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February 23, 2011 04:45 PM UTC

Wednesday Open Thread

  • 99 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

“We can evade reality, but we cannot evade the consequences of evading reality.”

–Ayn Rand

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99 thoughts on “Wednesday Open Thread”

      1. Because if Colorado can compel letters, then it can compel tax collection. And that would be the next step. I think we all can understand their not wanting to be sucked into the Colorado sales tax collection morass.

        1. Colorado HB 1193, enacted in February 2010, required online retailers to provide a detailed purchase report to customers with more than $500 of annual Colorado purchases by January 31st and to provide a summary purchase report with the total amount of each customer’s annual Colorado purchases to the Colorado Department of Revenue by March 31st.

          This law is currently the subject of a legal challenge brought by the Direct Marketing Association and others. In the meantime, the U.S. District Court has suspended enactment of the law while the legal challenge proceeds.

          So it sounds like that until it’s decided in court, Amazon doesn’t have to report the sales.

        2. Given that they are a business and businesses will try to gain whatever competitive advantage they can, sure I understand that they would want to avoid doing their part in collecting taxes.  That’s why we need a government willing to make them do their part.

          Of course, assuming the the information on the page is accurate, they aren’t required to do anything until the court case is decided.

          1. I supported the software sales tax law when it was proposed. I’m all in favor of contributing our part. The problem is that the sales tax collection system in this state is such a gigantic cluster-fuck that the overhead associated with handling it is killer.

            Add in the total incompetence of the state Dept of Revenue and it’s understandable that companies don’t want to get sucked into that. It’s not the tax payment, it’s the overhead.

              1. lingerie-supermodel-ballad postings of the recent past.

                His Ukrainian babes are all singing things like — “No more Colorado sales tax” . . . “Roxy Huber sucks” . . . “she’s so jealous that Dave posted my song instead of hers” . . . “Roxy is another Microsoft tool” . . . “tell Roxy to kiss my Moscovian . . .”, etc., etc.

                And here you all thought Dave was just some kind of Bolshevik horn-dog?  That’s exactly what he wants you to think comradeskis — it’s always about the message with him.

                2. I look almost exactly like the one on the right, but without the long blond hair, big boobs, and skinny thighs. Other than that, she’s almost my identical twin.

                  Maybe I should make a lip-synched music video sung in Klingon.

            2. Didn’t you specifically exempt a giant company like Amazon that sells in every district from the complaint about unreasonable overhead? I understand your complaint about small business costs of compliance, but Amazon can easily afford to comply. They just don’t want to because it would make their products seem more expensive.

            3. Amazon is incorporated.  As a legal entity, it is only concerned with it’s own profits.  That’s different from business owners like you (and me, actually) who also have other opinions and may support a reasonable and fair tax system.

              Amazon doesn’t exist to be reasonable and fair; they exist to make the most possible money for their shareholders.  If they are shown to not act in that direction, their shareholders can actually file ethics complaints against them!

  2. from CNN

    On Wednesday, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad urged leaders of regional countries to let their people express their opinions, according to the Islamic Republic News Agency. The Iranian official news agency also reported that Ahmadinejad wondered how the ruler of a country could kill his own people using guns and tanks.

  3. The House Judiciary Committee voted to indefinitely postpone consideration of “The Vitamin Cottage Poison Peanut Butter Bill” last night by a vote of 10-1. The motion was made by the sponsor – Sonnenberg.  I would love to know why he withdrew his own bill.  I would like to think that I – we actually – played a small part.

    In a related story, the Denver paper, whose name we do not use, reports that Sen. Cheri Jahn thinks that legislators aren’t doing enough “front end” work on bills that they sponsor. Ya think?

    2. Seriously, if she’d named her bill “The Vitamin Cottage Poison Peanut Butter Act” up front, she could have saved you, Colorado Pols readers, the legislature and some lobbyists lots of time.  

  4. I was going to re-post the link revealing Ayn Rand to be the two-faced whiney-ass bitch who called Social Security and Medicare evil while gladly taking those checks under her husband’s name, but Corporate Whining seems more appropriate:

    2. proposed by a twitter user who suggests using live ammo against Wisconsin protestors. Says they’re thugs. Dangerous. Need to be put down.

      Turns out he was a deputy attorney general for the state of Indiana. He isn’t anymore.  Good thing he wasn’t a high ranking Egyptian army officer.  But those troops probably wouldn’t have obeyed anyway. How about Wisconsin police,state troopers or national guard? Think they’d have been willing to save us from these labor terrorists? The ones, you know,  chanting stuff?

      http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…

      2. Blue, you make it sound so tame — chanting stuff. What you leave out is the critical detail that some birds got flipped. That takes it to a whole new level for the hypocritical “Second Amendment remedies” bunch of hooligans, now doesn’t it?

  5. We have been discussing the failure of President Obama and both parties to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan while our cities and states continue to sell off property and shutdown vital programs due to a lack of money (here and here and here and here and here). Rep. Ron Paul again showed his metal this month and again called for an end to the Afghan war. In legislation proposed with Rep. Walter Jones of North Carolina, Paul sought to withdraw funding for the war at a savings of more than $116 billion a year by ending the war in Afghanistan.

    That figure again is $100 billion a year that would easily cover the budget shortfalls that we have been detailing in recent stories.

    Nevertheless, the measure was voted down overwhelmingly by Democrats and Republicans alike – including the recently elected Tea Party members. So, the Congress will continue allow our state to cut away programs and sell off both parks and buildings to cover their bills. The failure of leadership is breathtaking.

    I have long had respect for Rep. Paul and this is an excellent example of why. He has become the leading anti-war voice in this country as had Rep. Jones. Rep. Barbara Lee also joined in the effort with Paul and Jones.

    This bill is an example of a profile of courage . . . as opposed to those who voted against it.

    By the way, these same legislators also voted down an effort to prevent the Army from spending $100 million in endorsements for Nascar.

    Something stinks to high heaven!

    h/t jonathon turley

                1. I speak pretty decent French and German, a fair bit of Arabic, and I can read Spanish and am learning to speak/understand it. But I don’t have many opportunities to practice any except Spanish, so I’m not fluent in any of them right now–but if you dropped me off a plane in a country that spoke any of those languages I’d be getting around fine and dreaming in the local language in under a week. (I’ve done this in France, so I’m not just guessing.)

                  Goal for this year is to pick up enough conversational Spanish to be comfortable switching back and forth when I’m out and about. I taught myself French by reading comic books, so I’m going to get a bunch of books on CD in Spanish and use those to pick it up.

                  Now just to find somewhere to practice my Arabic… it’s my favorite language! I might be biased ’cause my first two horses were Arabians.

                    1. Too much concrete, too few mountains, no place to park my horse.

                      I’ll have to stick with my current strategy of finding a lot of excuses to eat at the Ali Baba Grill in Golden. Mahmoud (one of the proprietors) was an English teacher in Lebanon, and he’s always kind enough to help me brush up when I come in!

                  2. but I like to sprinkle my speech with words and phrases from various languages…including Latin.

                    American children are woefully inadequate when it comes to being multi-lingual.

  7. A Federal Judge tossed yet another court challenge to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

    This suit was brought by a Pat Robertson-founded group and alleged that the health care reform law’s mandatory coverage provision violated the First Amendment rights of people who believe that God will protect them.

    Really, folks.  You can’t make this shit up.  When I first heard the story, I had to double check to make sure it wasn’t published in the Onion.

  8. …once the Libyan people finish off their dictator.

    Muhammad Al-Senussi, and Idris al-Senussi. My guess is that one or the other is suddenly going to find himself pushed as the legitimate heir to the throne of Libya.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M…

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I…

    Note that Muhammad is already weighing in publically in the revolt. However, Idris is a venture capitalist and involved with the Oil and Gas industry, and has sucked up to the various royal families in Europe, as well as pulling a con on the British Parliment.

    Both are Western educated, though Muhammad is definitely a Anglophile. I wonder who the West wants to take charge of the revolution?

    1. Libya’s ‘crown prince’ makes appeal

      Muhammad al-Senussi calls for the international community to help remove Muammar Gaddafi from power.

      Muhammad al-Senussi, who would be Libya’s crown prince if the country still had a monarchy, has spoken out about the ongoing violence in the country from London.

      Libya was a monarchy until Muammar Gaddafi took power in a military coup in 1969 and the exiled King Idris has long since died.

      In this interview with Al Jazeera’s Barnaby Phillips, al-Senussi asks the international community to help remove Gaddafi from power and stop the ongoing “massacre”.

      http://english.aljazeera.net/v…

  9. http://news.discovery.com/eart…

    Japan’s whaling fleet is heading home from the Antarctic, days after officials in Tokyo first admitted that they would be “suspending” this year’s hunt and then confirmed they were ending it early. According to officials from the Fisheries Agency of Japan (FAJ), the fleet caught just 170 of its intended 945 whales.

    2. Seriously, what could be cooler? Not only would I get to fulfill my childhood ambition of becoming a pirate, I’d be protecting whales, too. If they weren’t so friggin’ crazy I’d think about joining them in this universe.  

  10. UPDATED: Fox Reverses Poll Results To Falsely Claim Most Americans Favor Ending Collective Bargaining

    On Fox & Friends, co-host Brian Kilmeade claimed, along with an on-screen graphic, that a recent USA Today/Gallup poll found that  “61 percent” of Americans are in favor of taking away collective bargaining rights from public unions. In fact, Fox aired the results of the poll completely backward: the Gallup poll found that 61 percent of Americans are opposed to taking away collective bargaining rights.

    Folks, having been a Technical Director, fully fluent in Avid iNews, and understanding how the DekoMOS standard works for making news graphics based on the script, this is more proof that Faux News is bullshit.

      1. but almost anytime I see any video clip from a capitol-steps rally, I can’t help but be reminded of this Demetri Martin joke:

        A lot of people don’t like bumper stickers.  I don’t mind bumper stickers.  To me, a bumper sticker is a short cut.  It’s like a little sign that says, “Hey, let’s never hang out.”

          1. Some “thugs” flipped off Tea Partiers — this is so far beyond a deputy attorney general urging the use of deadly force, I don’t even know what I was thinking.

                1. Rather than address the behavior of the union protesters you just look for crazier behavior in another state. Great way to avoid acknowledging the union protesters were way out of line.

                  It was more than the bird being flipped. The fact that the SEIU sent their protesters to confront a peaceful counter rally suggests they prefer thuggish tactics. The union folks were chanting childish phrases and name calling, while the tea party group never responded by name calling in a group chant.

                   

                  1. it’s crystal clear that your tactic was to bring this up to offset the tea party’s well-documented thuggery, as well as add to the misinformation about the unions being thugs. What, turnabout isn’t fair play to you?

                  2. So we know who the adults are in this conversation! You win, beesknees, stop arguing!

                    It’s clear you’ve never been to competing protests before, though — the union “thugs” were doing some pretty tame shouting and waving. Horrors! Protesters actually protesting! I feel faint!

                  3. I wish I had a nickel for every time someone gave me the finger in my life.

                    If the one-finger salute is thuggery to you, you’re nothing but a freakin’ wuss.

                    Now go back to Free Republic where you belong.

                    1. Or are you just talking out your ass?

                      If you watch the video you’ll see that there is more than just bird flipping. The cops even called in backup because it was getting so rowdy. There was some dangerous and not fully right individuals shouting in extremely angry and aggressive ways on the union side. If the cops weren’t there separating the groups it could have gotten much worse.  

                    2. You mean that the aggressive Teabagging assholes that were out their hooting and screeching their insults and stupidity were somehow intimidated by the pro-union people who answered them back in kind?

                      Shocked, SHOCKED I am that these Kochsuckers are just a bunch of loudmouthed assholes who suddenly whine and cry for the cops the first time someone shouts back at them.  

                    3. Those would be unionized public employee cops, wouldn’t they? Or, as the counter-protesters would have it, communist scum.  

                    4. The Denver paper pointed out that the Tea Party was NOT pleased with Golyansky’s garbage rant. Funny, never heard anyone on the union side publicly disavowing the garbage being spewed from their side.

                      Also, public employees are not fully unionized here in Colorado. They have an employee partnership.

                      But why let facts get in the way of a good rant?

                    5. is a union for all intents and purposes. They have a collective bargaining agreement with the city of Denver.  

                    6. If I say the cops are operating under an employee partnership, who are you to contradict the Great and Powerful Beesknees? Who, I ask?

                      And if I say “the Tea Party” was NOT pleased when the article I cite mentions a couple people being uncomfortable, not exactly the entire crowd responding unfavorably, brzkWWCKGG-WRAK SMOKE MIRRORS short circuit

                      Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer, do,

                      I’m half crazy all for the love of you.

    3. I actually watched the video expecting to see some teabagger getting his head stomped on or something. Maybe Kenneth Gladney would show up with a fake neck brace or something and pretend to be unable to speak.

      All I saw was a bunch of people standing on separate sides of a street and making no attempt to cross it.

      Do you know what an actual attack feels like? It hurts, and not just your feelings.  

  13. .

    it seems that a teenager drove off in her illegally parked SUV, not realizing that a tow truck operator was hooking it up for a tow, since it was illegally parked.

    http://www.kktv.com/home/headl…

    I might know the girl.  If its who I think it is, she had such a bright future ahead of her.  I’m crying for her and her family.

    But the horror suffered by the victim – beyond words.

    Folks, hug your husbands and kids today for me.  And wives.  Who knows when they’ll be gone ?

    .

    1. Horrible for the tow truck driver, horrible for his family, and if this girl was truly unaware of what he was doing, horrible for her, as well.  

      1. NONE!  Maybe I’m too close to this, but to drag a person screaming for over a mile for any reason suggests a lack of regard for human life.  According to news reports, the driver turned around as soon as the tow truck operator became disconnected from the cable/chains.  That is highly indicative of knowledge of what they were doing and what was happening behind them.

        1. than I did when Barron posted the link. At the time, from what I read, the police weren’t even sure she knew she was dragging him.

          If she did know, then my sympathy for her matches yours–zero.  

        2. I heard about this and immediately thought of you, so I’m very glad it wasn’t you. (I know, the Springs has more than one tow truck operator, but I know only one.)

          I’m with you – I can’t imagine that it was possible for her to drive so far without realizing it.

          1. It’s been a tough week for the towing industry down here.  Allen Rose was laid to rest yesterday with military honors and over a hundred towers from all over the state on hand.  I’ve had a lot of people give me condolences, and we are all waiting to see what charges are filed by the D.A. next week.

    2. Whatever future she had is shot.  At some point, kids need to make their own choices.

      Please don’t confuse this post with heartlessness.  I share your mourning for the girl.

      As you said, please hug your kids.

      And yes, Barron, you never know when they will be gone.  It can happen overnight.

  14. Sen. Michael Bennet to appear on the Tavis Smiley show airing tonight at midnight on KRMA, or tomorrow afternoon at 5:00 p.m. on KBDI.  The reported topic of conversation is education.

  16. As I recall when the debate was about whether or not to raise the tax rate on the top earners the right was screaming that this was class warfare.  As I listen to the talking heads on the right discussing Wisconsin the first thing they start out with is the max pay for a teacher is x and if husband and wife are both teachers then they get 2x  and this is really too much, etc., etc., etc, …  

    My question is:  Why isn’t this also class warfare and why would the people that decried it so strongly before be such strong advocates of it now?

    3. There’s a post going around the Internet that really lays it out on just how much you’re paying to have your kid supervised and educated by a teacher.

      The average teacher makes $50k/yr.  If their class size is 30 kids, and they work 6.5 hours per day in the classroom, and they only work 180 days per year, then assuming each parent pays for their own kids’ attendance, they are paying $1.42 per hour per child for the teacher’s services.  Just try and get a babysitter – any babysitter – for that price, nevermind one that has a degree and can teach the child.  That’s less than $50 per week; can you find an early learning center for that price?

      Today’s conservatives are becoming less responsible fiscal adults than they are petulant children with grudges against the government and unions that they’re told are Bad.

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