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September 14, 2019 12:21 AM UTC

Weekend Open Thread

  • 42 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

“The greatest cunning is to have none at all.”

–Carl Sandburg

Comments

42 thoughts on “Weekend Open Thread

  1. Denver politics is getting weirder and weirder (I should do an entire diary on all the hasty job appointments and humiliating resignations/firings under the Hancock Administration).

    But in an unrelated development

    Former three-term Denver District Attorney Mitch Morrissey may run for the job again next year.

    During a phone call with The Independent, Morrissey initially said he did not know who commissioned the poll, which asked voters a variety of questions about Colorado politics, including some about the perceptions of and contrasts between Morrissey and McCann.

    He said he paid for a recent phone survey of voters and that he’s being pressured to challenge his successor, fellow Democrat Beth McCann, in 2020

    “I’m not sure exactly,” he said, later acknowledging, “I paid for the poll, yes,” and adding that such polls “can give you information about things — where you stand, what your reputation is, name recognition.”

    He said he didn’t know “off the top of my head” whom he paid to conduct the poll. 

    1. McCann is not an independent.  she was a democratic legislator. She has, to her credit, launched Denver's first adult diversion program.

      As Denver's first woman DA, she has shown both a brain and a heart.  I am very proud to have helped elect her.

      Mitch was ok in his day, but it's past time to be "tough on crime" and time to be smart on crime.  That's the McCann difference.

      1. A   deisre
        B+ effort
        C- execution

        She's just not very good at doing it.
        Not much better than the last guy- but different.

        I'm with JID – someone must be good at this

    1. Thanks for the kind words. It’s been a great journey.  If not for Governor Polis’ leadership in the House in the summer of ‘13 and Michael Bennet in the Dec.‘13 Conference Committee, ultimately securing 7606 in the 2014 Farm Bill we’d be nowhere near where we are today.

      Despite all the bluster from our #BlueGrass counterparts the Centennal state is once again poised to be the #1 hemp state in the nation 🌱 🚜🇺🇸

      #TeamHemp

      1. PS: a great story here on a new crop of young farmers in Colorado.  We're bucking the national trend; while this article doesn't focus on the emerging hemp industry, Colorado's leadership on bringing the plant back is having a positive impact on a lot of rural communities (ie: enticing young people back to the farm). 

        Who Are Colorado’s Next Generation of Farmers?

        [C]ensus of Agriculture data showed some hope for the Centennial State’s farming future: Colorado is one of the top 10 states in the country for “new and beginning producers,” or farmers with 10 years of experience or less. Additionally, even as the acres of farmland in the United States decreased by 1.6 percent between 2012 and 2017, the overall number of farms in Colorado has increased by 7 percent.

        1. Is there anything you can't do with hemp?

          Builders turning to hemp bricks to reduce pollution

          Hemp fields absorb carbon when they’re growing. After harvest, the crop continues to absorb greenhouse gases as it’s mixed with lime or clay. Hempcrete structures also have better ventilation, fire resistance and temperature regulation, according to their proponents.

          Numbers across the industry vary depending on the process, but JustBioFiber says that its hemp captures 287 pounds of carbon dioxide for each cubic meter it builds. Those structures made with their bricks will sequester more greenhouse gases than they emit in production. By contrast, each ton of cement produced emits half a ton of carbon dioxide, according to the European Cement Association.

           

        2. Of all the positive outcomes you generate, Michael, with your tireless work, this one is particularly encouraging and pleasing. I grew up (partly) on a family farm. The more families who stay connected to the land, the better.

          Corporate food is, in general, inferior to food grown on family farms, in resilient soils, by human hands. 

  2. In other legal news

    "The Committee can only conclude, based on this remarkable confluence of factors, that the serious misconduct at issue involves the President of the United States and/or other senior White House or Administration officials," Schiff wrote in a letter to Maguire on Friday.

    The initial whistleblower complaint was filed last month, and Schiff indicated that it was required by law to be shared with Congress nearly two weeks ago. His subpoena requires the information to be turned over by Sept. 17 or else he intends to compel Maguire to appear before Congress in a public hearing on Sept. 19.

  3. As should have been obvious at the time of the Kavanaugh hearings, Deborah Ramirez told the truth.  I normally post the article title, even when it sensationalizes the content in a way I think is inappropriate, but this one from the NYT fucking takes the cake, so…nah.

    Multiple people the FBI failed to follow up with confirmed Ms. Ramirez's story and also Kavanaugh apparently made a habit of sticking his junk in people's faces

    At least seven people, including Ms. Ramirez’s mother, heard about the Yale incident long before Mr. Kavanaugh was a federal judge. Two of those people were classmates who learned of it just days after the party occurred, suggesting that it was discussed among students at the time.

    We also uncovered a previously unreported story about Mr. Kavanaugh in his freshman year that echoes Ms. Ramirez’s allegation. A classmate, Max Stier, saw Mr. Kavanaugh with his pants down at a different drunken dorm party, where friends pushed his penis into the hand of a female student. Mr. Stier, who runs a nonprofit organization in Washington, notified senators and the F.B.I. about this account, but the F.B.I. did not investigate and Mr. Stier has declined to discuss it publicly. (We corroborated the story with two officials who have communicated with Mr. Stier.)

     

    1. Always fascinating to me that the resources of the New York Times are able to find stories and get people to speak on the record, but somehow, the White House, the FBI background check, and the Senate Judiciary Committee somehow missed those people.

  4. So while the Chicken Hawks, led by Cadet Bone Spurs, amp up the volume on war with Iran, might we talk about the fact that only 11% of our imports come from Saudi Arabia? Or that if we’d taken a fraction of the trillion-dollar-plus giveaway to the upper crust that we could have financed an entire advanced biofuel infrastructure, converting our 1.2 billion tons of ag waste (annually) into more than twice that amount?? 

  5. Ran into two of these assclowns at my local King Soopers today . . . 

    https://www.coloradocitizenvoters.com/?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIjaDZgtnT5AIVtR6tBh1l-wu8EAAYASAAEgIV__D_BwE

    . . . when I told them that non-citizens are already prohibited by law from voting, and that this was simply a way to make it harder for every citizen to vote, they just looked at me with a blank stare.

    Idiot: “Uhhhh, . . . No it’s not.”

    Me:  “You should really be ashamed of yourselves.”

    Other Idiot: “My dad works for the Republican party.”

    Me:  “He should be ashamed of himself, too.”

    1. There are certain modest exceptions to the citizen voting requirement.  I am permitted to vote in some property tax elections in Phillips County because I own property there, though I am a full time resident of Denver.  

      I know I have seen proposals to allow legal resident non citizens, green card holders, to vote in school elections.  I certainly don't object to that.

    2. Poor things. They're desperately casting about for an excuse as to why they can't win elections anymore. Lousy candidates and bad legislation can't possibly be the reason. Just ask them, they'll swear to it.

      1. In a larger sense, the inexorable marginalization of the T***p Troglodytes by demographics, is likely to generate all sorts of goofy and, at times, dangerous behavior.

        When they don't think they can win simply by cheating….it could get ugly.

    3. The Citizen Voter Initiative is the Republican Party’s latest attempt to be relevant. George Athanasopoulos, failed candidate for COGOP Chair, and for Perlmutter ‘s HD 7 seat, is in charge of getting124,000 signatures for this hateful monstrosity onto the ballot. 55 % of voters  would have to approve it for it to become law. 

      Even though the initiative is supposed to have no fiscal impact, it could well be interpreted to suppress the vote by demanding that voters show citizenship documents before being allowed to vote. In Colorado, only new voters would be affected, and new voters already must show a copy of a state ID to register for a mail ballot. But the language itself is meant to intimidate and suppress voting: “Only a citizen” may vote.

      A dark money group of Trump supporters is pouring millions of dollars into similar efforts in 14 states. “Dr” Gina Loudon , a conservative media star and national Chair of Women for Trump, led the effort in Florida.

      The Citizen Voter goals are to boost conservative turnout, suppress Latino and new-citizen votes, and to embarrass Democratic candidates who come out against the patriotic-sounding initiative.

      Good on you for speaking up about it, Dio.

      1. Here in darkest Mesa County, the trogs have been beating this drum for years. But they have no answer when I ask how this measure of theirs will work with mail ballots.

         

        1. Yes, the very same Joseph Stengel who billed taxpayers for his Hawaii vacation while he was House minority leader, and resigned under that ethics scandal, is the registered agent for the Citizen Voter Issue Committee in Colorado. See the committee’s September 3 filed report of non-monetary contributions for the Citizen Voter Inc info.

          The other registered agent is Michele Austin, of RedMap consulting, who owned “Save Our State.net” and launched a scurrilous telephone pop-up ad campaign last year to paint Jared Polis as a pedophile who wanted to a) recruit kids to a gay lifestyle, or b) impose Sharia law in the schools, possibly both. Those gay Sharians are so sneaky, doncha know.

          George Athanasopoulos, once an outspoken “Never Trumper”, is one of the a designated representatives of the I76 initiative itself, the signature gathering being funded solely by Trump donors. .  

          They have until 11/12/19 to collect 124,000 + signatures. They also have $462,958.60 in non-monetary contributions to pay signature gatherers already, even though they just filed on September 3, 2019. 

          The $463K came from Citizen Voters, Inc, a Florida business owned by  close Trump allies (John and Gina Loudon) . The Loudons are also spokespeople. Citizen Voter a is part of a national unofficial  GOP project, with millions of dollars in dark money and coordination in several states.

          So to recap: We have a former Never-Trumper and 2X failed GOP candidate (Anathasopoulos) as registered agent for the ballot initiative. We have a former House Republican leader (Stengel) who had to resign in disgrace for ethics violations as the committee agent; and a GOP operative (Austin) who published lies and conspiracy theories on social media as the other committee agent.

          The signature gathering effort is funded solely by Trump donors and associates (the Loudons) running a gigantic non-profit out of Florida that is trying hard to suppress the votes of supposed “non-citizens” in 14 states.

            1. In this case, it means that the Loudons’ Florida nonprofit, Citizen Voters, Inc, is paying directly for all of the signature gathering to get Initiative 76, the “Citizen Voters Amendment” on the Colorado ballot. This is spelled out in the Committee Contributions report on the Secretary of State site.

              In general, it does mean in kind donations. My guess is that the Loudons have some sweetheart deal with their preferred signature gathering vendor. David Munger is listed as the petition entity for #76. 

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