From today's Denver Post:President Barack Obama has nominated Stephanie Villafuerte to be Colorado's next U.S. Attorney. Villafuerte, currently deputy chief of staff to Gov. Bill Ritter, previously served as Denver's chief deputy district attorney. She worked on Ritter's campaign and has focused on community outreach as his deputy chief of staff. [emphasis added] Remember Stephanie Villafuerte? Still scratching your head? While with Ritter's 2006 gubernatorial campaign, she worked with the Denver DA's office as they accessed the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) database to go after Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent Cory Voorhis. The Colorado Bureau of Investigation went after Cory Voorhis for accessing the … [Read more...]
Covering Government Health Care Stories North of the Border
Some of my Independence Institute colleagues have taken the show north of the border, organizing a conference to introduce journalists to the real-life stories of Canadians adversely affected by their government health care system's painfully long waiting lists. Great coverage in the Los Angeles Times (shock!) and Washington Times. For more, the prolific Gateway Pundit has been live-blogging the event -- he also has conducted a compelling video interview (or two) of Canadian health care horror stories. … [Read more...]
The Deadline Approaches: Time to Send a Message with Your Money
We're two days away from the close of the political fundraising quarter. And maybe you've been getting harassed by the same amount of emails and other contacts as I have, urging you to give before the next reports come out. But I'll repeat it, too: If you have a clear favorite in one or more of Colorado's Republican primary races or you just want to tell the NRSC and Washington bigwigs to take a hike, nothing sends a message like a campaign donation. If you're like me, you aren't going to come close to making the max contribution ($1,050 for governor and other statewide races, or $4,800 for U.S. House and U.S. Senate). But if you want to earn the right to complain, you ought to put your money where your mouth is. A multitude of 10 … [Read more...]
Beneath Surface of Sept. Survey: Josh Penry’s Biggest Gains with Older Voters
For those who wish to dig a little deeper, today (at the end of this post) we release some more analysis of the results of our September survey of Colorado's political temperature. A few highlights -- in no particular order: The biggest gains fueling Josh Penry's surge in the latest poll come among those in the over-50 age group Of the eight candidates in the governor's and U.S. Senate races who received at least 10 votes of support, five are favored most often because of agreement on key issues, while three were primarily chosen for their past record -- none of the other five options registered as the main factor for support No surprises: Significantly more Ryan Frazier and Ken Buck backers think primaries are good and that national … [Read more...]
Colorado GOP Straw Poll Analysis: Depends on the Definition of “Clobber”
From the Department of Bad Headlines comes yesterday's Grand Junction Sentinel piece: "Penry, Norton clobber field in GOP straw poll". Yes, by winning nearly 80 percent of the vote, Josh Penry clobbered Evergreen businessman Dan Maes and no-show Scott McInnis -- earning nearly 8 times as many votes as his nearest competitor. But Jane Norton -- backed by Washington, D.C., powerbrokers and touted by the Denver Post as a campaign "game-changer" -- flexed her high-powered campaign machine to win just 34 percent of the vote and best her rivals Ryan Frazier and Ken Buck by only 25 votes. Clobbered? Hmmm, not exactly. Another example that new media often is more on top of its game, better understanding and interpreting political news than … [Read more...]
“It’s Too Hard”: Democrats Shoving Health Care Takeover Down our Throats
You can almost hear Democratic Senator Max Baucus pouting in a high-pitched, whiny voice: "It's too ha-ard...." What, you ask, is too hard for one of the 100 most powerful people in Washington DC, who supposedly represents the people of the great state of Montana, and nearly all of his Democratic colleagues on the Senate Finance Committee? From yesterday's Washington Examiner:A proposal by Sen. Jim Bunning, R-Ky., that would have required the Senate Finance Committee to post the final language of the $900 billion health care reform bill, as well as a Congressional Budget Office cost analysis, on the committee’s website for 72 hours prior to a vote was rejected 12-11.... Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., himself admitted that “This … [Read more...]
On Air This Sunday to Discuss Survey of Colorado’s Political Temperature
Those of you in the Denver metro area (or perhaps chained to the Internet) who are bored this weekend can listen to a pre-recorded conversation as I talk to Brad Jones on Face The State weekend radio about the recent surveys of Colorado's political temperature co-created by El Presidente. Tune in on Sunday either at 5:30 AM or 12:30 PM to AM 710 KNUS for the on-air conversation. If you miss it, I'll post a link to the podcast later. … [Read more...]
McInnis-Norton Think Tank Comes to Life with Bizarre, Irony-Rich Poll
Update, 9/25: From this morning's Denver Post: Sean Tonner said CPI "is not for elections" and "is going to be here long past 2010." However, Tonner has a long track record of working on elections, and CPI has absolutely no track record as an independent organization. So despite the obvious explanation that there's no formal relationship between CPI and these campaigns, the claim is dubious. Gulp -- I even agree with the Dead Guvs on this one. I'd been wondering when the new Colorado Policy Institute (CPI) would come to life and do something. So what did they finally do today? Publish a white paper? None of those yet. Post an item or two on their "Issues" page? Nope, still waiting for that to happen. One more guess, readers.... CPI … [Read more...]
Is Obama Striving to Make Jimmy Carter Look Good on Foreign Policy?
I spend very little time on this page analyzing foreign affairs, but I just want to take the chance to go on the record now before returning to my regularly scheduled blogging on state and national domestic policy and politics.... For those who believe America primarily has been a force for evil in the world and should kowtow to foreign dictators, leave no doubt Barack Obama is your man. It's hard to find any rationale for yesterday's pathetic U.N. speech, other than Obama might be trying to build up former president Jimmy Carter's self-esteem or that possibly he's trying to rewrite history to make Woodrow Wilson look like a foreign policy realist. If Obama believes what he said, it's scary about where he wants to take our nation. If … [Read more...]
‘Serious Fact-Checking’ and Serious Obama-MSM Irony: Toledo Edition
Who knew the fawning love affair between the old guard media and President Obama could produce such irony? Toledo's top blogger Maggie Thurber documents how in the same interview her local newspaper quoted Obama as being concerned about the blogosphere for having "no serious fact-checking", while failing to fact-check exaggerations and distortions from Obama. People who believe everything they read in the newspapers as the standard of gospel truth deserve pity. People who uncritically accept Obama's statements on important issues of the day as factual betray their own painful naivete. People who read a newspaper's interview of Obama without raising an eyebrow of suspicion...? Judge for yourselves. Thanks, Maggie (and thousands of … [Read more...]
- « Previous Page
- 1
- …
- 23
- 24
- 25
- 26
- 27
- …
- 94
- Next Page »