"Happy to come back to Michigan, but I miss the mountains!"
Raising concerns among many independent Internet entrepreneurs, a legislative bill to impose sales tax collection on many online retailers was sent back to the drawing board Wednesday. …Read the rest of my article at Watchdog Wire Colorado…. … [Read more...]
From the Independence Institute Amy Oliver Show: Teacher Tenure and a Tale of Two Court Cases (Podcast) HB 1262 Incentive to Reform Educator Pay Certainly Has Caught My Attention (Ed Is Watching) A Beautiful Day to Celebrate Coming Major School Choice Victory in Mississippi (Ed Is Watching) Finished One Good(read) Book This Week Humility: An Unlikely Biography of America's Greatest Virtue by David J. Bobb: I picked up the book because of the author's Hillsdale College connection and my own acquaintance with him during my freshman year. Largely familiar with the stories of the five profiled American leaders, I nonetheless found the virtuous thread binding it together to be worthwhile and edifying. Top Social Media Links of the … [Read more...]
I offered recorded commentary for an American Family Radio News syndicated report on the Colorado Education Association's legal and legislative challenge of the state's 2010 tenure reform. More from the Independence Institute Amy Oliver Show: Task Force Looks at Policy Answers for Online Learning (Podcast) Will President Obama Set Record Straight on How School Choice Has Helped Kids? (Ed Is Watching) Open Negotiations in Jeffco Schools? That Old Momentum Looks Like It’s Back (Ed Is Watching) Finished One Good(read) Book This Week Means of Ascent (The Years of Lyndon Johnson #2) by Robert A. Caro: If you have a sensitive moral conscience, you also will need a hard stomach. But this second installment in Caro's intensely … [Read more...]
Colorado Democrats couldn’t wait until National School Choice Week to kill the latest education tax credit proposal. On Wednesday, January 22, a 3-2 party-line committee vote marked the end for Senate Bill 33 — a proposal to create a limited tax credit for private school tuition or home school expenses. Tax credits provide a stronger financial incentive by removing the specified amount paid on qualifying expenses from a person’s tax liability. …Read the rest of my article at Watchdog Wire Colorado…. … [Read more...]
Imagine sitting down to write a term paper or thesis, then releasing the first draft of the paper not only to your professor but to a worldwide audience. Now imagine your paper contains instructions for allocating billions of tax dollars to a bunch of different groups. You can start to understand what Colorado state senator Michael Johnston (D-Denver) feels like after releasing a draft of legislation to rewrite the state's 19-year-old School Finance Act. In the funny game of democratic politics, is it better to make a bold push in one direction, or to try to bring diverse interests together around a "Grand Bargain"? When it comes to Johnston's monumental effort, the question is being played out before our eyes. The idea is to tie "bold" … [Read more...]
Three of the five Board seats for Colorado's largest school district are up for grabs in 2013. One of them is just inviting a challenge. Jeffco school board director Paula Noonan made local headlines for displaying a serious bout of bad judgment:Jeffco school board member Paula Noonan was arrested during a traffic stop Jan. 8 when Denver police officers became aware of an outstanding warrant from a 2011 traffic ticket. Noonan's arrest was not the first occasion during the term of the school board's First Vice President in which she has drawn media scrutiny for irresponsible behavior. Local TV news covered her controversial 2010 Dakota Ridge High School commencement speech, with one parent describing it as "a rambling, self-absorbed … [Read more...]
Conservatives have plenty of reason to mope in the fiscal gloom these days, maybe even enough to indulge in a bit of dark humor. That brings us to the Colorado political junkie joke of the week, the first of 2013: "How bad was the fiscal cliff deal Congress approved?" "I don't know. How bad was it?" "The fiscal cliff deal was so bad that Michael Bennet couldn't even vote for it." The serious question, though, that follows Congress' pathetic kicking-the-can-down-the-road exercise -- which strangely divided Colorado's Democratic tag-team duo in the U.S. Senate -- is whether Colorado Senator Michael Bennet's dissent may have set the stage for Republicans to start taking a necessary hard line on the next tough issue around the bend. … [Read more...]
The 19th century American individualist Ralph Waldo Emerson once famously declared, "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds." This coming legislative session might just give teachers union leaders a chance to confront their own hobgoblin -- choosing whether to embrace it or banish it far away. Rumors persist that the American Federation of Teachers wants to inflict legislative revenge on the bold Douglas County school board. In exchange for having their monopoly bargaining status and political dues collection revoked, they apparently are tempted to advance a bill that would impose some sort of bargaining requirement on local school boards. To succumb to the temptation would place their Colorado Education Association (CEA) … [Read more...]
Last week, as the honored recipient of the 2012 Kemp Leadership Award, Florida U.S. Senator Marco Rubio laid out a vision for parent-empowered education reform. On one point especially, Coloradans should take heed. When a Republican politician speaks competently, compassionately and courageously about real education reform, my ears perk up. When that politician happens to be hailed as one of the GOP's top contenders for the national ticket in 2016, I also smile optimistically. Rubio framed the education message in his D.C. award acceptance speech around the goal of opening wide the doors to America's middle class. A linchpin is his bold proposal to expand educational choice at the federal level in a way that has not really been … [Read more...]
Earlier this week I told you that it looked like Right-to-Work legislation was coming to the Big Labor stronghold of Michigan. And has it ever come quickly! Some of Wisconsin's early 2011 scenes played out yesterday at the State Capitol, as protestors thronged and chanted favorites like, "A people united will never be defeated!" and "Hey hey, ho ho, Right-to-Work has got to go!" News outlets report that Michigan State Police arrested eight people trying to break into legislative chambers as the state senate gave preliminary approval to send the workplace freedom measure on to supportive Governor Rick Snyder. (When similar legislation is introduced here in Colorado in 2013, the reaction almost certainly will be much more quiet... and … [Read more...]