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January 27, 2017 11:30 PM UTC

Weekend Open Thread

  • 62 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

And it’s only been a week.

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62 thoughts on “Weekend Open Thread”

  1. Tale of two states: N. Dakota has $4 billion saved from oil and gas taxes; Colorado has almost none

    Nearly a decade ago, North Dakota and Colorado, poised for explosive growth in the drilling of energy resources, faced a decision: What to do with what appeared to be a never-ending geyser of new oil and gas riches?

    Voters in Colorado opted for the status quo in 2008, rejecting competing efforts to use tax revenue from oil and gas production to pay for what backers called vital needs. They voted down one proposal to eliminate favorable energy industry tax deductions to pay for higher education scholarships and wildlife restoration and another plan to use existing revenues to build new highways.

    Two years after the plans in Colorado collapsed at the polls, voters in North Dakota took the opposite approach and embraced radical change. They passed an initiative to set aside for future generations some of the tax revenue produced from the extraction of oil and gas. The Legacy Fund that North Dakota voters created in 2010 now has socked away more than $4 billion. This year, lawmakers in North Dakota will start debating how to spend the $300 million in interest earnings the fund is projected to generate annually.

      1. Colorado has always rolled over and played dead for the oil & gas industry. Which is why our severance taxes are among the lowest in the Western states. 

  2. From the Guardian (still developing)

    Green-card holders will be hit by Trump ban – Homeland Security

    People holding so-called green cards, making them legal permanent US residents, are included in President Donald Trump’s executive action temporarily banning people from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States, the Department of Homeland security has confirmed to Reuters

    “It will bar green card holders,” Gillian Christensen, acting spokeswoman for the department, reportedly said in an email.

    1. The meat packing industry in Colorado and several other states will not be happy with this. JBS Swift in Greeley alone will lose 15-20% of its workforce. Thanks to former Weld County Atty Gen. Ken Buck, these meat plants already lost 25% of their Mexican and Central American labor force in 2006.

      This is just another dumbass short-sighted move, fueled by xenophobia and conspiracy stories, which will create hardship in refugee communities, and ultimately affect the consumer by making America's meat packing industry less competitive than China's.

       

      1. All sorts of industries in the US will be looking bad now that the Trumpster has ceded economic hegemony in the Western Pacific to China by trashing the TPP.

        1. I have little interest in refugee communities unless they’re here legally. But, Andrew, feel free to let us all know when YOU are ready to go hit cows in the head to kill them and then skin them. 

          1. Lets see, packing houses have a demand for labor. The supply of labor goes down with illegals going home. Packers will choose to automate or pay more in wages. Andrew makes more money hitting cows in the head. Price of Big Macs go up. Melissa can't afford the new cost of Big Macs and does another video to increase the minimum wage. Unions use the minimum wage to negotiate increased wage contracts. 

        2. AC, PP and CHB – your ignorance is appalling. Refugees are legal immigrants. If they hold a green card, and refugee status, they have been through persecution and hell in their home countries, vetted, waited years in refugee camps, been vetted again, and finally given permission to immigrate and to work in the US. The meat packing industry employs thousands. In Colorado, refugee meat workers are mostly from Somalia and Burma. Your hamburger was probably slaughtered, ground, and packed by a Muslim refugee.

          Trump's directive is not "enforcing the law". It is creating new law, subverting existing laws, only for the purpose of satisfying his rabidly racist base… which includes at least two of you.

          My mother's family were refugees, fleeing from Austria during the Anschluss.  They liquidated the business, left what they couldn't carry, and sailed to England first because America had quotas for Hebrews. Many of their fellow refugees were turned around on America's shores, and sent back, where thousands died in the camps. This shameful history, built  our existing refugee law over half a century. The Immigration and Nationality Act law states

          …plainly that no person could be “discriminated against in the issuance of an immigrant visa because of the person’s race, sex, nationality, place of birth or place of residence.”

          1. MJ, American doesn't want Democrats in charge of the government. No amount of name calling will change that fact. Your candidate was and remains a fraud, get over it, move on. The solutions to your party problem is to get more extreme, then the voters will pay attention to your message.

            1. Hillary actually was a quality candidate, albeit with some self-inflicted baggage. The "fraud" part was created by the alt-right media & religious right, and never successfully rebutted by the campaign. She must have gotten some of her her senior campaign staff & advisors from among the same yay-hoos who ran Mark Udall's campaign in 2014.

            2. A fraud? Like a man who refuses to show his tax returns, for fear of being outed as beholden to Russian Oligarchs, or, even worse in his mind, not nearly as rich as he claims to be?

              Like a man who's had to settle countless suits over his fraudulent actions, including the latest, for over 25 million dollars?

              Like…that kind of fraud?

          2.  MJ, Banger is certainly capable of speaking for himself but when you call him a racist he's going to get mad, he might even respond in all caps, after all he is a Republican so he can't be a racist, that means  you must be referring to AC and myself because we're conservatives. You got me, I am a racist, I'm for the human race and until Democrat policies and ideas can be kicked to the curb the human race is in jeopardy.

            Those  refugees that were turned around, that was the Democrat/Rooooooosevelt administration, internment camps the Democrat/Rooooooosevelt administration the KKK were Democrats. 

            Democrats will sell America into economic slavery to serve an unjust Federal Government. Freedom and Liberty will be extinguished.

            1. Present refugee law was built up on 50+ years of xenophobic mistakes and regrets, no matter which Administration/ political party made them.

              Trump will throw all those decades of hard-won wisdom and tolerance out the window, and probably manage to get us into a few more military "adventures" into the bargain.

               

          3. I'm a racist…….    Really?   And you can make that determination from some web site posts too?   No wonder your fellow liberal Blue Cat got frustrated with you, and pissed off at you.

            "they have been through persecution and hell……."  Most Somalis are economic refugees. Yeah, if they live in the southern part of the country, lots of chances to get shot. But the northern part of Somalia; the former British Somaliland; is relatively peaceful and growing in prosperity. But I guess that part of Somalia is inhabited by the wrong tribes and southerners won’t go there. Primitive tribalism rules in Somalia.

            "Your hamburger was probably slaughtered……"  Emphasis here should be on "probably."  But what DO you know about my eating and food buying habits? 

            Your oft-times problem; present here; is that you allow your good points being made to get lost in all the histrionics.

             

            1. CHB, I was not calling you a racist, but PP and AC certainly are. You, however demonstrated ignorance about the differences between refugee and immigrant status when you wrote "I have little interest in refugee communities unless they’re here legally."

              In Greeley and other refugee centers,  refugees are by definition here legally. That reveals lack of research, if not ignorance, on your part, and lumping all immigrants / refugees together serves only the Trumpster interests.

              What you say about northern Somaliland is interesting, but not germane to the plight of the hundreds of thousands of Somalis caught up in civil war, made homeless and living in refugee camps, applying and waiting years for refugee status in the US and other countries. They hate ISIS in all its incarnations. They want to live in order, not chaos. The students, and I’ve taught many of them in Greeley, are often missing years of education. And the people who work in meat plants are about 15 – 20% Somali or Burmese Muslim, or Karenni, whether you eat hamburger or not.

              Have you spoken with Bluecat about her reasons for leaving here? If not, kindly check your speculations at the door. She's still posting comments on other sites. I put it down to the general angst we all feel about the election results and politics in general.

        3. AC, you mean the federal court order that DHS is refusing to comply with?  Just admit that you love the new demagogue and couldn't care less about the Constitution you clearly know little about

           

  4. Your "Bold" and "Principled" Democrat Michael Bennet voted for all these pro-torture, revolving door Trump nominees:

    Only 17 Senate Democrats opposed granting Mad Dog Mattis an exemption from a law that makes it illegal for a recent non-civilian to serve as Defense Secretary. And the only vote against confirming him was from a self-serving corporate shill who wants to run for president by recalling an uninformed Democratic base with her "progressivism" and courage. Only 11 Senate Democrats voted against confirming General John Kelly as Secretary of Homeland Security. Only 8 Senate Democratswere serious in their opposition to torture enthuseiast Mike Pompeo as head of the CIA. And only 4 Senate Dems voted against confirming Nikki Haley as the Ambassador to the UN. 

    Here's a guy who could use his winning votes, Colorado's choice of Hillary, and Democrats' choice of Bernie to actually do something gutsy against the regime of our mentally unstable president.

    Yet once again he plays the same old DC game rejected by voters of both sides and plays ColoradoPols for his patsy little web site. 

    1. Just curious, Zap…do you ever actually call or write to Senator Bennet? I have, many times. Again tonight on the Betsy Devos and Rex Tillerson nominations. One threatens my livelihood as a public school teacher; the other threatens my planet and would bring corporate rule of the US closer to fruition.

      1. MB and/or one of his flunkies surely keeps track of what's going on here. Otherwise, how would he know when they type up his press releases word for word?

  5. Comrade Pee Wee's approval rating has PLUMMETED:

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/gallup-trump-approval-rating-falls-week-one

    The MAJORITY of the American people DON'T WANT their of their fellow citizens' healthcare fucked with by greedy, immoral, deplorables:

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/polltracker/ap-norc-poll-majority-americans-worried-obamacare-repeal

    And, correctly per Josh Marshall, the trump-enabling gop congress can, should and must be held responsible for the ignorant, infantile, incredibly unpopular antics and tantrums of the insecure psycho man-baby:

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/the-republican-congress-is-responsible

    All in all, a lovely, upbeat, encouraging weekend for Democrats everywhere, if not for the country and the world at large…

    Fight the clear and present fascistic danger currently (and temporarily) entrenched in our White House, America! Resist and oppose them at every turn, and let’s all work together to remove Little Donnie and the Deplorables from federal, state and local office ASAP.

    1. You need to stop whining and get angry, get mad get enraged and get your mob together and burn down businesses. Throw trash in the street and block roads. Oh wait that's already been done and Hillary still isn't president.

      1. It is to laugh, you ignorant, arrogant knob; your house of cards is teetering and trembling even as I type. We'll be eating your lunch again before you know it. And OH how you deplorables will re-start your endless pissing, moaning and whining YET AGAIN then! We just had 8 years of it, and so we’ll simply tell you Commie-loving nincompoops again to GFY. Be ready, fool; it’s coming sooner than you think…

        1. With all due respect, DP…let's leave hilbillies out of this. I am from hillbilly stock, and while our region certainly has its share of fools and idiots, we have no corner on that market.😊

            1. Yes.. I did.

              While it is true that most southerners seem to have supported Trump…nearly as many didn’t. Hillbilly and redneck aren't interchangeable terms. I take no offense at it, except that it is true that one cannot be discriminated against because of hillbilly origins….There is case law on the matter….laugh

  6. Worry not, America: Comrade Pee Wee and Congressional Deplorables are working diligently around the clock to resolve the totally unnecessary and utterly unwanted ACA 'repeal and replace' clusterfuck they have created to satisfy their mindlessly angry, ignorant, bitter base! (Pee Wee’s the one in the middle, with the toupee. Paul Rand — er, I mean, Ryan, is directly to your left, and that’s Turtle McConnell bringing up the rear, over to the right.)

      1. Don't you mean 'Democrat" Party, you insignificant, Fox talking points-parroting numbskull?

        You’re very clearly part of the gop’s “mindlessly angry, ignorant, bitter base” I mentioned above.

        And we already know that the truth about you deplorables and your laughably incompetent ‘representatives’ hurts and is deeply embarrassing, little snowflake. Just as with your beloved Deer Leedur, your own transparent bravado masks a deep insecurity and that undeniable, terrifying sinking feeling you and your ilk keep experiencing as you witness your political world coming apart at the seams, a mere week into Pee Wee’s unpresidency. That’s why you’re here trying so hard (and failing miserably, I might add) to deflect and to project your fears, failings and insecurities onto us. But it won’t work. So don your big-girl panties, at least make an attempt to engage reality for once in your bitter, misguided life, and try to keep up, mmm-kay Petunia?

        It’s hard, we know, after so many years of unchallenged White Nationalist indoctrination…

        1. This troll has a special affinity for extraordinary stupidity, DP…. It is rapidly becoming one of my favorites.                             

  8. All the good Nazis in the GOP (ah, heck why don't they just come out and rename it the Reborn Nazi Party) are predictably falling in line.  Any objections they had to Trump's obscenely unconstitutional ideas are okey dokey now that he's given them real power to pass their wildest fantasy legislation.

    Republicans Go Largely Silent As Trump Bars Refugees And Immigrants From U.S.

    It’s not just rank-and file Republicans trying to duck the issue. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) hasn’t said a peep. His counterpart, House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), is one of the handful who did respond to Trump’s action ― by supporting it, while simultaneously saying America is a “compassionate” nation.

     

    It was just months ago that Ryan was condemning Trump’s campaign trail threat to institute a Muslim ban. Back then, when few expected Trump to win the election, Ryan said targeting immigrants didn’t reflect “America’s fundamental values.”

     

    Before he was vice president, Mike Pence, too, denounced the idea of banning an entire group of people from the country based on their religion. Here he is in December 2015, when he was governor of Indiana:

     

    The difference between then and now is that Trump is the president. Republican Party leaders like Ryan and McConnell appear willing to give him a pass on whatever extreme actions he wants to take ― instituting a Muslim ban, directing Congress to spend billions to build a wall along the Mexican border ― as long as he helps them pass laws they want pass, like cutting taxes for corporations and repealing the Affordable Care Act. These are types of things Republicans have been itching to do, but couldn’t under President Barack Obama.

    It remains to be seen when, or if, Republicans will draw a line on embracing Trump’s controversial and, in this case, racist actions. When even hawkish former Vice President Dick Cheney has suggested Trump’s ideas go too far, it appears there is a line somewhere.

    There is no line Republicans won't cross, no bottom to the depths they will stoop to get what they want.  Ooh baby, fucking over millions of people all at once (Trump would insist it's really BILLIONS) is so much better than just plain sex!  How in the world could our resident trolls deny it?

      2. The profound irony of your oh-so-'witty' retort is completely lost on you, isn't it, snowflake?

        This is why no one with a shred of intelligence, honor, integrity or decency takes any of you extremist right-wing poofs seriously anymore.

        You all appear to think with one tiny, diseased, atrophied brain. You seem 100% lacking in critical analysis skills and even the faintest glimmer of self-awareness — trapped forever in a selfish, hellish, humorless, compassion-less, narrow-minded world of proud ignorance, bitterness, anger, resentment, racism, homophobia, scapegoating, blind/slavish devotion to your perceived “betters,” endless self-sabotage (for which you always blame someone else) and pure cognitive dissonance.

      3. Independent thought is a strange term, coming from someone who's done nothing but slavishly repeat whatever has spewed from Trump's Ministry of Propaganda, regardless of facts or reason.  

        You're a coward, a racist, a bigot, and, because you think this won't end in disaster for the GOP….a fool.

        1. Cro-Magon, only four pejoratives? Surely you have more then that  in your vocabulary you can use. That's the problem with you Democrats, you could never really muster that high quality anger necessary to get commitment to your message.

          1. I suppose, since you misspelled Cro-Magnon, we can add stupid to the list.  

            I remember when all the crew-cuts were crowing that the '72 election meant they were in power for good, law and order would reign supreme, and protests meant nothing.   And the good guys have the media this time.   You should be even more frightened than you obviously are.   

             

  10. Thought-provoking "What if":

    Last Saturday, Robert Reich posted the notes of his conversation with a former Republican Congressman who said the GOP won’t do anything to rein in Trump. First they’ll use him to lock in their pet policy agenda—tax cuts, deregulation, the usual. Then they’ll turn around to impeach and replace the President with Mike Pence, who is one of the club. (Who says treason can’t go both ways?)

     

    While we (justifiably) fume at the White House over walls and pipelines and visas and torture, on the Hill, Congressional Republicans rewrite the rules of the game to make their power grab irreversible.

    While we wait for a GOP mutiny, they keep giving their useful idiot just enough rope to hang himself. It seem the real puppet-masters are in the Capitol rather than the Kremlin.

    But they’re still not on our side.

  11. Morgan Carroll's Open Letter to Congressman Mike Coffman

    Retrieved from Facebook 1/29/2017

    Your constituents need you. Now! Over the course of the campaign cycle you assured the voters that you would “stand up” to Donald Trump, if he were elected President. You told countless audiences that you supported immigrants and refugees. Yet after his election you expressed your “excitement” to be working with Donald Trump and that we should all “give him a chance.”

    The life and liberty of many of your constituents are already in profound peril – whether through refusing refugees and condemning them to death, torture
    or violence; removing access to life-saving medical care for people with pre-existing medical conditions; or attacks on facts and the First Amendment freedoms of speech and the press.

    Donald Trump’s baseless investigation into “massive voter fraud” may in fact put voting rights of your constituents in peril. You represent one of the most diverse districts in the nation with some of the most vulnerable populations. They need you to be their champion. When your constituents have tried to meet with you, rather than hear their fears and concerns and stand up to protect them, you ducked out the back door.

    Please be the leader you promised to be. Stand up to Donald Trump. The life and liberty of your constituents are under attack and your silence is deafening.

    Morgan Carroll – Aurora Resident
    Former Candidate 6th Congressional District
    Former President Colorado Senate

      1. There ya go, boy — knew you could do it! Party loyalty and Fox News allegiance demand that you drop the "ic" from the end of Democratic at all times! Wouldn't want Sean or Rush to issue you demerits for disloyalty!

        You lemming-like fools are nothing if not malleable and predictable. Sad!

      1. All things in time, ACHole.

        Comrade Coffman’s mumbling word-salads are intentionally, very cynically indecipherable and incoherent, his flip-flopping is unparalleled, his uncanny ability to talk out of multiple sides of his mouth concurrently is remarkable, his dissembling and obfuscation skills are first-rate, and his handlers/puppeteers do a top-notch job of hiding him from non-sycophantic constituents and legitimate journalists.

        But we'll get him eventually.

        And then what will you do? Why, slink away of course. Can't wait.

  12. James Hoffa president of the Teamsters union, a pillar of the labor movement comes out in support of president Donald Trump for his position on TPP, NAFTA and the pipelines.  Hoffa  expresses support for the President and his stance in helping the workingman. Democrats fill their pants as another historically solid voting block realize the stupidity of Dmemocrat policy.

    1. You keep clinging to that, pal. I'm sure it'll keep you warm at night, throughout the cold, dark, interminable four-year nightmare of resistance, uprising, failure and rejection you deplorables, your Deer Leedur and your laughable Republic party already have begun to face.

      But buckle up now, because you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

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