director of the Secret Service on the investigation into the agency's prostitution scandal.
The official said Obama was briefed in person by Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan Friday afternoon in the Oval Office.
The briefing came as a government official told The Associated Press a twelfth Secret Service employee has been implicated. The official says three agents were resigning Friday.
That brings the agency departures to six from the events at a hotel late last week in Colombia before Obama arrived for a summit meeting.
Eleven Secret Service employees had been noted earlier. The twelfth has been placed on administrative leave.
At this rate Ted Nugent might've done a better job....
Controversial House Bill 1048 passed on a 37-28 vote, with four Democrats joining the NRA and 33 pro-death, pro-gun profit Republicans in support of the measure. The bill would eliminate the state's background checks on gun sales for firearms.
Tea Party sponsor Mark Waller (R- Colorado Springs -- but you knew that) justified the bill, stating it simply eliminates a "duplicitous system" because the FBI already performs background checks through federally-licensed dealers.
Representative Rhonda Fields (D-Aurora), who lost her son and his fiance to gun violence, urged legislators to defeat the bill, saying, "We should be doing everything we can to preserve and protect life".
Democrats and pro-life advocates need to band together to defeat this pro-death bill, which was clearly written to increase profits for gun manufacturers. Gun checks at the state and federal levels sometimes create slightly different results, creating a much-needed second-opinion before putting firearms in the hands of persons who may be mentally ill, or may have criminal records. The evidence that a second gun-check is effective in reducing gun sales to potential criminals is obvious -- if the bill didn't prevent an occasional sale (profit), the NRA would not be pushing this piece of legislation. And they are.
As a woman who grew up surrounded by rifles, I have nothing against guns. My father worked in a factory during the week, but on evenings and weekends, he and my brothers hunted and fished in the Michigan woods, regularly bringing home dead things to eat to supplement the family food budget. Dad loved guns; my brother does even more today. In fact, he and his wife and seven children pose every year in front of their Christmas tree for their annual holiday photo, with their new gifts of camouflage and rifles (probably why I converted to Judaism and became a vegetarian as an adult). My Dad was the biggest hunter-enthusiast I've ever known, and he would have clearly renounced this bill.
I am disappointed in the four Democrats who voted for this bill, and I urge all Coloradans -- whether Democrat, Republican, Unaffiliated or Independent, to defeat this pro-death bill in the Colorado Senate. In the state that suffered huge losses in the Columbine shooting, we know better than to cut corners by putting guns in the hands of people who should not have them.
Allen West has accused members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus of being card-carrying members of the Communist Party.
Our congressional "leaders", cowards and political idiots that they are, continue to let the threats, insults, lies, attacks, obfuscations continue on TV, radio, and print day after day, week after week, and year after year against the President and all assorted Democrats and Progressives at almost every level of government.
(a) Whoever knowingly and willfully deposits for conveyance in the mail or for a delivery from any post office or by any letter carrier any letter, paper, writing, print, missive, or document containing any threat to take the life of, to kidnap, or to inflict bodily harm upon the President of the United States, the President-elect, the Vice President or other officer next in the order of succession to the office of President of the United States, or the Vice President-elect, or knowingly and willfully otherwise makes any such threat against the President, President-elect, Vice President or other officer next in the order of succession to the office of President, or Vice President-elect, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both.
(b) The terms "President-elect" and "Vice President-elect" as used in this section shall mean such persons as are the apparent successful candidates for the offices of President and Vice President, respectively, as ascertained from the results of the general elections held to determine the electors of President and Vice President in accordance with title 3, United States Code, sections 1 and 2. The phrase "other officer next in the order of succession to the office of President" as used in this section shall mean the person next in the order of succession to act as President in accordance with title 3, United States Code, sections 19 and 20.
Yes, Ted Nugent is a vile excuse for a rock 'n' roller.
Yes, Allen West is ignorant beyond measure.
But the behavior of Elected Republicans, Highly Visible Conservatives like Nugent and Rush and Hannity, and Rosen and Brown, and Silverman and Caplis (thank God that monster Gunny Bob was fired) will never go away unless their equals in the Public Square start fighting back and refudiating their charges. That would be Democrats like Jared Polis, Diana DeGette, and Ed Permutter, and any number of Colorado officials, who are almost universally mute on these subjects.
Until then, I must sadly assume, those refutations will be left to Cheetoh-stained bloggers with 3 readers, including their dog.
* - By the way: Both sides don't do it to the same extent. Those who call the President a Communist, Socialist, Traitor, hopes or works "for the downfall of the USA", "hates white people" are Republicans and Conservatives who make Millions of Dollars a year, have multiple high-profile venues for spewing their hate, and are highly respected among the highest societal strata of their peers and associates.
