CO-04 (Special Election)
See Full Big Line
(R) Greg Lopez
(R) Trisha Calvarese
90%
10%
President (To Win Colorado)
See Full Big Line
(D) Joe Biden*
(R) Donald Trump
80%
20%↓
CO-01 (Denver)
See Full Big Line
(D) Diana DeGette*
90%
CO-02 (Boulder-ish)
See Full Big Line
(D) Joe Neguse*
90%
CO-03 (West & Southern CO)
See Full Big Line
(D) Adam Frisch
(R) Jeff Hurd
(R) Ron Hanks
40%
30%
20%
CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado)
See Full Big Line
(R) Lauren Boebert
(R) Deborah Flora
(R) J. Sonnenberg
30%↑
15%↑
10%↓
CO-05 (Colorado Springs)
See Full Big Line
(R) Dave Williams
(R) Jeff Crank
50%↓
50%↑
CO-06 (Aurora)
See Full Big Line
(D) Jason Crow*
90%
CO-07 (Jefferson County)
See Full Big Line
(D) Brittany Pettersen
85%↑
CO-08 (Northern Colo.)
See Full Big Line
(D) Yadira Caraveo
(R) Gabe Evans
(R) Janak Joshi
60%↑
35%↓
30%↑
State Senate Majority
See Full Big Line
DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
80%
20%
State House Majority
See Full Big Line
DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
95%
5%
January 12, 2010 06:51 PM UTC
27 Comments
All you have to do is drive down I-70 between New Castle and DeBeque to notice drilling rigs popping up everywhere. Want ads for oil-and-gas workers are increasing, and fracking trucks are again zooming up and down the local highways.
Gas drilling is definitely on the rise in the Gas Patch.
O&G guys here say (off the record) that business is picking up with national supplies dwindling because of the cold winter and new pipelines to the east opening up. Some are drilling under the higher prices locked in the Futures market from a few years ago.
Gov. Ritter got blamed for the slowdown when it was the national economy that hit natural gas prices and slowed drilling. Now that there is an increase of business, will Ritter be credited? Unfortunately, propaganda is a one-way street.
have their talking points in order and aren’t deviating one iota, not even in the face of the truth.
These guys would never let the facts stand in the way of a good campaign rant.
WTF was I thinking, anyway? 🙂
Reality is not an option in today’s Republican Party. Ideology governs all debates. To the Republican activists, the sky is red because ideology says the sky is red. The objective provable facts are irrelevant.
For more proof of this, read Mr. Schmidt’s new book about Gov. Palin during the last presidential election. He served as one of Senator McCain’s chief strategists. According to his book, Gov. Palin believed Saddam Hussein was responsible for the 9/11 attack. She couldn’t articulate why there are two Koreas or what the basic function of the Federal Reserve is. He described how she continually made statements that were factually and easily proved wrong. And yet she is the leading candidate for the Republican nomination in 2012.
There is a real disconnect from reality in today’s Republican activist core. There is an unwillingness to deal with real facts and real causes when facts and causation don’t fit ironclad ideology.
We can’t trust the government to people who think like that.
Schmidt made some of these remarks on 60 Minutes on Sunday, but he doesn’t have a new book about Palin. The new book is Game Change, by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin, published this week. Let’s keep the facts straight, especially in a post about politicians having trouble sticking to the facts.
is that so much of the Republican base sees her level of ignorance as her highest virtue.
If blinds faith, whether religious faith or faith in the talking points handed down from on high, is the ideal then independent pursuit of fact based knowledge is morally suspect. Palin’s stunning breadth of worldly ignorance makes her close enough to immaculate in that regard to be worthy of the utmost veneration. She’s the High Priestess of the non-reality based world.
From “The Idiots are Taking Over” by NOFX
I can’t seem to catch goofs that don’t trigger spell check anymore. That would be blind faith.
Like my sig line says Reality has a liberal Bias. republicans have lost touch not just with reality but also with Truth.
it is amazing to me as to how republicans not just get away with it but how eventually it becomes perceived fact. no matter how many times it is found to be untrue.
Tutti Fruitti, ah Scooty, a Tutti Fruitti, ah Scooty.
McInnis will continue to ride the Penry lie as long as he thinks the people of Colorado will believe it.
From Scooty’s campaign site
From RigZone 11 Jan 2010
Governor Ritter has been THE leader in America in showing other states how sensible rules can both protect the population and accommodate drilling.
The Secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection is now wanting to get caught up to Governor Ritter’s vision.
Scooty might want to keep comparing Colorado to other gas patch states, but it is clear, as reports like those issued this week show, the canard of rules causing a slow down will no longer be a piece of Penry flimflamery useful to his cause.
“The days of McCain and McInnis are over.” -Don Bain, former chairman of the Colorado Republican Party
Website. it has a picture of trees in the fore ground and desolate sand dunes in the background.
seems to me this pic is the subconscious vision scott mcInnis has for our future should he be elected..
Desolation.
We don’t “think” so, we know so and horseshit posts like this prove it.
Dems good, Republicans bad, but were not a partisan outfit! You make me laugh so hard.
that the decrease in production was the result of the regulation and not from the overall market decrease and factors unique to Colorado.
I looked- couldn’t find any.
WHich ones did you find?
The question isn’t “horseshit posts like this.” The question for you is simple. Don’t the facts from the Colorado Oil & Gas Commission prove the Republicans, including Messrs. Penry, McInnis and Gardner are wrong and have been wrong since they began stating the new rules drove oil and gas drilling out of Colorado.
Ideology has the virtue of simplicity but it rarely is the basis of good public policy because it represents general propositions or values that may very well not be true in specific factual situations. Thats why the devil is always in the details (the facts).
“Ideology has the virtue of simplicity…”
You say this like it’s a bad thing. 🙂
In my neighborhood and other R circles the complaints are that D’s (liberals in general) always want to make everything so complicated and then argue from an intellectually superior point of view. (I plead 1/2 guilty). But we can’t answer simple questions.
Questions like if the gov’t was capable of running health care, why is Medicare so screwed up? Or do I really want my healthcare run by the same people that run the DMV? or other simple questions.
I often smile and get more cookies at this point.
If pressed I apologize for the world being so complicated for them, but progressive taxes make more sense. (John Rawls – Veil of Ignorance)
If really pressed, I’ll engage. What emerges is frequently a more complicated political ideology than they want.
Truth is- it is what is.
I had this conversation last night at the kids’ practice – and when pressed for a simple answer to a simple question, I said let me ask the question (ht SSG_Dan) and posed the question of why it is so hard for vets to get access to VA benefits. ANd suggested a presumption of qualified and then a review as/when needed after. Simple problem, simple solution – saves beau coup on admin.
Suspicion and conviction that there would then be too much incentive for vets to fake claims. Oh, so these patriotic Merican’s are going to be moivated to become coriminal to maek $178 a month and make it 6 o r 9 months sooner than they might other wise? Uh-huh
it rarely has considered the facts or the nuances which almost always make a difference. Going back to the oil and gas regulations what happended in this case was the fact the operating drill rig count began to fall drastically the year before the new rules were approved. The Republicans took the ideological position that regulations always hinder economic growth or cause it to decline, and therefore there could be no other possible explanation for the drop in drilling except fear of the proposed regulations. Here in Colorado, Republicans like Messrs. McInnis, Penry and Gardner absolutely refused to admit that the glut on the gas market or lack of pipeline capacity had anyhting to do with the decline in drilling. They said this in the face of the obvious objective fact that drilling was declining at about the same rate throughout the oil patch. In other words, in other states where there were no new proposed rules drilling was declining too at virtually the same rate.
It is now obvious their ideologically based opinion was just plain wrong as most people who paid attention to the issue knew from the beginning. The Republicans her ein colorado simply refused to address or consider facts which obviously pointed to a different conclusion. Even the oil and gas industry publications said the glut and the resulting decline in prices was the root cause of the decline in operating drillling rigs.
Another example is former U.S. Representative and the 2008 Republican U.S. senate candidate Bob Schafer who made the following statements on his campaign website in 2000:
“Republicans defend religious freedom. Democrats incinerate religious zealots and their children.’
“Republicans are for a clean environment. Democrats set big forest fires in New Mexico.”
Can anyone take statements like that seriously. Those kind of statements are silly. Yet, Mr. Schafer put this on his campaign website on the worldwide web during his last campaign for the U.S. House in 2000.
It is the simple fact many Republican candidates either refuse to recognize facts or they make them up like Mr. Schafer did. People with that kind of mindset, whether Republican or Democrat, simply don’t have any business running our public affairs. Reality is important.
I’ve seen D’s do it too.
but I will agree that “Reality is important.”
In fact, that’s going to be my new sig line as soon as I don’t need my current one as much
at the present moment are dominated by ideology.
This is a basic, defining issue in Colorado. The oil & gas companies have been here for decades and have a track record. Many volunteers have been studying this issue for decades as well. Of course there is the underlying NIMBY issue but in this case there are enough pesky facts that make me go back to basics: first, prove that the changes to the natural world will not cause long-lasting harm, to people, communities, wildlife, or the land. Without that absolute proof, rules and regulations make sense. Let’s argue about the specifics but this misdirection on the part of elected Republicans is destructive. Colorado Pols has been a voice of reason on this issue and please keep at it!
Next GOP talking point: Russia’s gas output declined by 12.4% in 2009 as compared to 2008. These state regulations are insidious. Colorado Dems are not only destroying the state’s economy, but the world economy as well.
They get their talking points from NPR.
(I heard that story this afternoon and immediately thought of posting, except I was in my car driving daughter from A to B and back again.)
we can figure out a way to infiltrate the Martian government, we’re going to put the Solar System Economy into a tailspin, as well. No more drilling on Venus! Hands off of Saturn ( I started to say Uranus, but thought better of it). And then…the total destruction of the Galactic economy!! Bwaahaahaaaa!
Headline Moscow:
(OK, maybe the second paragraph didn’t actually play out as above, but the first paragraph is based on evidence that can be verified and/or challenged.)
Thanks for the laugh.