Mount Virtus

Big Labor is really bummed out today with the news that U.S. Senator Arlen Specter won’t be backing their Orwellian-named Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) (you can watch his floor speech here) — at least for this year. No Republican votes (and many shaky Democrats) means union officials won’t be able to invoke the 60 votes needed for cloture to take away workers’ rights to the secret ballot and impose costly binding arbitration.

This has got to spell a little relief for Colorado’s newly selected U.S. Senator Michael Bennet. EFCA has put Bennet in a bind, but if the political signals are clear that the legislation won’t pass he might have the cover he needs. At this point, my guess is Bennet will take the path of least resistance within his own party and vote for the Big Labor boondoggle while trying to reassure moderate business leaders that his vote cannot do any actual damage.

The likely result? Michael Bennet should be able to preclude a costly primary in 2010, but he will speedily enhance his status as a high-profile target for a slate of top-notch Republican challengers to take on. Whether it’s Bob Beauprez or Ryan Frazier or someone else, next year’s U.S. Senate race figures to be THE Colorado political campaign to watch.

From Gateway Pundit, more evidence of the kind of “change” in diplomacy we voted for: Barack Obama writes to FORMER president of France Jacques Chirac saying he looks forward to working together “in the coming four years” — while altogether snubbing current president Nicolas Sarkozy. More at EuroPumas.

(Here’s the original Le Figaro story, in case you’re interested. It’s not every day I get to link to something en Francais.)

Way to go. Just one more in a string of diplomatic embarrassments emanating from the Oval Office. But keep on laughing, Mr. President.

Update: El Presidente has more of the details surrounding what went down at today’s state party officer elections.

I was not able to attend today’s Colorado Republican state central committee meeting in Castle Rock, but I’ve had a chance to follow developments remotely. As reported at Rocky Mountain Right, Dick Wadhams was comfortably re-elected to the chairman’s position.

The more competitive race was for vice-chair, in which DougCo GOP reports on Twitter that Leondray Gholston beat out Nathan Chambers on the 3rd round of voting. For many conservative grassroots supporters, Gholston’s election represents a new and exciting direction for the state party. Let’s hope their optimism is justified. Certainly, Gholston’s passion, enthusiasm, and dedication cannot be denied.

Fundraising should be a strength the Wadhams-Gholston team. Also, from a Colorado Statesman article published before today’s proceedings:

Wadhams listed his goals as improving high-tech communications, registering new Republican-affiliated voters, recruiting and training candidates and continuing to work closely with elected officials.

To hear more about these gentlemen’s plans for the future of the Republican Party in Colorado, I invite you to listen to archived episodes of Rocky Mountain Alliance Blog Talk Radio: the March 10 episode for Dick Wadhams and the February 10 episode for Leondray Gholston.

Congrats to all those who put their names in the hat to run for office. Now is the time for Republicans to unify and work together toward our shared commitment to limited government, personal responsibility, and a strong national defense.

I look forward to more reports — especially from those who were actually in attendance at today’s meeting.

(Cue music to “Mrs. Robinson”) “Where have you gone, Colorado Media Matters? A state barely notices you’re through … Woo, woo, woo….” Nice (“don’t let the door hit you on the way out”) post-mortems from Slapstick Politics and Rossputin.

Curious silence from the various Lefty blogs I’ve read, though. Maybe they are just relieved that the embarrassment is gone.

As for me, I feel bad I’ve already wasted the last 5 minutes of my life…

Today brings a chance to review another member of the bad legislation parade down at the Colorado State Capitol. Senate Bill 180 (PDF) would override the local will of voters and impose collective bargaining on all local police and fire departments. After making it through the Democrat-controlled State, Military, and Veteran Affairs Committee, the bill is on the slate to be heard by the full senate any day now.

From the Denver Daily News:

Concerns are being raised that collective bargaining leads to overtaxing government budgets through increased payroll costs, which ends up hitting taxpayers hard.

The last time the issue raised so many conservative eyebrows was in 2007 when Gov. Bill Ritter issued an executive order authorizing state employees to join unions and bargain collectively.

[Bill sponsor state senator Lois] Tochtrop [D-Thornton], however, said her legislation would be about negotiating for safety equipment and tools – not for higher salaries. [link & emphasis added]

“Not for higher salaries”. Oh, really? (more…)

After a so-so 12-4 showing in my first day selections, here are the picks for Friday’s scheduled first round games with my projected winners in bold: (more…)

Tomorrow (Thursday) afternoon is the moment of truth at the Colorado state legislature for Senate Bill 57, a measure that would require school districts to open up their financial books online so citizens can search them. It goes before the House Education Committee.

Here are things you can do:

• Starting at sometime shortly after 1:30 PM local Mountain time, listen to the hearing online (House Committee Room 0112)
• Follow me on Twitter during the proceedings, or join the Tweeting yourself
• Show up at HCR 0112 and testify yourself, or just pack the room and provide moral support – nothing like an extra concerned citizen or two to remind lawmakers whom they serve
• Call or email members of the House Education Committee to make your voice heard: It’s time for our taxpayer-funded schools to put their revenues and expenses online in a searchable format

Certain lobbying groups are seeking to kill this bill quietly. Among their main concerns is that citizens will more easily be able to see the salaries of school administrators. Other arguments and tactics are being used to try to terminate transparency and stop it from happening.

By doing your small part, you can help send a message: Show Me The Money and If You Can’t Defend It, Don’t Spend It. SB 57 is endorsed by the Denver Post and the late, great Rocky Mountain News.

More information on ways you can get involved and help the cause of transparency and accountability is available at the People’s Press Collective.

I’ve decided to do something a little different with this year’s NCAA Tournament and the blog. I’ll be posting my picks on a day-by-day basis. Below are a list of tomorrow’s scheduled first round games with my projected winners in bold: (more…)

Coloradans need to wake up to the threat of House Bill 1299, which would spit on the U.S. Constitution and render Colorado irrelevant in national political elections. The Left is pushing the issue forward because it can, hoping to prey on the ignorance and apathy of the general populace. But perhaps they forgot what happened with Amendment 36 in 2004, which voters rejected nearly two-to-one.

HB 1299 is worse than that: Rather than divide up Colorado’s electoral votes proportionally based on our own state’s popular vote, this bill would sell all our electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote. Colorado truly would be political flyover country, our state’s interests all but forgotten. (more…)

I agree with Rocky Mountain Right: Who? I’ve been reasonably involved in the Jefferson County Republican Party for six years, and have never heard of this fellow from Evergreen. Methinks he’s not the Republicans’ best hope to take on Bill Ritter.

My thoughts are here.

Tune in starting at 8:30 PM local Mountain Time this evening for the special Saint Patrick’s Day edition of Rocky Mountain Alliance Blog Talk Radio. From 8:45 to 9:15, state senate minority leader Josh Penry will join us to discuss yesterday’s supreme court ruling, the ongoing debate about lifting state spending limits, and other goings-on under the Golden Dome.

Starting at 9:30 we’ll talk with Nathan Chambers, candidate for Colorado Republican Party vice chair. We previously interviewed his opponent Leondray Gholston.

Don’t forget. If you miss the live broadcast of tonight’s show, you can go back and download the podcast, or just use the handy widget on my sidebar to listen directly from Mount Virtus.

Update, 3/17: Link added – check out “Keep The Cap Colorado”

Saying state representative Don Marostica is not the future of the Colorado Republican Party was one of the blog understatements of the year. As if latching on to the Democratic caucus to support California-like spendthrift policies wasn’t enough by itself, Marostica had to go and try to explain his position.

From Don Marostica’s hometown, this Loveland Politics report seems to indicate the representative has walked off the political cliff:

If the purpose of Saturday’s “town hall” meeting was to mend fences within his own party, it failed miserably when the Republican legislator Marostica told those assembled “Now, I know Republicans — really get nervous about that because they have been telling that lie for a long time.” Marostica was referring to the concern that a repeal of [Arveschoug-Bird] would lead to higher taxes to cover the extra spending since the state is unable to carry a budget deficit the way the federal government does.

Marostica lectured the audience that Democrats are not runaway taxers and spenders like many in his party believe but instead mostly responsible people who want a balanced budget. He than accused “at least 15%” of his own colleagues in the legislature of not really being Republicans but instead Libertarians who don’t want the government to collect or spend even a single dollar. Many of his comments lent credibility to the rumor Marostica is preparing to change political parties before the next election.

I’m not sure what is more unsettling – the incoherent logic, phony rhetoric, or Democratic talking points (all of which seem to overlap in this account).

Among other things, seems there’s a lesson in here to be reinforced: Blindly trusting party designations is a foolhardy strategy. It looks like Don Marostica used the Republican label as a mere convenience to get himself elected. Will the state GOP have the courage to abstain from providing him support, if necessary, in the coming election? Then again, that seems to be what Marostica wants.

Update, 3/17: Law student Constructively Reasonable says the decision is a cause for “outrage”. A watcher says Colorado may not as well even have a constitution.

The Colorado Supreme Court has done it again, showing its disdain for taxpayer protections in the state constitution. From the majority opinion:

When it issued its declaratory judgment order, the district court did not have the benefit of our recent decision in Barber v. Ritter, 196 P.3d 238 (Colo. 2008), in which we held that a statute challenged under article X, section 20 must be proven to be unconstitutional beyond a reasonable doubt. The trial court erroneously held that the relevant test of SB 07-199s constitutionality came from the interpretive guideline included in the text of article X, section 20 to reasonably restrain most the growth of government. Applying this erroneous standard, the trial court concluded that: (1) SB 07-199 constitutes a net tax revenue gain to the State of Colorado; (2) SB 07-199 was not a change in state tax policy requiring a statewide vote; (3) voter approval was required under subsection 7(c) of article X, section 20; and (4) the waiver elections held in the local school districts did not satisfy subsection (7)(c).

Let me boil it down for you. The Colorado Supreme Court says:

1. We’ve made our own arbitrary rule that the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights has a higher threshold for being violated by government than the rest of the constitution does.
2. This “tax policy change” that Democrat State Treasurer (and SB07-199 architect) Cary Kennedy admitted is a “tax policy change” somehow is not a “tax policy change”
3. The state can change tax policy (without it necessarily being a “tax policy change”) that raises local tax revenues, without having to ask voters’ permission
4. Voters in local school district elections had the clairvoyance to know their votes would result in the “tax policy change” of SB07-199 that really wasn’t a “tax policy change”

Or let me make it even simpler: (more…)

It seems Colorado’s own David Harsanyi is getting some national attention for his column-writing talents. Witness “The 30 Best Conservative Columnists for 2009″ list compiled by John Hawkins of Right Wing News. David breaks in at number 22.

Yes, David is a native New Yorker and not really from Colorado. (Then again, few of us really are from Colorado.) But he’s certainly made a name for himself while on the editorial board of the surviving Denver Post. Some of us even can say we knew him “when”. You can find his columns here and his blog contributions here.

Of course, Michelle Malkin – who regularly graces the lists of top conservative columnists and comes in at number 7 on the latest – is officially a Coloradan as of last summer.

I’d say that, all in all, Colorado is well represented on the list of today’s top conservative writers.