March 14, 2013 08:15 AM UTC

Is Hick Half Full or Half Empty?

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• by: DavidThi808

(Promoted by Colorado Pols)

The optimist says the glass is half full, the pessimist says it is half empty (and the engineer says it was designed too large).

So is Hickenlooper a half full or half empty Governor? It hit me that a lot of people here seems to focus on the negatives and only give lip service to the positives. So I thought I would add my take on him so far and see what others think on this. 

Half Empty

1. He's owned by the oil & gas companies. I think this sets people off more than most if he was owned by say Wall St (see Bennet, Udall) because the Oil & Gas companies are supposed to own Republican politicians and the Democratic politicians are supposed to be owned by unions.
2. He's ignoring education. Some talk but no action on either improving the system or gaining control of the unsustainable increase in educational costs (other than just limiting the total dollars).

Half Full

1. He came out in favor of addressing guns before Newton. He's put his ass on the line for this and chose to do so.
2. He (finally) supported civil unions. Late to the game but the bottom line is he's supporting it now.
3. He's worked very smoothly with the legislature, both when it was divided and now when it has a slight Dem majority. The fact that he makes it look simple & easy does not mean it was – that is a major accomplishment.

Not His Fault

1. Addressing TABOR and all the other constraints in the constitution has to come from the legislature. And he should leave the to them.
2. OIT & Dept of Revenue being staffed by incompetents. That appears to be a state requirement as it's been this way for administration after administration. Apparently there's a hidden clause in the state constitution mandating inept management in both departments.
3. Alternative energy efforts appear to be mostly wasted money ineptly spent. But that to a large degree was inherited from Ritter (who loves alternative energy) so again, this is probably more just an inept state bureacracy, not the direct fault of Hick.

I look at this and see a pretty good governor. And I think it's unfair to constantly focus on Hick's servicing the Oil & Gas industry when Bennet & Udall get a free ride on the fact that they're owned by Wall St.

Are we unfairly focusing too much on the negatives with Hick?