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January 04, 2019 07:24 AM UTC

72nd Colorado General Assembly Open Thread

  • 19 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

Comments

19 thoughts on “72nd Colorado General Assembly Open Thread

  1. David Brock: Bernie Sanders' fans can't be allowed to poison another Democratic primary with personal attacks

    I'm hardly the only political observer who blames Hillary Clinton's general election defeat to Donald Trump in part on personal attacks on Clinton first made by Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and his backers. Those attacks from her left laid the groundwork for copycat attacks lobbed by Donald Trump — and, in the process, helped hand the Supreme Court to the right-wing for a generation.

    1. How difficult was it for Trump to ape Bernie "The System Is Rigged" mantra?

      As for the Supreme Court, Republicans fall in line, Democrats want to fall in love. That’s why Republicans hold their collective nose and win while Democrats hold out for someone who will inspire us.

        1. Well, they are similar. One is a megaphone for right wing shills, the other for left wing shills. I will say this: the left wing shills are definitely preferable because they: (a) lack the racism, and (b) have a reality-based understanding of science.

    2. I have a problem with Brocks’ headline: 

      “Bernie Sanders fans” – does he imagine that this is a monolithic group? We had first time voters, seasoned (OK, older) activists, populists, policy wonks, etc. 

      those were the actual humans who caucused and voted for him and rallied and volunteered. It wasn’t because he was sexy or any kind of alpha male – it was his authenticity, morality, and message, including policies. 

      Then there were the bots and trolls created by Russians – they crawled into our social media feeds and spread lies, distortions, porn, disgusting crap. If we shared or liked it, we were complicit. But most of us deleted, reported, blocked. 

      “Can’t be allowed” – Is Brock proposing censorship here? Is he proposing that anyone who prefers a different candidate be silenced?

      “To poison another Democratic primary” Does Brock see the primary process as flawed? Does he want to just skip all of the debate and rallies and forums and caucuses and go straight to crowning Beto as the nominee?

      ”with personal attacks” – is any criticism of policy now a “personal attack”?

      By using loaded language to clump all Sanders supporters together into one evil scapegoat , Brock has himself “poisoned the primary” – and the primary hasn’t even started yet. 

      I like what I’ve seen of Beto O’Rourke. If he’s the nominee, I’ll vote and work for him- but I like Elizabeth Warren better, because of her policies. That doesn’t mean I’m attacking or poisoning Beto’s ( so far theoretical) candidacy.

      I hope for some good, solid policy discussions and debates among all of the candidates.  I also hope that we have all learned from 2016 that there are hostile foreign powers that will target a successful Democratic candidate with vicious slurs. We shouldn’t help them do that. We should keep the debate on the issues.

      Character is important – we’ve seen how a complete moral void can destroy an institution… but personality really isn’t.

      1. I agree with everything you said except that I am lukewarm towards both O'Rourke and Warren.

        I will also add that Bernie Sanders campaigned for Clinton fairly effectively. Indeed, more Clinton "Party Unity My Ass" types voted for McCain in 2008 than Sanders voters who voted for Trump in 2016.

        A study of the 2008 election found that 25% of people who voted for Clinton in the primary then voted for McCain against Obama in the general election. The paper has the wonderful title "'SOUR GRAPES' OR RATIONAL VOTING? VOTER DECISION MAKING AMONG THWARTED PRIMARY VOTERS IN 2008".

        In contrast party unity was higher for Sanders voters with only 12% defecting. Half the rate of 8 years earlier.

          1. Not everyone who votes in a primary is a Democratic activist. Also, the converse also happens on the other side.

            12% of Republican primary voters defected to vote for Clinton according to the same study of 2016 voting patterns.

            Also, remember, a decade ago there were probably more dead end the South Will Rise again types in the Democratic party officially. They probably regularly voted in the Democratic primary and then voted for the Republican in the general election.

    1. According to the Post's "live blog", Dave may have been better off watching the paint drying channel after all. But the "live blog" wasn't updated after 10:43 am today; apparently nothing at the Leg was worth writing about  (other than Chris Holbert making a fool of himself).

      I did see that new Senate leader Leroy Garcia plans to make funding treatment for opioid abuse a high priority in this session. As a former Marine and paramedic in civilian life, Garcia would have seen plenty of addicts in crisis.

      Opioid abuse is a growing problem wherever there are industries with high rates of injuries for which people could be prescribed pain killers – so meat cutting (NE CO), steel mills (Pueblo), oil and gas roughnecking, construction, agriculture in general. In 2017, more people died of drug overdoses (opioids, meth, and cocaine) than from car crashes. (558 from legal and illegal opioids, according to the Colorado Department of Health) .  Rural areas, especially, lack treatment facilities for addiction, although we have plenty of prison beds to lock addicts up after they commit crimes.

      John Frank of the Denver Post article wrote “Colorado’s opioid epidemic explained in 10 graphics 11/26/17, which tells the story about addiction trends and access to treatment in Colorado.

      I got a year end update flyer from my Representative, Ken Buck, in which he blamed opioid abuse on illegal immigration and "sanctuary cities" (Hello Boulder! Hello Denver!) . That's right – according to Bucko, it isn't an American problem, it's an immigrant problem.  Although heroin trafficking by immigrants is a problem, overdosing from legal opioids is a bigger problem in Colorado, from the research I've seen. The CDH found that 70% of heroin users started their opiod habit with legal pills.

      Legal opioid abuse is as American as apple pie.

      And there are high social costs to the pill popping habit.

      So kudos to Senator Garcia. There was something worthwhile happening at the Legislature today, after all.

      1. The Colorado Sun has the Post's Legislature Opening Day coverage beat all to hell.

        The Sun has quotes, detailed analysis of speeches by both Senate and House leaders.

        The Post has pablum and a promise to update. (which was not kept)

        Truly , Alden is just barely calling it in anymore with the Post. It's a bare minimum of lite news filling out the advertising pages.

        So subscribe to the Colorado Sun, or at least get on their mailing list so you can get the top story summaries. Seriously, it reminded me of what good reporting looks like.

  2. Jeff Hayes is stepping down as the Colorado Republican Party Chair. If he had tried to continue Republicans may have been asking why they should support him when they lost the vote for the Colorado House 54.80% to 42.53% (Yes, minor parties rounded up 2.67% of the state house vote, if I worked my spreadsheet correctly.)

    To be completely fair a party chair probably cannot overcome a bad environment for a party, but still this is likely the sort of questions they would be asking.

    1. Let me be the first to place into nomination as Hayes' successor the Adams County GOP Chair, Anal Mathai, who is such a fanatical RWNJ that he will best lead the party to wherever the hell it is destined to go.

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