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Choice Media TV Tells Douglas County Voucher Story: Spread Hopeful Word

What a week. It may be just enough to motivate me to get this blog back running in full gear. Sorry to disappoint some of you. My election night fresh analysis post got some attention, then Michelle Malkin cited some earlier work I had done on Prop 103 and education funding. Today, it gets better (or maybe worse, depending on your perspective), as my mug is featured in an excellent 8-minute Choice Media TV video feature about the Douglas County Choice Scholarship Program: You certainly don't need to watch it for my sake, but please watch it to help keep hope alive... and spread the word. Why? As I wrote in an in-depth post-election analysis for Ed News Colorado, the message has been sent that it's time to do something different, more … [Read more...]

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Colorado Prop 103: Weak Case for Tax Hike’s Job-Killing “Domino” Effect

Update, 11/2: Welcome, Michelle Malkin readers... Thanks for the link! Colorado has one issue on the statewide ballot this year: Proposition 103, a large tax hike sold as a way to increase revenues for K-12 and higher education. Unfortunately, there are two major problems with this proposal that render it unworthy of support. First, it's a job-killer that very well could prolong and deepen our state's current recession. An Independence Institute issue paper by Dr. Barry Poulson finds that more than 11,000 jobs will be killed, a devastating analysis of the Prop 103 "domino" effect most creatively expressed in this amazing 3-minute video: Second, the case for more K-12 education funding rests on a very weak foundation that lacks … [Read more...]

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Colorado Child Stars Win Power Line 7th Place for Portraying Fiscal Abuse

As the ominous debt ceiling deadline approaches, the release of the winners of the Power Line Prize contest ("$100,000 will be awarded to whoever can most effectively and creatively dramatize the significance of the federal debt crisis") could not have been better timed. While prominent bloggers are helping the Power Line crew count down the top entries, I have a very special and personal attachment to the 7th place winner, released today: I'm heavily biased (take time to read the brief credits), so I'm really curious to see what six entries could have finished ahead of this "Fiscal Child Abuse" video masterpiece. Maybe the girls are so cute that they somehow downplay the gravity of the message? I don't buy it, but that's the only … [Read more...]

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Nate Oakley Makes Case for Douglas County Colorado School Vouchers

In my official capacity at the Independence Institute, I helped to create this newly-released video (narration by Mary MacFarlane, editing and production by Justin Longo, consulting and oversight by Jon Caldara and Pam Benigno): As my juvenile alter ego at Ed Is Watching pointed out:...it’s a story like 13-year-old Nate Oakley’s that brings to life the need for Douglas County vouchers, and the real threat created by lawsuits filed by the ACLU and other groups. Find all the resources you'll need to follow the developments and ins-and-outs of the Douglas County Pilot Choice Scholarship Program on the Education Policy Center website. … [Read more...]

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Seeking Transparency in Jeffco Teachers Union Negotiations

Update IV, 5:15 PM: For the record and for the sake of full disclosure -- yes, the information related to open negotiations that I have requested from Jeffco Public Schools has been done in my professional capacity as a senior policy analyst for the Independence Institute. My personal and professional opinions happen to be in very close harmony on this issue. And both versions of the recording -- the low-quality one I deleted and the higher-quality one linked just below -- came from a concerned citizen who attended and recorded the public meeting. Thankfully, because the district's recording of the relevant part of the meeting was not posted due to the aforementioned "system error." Update III, 3:40 PM: I have obtained a better 5-minute … [Read more...]

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Irony, Hypocrisy (and Independence?) in Lefties’ Anti-Koch Brother Campaign

Update, 9:00 PM: Common Cause issued a formal "apology" for the vile behavior of its rally attendees, a statement thoroughly deconstructed by James Taranto, who concludes with the zinger: "For the sake of truth in advertising, Common Cause should change its name to Hypocrisy Hub." Ouch. That's going to leave a mark. Independent new media journalist Christian Hartsock has a compelling piece up at Andrew Breitbart's Big Government blog. Hartsock went to cover an event sponsored by the Progressive group Common Cause. The goal seemingly was to organize a grassroots protest of the pro-free market billionaire Koch Brothers and conservative U.S. Supreme Court justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas for some imaginary collusion on the … [Read more...]

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Surprise, Surprise: John Hickenlooper Calls Todd Shepherd On 850 KOA

Kudos to my friend and colleague Todd Shepherd (of Complete Colorado fame) for catching a surprise exclusive live interview with Colorado's new governor. In the middle of hosting the Sunday afternoon show on 850 KOA, Todd's jaw hit the floor when none other than John Hickenlooper heard his name being discussed and called in to the show while en route from Pueblo to an event in Colorado Springs. Click here for the full hour's audio: the Hickenlooper call starts about halfway through (not to be completely overshadowed is Todd's discussion with Colorado RNC committeeman and former state treasurer Mark Hillman at the top of the hour). Todd took a few minutes to get the softballs out of the way. But then he went to work with a series of … [Read more...]

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Twenty-Eleven Means I’m Back

The New Year has arrived, and my long hiatus from serious blogging is over. For any blogger, a long hiatus can be a dangerous proposition -- threatening the already tenuously small readership and helping people to forget about you. Look, many of you already were going to forget about me anyway over the Christmas / New Year holiday anyway. And having blogged here for nearly seven years (can you believe that?), I felt secure enough to take the time off. But one major reason for the break was to gear up mentally and spiritually for the battles that lie ahead. Contributing to all the apparently positive gains in the 2010 elections, in Congress and elsewhere? That took some effort, to be sure. The real challenge lies ahead, however -- among … [Read more...]