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July 17, 2018 07:07 AM UTC

Tuesday Open Thread

  • 24 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

“How often it is that the angry man rages denial of what his inner self is telling him.”

–Frank Herbert

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24 thoughts on “Tuesday Open Thread”

      1. Gilpin elections will not be hacked. We pretty much have a full hand count. Plus the SoS random ballot audit, plus the 20% canvass machine re-count correlated to the first hand count and machine count. Don't bother asking for a recount; you'll just waste money and time to get the same vote totals.

        I'm proud of our little county. We're serious about election operations.

  3. Is anyone else as impressed with Dubya Stapleton's timing as I am?

    After a primary election campaign linking himself with Trump, Stapleton doubles down and says he wants Trump to campaign with him.

    And then we have the Trump Tour de Europe … where Trump pedals (peddles?) on his usual bluster, contradictory positions, insults, and confusion, topped off with a glorious sprint to the finish where he embraces Putin, the recent winner of the World Cup.

    Reactions to the tour are mixed. Some call it Treason. I've seen Disgraceful. Shameful. Fawning. And all those are from Republicans.

    So, will Stapleton stick to his guns and have Trump campaign for him?

  4. Cory Gardner got a shout out from the New York Times!  

    A few Republicans, like Senator John McCain, offered strong rebukes to President Trump’s anti-American, pro-Russian ramblings yesterday. More Republicans, unfortunately, offered weak excuses. (My vote for the single weakest statement goes to either Senators Cory Gardner of Colorado or Bill Cassidy of Louisiana — both of whom complained about previous presidents.)

    But whatever Trump’s fellow Republicans did or didn’t say yesterday, the big question is what — if anything — they will do. Trump is engaged in a shameful campaign to weaken the United States for some mysterious mix of self-interested reasons. Mere words aren’t enough of a response. This is an emergency.

    And so far, Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, and other top Republicans have shown no willingness to take action to defend the country. “McConnell will deploy every tool at his disposal to refocus on business as usual,” Adam Jentleson, a former Democratic Senate staffer, predicted on Twitter. “A smattering of critical statements from GOP senators is step one because that will get reporters to stop hounding senators for reactions. No action will follow, and soon we’ll be back to normal.”

    Vichy Republicans like Cory Gardner are hoping this latest storm will pass so they can get back to the business of taking from the poor and middle class and giving to their wealthy benefactors.

    1. Really.  MAGAt-anus keeps insisting that Republicans "must not show weakness" by negotiating.  They embody weakness by collaborating with a traitor.

    2. Interesting read. Puties offshore accounts could be at risk – but the man he specifically pointed out yesterday isn’t an American. 

      I'm Bill Browder. Here's the Biggest Mistake Putin Made When Trying to Get Access to Me Through Trump

      The biggest mistake that Putin made in his offer today to effectively swap me for the 12 Russian agents is that he went to the wrong head of state. Although I was born in America, I emigrated to the United Kingdom 29 years ago and am a British citizen. If he really wants me, he better go talk to Theresa May, who might have a few choice words for him after Russian agents spread the military-grade nerve agent Novichok across the cathedral town of Salisbury, England.

      2. That's right Michael — always follow the money.  Putin, as does Trump, equates power with money.  Lose one, and the other will surely follow.

        Besides the obvious affinity that Trump has for strongmen, which of course as he fancies himself (a common problem with autocratic businessmen trying to run a government), and need for flattery, we may eventually find that the only thing keeping Trump's businesses propped up is Russian money.

  5. WOTD from DailyKos: "Trump Colludes with Russian Spy"

    Depending on the audience, Butina has presented herself as a Russian central bank staffer, a leading gun rights advocate, a “representative of the Russian Federation,” a Washington, D.C., graduate student, a journalist, and a connection between Team Trump and Russia. She used each role to help her gain more high-level contacts in the nation’s capital.

    July 11, 2015: Butina asks Trump a question at FreedomFest, a libertarian event held that year in Las Vegas. As president, she asked, would Trump continue the sanctions imposed against Russia in 2014?

    For this to happen, Maria Butina has to first be at the event. Then she has to be posing as a journalist. Then she has to attend a speech by Donald Trump. Then, out of a hall full of actual journalists, Trump has to call on Butina … who asks a question on the same topic that would be at the focus of the Trump campaign’s connections to Russia for the next year. That’s a sequence that doesn’t imply coincidence. It signals coordination between the fake journalist in the audience, and the fake billionaire on stage.

    1. The opening paragraphs from that article are also very enlightening, as well as disturbing.

      On Monday, Russian pro-gun activist and lifetime NRA member Maria Butina, was arrested on charges of conspiracy to defraud the United States and acting as a covert agent of the Russian government. The indictment against Butina, on the same day that Donald Trump so weakly acquiesced to Vladimir Putin in Helsinki, came after years in which the Russian agent openly presented herself as a gateway between Republican causes and Russia. During that time she not only supported the candidacy of Trump, but worked with other prominent members of the GOP, promoted Republican visits to Moscow, and secured pro-Russian statements from right-wing politicians up and down the line.

      Butina has been a prominent and vocal presence in the link between the National Rifle Association and Russian pro-gun groups. But she has also inserted herself into other lobbying efforts, both for guns and for Russia. That includes open claims that she was a conduit between the Russian government and the campaign of Donald Trump.

      Brings new meaning to the term "Comrades-in-Arms"

      1. HSA Adviser "Yosemite John" Bolton was all up in that Rooski NRA boostin', too. The video in the article was shown in Russia,captioned in Russian. And that's not even the scariest thing about him.

        It would be sweet to see Bolton have to resign to spend more time with his…. family – at least the ones that don't have  restraining orders against him.

  7. Five years ago this week the SB-13-252 Task Force began their work.  Remember those days? The siren calls from our rural brethren? The belief that life as rural Colorado knew it was about to come to an end?  

    Yeah…well, that didn't happen. 

    In fact, fast forward five years: we now know that Tri-State was privately negotiating for additional wind power at the very same time they were denouncing the legislation.  Not cool.  We also have witnessed billions of dollars in investments in our rural communities, representing one of the largest transfers of wealth from the urban to the rural areas in generations via tax payments to local county governments. 

    Those damn libtards that are ruining our way of life. 

    In the meantime we also managed to kill the Holcomb coal plant, quite likely the largest financial debacle every proposed to rural, Colorado taxpayers. 

    Today, we have even more good news: Xcel Energy is set to achieve a 50% renewable energy goal, bringing low-cost, clean energy to their consumers and even more investment in rural Colorado. 

    Don't think for one minute that sound public policy doesn't matter.  In spite of our rural representatives, the roots of this revolution were vehemently opposed by not only Xcel at the time, but Tri-State, our rural electrics and every Republican rural representative in Colorado. 

    It's said we over-estimate what we can do in a year and under-estimate what we can do in a decade.  It's been a little over a decade since the initial implementation of Amendment 37 has taken place.  With a Governor Polis, we'll be well on our way to 100% clean energy.

    Sound public policy matters to rural Colorado. Both eighty years ago and today. 

     

    Below is a post I wrote five years ago today…

    **************************************************

    While the SB-252 Implementation Task Force begins their work on a roadmap to reach their now-mandated goal, Tri-State is busy behind the scenes in Washington trying to amend federal law so the proposed and ill-fated Holcomb coal plant can be built. 

    It's no secret that Tri-State has spent tens of millions of dollars since 2006 to see this plant become a reality. In the process, they now own the water rights to over 37,000 acres of prime farmland below John Martin reservoir for the sole purpose of producing energy via coal and nuclear plants. They are committing their balance sheet to a Kansas coal plant – which had the ultimate effect of squeezing out opportunities on the eastern plains and western slope – and doing nothing for the communities they serve in Colorado. 

    They are hard at work behind the scenes getting the House to undo the recent Sierra Club/Earthjustice win in the federal courts regarding the proposed Holcomb coal plant. They are attempting to modify Section 5206 of the Farm Bill (HR 2642). This proposed change is directly targeted at the RUS NEPA opinion and would let Tri-State/Sunflower move ahead with Holcomb without any NEPA review by RUS. This provision would apply more broadly as well. 

    Here are their proposed changes: 

    SEC. 5206. Certain Federal actions not to be considered major.
    In the case of a loan, loan guarantee, or grant program in the rural development mission area of the Department of Agriculture, an action of the Secretary before, on, or after the date of enactment of this Act that does not involve the provision by the Department of Agriculture of Federal dollars or a Federal loan guarantee, including-
    (1) the approval by the Department of Agriculture of the decision of a borrower to commence a privately funded activity;
    (2) a lien accommodation or subordination;
    (3) a debt settlement or restructuring; or
    (4) the restructuring of a business entity by a borrower, shall not be considered a major Federal action.

    Call the offices of Senators Bennet and Udall and the Congressional offices of Gardner and Tipton. Tell them to side with rural jobs and to reject the proposed changes to Sec. 5206 in Conference. We don't need a multi-billion dollar investment in 19th-century technology in an adjoining state. Our focus should be squarely on rural Colorado – and the significant opportunities for the rural areas that are being masqueraded as a 'war'. A fake war whose only victims will be those who choose to stay wedded to last centuries mindset.

  8. Obama in S. Africa, giving the keynote address on Nelson Mandela's 100th Birthday celebration….in case you want to remember what a President is supposed to sound like.

     

    1. I can remember when old Bruce ran for governor 24 years ago.

      Seemed like it was just yesterday.

      Then again, after Both Ways Bob, Dan Maes, Both Ways Redux, and now Walker Simpleton, Benson doesn't look so bad.

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