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March 01, 2017 06:17 AM UTC

Wednesday Open Thread

  • 68 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

“Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming. This is a fault.”

–Oscar Wilde

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68 thoughts on “Wednesday Open Thread”

      1. Gee, you mean Nancy Pelosi was caught showing how she feels about having a Carnival Barker Con Man spouting lies and phony promises to the American people (the prized qualities in the GOP these days, see: Gardner, Cory, Ryan, Paul for further examples)?

        Trump is your turd.  You'll just have to eat it yourself.

         

  2. Look who's busy re-inventing himself?  Yes, the man who didn't bother to show up (as their state Senator) for the groundbreaking of the Limon wind farm; the man who loathed Amendment 37 and actively campaigned against it – and the man who claimed SB-252 was going to cost the Wray School District $30,000/yr. is now so pleased with what's happening in Colorado's renewable energy sector.   

    GUEST COLUMN: Colorado's pioneer spirit drives innovation in energy

     

  3. Cory Gardner tele town hall

    1)  Commits to cybeseciruty select committee on Russian hacking, not Trump ties to Russia

    2) Avoids question of defunding Planned Parenthood as money does not support abortion, repeating that he is pro-life by parroting lie that money can be redirected to other federal health centers.

    3) Garland SCOTUS nomination. Parrots lie about not voting in a presidential year.

    4) Offers politically correct patter about protecting Muslims from Trump inspired hate.

     

    1. 5) You ran as a moderate in a blue state and didn't vote for Trump, so how do you justify being 100% pro-Trump? Obfuscates about the votes being for cabinet members, ignoring DeVos vote, and coal waste dumping. Admits there is no evidence of 3 million illegal voters.

    2. 5)Followup question on Trump Russia ties, not just cyberattacks,  also wants to know about science and technology act, and school vouchers.

         Says FBI is still investigating , name checks Dem Senator Warner, reiterates cyber committee.

          Makes science bipartisan again, manufacturers edge, transferability of technology, scientists determine what science is, not congress, ARPA-E, buzzwords, aspirational.

         DougCO he supports school choice, congress out of the classroom. Parents know best.

    3. 7) Colorado MJ? Sessions and Spicer make equivalence between MJ and opioids. Will you stand against these ignorant statements and support our $1.3 billion industry and protect our state constitution?

           We're the heart of the laboratory of democracy. Sponsored banking legislation for MJ industry.  Name checks Charlottes Web and Rand Paul and facilitating MMJ. Says Sessions told him it wouldn't be a priority, says he'll push back against  Whitehouse statements, ignoring Sessions' statements.

        1. Definitely lying, skinny. They  (Big Pharma) are crapping their pants at their losses where pot has become legal. They will push hard, with the private prison industry and the Partnership for a Drug Free America right beside them.

    4. 8) Pre-existing conditions. ACA has given families access to care they didn't have. How will this be protected, and I'm not a paid protester.

      Usual lies about 750K losing polices. Coverage v. Access. People have insurance, can't afford deductible. Hears from people all the time about pre-existing conditions,  mentions family members with pre-existing conditions. Wants to protect those people and increase affordability. Important issues we need to get right.  Says HC discussion has been too partisan. We can do better. Pablum

    5. 9) Not a paid protestor. How will you protect communities from mining waste.  Bonding for cleanup costs?

         Good Samaritan law proposed but never passed. Make land and water preservation fund permanent. Crown Jewel of our preservation funding. Claims he's a leader on renewables. 

      Contact our offices, all over the state.

      Won't pick up the phone.

    6. 10) Will you demand a Sessions recusal if FBI reports ties between Trump campaign and Russia and demand a special prosecutor?

         Avoids question, says it's premature. Wait for the outcome of the investigation.

    7. 11) Will you support SW CO and the BLM methane rule?

           States he has met w/ county commissioners (bought by O+G?) Congress should do the work, not regulatory agencies, closest to the people. No public position, listening to both sides.

    8. 12) Increased military budget v. foreign aid for food and education to build markets abroad for American products. Development is cheaper than war. Mattis says more state department equals fewer bullets.  Will you support foreign aid?

          Foreign aid is a small portion of budget. Diplomacy is less expensive than defense. Opposes slashing foreign aid. Human trafficking and abuse of women/girls fought by our aid

          Claims our military equipment levels are dangerously low. Diplomacy backed by strong military.

        1. Regarding your #11, please share which county commissioners in SW Colorado that you think have been "bought" by the oil & gas industry? 

          1. All three county commissioners in both Garfield and Mesa counties (the ones with which I am familiar) are apologists and facilitators for oil and gas development. If you question the use of the word, "bought", that is your privilege, and I daresay there are no payroll entries for the six people I have mentioned. You might check their campaign contribution records if you doubt the reason for their fealty 

              1. The culture of obeisance to the O&G industry by County commissioners in western Colorado counties is long and well-documented. In fact, I only know of one who actually championed the people who live in the patch and suffer the consequences. That was Tresi Houpt. A true champion of the people.

          2. ?

            Did you miss the punctuation mark? 

            I was asking if it were the case (seeing as Senator Spokesmodel did not mention meeting with any other local stakeholders like the caller.)

            Duke answered.

            1. Hate to be picky here, but to me, Garfield and Mesa Counties are west central, not southwest. If you want to talk about Montezuma County BOCC, you may have a point. But I wouldn't expect any "charges" to stick to BOCCs in La Plata, San Miguel, Ouray, San Juan. Don't know about Archuleta.

    1. That's easy, the Morlocks in the GOP give us remaining Eloi food and in return … well, you know how that turns out.

      I actually read a Sci-Fi story about this 50 years ago (can't recall the author or title).  The poor were given (mandated to take) the job of consuming all the excess goods that were piling up — keeping up with their quotas was apparently a huge burden, with harsh penalties for failing).  

      Lavish displays of consumerism (long parades of robot-driven limos at funerals was a pitiful sign of poverty), while the elite were allowed to keep classic old cars to drive around in, and had no pressure to wear out all the consumer goods flooding the markets.

      But I actually have faith we'll muddle through as always.  When the problem becomes obvious enough, and when all other methods are exhausted, we'll do the right thing 😉

      1. That's a short from Midas World, a collection by Frederik Pohl.  The story is called "The Midas Plague."  IIRC, the notion is that the poor get "rations" with the twist that the allocation is how much they must consume rather than how much they're allowed.

        1. Yes!  I've thought about that story for decades but never knew where I could find it — thanks for pointing it out 🙂

          SF is a wonderful tool to open up the imagination of children before their minds can be closed down by cynical and/or disillusioned adults.

      2. Oh, Christ.  Not this bullshit again.

        The civilian labor force participation rate is around 62.9%.  That includes both folks who have jobs and those who don't, but would like to.  The 37.1% not participating includes folks who are unwilling, unable, or whom we do not expect to participate in the labor force.  My sister is one of these folks, as she chooses to be a stay-at-home mom because her husband has a terrific job.  It also includes retirees (about 40% of nonparticipants), students (another 20%), the disabled (another 20%), and stay-at-home folks who aren't looking for work (about 15%).

        The labor participation rate is basically a weighing and measuring of people who exist in the US by dropping them into a "worker" (in the formal sense) or "nonworker" bucket.  Higher participation rates are not necessarily good– they can be increased by folks skipping school or never retiring because they lack the funds to support themselves– and lower ones aren't necessarily bad– people pursuing education or retiring in greater numbers.

        The best measure of whether folks are unable to find work is the U6 unemployment figure, which Republicans suddenly discovered under Obama, and I can bet will never be mentioned by them again.  It measures all the folks that would like to work but either can't find it or can't find as much as they'd like.  That number is around 9.4%.  U3, the number Trump will come to love, and the one most reported on, is about 5.1%.

        1. U3 is the standard media reporting metric, easily understood by voters. 

          Would you support all the historical employment data switched to U6 with that being  media reporting metric?

      3. AC —

        Most recent report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics [my emphasis]:

        In January, the number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more) was essentially unchanged at 1.9 million and accounted for 24.4 percent of the unemployed. Over the year, the number of long-term unemployed has declined by 244,000. (See table A-12.)

        After accounting for the annual adjustments to the population controls, the civilian labor force increased by 584,000 in January, and the labor force participation rate rose by 0.2 percentage point to 62.9 percent. Total employment, as measured by the household survey, was up by 457,000 over the month, and the employment-population ratio edged up to 59.9 percent. (See table A-1. For additional information about the effects of the population adjustments, see table C.)

        The number of persons employed part time for economic reasons (sometimes referred to as involuntary part-time workers) was little changed in January at 5.8 million. These individuals, who would have preferred full-time employment, were working part time because their hours had been cut back or because they were unable to find full-time jobs. (See table A-8.)

        In January, 1.8 million persons were marginally attached to the labor force, down by 337,000 from a year earlier.

        So, looking at the workforce participation number, it increased, despite the on-going structural reasons for decline and those who, due to the improved economy & stock market, are able to CHOOSE not to work.

          1. An analysis of Trump's economic policies show the typical GOP head up their ass solutions would actually have the opposite effect from those intended:

            Now consider what Zandi and his team said about Trump's proposals getting pushed through in their current form — meaning, among other things, that the top marginal tax rate would drop from 39.6% to 25%, estate and gift taxes would be eliminated, and 11.3 million undocumented immigrants would be deported.

            "The U.S. economy will weaken significantly if Mr. Trump’s economic policies are fully implemented as he has proposed," the June report said. "The economy will suffer a recession that begins in early 2018 and extends into 2020. During this downturn, real GDP will decline peak to trough by close to 2.4%."

  6. Fucking Sessions lied under oath at his confirmation hearing, about his Russian contacts during the campaign. Can we get rid of him already? Can we at least make him recuse himself from the hacking investigation? Cheezun Rice!

      1. He'll certainly post this, as he probably should.  Trump opponents don't do themselves any favors with the ready, fire, aim technique.

        2. The Senator from Missouri's tweet was inartful at best.  I think she's referring to the committee where she and Sessions both share seats: the Armed Services committee.  To her point, Sessions sat on (Armed Services), Judiciary, Budget, EPW and the Caucus for International Narcotics Control.  Probably not a long list of reasons why he'd be meeting with Russians regarding issues before those committees.  Her stated point: Ambassadors call Foreign Relations Committee members (Cory could get such a call).

          McCaskill sits on Homeland Security and Government Affairs, Subcommittee on Investigations, sub on Cyber Security, and sub on International Trade.  Not a stretch to think she'd have reasons to have Russian Ambassadors on a phone call to discuss the Iran deal almost two years ago. 

          The Russian adoption ban had tentacles into the media blitz leading up to Putins invasion of Crimea (the time frame of her first tweet).  

           

          1. McCaskill is a weak politician. Her sanctimonious preaching will be a campaign ad for 2018 and her defeat. She deserves to be defeated.

            1. Old white guys having been saying that (to their detriment) since 2005.  She's more likely to be taken out by a progressive in a primary than by a 'legitimate rape' Republican challenger like your buddy Todd Akin.

              Is it just a coincidence that you loathe her and she's a woman? 

  7. Maybe this little scandal will keep Beauregard busy enough to keep him out of Colorado's mmi business? (and maybe he should leave science to the scientists, not his bigoted friends?) 

    Jeff Sessions to AGs: “We don’t need to be legalizing marijuana”

    I see a line in The Washington Post today that I remember from the ’80s. This one was, if you smoke marijuana, it’s a cure for opiate abuse. Give me a break. This is the kind of argument that’s been made out there to just almost a desperate attempt to defend the harmlessness of marijuana or even its benefits.

    I doubt that’s true. Maybe science will prove I’m wrong, but at this point in time, you and I have a responsibility to use our best judgment — that which we’ve learned over a period of years — and speak truth as best we can.

    1. Washington Post has a nice piece today showing medical marijuana very good at fighting chronic pain and reducung opioid abuse..  A pleasant surprise for me, since I've thought medical mj largely a dodge for getting high.  But it turns out there are practical grounds for legal mj as well as libertarian ones.

      1. Michael's been telling us that for years, V. Not to mention the non-intoxicating fractions of the plant. The medical uses of cannabis are just now being enumerated in the U.S. The reason most studies have yielded no positive results over the last half-century is because they were all done on the same sorry, worn-out patch that's been growing at the University of Mississippi since they outlawed the stuff in, what, 1937? 

          1. I wish I could. The random drug tests of non-athletes in my district will continue, even though they have been shown to be non-effective in other districts. I've said and done what I could.

            That means that kids who aren’t involved in sports or extracurricular activities are the ones who aren’t getting tested, and they tend to be the ones who are more likely to abuse substances,” Romer noted

            1. I believe mj convictions are still grounds for denying student loans.  Your warriors are playing with fire.   As I have often said, wars are not waged against inanimate objects.  There is no war on drugs.  There is only a war against people who use drugs.

              1. This just-published journal article "Genomic and Chemical Diversity in Cannabis" from our friends and neighbors at the UC-Boulder Cannabis Genome Project is one every CannaNerd should read.  I'll be waiting for our little indignant Sessions-lover-troll to come along and shoot holes in the study

                Genomic and Chemical Diversity in Cannabis

                Voyager – I could point you to a dozen conservatives in Yuma County using marijuana as a replacement for prescription drugs.  It works.  Thanks to you I've stopped calling it a War on Drugs and now refer to it as the War on People. 

                 

                2. My daughter has fibromyalgia .  Apparently mj helped some.  Nothing seems to workfor too long.   doctors say pain is important to the body and if you block it too long, body finds another route to get it to the brain.   Thanks a lot, God.

                  As for me at 71 the main reason I don't smoke marijuana is that I don't smoke.   Chronic asthma means a joint would probably have me gasping and making dry heaves.   I might try an edible some day but I cherish what little mental clarity I still have and don't really need new paths to befuddlement.

                  Otherwise, smoke em if you want to.  Stoners are a lot better to be around than drunks.

                  1. V – you don't get befuddled, enlightened perhaps, but not befuddled!  Not good prairie stock like yourself! My daughter, too, has fibromyalgia. She can't use the therapy because of her work so she uses prescription drugs – but if that isn't an issue for your daughter I'd be happy to introduce her to a nurse who is using a cannabis therapy that works well for most women. 

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