November 12, 2021 09:40 AM UTC

Get More Smarter on Friday (Nov. 12)

• 9 Comments
• by: Colorado Pols

There are only 49 days left in 2021. Let’s Get More Smarter. If you think we missed something important, please include the link in the comments below (here’s a good example). If you are more of an audio learner, check out The Get More Smarter Podcast. And don’t forget to find us on Facebook and Twitter. 

CORONAVIRUS INFO…

*Colorado Coronavirus info:
CDPHE Coronavirus website 

*Daily Coronavirus numbers in Colorado:
http://covid19.colorado.gov

*How you can help in Colorado:
COVRN.com

*Locate a COVID-19 testing site in Colorado:
Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment 

► Could Colorado be forced to start rationing health care as it battles against a surge of COVID-19 infections? We could be close to that point, as The Denver Post reports:

If the current acceleration in COVID-19 hospitalizations continues, the state could run out of hospital beds by the end of December, though Gov. Jared Polis has called on facilities to find space for 300 to 500 more patients. It’s not clear how hospitals would find enough staff for those additional beds, though.

State officials have estimated Colorado has 2,000 to 2,200 beds that could potentially be used for COVID-19 patients, and as of Thursday afternoon, 1,466 of them were full. If all of those beds were filled with people who have the virus, it would leave very little room for anything else to go wrong, from a bad flu season to traffic injuries during a snowstorm.

Dr. Eric France, the state’s chief medical officer, said at a Thursday meeting of the Governor’s Expert Emergency Epidemic Response Committee that it’s possible Colorado will need to activate its hospital crisis standards of care, which allow for rationing, in the next few weeks. [Pols emphasis]

It doesn’t need to be this way — just get vaccinated, people!

Colorado Public Radio takes a deeper look at why COVID-19 cases in Colorado have gotten so bad lately. Governor Jared Polis is providing a live COVID-19 update at noon on Friday.

► This is a totally normal thing for a former President of the United States to say out loud. From The Washington Post:

Former president Donald Trump said he considered it “common sense” for his supporters to chant “Hang Mike Pence!” during the Jan. 6 insurrection but that he never feared for his vice president’s safety. [Pols emphasis]

Audio of Trump’s comments to ABC News’s Jonathan Karl were published Friday by Axios in advance of a forthcoming book by Karl.

In the exchange, Trump again took issue with Pence for not intervening to change the results as he presided over the count of electoral college votes by Congress. The count was ultimately interrupted after rioters breached the Capitol and Pence was whisked out of the chamber amid threats on his life.

Asked by Karl if he was worried about Pence’s safety, Trump said: “No, I thought he was well-protected.”

In related news, former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows failed to appear for a deposition on Friday in front of the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection.

► The Aurora Sentinel digs into the story of the pending breakup of the Tri-County Health Department:

After more than seven decades of collaboration, the Tri-County Health Department is disbanding over increasingly difficult to reconcile approaches to public health, leaving Aurora — a city of almost 400,000 people with land in Adams, Arapahoe and Douglas county — in an awkward position.

As the three counties prepare to go their own separate ways, Aurora will either have to navigate being served by three public health agencies or embark on the ambitious task of forming its own health department, similar to Denver and Broomfield, which each operate as both cities and counties.

Local elected and public health officials have mixed feelings on the best approach…

…Douglas County voted to leave Tri-County in September after clashing with other members of the department over public health measures during the pandemic. Things came to a head in August, when the other board of health members overruled Douglas County’s representatives to impose a mask mandate in all K-12 schools.

A month later, Adams County voted to leave the department as well, a decision that left the Arapahoe County’s board of commissioners in the lurch.

Click below to keep learning stuff…

And Now, More Words…

► States with looser gun control laws tend to have more homicides overall. That seems like common sense, but it is a point that conservative lawyers are trying to argue in front of the Supreme Court. According to a fact check from The Washington Post:

What we know is the places with looser concealed-carry laws — the “shall issue” and no-permit states — had a higher homicide rate on average during a recent five-year period (2016-2020) than the eight states with stricter permit laws. New York City had a lower homicide rate than the three “shall issue” cities [Paul] Clement mentioned. Chicago’s homicide rate was five times that of New York last year. That’s the definition of “demonstrably worse.”

► Axios Denver has more on the troubles facing Colorado schools because of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and continued staffing shortages.

► As Paul Krugman writes for The New York Times, history has taught us not to get overly worked up about inflation:

So what can 1946-48 teach us about inflation in 2021? Then as now there was a surge in consumer spending, as families rushed to buy the goods that had been unavailable in wartime. Then as now it took time for the economy to adjust to a big shift in demand — in the 1940s, the shift from military to civilian needs. Then as now the result was inflation, which in 1947 topped out at almost 20 percent. Nor was this inflation restricted to food and energy; wage growth in manufacturing, which was much more representative of the economy as a whole in 1947 than it is now, peaked at 22 percent.

But the inflation didn’t last. It didn’t end immediately: Prices kept rising rapidly for well over a year. Over the course of 1948, however, inflation plunged, and by 1949 it had turned into brief deflation.

What, then, does history teach us about the current inflation spike? One lesson is that brief episodes of overheating don’t necessarily lead to 1970s-type stagflation — 1946-48 didn’t cause long-term inflation, and neither did the other episodes that most resemble where we are now, World War I and the Korean War. And we really should have some patience: Given what happened in the 1940s, pronouncements that inflation can’t be transitory because it has persisted for a number of months are just silly.

► A record number of Americans — 4.4 million — quit their jobs in September.

► As Chris Cillizza explains for CNN, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is trying to position himself for a Presidential run in 2024 by going right at former President Donald Trump.

► Congressperson Lauren “Q*Bert” Boebert is indeed a real person; it just seems like she is a comedy sketch come to life.

► High-paid health care industry lobbyists are working hard to try to water down sections of President Biden’s economic passage that are meant to decrease the cost of care for many Americans.

► Investigators say the gunman who killed an Arvada police officer in June was “warped” by watching hours of anti-police YouTube videos.

► Colorado Public Radio tries to understand why people who cause wildfires are rarely investigated.

► President Biden is nominating a former FDA administrator to return to the job, as The Associated Press reports:

► As Republicans look to take back control of Congress in 2022, POLITICO looks at the road for Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy as he tries to become the next House Speaker:

While the GOP is widely favored to take back the House, McCarthy needs a majority of votes on the floor in early 2023 in order to ascend to speaker. The minority leader’s math problem is simple: The fewer seats Republicans pick up in the midterms, the more powerful his skeptics will become…

…Interviews with more than 40 Republicans, both inside and outside the conference, point to two worrisome factions for McCarthy in a future vote for speaker: conservatives and wild cards. As assiduously as the affable 56-year-old has fundraised and recruited to turn the House red, he’s expending just as much effort to please both the often-unruly right without alienating the handful of centrists whose support he may need.

► Who will protect the Woofs? A federal courtroom is moving toward a decision today.

Say What, Now?

Maybe Congressman Ken Buck (R-Greeley) should disconnect from the right-wing internet tubes for awhile:

Your Daily Dose Of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

► Former President Trump might REALLY think that he is still involved in American foreign policy decisions, as The Huffington Post reports, Trump recently claimed that he had sent an “envoy ambassador” to the Kosovo-Serbia border (he did no such thing). 

► Indiana Republican Sen. Mike Braun has an inexplicable response for why he has apparently broken campaign finance laws. As The Daily Beast explains:

On Wednesday morning, the Federal Election Commission released its audit of Braun’s campaign committee, alleging a litany of serious financial reporting errors, as well as millions of dollars in allegedly improper loans Braun used to finance his 2018 bid—including $1.5 million routed from the candidate’s former company.

However, the campaign claims it cannot fully comply because its former treasurer “vanished,” and they have not been able to locate him in three years.

But the campaign must not be looking very hard. It only took The Daily Beast minutes to identify and locate the man. His mother said in a phone call that she would pass along a request for comment.

ICYMI

► Another 2022 Republican candidate in Colorado is voicing her support for Q-Anon beliefs. Mary Lynn “Dede” Wagner is running in HD-25, where she’ll have to first win a Republican Primary against incumbent Rep. Colin Larsen.

► This week on The Get More Smarter Podcast, hosts Jason Bane and Ian Silverii talk with Erik Maulbetsch of The Colorado Times Recorder and try to understand the new trend of conspiracy-believing Colorado Republican candidates:

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