CO-04 (Special Election)
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(R) Greg Lopez
(R) Trisha Calvarese
90%
10%
President (To Win Colorado)
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(D) Joe Biden*
(R) Donald Trump
80%
20%↓
CO-01 (Denver)
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(D) Diana DeGette*
90%
CO-02 (Boulder-ish)
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(D) Joe Neguse*
90%
CO-03 (West & Southern CO)
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(D) Adam Frisch
(R) Jeff Hurd
(R) Ron Hanks
40%
30%
20%
CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado)
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(R) Lauren Boebert
(R) Deborah Flora
(R) J. Sonnenberg
30%↑
15%↑
10%↓
CO-05 (Colorado Springs)
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(R) Dave Williams
(R) Jeff Crank
50%↓
50%↑
CO-06 (Aurora)
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(D) Jason Crow*
90%
CO-07 (Jefferson County)
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(D) Brittany Pettersen
85%↑
CO-08 (Northern Colo.)
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(D) Yadira Caraveo
(R) Gabe Evans
(R) Janak Joshi
60%↑
35%↓
30%↑
State Senate Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
80%
20%
State House Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
95%
5%
June 16, 2016 01:34 PM UTC
33 Comments
They’re getting their marching orders from the fat one, as usual. The hate radio crew is screaming to high heaven that Trump and all Republicans can win by pounding the Muslim theme and nothing else.
I gotta admit I'm with Randy on the GMO foods issue. I guess it's true that even a stopped clock is right twice a day.
I too have a tough time getting worked up about higher rather than lower tech genetic modification. I'm one of those people who wants to crawl under the table when dining with a friend who keeps the busy server standing there to be grilled about all the various things they find unacceptable in their food. Not talking real, much less serious life threatening allergies and heath issues but all the other stuff some people make a hobby of obsessing over until that list becomes non-operational and is replaced by the next. Usually the person sticking to whatever list of does and don'ts is the latest thing never shows any signs of being healthier or thinner than anyone else.
We do have to watch the gluten thing carefully, because my wife has Celiac;s disease. But we've been modifying food genetically since the first thumb sized ears of corn came over in the Columbian exchange. I try to stick to semi-vegetarian, just for health reasons (meaning meat is sparingly used as a condiment.) But I admit a side of Bacon is often my undoing.
Bacon is one of the 4 food groups.
Along with beer, pizza and chocolate.
You mean beer and pizza are separate items? Who knew?
Celiac is a real thing. Most people who claim to be gluten intolerant aren't. It's estimated that 90% of people buying gluten free not only don't need to but would be better off not avoiding it. There is a higher incidence of Celiac disease among the Irish and those of Irish descent. But even so, the vast majority of Irish ancestry people don't have it. My son in his server days always got a kick out of people who would ask for gluten free pizza at the Italian place where he worked but would happily drink beer along with it. They could tolerate the gluten in beer because they didn't know it had any.
A bit under 2 pct of the population actually has celiac. For the rest, gluten is not a bad thing. I personally love the gluten free fad, because it has given my wife and daughter a vastly wider choice. Sadly, they do have to choose gluten free beer, which is generally fermented camel urine or something like that. However, hard apple cider is naturally gluten free and a great sub for beer. As a diabetic, I have to avoid a lot of stuff my wife eats, like rice, mashed potatoes etc. We're a bit like Jack Spratt and his wife.
Here's some good info on why gluten has become an issue with our new strains of wheat (and how it's processed).
Interesting but the fact is there is a an aspect of fashionable complaints to the urge in people who imagine themselves to be gluten intolerant. For a lot of people having imaginary strict diet restrictions or becoming devotees of every new fad that comes along, whether it's deciding that there are 8 foods you can never eat or that that you require periodic cleansing with things like coffee enemas, it's a way of feeling special.
Don't get me wrong. I often choose organic foods or things like old fashioned coarse ground cornmeal because, besides the health aspect (fiber good) they just taste better, like organic strawberries over the ones that are about as tasty as sawdust or cornbread made in a skillet with a nice crunchy crust and great texture all the way through over an insipid "cornbread" that might as well be cake. But if I'm having dinner at the home of friends I'm not going to make demands because eating whatever they serve isn't going to hurt me as long as I eat the way I prefer most of the time. Ditto with tormenting waiters with an endless grilling.
I completely understand why people with real food related health issues have to be careful but it's a pain in the ass when I'm out with, say, my sister who has come up with new sets of wacky food issues for decades and takes forever to order with all her questions and requests for substitutions.
When I'm having lunch out with her I tip even better than usual.
The farther I stay away from wheat products the better I feel but I'm not a food nazi in public or private. I make my purchases based on my preferences. It's an Adam Smith kind of thing for me.
Mostly, the article focuses on white bread. I only eat stone ground whole wheat bread, which is vastly better for diabetics and tastes better too. The exception is sourdough, which is also low glycemic index and also tastes great. I also like rye and dark rye but it is harder to get that stone ground. White bread is the devil's work.
Agree
white bread is a marker for civilization decline
My early childhood was spent growing up with my extended family (great grandmother down to my brother and I) with grandparents, great aunts and uncles and great grandma being Russian Jewish immigrants, parents, uncle and Mom's cousins born here. We occupied most of a Chicago apartment building. White bread was simply not in evidence or mayo either. Grandma (Bubbie to us) used to tell us that white bread is just like library paste. Of course we wanted Wonder Bread as an exotic treat but we now know Grandma was right. Also told us that if you left a tooth in a glass of coke over night it would disintegrate but I'm pretty sure that one wasn't quite accurate. Probably close enough.
I've heard Hoiday Brewing Company in Golden is making decent gluten free beer. I haven't been but I've been told it's pretty good, if a little pricey.
http://www.holidailybrewing.com/
There is a lot of conflation between 'hybrids' and 'GMO'. The right questions never get asked on the subject, which should be what are the effects on our environment in growing the crops. True, enhanced brown rice, etc. are valuable inventions. What we should be concerned about is the massive applications of glyphosate on crops like cotton, corn, soybeans and sugar beets. Are they safe to eat, wear? Maybe. Jury is certainly out in the global community (Monsanto, the purveyor of all things glyphosate has managed to buy a Congress that disagrees with the global consensus that it's a carcinogen). I'm not a nazi on this issue in my daily consumption. If I have a choice I'd always choose something not made from what I consider the toxic soup, Round-up (high fructose corn syrup, soybean proteins) – but I am interested in getting us weaned off the Monsanto product and getting Monsanto extracted from being the kingmaker on Capitol Hill during the Farm Bill negotiations. Our subsidy programs have turned themselves upside down; we incentivize almost nothing of nutritional value in the food pyramid.
In other news Monsanto, desperate to find a merger so they can drop their name that has become synonymous with poison, may be the sucked up by Bayer, AG. Global predation at work. What could possibly go wrong?
I don't get too upset over GMOs when they're close to what a natural hybridization could produce, but I get concerned about the unknowns when GMO's go far afield for their source material, as it were. (E.g. inserting a salmon gene into a vegetable; stable and fully safe? I would argue that there's not enough testing to be sure) Also, I would like to be able to eat heirloom varieties without worrying whether Monsanto is going to bust me for "stray" GMO genes. And yes, GMOs designed to allow heavy application of chemicals that could be dangerous to us has proven already to be a Bad Idea, if not for the GMO portion, then for the overuse and lack of safety review of those chemicals.
Unlike you, PR, I want the widest experimentation in GM I can imagine. In my daydreams, I learn to make a squash that tasks exactly like rib-eye steak, with even the same texture. You'd save a billion cows and maybe the planet to boot. Cow methane, more from burping than farting, so they say, is a big time greenhouse gas. So, yeah, a fake cod that lets the natural variety rebuild. And soy milk as rich and tasty as the moo variety. Make veganism the cheaper and tastier alternative. Live longer, for less money and eat really well.
We're not there yet, but we're making progress. I use recombinant DNA everyday in the form of insulin just to go on living. Decoding the double helix will prove to be one of the two greatest achievements of humankind. The other, of course, was drafting Von Miller.
Given a choice between revealing my ignorance and perpetuating it, I'm going to opt for the former, Michael. What exactly is a glyphosate and why is it a bad thing? And what is Round-up made of? in general, I am not afraid of GMOs. But since we have more or less abandoned the venerable chisel the straw under farming system in favor of smothering everything with roundup, I do worry about the accumulation of poison in our soils. I spent many unhappy hours toiling with one ways, chisels and rod-weeders. But at least I knew the soil I tilled was fertile and safe. Today, if I was in the game, I'd love to do what my hero Henry Clay did and grow hemp.
There's a lot to unpack around this issue. Good article here. Wiki here. A diary on Monsanto and the Farm Bill here. If you think Monarch butterflies are worth preserving, read here.
I, too, spent many a day on a cab-less JD 4020 with a plow, chisel, road weeder or a one-way behind me. Then we went to a 5020 with an Egging cab. I think I preferred the wide open to those dust traps! Now we can sit in an easy chair, hands off the wheel, monitoring the Chicago Mercantile Exchange while watching re-runs of I Love Lucy.
Spent last weekend in Kentucky on the hemp farm. Just up the road they were celebrating the fist hemp crop to be planted on the Henry Clay Estate in decades. Great story.
I assumed glysophate was roundup but wasn't sure. That's fabulous to see hemp back onHenry Clay's estate. He was such a visionary and our history would have been so much better had he, not the odious Jackson, been president. Among other things, he fought for the rights of the Cherokees and other Indians whom Jackson persecuted. He also opposed slavery and helped promote what became Liberia. (While advanced for his time on the slavery issue, he was more interested in sending the freed slaves back to Africa than integrating them here.)
Unlike Jackson, whose stupidity in eliminating a national bank led directly to the Panic of 1837, Clay understood the need for a national currency. And he knew that Bill Belicheck was a disgrace to football, though some historians still question whether that was even possible.
Anyway, a great man and a great crop. Clay mostly sold it for naval cordage but an even broader and environmentally responsible market awaits us today. Just don't drench it inRound-up, please.
For our lady friends concerned about glyphosate, you might want to pay particular attention to your feminine products. Recent studies show 85% of all products have traces of glyphosate.
Cotton is grown on about 3% of global farmland and consumes roughly 35% of all chemicals used in agriculture. The industry is almost exclusively dominated by Monsanto. We have better options. Hemp produces 4x more fiber per acre than cotton, needs little or no pesticides and herbicides – and uses half the water.
It's a false equivalency, though, and it sounds like Baumgartner is trying to take it out more on the trans persons than on the GMOs.
Exactly.
It must be confusing just to be Randy Baumgardner.
Indeed. The good senator may have forgotten that for a lot of years, Trinidad, Colorado was the sex change capitol of the country.
I had the (dis)pleasure of talking to this knucklehead on Lobby Day. Literally ran away when he realized he was losing the debate…I mean RAN AWAY.
I have seen that behavior before. Incompetent legislators have a tendency to hide from their constituents whenever possible. They move quickly and furtively through the halls, hoping to avoid meeting people …and reporters (who are very much like actual people, but who are always writing shit down, dammit!)
Laura Bradford (remember her?) was just such an elusive Capitol bunny rabbit. She was so shocked when she won the election because even she knew she was totally unprepared to do the job. She spent her first session darting between offices so she wouldn't have to talk to anyone.
Former Republican senator Al White has endorsed either Baumgardner's primary opponent (if he has one), or his Dem opponent.
Al White endorsed Baumgardner's general election opponent, Emily Tracy (D). I'm guessing the biggest challenge in the District is the "low information" conservative voter who looks for the R on the ballot. People who have had any dealings with Baumgardner know he's worthless, and worse.
Yes, and I had the pleasure of chatting with Emily and her husband, Del, at the CD3 caucus. She is smart and engaging and seems to understand her district,,,,and is genuinely concerned by the truly pathetic representation her district has been receiving from "El Mustacho".
You should expect nothing less from Laura Woods. She's a puppet of her church, just as Libby Szabo is, and I'll bet that church is with the Baptist guy in Orlando who thinks that gays should be executed. Why doesn't someone ask her. I'm sure she'll tell you right out that she thinks gays should be executed. I know for sure she believes that in her heart.
Laura Woods is a New Life Churcher? That would explain a hell of a lot.