“However big the fool, there is always a bigger fool to admire him.”
–Nicolas Boileau-Despreaux
You must be logged in to post a comment.
BY: Beware electing Janet Rowland as county commissioner again – AnneLandmanBlog
IN: The Trouble With Jared Wright
BY: Mesa County’s newly-elected Republicans deny reality, promote conspiracies – AnneLandmanBlog
IN: The Trouble With Jared Wright
BY: A history of Republican cronyism at Colorado Mesa University – AnneLandmanBlog
IN: So, About That “Higher Ed Hiring Spree”
BY: spaceman2021
IN: So We’re Arresting Judges Now
BY: JohnInDenver
IN: Gabe Evans Disses Jeff Hurd Over Impending Medicaid Cuts
BY: coloradosane
IN: Gabe Evans Disses Jeff Hurd Over Impending Medicaid Cuts
BY: 2Jung2Die
IN: So We’re Arresting Judges Now
BY: harrydoby
IN: Weekend Open Thread
BY: spaceman2021
IN: So We’re Arresting Judges Now
BY: DavidThi808
IN: Weekend Open Thread
Subscribe to our monthly newsletter to stay in the loop with regular updates!
May 4, 1970
13 students shot by the Ohio National Guard while peacefully assembled at Kent State University
Killed
Jeffrey Glenn Miller; age 20
Allison B. Krause; age 19
William Knox Schroeder; age 19
Sandra Lee Scheuer; age 20
Wounded
Joseph Lewis, Jr.
John R. Cleary
Thomas Mark Grace
Alan Michael Canfora
Dean R. Kahler
Douglas Alan Wrentmore
James Dennis Russell
Robert Follis Stamps
Donald Scott MacKenzie
"Ohio" Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young. 1970.
When I was in grad school at OU in Athens, Ohio the 'spring riots' were explained to me as being a recognition of the Kent State shootings. The students there fled to Athens and expressed their rage on that campus.
The 'observances' I was part of started with much drinking and then, when the bars closed an hour early due to the change in DST, a riot ensued.
Townies (think Michigan Capitol lockdown protesters) enlisted by the local police assembled at the north end of Court St dressed in riot gear, a horse or two and equipped with kneeknocker wooden pellets that they fired at the students (I still have one) and pushed us all back onto campus. Sometimes an eye was lost.
Not a great way to solemnize the event, IMHO, but you did get some sense of what it was like on the Kent State campus that day. Total police state.
https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=126426361
Good point.
and years prior
Orangeburg, SC
$rump town
hall with Fox at Lincoln Memorial on Sunday, May 3, 2020. He said that if 100,000 die from coronavirus, it still would have been worse under another administration. That’s the kind of head-spin you need an exorcist to cure.
UPI story and jarring image here.
Why is he choosing Lincoln’s memorial for this travesty?
a. Lincoln was a Republican.
b. Lincoln was photogenic, and still gets good ratings.
c. More people died in the Civil War (~620,000 by latest historical estimates) when Lincoln was President.
Give the Orange Destruction another 4 years and he will likely surpass that total.
Just by an executive order forcing the reopening of the Mall of the Americas.
for your consideration…from Axios.
Chinese embassy publishes 16-point coronavirus rebuttal
https://www.axios.com/china-embassy-coronavirus-disinformation-propaganda-c50db506-d84e-4418-bdcd-537bdff17615.html
Rs are going to blame China and Obam, and also her emails.
They will claim Obama’s deficit wwas gone before the virus
Oddly, they will clamor for release of liability while also telling the rest of us there is no real risk
What I find so ironic about this push to choose the economy over the elderly is that the elderly have been a core Republican bastion of reliable voters and now 1) Republicans want to kill them off as parasites on society and 2) the elderly might not be so keen on voting for assholes who want to kill them. By the time the Trump regime is done, it will have alienated every voting bloc in it's constituency except for the crazy extremists. Fitting that it is the one voting bloc that will never forsake Mr. Potatohead.
You noticed that, too? Some of these Congresscritters who aren’t interested in helping to save their elderly constituents are about the same ages. The only difference? Being a Congressperson/Senator comes with free gold-plated healthcare.
Journalist Allen Best does (another) great piece on issues involving a transitioning rural and green energy landscape in Colorado:
Upheaval & Tension in Colorado
Excellent article.
I've been significantly involved in Pueblo's attempts to "off ramp" from their 20-year franchise with Black Hills Energy (they're in the 10th year of the franchise and the law allows them to exit). Black Hills is one of Colorado's two IOUs (investor-owned utilities). The Pueblo City Council voted to put the issue on the ballot, though NOW 4 of the 7 Council members are openly fighting the break away. Pueblo voters will have their chance at local control of their electric utility at the election tomorrow. But Black Hills has secretly funneled at least $1.5 million to a committee fighting the YES on 2A effort. They have set up two committees – one receives the money from Black Hills, then donates it to the issues committee which reports that most of their donations are from the first committee (in other words, Black Hills' contributions are hidden from public view). Meanwhile the grassroots campaign to oust Black Hills has been able to raise only a tiny fraction of what Black Hills has contributed to defeat the ballot measure.
Black Hills management folks will not discuss the issue in public, and were no-shows at a League of Women Voters forum some weeks ago. They just spend their millions on radio, TV, and newspaper ads full of lies about themselves and the proposal to break away (and one wonders how money is being funneled to the 4 on Council who now oppose the break away).
Folks who live in the six counties in southern Colorado who are served by Black Hills electric pay about the highest rates in Colorado. I have a home in the Black Hills area and a home served by Xcel. Over a two year period my cash out-of-pocket to Black Hills was 77% more per kilowatt hour than to Xcel. The high cost of electricity for residents and businesses is tough in an area of the state with a much higher poverty rate than the statewide average, and has clearly had a negative impact on economic development.
There's no question there need to be changes in Colorado law re: IOUs – communities have little power to determine what will best serve them.
That’s so great you’re involved. I don’t know if you remember, but in late 2006/early 2007 (just after Ritter was elected) we had put together a group of leaders and financial people (led by Frederico Pena) to extract Pueblo from the old Aquila contract.
Early on we discovered Pueblo had an exit scenario in their franchise agreement – they could have rejected the Aquila sale and taken their infrastructure back. We held meetings at CSU-Pueblo and on at least two occasions met with the Pueblo City Council. The idea was to transition from a coal-fired power steel town to the first city in the United States to be powered by renewable energy. There just wasn’t enough horsepower on the (then) city council to take this on. They were getting blasted by a shadow group (funded by the utility) that they couldn’t even manage the water utility, how in the world could they be trusted with your electrons?
To complicate things, Aquila bought most of their wholesale electric power under contract from Xcel at the time; Xcel had hoped to use that expiring contract as a sledge hammer to pick Pueblo up as a customer – and wasn’t happy about getting outmaneuvered by Black Hills. Their next move (Xcel) was to cancel the wholesale contract (one might describe that as ‘spite’) forcing Black Hills to build those horrendously expensive natural gas units to make up for the grave Xcel was digging for Black Hills – and the pillaging of the Pueblo customer base commenced.
Round-and-round they went. Pueblo residents were thrown under the bus. Black Hills isn’t the only one to blame. Xcel has dirt on their hands, as well as the PUC (at that time).
It makes me ill to think of the money that’s been unnecessarily bled from Pueblo over the last 13 years.
Realist, we probably met when I lived in Pueblo about 7 years ago. If not, we should have. Black Hills was definitely one of the worst utilities I’ve ever had. They cut off my power at some point- I remember cutting a lot of wood for heat. Then they charged me some outrageous reconnect fee. They also consistently lied to consumers about their costs and profits, and it sounds as if they still do. Hick’s PUC Chair nominee, Glenn Vaad, enabled them to continue their gouging.
Frances Koncilja fought for Pueblo against Black Hills for three years on the PUC, and the BH energy whores attacked her nonstop for it. When her term expired, Polis didn’t reappoint her, which was disappointing.
You should consider writing a diary on the ongoing struggle to curtail BHE greed. Best wishes for the election tomorrow- May the good people win!
Thanks, kwtree and Michael – I don't live in Pueblo but I have a small home (now a second home) in the BHE service territory, and have been actively involved in this battle for more than two years. I've heard a lot of the history from Pueblo folks – it really is a mess. The gas-fired power plants that BHE built – one of them is used two days per year I'm told – but of course BHE (under current law) can recoup all their costs from customers through predatory rates. A former manager with Xcel says BHE was TOLD that Xcel was ending the supply of power to the service territory BHE acquired from Aquila. I'm guessing BHE saw an opportunity to make money by building power generation which can be charged to ratepayers.
Some day I'd love to hear the inside story re: why Polis didn't reappoint Koncilja – my guess is the answer is obvious (and Koncilja recently alluded to this) – Black Hills put pressure on the Governor to get her out of there. In recent years (during the time Koncilja was on the PUC), Black Hills was forced to change some of their draconian policies such as requiring the equivalent of 3 mos of charges to be paid as a deposit when someone's electricity was turned back on, in addition to any arrearages. For many years local charities helped people get the power back on – in other words, they made sure BHE's revenue flows didn't suffer!
I hope the YES on 2A folks win tomorrow – but it would be a miracle in a David vs. Goliath battle. Either way the battle is far from over. I've spent a number of hours phonebanking for the last 1 1/2 weeks for the effort – of course talking to voters is always a reminder of how ill-informed many of them are . . .
Thanks for all you’re doing for 2A realist. Let’s hope David rules the day tomorrow!
I got pulled into a CIVIQS poll this morning, asking the usual favorable/unfavorable questions about Trump, and now Biden. The shift was the addition of Gardner & Hickenlooper.
Could be a new published poll on their site sometime soon.
Duke's not going to like the presumption of that poll.
Probably the kiwi bird will be unhappy as well. Her last announced fave, Lorena Garcia, fell way short in her petition drive but was asking a court to put her on the ballot. The primary was already complicated when another court put michelle warren on the ballot because why not?
Sec State has to certify ballot May 7. We'll see how many left outriders will drain off support from Romo as he tries to derail Hick.
What say you, kiwi? Any updates on standing of your faves?
You talking to your imaginary friends again, V? If you want a serious reply from me, address it to the alias I use on here (kwtree), or to my real first name, which you know. I’ll write a diary / interview with Lorena Garcia, when I get to it.
As of now, Lorena Garcia will be on the ballot. The judge decided in her favor, as she met signature requirements , turning in over 14,000 before CV curtailed all in person activity.
Unless the Secretary of State successfully appeals the Judge’s decision, Lorena Garcia will be on the primary ballot.
Michelle Warren will not be on the ballot, having collected very few sigs, and using the Senate run as a book publicity stunt.
Eric Underwood, also not on the ballot, for similar reasons
Love the tartness KW. Just the right mix of sweet and Fuck You.
Garcia should be running for something a little more in her ability range like a city council or state legislature seat. She's not going to win but maybe the exposure will help her with some other public service opportunity. I wasn't that impressed with her when I met her. She was always running other folks down to build herself up. Classic warning signs of a scapegoater.
your account is contradicted by the stories that have been on pols and that are summarized in the big line, flightless bird, The judge put warren and later garcia, on the ballot, though the colorado supreme court may yet change that. Did you mean to say Diana Bray didn’t”t make it? She did not.
Bray chose to not join in the court action, but apparently agreed she did not meet criteria.
I don't think either Garcia or Warren has a serious chance, but they could hurt Romo by splitting the anti-Hickenlooper faction. I'll vote for Hick as the more electable of two fine candidates.
Oka y, Colorado Sun reports Colorado Supreme Court tossed warren off the ballot today on a unanimous vote. That strongly implies the court will also toss Garcia off if and when sec state appeals the denver judge’s ruling that pot her on.
That would mean two well qualified candidates facing off head to head, Romo vs. Hick, with no complications.
Some d ays the good folks win.
,
I stand by the statement that Romanoff, Garcia, and Hickenlooper (in that order) will be on the Senate primary ballot in June. Warren, Underwood, Zornio. Bray, Spaulding, and all the other impressive candidates who dropped out earlier will not. Spaulding has endorsed Garcia.
Secretary Griswold is challenging Warren’s attempt to get onto the ballot, but so far she has not chosen to challenge Judge Baumann’s decision regarding Garcia. The CO Supreme Court, therefore, will not be ruling on Garcia’s ballot access unless Secretary Griswold challenges it. Hence, Lorena Garcia is on the ballot.
The Big Line is not infallible.
You is.not infallible either, flightless bird. Read my above post. Colorado Supreme Court just tossed warren off the ballot 7-O, and will almost certainly do the same to the other wannabe, Garcia.
The same denver judge, baumann, put both wannabes on the ballot though neither was close to qualifying.
Just the right mix of incompetence and corruption we've come to expect from this administration. Reeks of Trumpstink
Thanks for the link, Harry, I would have missed this. Boy, these MAGAts never miss an opportunity to grift, do they?
It’s like they must think they’re an airline, or something . . .
. . . wonder how much they’re charging for masks and in-flight virus-free air?
So, the
deniallyingblaming Obamaunfounded magical thinkingmiraclehydroxichloriquone.sunlightblaming Chinawarmer weatherlysoltweetingmy favorite pillowlatest corporate bail-out isn’t working??? . . .. . . clearly then, this can only be some kind of messaging problem??
I've learned that the Bezos CNN NYTimes is fake.
and that people are ready to die for our country.
Bezos owns the Washington Post, Madco.
fake
Trump s tinks!