The Washington Examiner‘s Byron York interviews an anonymous Democratic political strategist to help answer some questions that have been nagging me, too:
To some observers, the Democrats’ race to pass national health care seems irrational — even suicidal. Don’t party leaders understand how much the public opposes the bills currently on the table? Don’t they know that voters are likely to take their revenge at the polls next year? Given that, why do they keep rushing ahead?
We already had a notion of this folly from our junior U.S. Senator appointee Michael Bennet. Yet even if the Democrats are going to be headstrong about trying to force through any particular kind of this terribly unpopular legislation, it can’t hurt to remind them why at today’s Code Red Rally near you.
And take a little time to check out the entire Byron York piece. It’s good to get inside our opponents’ minds as we continue to craft not only a bold, but also a smart, resistance to the Democrats’ terribly misguided efforts to lead us toward government-controlled health care.
Today brings a difficult reminder of how quickly time passes. It was exactly one years ago that the Rocky Mountain Alliance lost a charter member, and I lost a good friend and Christian brother: Jim Cannon. From our point of view, he left us all too soon. But God knew just when to bring him home.
I am thankful for the opportunity to have known Jim, and for the positive impact he had on my life. Here is the eulogy I was honored to deliver at Jim’s memorial service last December.
And here is a passage from Revelation 21 to lift our thoughts heavenward: (more…)
Update, 12/16: Part 2 is now available as well.
Rossputin performs a great service with a two-part, in-depth investigation of the “Federal corruption and cover-up in the prosecution of Cory Voorhis.” Part 1 is released this morning — for those less familiar with the story, Rossputin does a thorough job summarizing events. In addition, he introduces a lot of evidence I haven’t seen before that shows in detail how the case against Cory Voorhis was corrupted.
Excellent work all in all. And its release coinciding with the news of Stephanie Villafuerte’s withdrawn nomination for U.S. Attorney, the report is extremely fresh and timely.
One of the most tireless conservative grassroots organizers I know today received a small but certainly plum reward for his hard work. I’m talking about Matt Arnold from Clear the Bench Colorado, and the plug he received in a Valerie Richardson Washington Times article about another controversial Colorado Supreme Court decision: (more…)
As fellow RMA blogger Don Johnson also has noted, Republican Congressional candidate Ryan Frazier today announced support for his campaign from 23 key area Hispanic leaders. Many of them have made their marks as business leaders and entrepreneurs.
A good number on the list are traditional Republican partisans, such as former state party chair Bob Martinez, but there is also a little political diversity among the group. For example, according to CampaignMoney.com, Source One Management President Sal Gomez has a record of contributing money to both Democrat and Republican campaigns — his most recent giving includes Rudy Giuliani, Mark Udall, and the Salazar brothers (John and Ken).
Another Frazier-backing business leader, Diedra Garcia, won a 2008 appointment from Denver’s Democratic mayor John Hickenlooper.
Also perhaps of interest to Ryan Frazier’s newest primary opponent Lang Sias, three of the new endorsing Hispanic leaders gave significant contributions to the 2008 John McCain campaign: Madelaine Rohan, Jerry Natividad and Frank Barron.
Update, 10:15 AM: Good luck getting someone like Mr. Tidwell to confront the fallout from Climategate, including this revelation from one of the lead authors of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), who said: “The process is so flawed that the result is tantamount to fraud. As an authority, the IPCC should be consigned to the scrapheap without delay.”
In the wake of the telling Climategate revelations, it’s very interesting to see the mask come off the fanatical climate change crowd. The Denver Post ran a Sunday opinion piece by Mike Tidwell of the Chesapeake Climate Action Network that ought to make your skin crawl.
See what I mean — Tidwell writes:
Instead of continuing our faddish and counterproductive emphasis on small, voluntary actions, we should follow the example of Americans during past moral crises and work toward large-scale change.
The country’s last real moral and social revolution was set in motion by the civil rights movement. And in the 1960s, civil rights activists didn’t ask bigoted Southern governors and sheriffs to consider “10 Ways to Go Integrated” at their convenience. [emphasis added]
A moral crisis compared to the entrenched evils of Jim Crow laws and segregation? I have no qualms in calling climate change fanatics like Tidwell the greatest moral idiots of our time. (more…)
Over at Red State, Erick Erickson outlines what Senate Republicans should be doing right now and in the coming days to slow down the anti-liberty Obama Care beast opposed by most Americans.
Among many others, Erick makes this salient point:
If the Republicans want the news media to cover what they are doing to educate the American people even further about the atrociousness of this bill, they have to create drama on the floor of the Senate.
The national Republican party is flirting dangerously with proving itself an entirely ineffectual ally of liberty and limited government. If they can’t fight the government health care takeover with all they have now, how can they be trusted in any meaningful way as fellow Guards of our future security?
Let it be known that we are paying attention. And a national Republican Party that would callously take for granted the votes of fiscal conservatives and friends of liberty at this most desperate hour will prove itself unworthy of loyal support.
So … WAKE UP!!!
So you’re not convinced that the new Harry Reid Senate health care “compromise” is bad news for your health care freedom and the nation’s fiscal sanity? Need a reason to show up during lunchtime next Tuesday, December 15, at the Code Red Health Care rally in your city, and speak your mind to our U.S. Senators Mark Udall and Michael Bennet?
How about the fact that, as Red State’s Brian Faughnan reports, the “compromise” was crafted by none other than Howard Dean with the belief that it will strengthen bureaucracy and lead more people into single-payer government health care? Yeah, I thought that would wake you up — if you’re not already.
Meanwhile, Michael Barone breaks down what it will take for the Democrats to cram through a bill in the Senate that will also be acceptable to Democrats in the House. Bottom line: The fight isn’t over yet. Make your voice heard for liberty now, and for taking our Congress back from the fools and knaves currently in charge.
Rocky Mountain Right brings our attention to an important story from another part of Colorado that sharply undermines one of the prevailing pieces of accepted wisdom among certain Republican elites in our state. From the Steamboat Pilot and Today, about the three-way Republican primary in Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District:
“You may not actually, for the most part, be able to slip a piece of paper between what any of us are going to be standing for, with the Republican candidates,” [state Rep. Scott] Tipton said last week. “I will not delineate differences between myself and them. … I’m not running against them, I’m running against John Salazar, and we’ll let the voters decide who should carry the banner.”
[Bob] McConnell echoed that sentiment Sunday.
“The policy differences are minimal — we, along with Martin Beeson, are all good conservative Republicans,” McConnell said about himself and Tipton. “I’ve told Martin and Scott, ‘I’m not running against you, I’m running with you.’ We will let the people of Colorado decide.”
You mean … you can have a competitive intraparty primary AND unity? Who’d have thought they weren’t mutually exclusive? As RMR aptly puts it:
This just goes to show that maybe Republicans really can unify when there are no efforts to maliciously sabotage primaries to prematurely end them or to run a campaign entirely out of Washington D.C. over the wishes of local activists.
So why did I simply re-post RMR’s link and observation? To show a little unity, don’t you know….
Ever the libertarian wit, Denver Post columnist David Harsanyi highlights some “lessons in capitalism” based on a new USA Today investigation that finds safer meat at your local fast-food restaurant than in the government’s National School Lunch Program for poorer students.
“Doesn’t the USDA care about the children?” Harsanyi asks with more than a hint of sarcasm.
Seeing his thoughts in writing made me think: Perhaps we should be giving poorer students vouchers to buy Happy Meals for school lunches? I don’t know about the value of such an idea as a practical policy prescription. However, the mere fact I’m bringing it up might make some heads spin in the USDA office on the floor below the Independence Institute where I work.
Let’s see if anyone comes storming upstairs after this is posted ….
Update, 9:50 AM: The Patient Power Now blog presents more explanation why the new Harry Reid “compromise” is a bad deal.
So the big news from Capitol Hill is that Democrat leaders in Congress have ditched the “public option” — which means we can claim some small victory, right? WRONG. What’s the matter with the Democrats’ new “compromise” deal on so-called health care reform? Keep on reading…. (more…)
Two quick updates from the Republican primary campaign trail in Colorado’s increasingly competitive 7th Congressional District. First, an unsurprising big-name endorsement for newcomer Lang Sias from U.S. Senator and 2008 GOP presidential nominee John McCain. I’m not sure how much that excites the Republican base locally.
Meanwhile, Ryan Frazier — who has managed to garner a much longer list of local endorsements — sent out a challenge to sitting Democrat Rep. Ed Perlmutter on Harry Reid’s outrageous public comments:
“Congressman Perlmutter owes it to the citizens of the 7th Congressional District to repudiate the incredibly hurtful statements made by Democrat Harry Reid and his intentional distortion of history.
“Let me be clear: When Harry Reid compares Republicans to slaveholders, he insults me and every other African American who has spent so many years attempting to put the horrors of slavery behind us….
Democrats must be so proud to have Harry Reid as a leader of their party.
Also, Don Johnson reports that this morning, to a crowd of over 100 at the Arapahoe County Republican Men’s Club, Frazier went after Ed Perlmutter for “voting with the San Francisco liberal Speaker Nancy Pelosi 97% of the time.”
As promised, last week the state senate; this week the state house. Currently, the Democrats own the chamber by a 38-27 advantage. It’s a fairly safe bet that the Republicans will have more representatives than 27 come 2011. But winning back the majority will be a tough challenge, so just how many can they win?
All 65 seats are up every two-year cycle, and a lot of jockeying can still be expected to take place. Of current Republican-held seats, the only truly vulnerable one belongs to one-term incumbent Kevin Priola (HD 30, Adams County). On the other hand, based on voter registrations and incumbent strength, here are what I see as the dozen Democrat seats that are potential pick-ups — as you’ll see, some likelier than others: (more…)
I’ve pointed out before the lack of transparency in the Obama administration’s Labor Department. But this new Associated Press story about so-called Obama transparency takes the cake with a new level of irony:
It’s hardly the image of transparency the Obama administration wants to project: A workshop on government openness is closed to the public.
Political cartoonists are probably already putting pen to paper now to mock this amazing self-parody. Imagine the scene:
Citizen: Hi, I’ve come for the meeting on open government. Is this the right place?
Security guard: Where’s your invitation?
Citizen: I, uh… W-what? This is about open government, right?
Security guard: Right. Which is why President Obama says it’s too important to let in just anyone….
