Wadhams: By-law change a false rumor started by Maes supporters

by Rossputin | 4:35 pm, September 7, 2010

I just received the following e-mail from Colorado GOP Chairman Dick Wadhams…

Islamic Triumphalism: Cruel Lessons From History for New York City -Part I

by El Marco | 4:35 pm, September 7, 2010

The Center for Security Policy recently produced a powerful 1-minute video opposing the construction of the 13-story, $100 million mega-mosque near the site of the World Trade Center. The Twin Towers were destroyed on 9/11 by adherents to the supremaci…

Legal challenge filed against Tancredo candidacy

by Rossputin | 4:00 pm, September 7, 2010

The law firm of Hale Westfall, LLP, acting on behalf of plaintiffs (and Maes supporters) Marian L. Olson and Joseph Harrington, have filed a petition and motion with the Denver District Court arguing for Tom Tancredo and his running mate, Patricia Miller, to be deemed ineligible to run as candidates of the American Constitution Party in the 2010 election.

The petition and the accompanying motion calling for “the Secretary of State to recertify the ballot for the 2010 general election to exclude the names of Defendants Thomas Tancredo and Patricia Miller as candidates for the office of Governor and Lieutenant Governor, respectively, and to advise and instruct Colorado’s 64 county clerks accordingly” are both presented below.

I’ve touched on some of the legal arguments in a prior note on these pages, but let’s go over the concept again using the language directly from the plaintiff’s motion and petition.  I’m going to simplify so I encourage those who enjoy reading legal documents, especially short ones, to read the petition and motion yourself.

First, it’s a given that Tom Tancredo (and we need not spend time discussing Patricia Miller here) was a Republican until his candidacy under the banner of the American Constitution Party.

State law says that unless the bylaws of a minor political party state otherwise, a candidate for certain offices (including Governor) can only be eligible to run on that minor party’s ticket if he…:

(b) Was registered as affiliated with the minor political party that is making the nomination, as shown in the registration books of the county clerk and recorder, no later than the first business day in January immediately preceding the general election unless otherwise provided in the constitution or bylaws of the minor political party, and

© Has not been registered as a member of a major political party at any time after the first business day of the January immediately preceding the general election for which the person was nominated, unless otherwise provided in the constitution or bylaws of the minor political party.

Then we have to look at the ACP’s bylaws, which the documents do (in part) as follows:

25. Article 11 of the ACP’s Bylaws, filed with the Colorado Secretary of State on February 1, 2009 in accordance with C.R.S. § 1-4-1301(1) and C.R.S. § 1-3-103(9)(a), states as follows (with emphasis added):

Candidates for political office shall be eligible for nomination at the state nominating convention if they are 1) registered as affiliated with the ACP for at least six months; 2) an up-to-date dues-paying member of the ACP for one year or more prior to the nominating convention; and 3) are not and have not been declared a candidate for nomination by any other party to the same office in the current election cycle.

The above requirements may be waived on an individual, case-by-case basis by a 2/3 vote of the whole membership of the Executive Committee, unless required by state statute.

Candidates who are seeking a position on the primary ballot by petition must have been registered as affiliated with the ACP for 12 months prior to the date of the state nominating convention in addition to meeting requirements 2 and 3 above.

Candidates chosen to fill post-convention vacancies must be confirmed by a majority vote of both the Candidate Search Committee and the Executive Committee.

The plaintiffs conclude from this language that the ACP may waive the affiliation and disaffiliation requirements in the case of nomination of candidates at the state nominating assembly.  That much is clearly true.

The next step provides the difficult legal questions:

First: Would it be true, as the plaintiffs argue, that the word “above”, as emphasized by the plaintiffs in the petition, means that the 2/3 vote of the ACP Executive Committee to waive the requirements is not permissible in the situation of a vacancy after the assembly or convention?

Second: Would it be true, as the plaintiffs argue, that the requirements of the first paragraph of this section of the bylaws regarding affiliation apply to a post-convention vacancy?

Or, is the implication (as I would argue if I were the ACP’s attorney) that the only qualification beyond what is required by state law and not able to be overridden by the party for a candidate to fill a  post-convention vacancy is his approval by the relevant party committees?

Similarly, do the bylaws override the disaffiliation provision of the state law?

As I said previously when the rumor of this sort of challenge came up in an article in the Maes-supporting Constitutionalist Today newspaper (which is doing itself no favors by being this deeply involved in a political race), I think this case could go either way.

I absolutely don’t discount the plaintiff’s arguments, but I don’t think they’re rock solid either.  (Keep in mind that I am not an attorney.)

If I were the ACP, I would argue that the reason the paragraph about post-convention vacancies doesn’t include a provision for overriding the affiliation and disaffiliation requirements is that those requirements are specific to candidates “eligible for nomination at the state nominating convention.” Therefore, I would argue that the votes of the relevant party committees is all that’s needed to make the candidate eligible under the party’s bylaws and therefore under state law.

This is no slam dunk for either side.  I would expect the Secretary of State to rule for Tancredo, and to argue that way in court, unless his lawyers say the plaintiff’s case is much more definitive than it seems to be.  This is because government is and should be reluctant to remove candidates from a race unless their ineligibility is clear.  Perhaps most importantly, the Secretary of State is a Democrat in a tough race against Scott Gessler and probably would think he’d earn the gratitude (and campaign contributions) of Democrats for keeping Tom Tancredo on the ballot and thereby greatly increasing the chances of a Hickenlooper governorship (not that I think Dan Maes can beat Hickenlooper in a head-to-head match-up.)

Therefore, if I had to bet, I would bet that the plaintiffs lose and Tancredo remains on the ballot.  But I wouldn’t bet a lot, especially if it ends up in front of a Republican judge.

But the problem is, as Bob Schaffer taught me, “if you’re explaining, you’re losing”.  This lawsuit will keep Tancredo explaining that he is indeed a legal and eligible candidate, which is the political equivalent of having to answer the question “have you stopped beating your wife?”

While the filing of this petition does not make me think that Dan Maes will have a chance of winning a three-way race, it does make me think that he can keep that many more waffling Republicans from switching to Tancredo, and ensuring that our next governor is John Hickenlooper.

It therefore reinforces my view that conservatives should abandon this race. Indeed, it’s probably in our interest to simply (and honestly) say that since we’re almost certain to have a leftist, radical environmentalist, big-taxing governor, it’s absolutely critical that we do everything we can to retake at least one house of the state legislature.

And let me be clear to those Maes supporters who are ridiculously saying that my take on this race somehow implies that I’m supporting Maes.  I’m not.  I used to think I could support Maes for a seat in the state legislature, but events of the past two weeks have made it so that I wouldn’t support him for anything.  It’s not just that he can’t win the governor’s race…he shouldn’t win.

Finally, I wonder if anyone’s noticed the irony that the tactic of these Maes supporters is almost exactly the tactic that Barack Obama used to win his first election in Chicago, to eliminate the competition rather than actually compete against them.

Petition to the Court arguing that Tancredo’s candidacy is illegal:

Motion requesting Secretary of State remove Tancredo from the ballot:

Support the candidates who support our values

by Al Maurer | 12:05 pm, September 7, 2010

The title was my concluding thought in my June 8 post, Tea Party Endorsements. The post was about whether Tea Party groups should endorse candidates or not. They should. That post continues to get a lot of hits. In fact, if you google the phrase that post, via the Peoples Press Collective, comes up in [...]

Support the candidates who support our values

by Al Maurer | 12:05 pm, September 7, 2010

The title was my concluding thought in my June 8 post, Tea Party Endorsements. The post was about whether Tea Party groups should endorse candidates or not. They should. That post continues to get a lot of hits. In fact, … Continue reading →

Last Chance to Speak Out – Governor’s Office seeks public comment on Colorado Supreme Court nominees before deciding

by CTBC Director | 12:00 pm, September 7, 2010

Speak Now, or Forever Hold Your Peace…
Governor Ritter has asked for public comment on the three nominees (he’ll pick one of the three) put forward by the Supreme Court Nominating Commission to replace outgoing Chief Justice Mary Mullarkey, who announced in June that she would resign rather than be held accountable by voters this November.
Send E-mails to judicial.appointments@state.co.us [...]

A Glimpse at New Schools: G.A.L.S. for Girls in Denver

by Eddie | 10:57 am, September 7, 2010

If the Denver Post can take a glimpse, so can I. Not that I am excited by the prospect of taking a glimpse at a school full of icky girls. But here goes anyway….

About 120 sixth- and seventh-grade girls who enrolled in the Girls Athletic Leadership School now inhabit the third floor of Calvary Temple, [...]

Vote for Ryan Frazier in this online poll

by Rossputin | 10:40 am, September 7, 2010

Let’s help Colorado’s own Ryan Frazier get some more nationwide attention.  Please vote for Ryan in thie “Right Klik” poll linked here:

http://www.rightklik.net/2010/09/ten-buck-fridays-september-5-10.html

More Maes supporters losing their minds

by Rossputin | 9:00 am, September 7, 2010

I received the following note on Facebook from someone mistakenly thinking I’m a supporter of Dan Maes.  I’m leaving out the name of the sender:

Subject: Urgent!!! This is bigger than Dan Maes and also about the GOP trying to by-pass the system and ignor

Everyone,
Many of you are aware that the GOP elites do not want Dan as the republican candidate because he wasn’t chosen by them, but by us the people. Tomorrow they are having a meeting to change the by-laws so that republican officials would be allowed to support any candidate from any party. They are saying that we don’t matter, that our votes don’t matter, and that what we want doesn’t matter. Just as importantly, they are saying that the average person cannot have one of their own to represent them nor can the average person become a leader.
Irene

The following has the details of tomorrows meeting and what we are doing to try and stop them.

TOMORROW – Dick Wadhams is calling an emergency statewide meeting of the GOP to change the by-laws so that they may completely circumvent the People’s voice. Did we or Did we not GET involved because we are sick and tired of being ignored and having the powers that be running the show with complete and utter disregard for the people? Whatever your current views on certain races are – you must agree that the State GOP and powers that be are hell bent on destroying the people and their ability to participate in the process. United we stand, Divided we fall.

This is a crucial time in our lives- Our founding fathers sacrificed their lives, their families and their fortunes! What are we going to do????

This is serious, I mean this is bigger than just Dan Maes. This is a takeover by the GOP. They will not listen to us. They want to by-pass the system and ignore We the People.

PLEASE come to a “PEP” Rally tomorrow at 1:30pm…..at 5950 S. Willow Drive, Greenwood Village 80111. Pease wear your Dan Maes shirts (or a RED shirt). We must not allow them to do what they are planning on doing!!!!

We need you, your voice and we need to stop the Colorado GOP!

The Colorado GOP is calling for all county chairs to meet so they can vote on changing the by-laws and request to be able to support any candidate of their choice. They are ignoring the voters and the electoral process. This is unbelievable! Dan has done nothing wrong!!!

We are meeting in Colorado Springs at the Shops at Briargate (in the far west parking lot by Starbucks) to car pool at 12:00pm. Please come join us. PLEASE!!!

We are meeting at 12 noon at the Shops at Briargate- Please forward to only Dan SUPPORTERS!

Peace, Love, and Blessings
XXXXXXX

Following is my response:

So now what, XXXXXX?  The Tea Partiers and others who correctly complained about “party trumps person”, who have recognized that blindly supporting a Republican primarily because he’s the Republican candidate has brought the nation to ruin, are supposed to get angry because some Republicans are actually coming to agree with the complaint?

Are you seriously saying they should be forced to support a candidate they think is no good?  That’s like saying all Republicans should have been forced to support John McCain, something many of us didn’t do.

And John McCain makes Dan Maes look like a guy who sticks with his positions!

Give me a break.  Dan is a TERRIBLE candidate who can’t and shouldn’t win.  He’s an accidental candidate who got here by not telling people who he really is and by the collapse of the other candidate who was never inspiring to begin with.

This may be a crucial time in our lives, but not because of Dan Maes. 

Finally, the people in the GOP who want to support someone else are NOT saying that you don’t matter or that your votes don’t matter.  They are saying that you can do that on your own dime but they don’t want to go along for the ride.  Trying to force them to support someone they deeply oppose represents your doing everything that you would complain about them doing in a parallel situation.

It’s not as if they’re trying to get Maes off the ballot or replace him as the GOP candidate at this point, since it can’t be done without Maes’ agreement, which is not forthcoming.

I completely support Wadhams’ move.  Preventing someone from supporting the candidate of his or her choice is unAmerican.  You should be ashamed for sinking to tactics which you would criticize in any other situation.

Those who supported Dan Maes should put their egos aside and recognize that they’ve made a huge mistake. They should learn from the lesson that having no qualifications for a job does not make you the best candidate for the job, even if you’re in an anti-incumbent mood.

I’m so sick of the rhetoric and tactics of Maes supporters.  I’m embarrassed for you since you apparently don’t have the sense to understand when you should be ashamed of yourself.

Struggling with the governor’s race

by Rossputin | 7:27 am, September 7, 2010

For one of the few times (or maybe the only time) in my memory, doing my radio show on Sunday may have changed my mind – or at least made up my mind – about a political issue.

To start, let me say that at this point in the race for governor, I strongly prefer Tom Tancredo to the other candidates.  John Hickenlooper is a radical environmentalist leftist-in-moderate-clothing who will preside over redistricting us (non-leftists) to death if he gets the chance.  Dan Maes is an incompetent man of too many stories and too many questions even though I think he mostly has conservative gut instincts.

Tom Tancredo is a man who means what he says and says what he means.  Even though I am not in agreement with him on the aggressiveness of his anti-immigration views (not just anti-illegal immigration), I feel that he’s a trustworthy and principled guy.  I am not at all sure he has the skill set to be the CEO of a state…but I am not sure he doesn’t have it, and I am sure Dan Maes doesn’t have it.

John Hickenlooper’s popularity outside of Denver, and his ability to increase that popularity with advertising, is quite limited, especially in an anti-Democrat year like this.

It’s not absolutely inconceivable that he could be beaten, even in a three-way race, but it would require one of the other candidates to get no more than 20% of the vote, perhaps no more than 15% of the vote.

It is inconceivable to me that Dan Maes can beat Hickenlooper in a 3-way race, which means that Tancredo has the only chance.

I went into the radio show last night thinking that with enough beating up on Dan Maes, not least by the media whom I expect to put out more negative information about him, enough conservatives and Republicans could be convinced to vote for Tancredo that Tom might have a decent shot.

And that possibility left me wondering whether it makes sense for anti-leftists of all stripes to allocate some of our limited resources, whether in terms of time or money, to Tom’s campaign to try to help him to victory.  I was leaning toward saying we should.

After Sunday’s radio show, I’m not so sure.

In particular, two of the three calls we got while I was interviewing Tancredo were people who said they were long-time fans of Tom’s.  One, an older lady, said he had always been the only politician she felt she could trust and that she gave him a hug when she met him at a Republican event some months ago.  The other caller was a gentleman who was also a long-time supporter of Tom’s.  They both said, however, that they were supporting Dan Maes for governor.

While I don’t think there are nearly enough of these people to give Dan Maes a victory, they represent precisely Tom’s electoral challenge, and I do think there probably are enough of them – people who will vote for the “R” no matter what, like yellow dog Democrats, ham sandwiches, etc. – that they could keep Tancredo from winning.  In other words, they will keep the vote split too evenly for either to win.

It was remarkable when the woman said that she thought Dan Maes was a man of integrity because of his stated views on issues. It showed a lot about how when people get emotionally involved with a candidate, their choice becomes for the next few months until the election akin to a secondary religion, not susceptible to criticism based on facts or logic.  The idea that Dan Maes must be a man of integrity because he said some right things about taxes or regulation or whatever in the face of his repeated lies or errors of omission is stunning unless viewed in the sense of someone with a religious attachment to his or her candidate.

Other supporters of Maes hitched their wagon to his horse early on and want Maes to succeed because they’ve staked their own political capital and their own hopes for moving up in GOP party hierarchy on a Maes victory.  This isn’t quite religion, but the behavior of such people is the same.  They refuse to admit that their candidate is fatally flawed, if they admit that he’s flawed at all.

The more I come to believe that many Republicans, especially those who are not political junkies like me and the readers of these pages, will just vote for the Republican in November, while many others who are paying attention (as well as quite a few independent voters) will vote for Tom Tancredo, the more I think Dan Maes will still get more than 20%, but less than 1/3 of the vote.  Hickenlooper will get 40%, and that will be the end of it.

This has a couple of ramifications for me:  First, I’m starting to think that conservatives should not spend money on this race.  People get the government they deserve.  George W Bush and Republican idiocy earned us the penalty of Barack Obama.  Scott McInnis and Dan Maes, and the supporters of both, will earn us the penalty of John Hickenlooper.  Too many voters are too stupid, too loyal, or too mind-numbed to realize that not only can’t Dan Maes win, but he shouldn’t win.

Dan Maes only won the party’s nomination because Scott McInnis was so unpalatable (even before the plagiarism scandal), and because he was a fresh face.  He has absolutely zero relevant experience.  He is sort of a blank slate upon which Tea Party activists and other political newbies (not that all Tea Party activists are rookies at this game) projected their fondest hopes and dreams.  And who does that description remind you of? (Hint: he’s President of the United States)

Sure there were some real supporters of Maes, but many Maes votes were really protest votes against McInnis.  Furthermore, the undervote in the primary was likely the cause of McInnis’ loss in that those who were supporting McInnis were more disgusted than those who were supporting Maes.  Maes is the accidental nominee.  He’s the guy who got to third base on a wild pitch and two errors and is telling people he hit a triple.

But there are enough Republican voters who will say “He would have hit a triple if the pitcher hadn’t thrown the wild pitch first” that Maes will still probably get enough GOP votes to keep Tancredo from winning while Maes himself has no chance that I can see.  The state GOP won’t help. The Republican Governors’ Association won’t help.  Most of the GOP big hitters have abandoned him.  He won’t raise even half of what Tancredo raises, and Tancredo won’t raise half of what Hickenlooper raises.

The more I think about it, the more I think this race is over and that conservatives and libertarians should focus on making sure that Ken Buck, Ryan Frazier, Scott Tipton, Cory Gardner, and a slew of state legislative candidates win.  Send your money to them. Volunteer for them. Vote for Tancredo or Jaimes Brown (Libertarian) or Jason Clark (Independent).  I’ll probably vote for one of the latter two, actually, though I haven’t decided yet other than that I  know I won’t vote for Hickenlooper or Maes.)

I really like Tom Tancredo personally. I like talking with him over a beverage.  He strikes me as the most direct politician I’ve ever known.  But he’s very controversial, even divisive, including among Republicans.  He’s not difficult to demonize from a distance, though it won’t sell with people who really know him.  The problem is not that many people really know him, and he can’t get enough people to know him in two months.

It pains me to say it, but my inclination at this point – with apologies to Tom Tancredo – is to give up on the governor’s race and do everything we can to take back a majority in at least one house of the state legislature.

Indeed, to the extent that we maintain a divisive dialog among Republicans and conservatives about the governor’s race, we damage the likely enthusiasm to contribute to, volunteer for, and fill out ballots for down-ballot races which are so critical in 2010.

It should be noted that one of the people whom I mentioned earlier in terms of supporting Maes no matter what because he’s spent his own political capital and has his own in-party hopes tied to Maes’ success has posted a note to Facebook saying that he has hired a law firm to try to get Tom Tancredo disqualified from election and to make sure “the people know that Tom Tancredo is on the ballot illegally whether or not the Colorado Secretary of State agrees.”

To me, this is a fairly disgusting move, essentially saying that even if the appropriate regulator says that Tancredo’s candidacy is absolutely legitmate, they intend to tell people it isn’t. It’s reprehensible and shows what depths people will stoop to in order to win their political battles, even if the battle is in support of the worst Republican candidate I’ve seen for major office in my several years in Colorado.

The move shows that it’s not about good government or a good candidate, but just trying to beat up another conservative even if they have to effectively lie to do it.

It’s a stark contrast to Tancredo himself: when I suggested that the dynamics of the race were such that he’d have to spend a lot more time attacking Maes than Hickenlooper, Tancredo said “I hope not” and that fighting against a Republican is “the worst part of all of this.”

Maes and his supporters, not all but too many, seem to be birds of a feather, willing to say anything to win in order to extend their already undeserved 15 minutes of fame.  Maes does not deserve the support of any voter in Colorado.  Tom Tancredo does – although he clearly has his flaws and errors as well – but the dynamics of this race are such that we are still very likely to be looking at a horrific sight of John Hickenlooper moving into the governor’s mansion.

Time for Republicans and conservatives to focus on winning races we can win while doing what we can to keep the governor’s race from opening a Referendum C-type wound within the just-healing-from-that-fiasco GOP.  As far as the punishment that deserves to be doled out to those who gave us Scott McInnis and Dan Maes, we can do that after November.

Vote your conscience.

by David K. Williams, Jr. | 6:49 am, September 7, 2010

Barring a miracle just short of a virgin birth, John Hickenlooper will be the next governor of Colorado. You do not have to be concerned with your vote “spoiling” the election and “throwing” it to a progressive Democrat. The GOP has already taken care …

Flying the American Flag in America is Offensive

by PerlStalker | 6:36 pm, September 6, 2010

The Denver Channel is reporting that a student was ordered to remove two large flags flying from his pickup because they might make other uncomfortable.

A high school student in Northglenn is upset that campus security told him to remove the large A…

Under Nanny State, We Don’t Feel Like Dancing

by Ari Armstrong | 11:25 am, September 6, 2010

The following column originally was published September 3 by Grand Junction Free Press.Under Nanny State, we don’t feel like dancingby Linn and Ari ArmstrongThe grocer looked incredulous: “What’s 3.2 beer?” While visiting New York City, your younger au…

Nominees to replace outgoing Chief Justice Mary Mullarkey on Colorado Supreme Court profiled in Denver Post (part 3)

by CTBC Director | 7:47 am, September 6, 2010

For the first time in the history of Colorado’s “merit selection and retention” process for placing and removing the occupants of judicial office, Colorado Citizens are being presented with substantive information not only on the three incumbent Colorado Supreme Court justices who will appear on the November ballot, but also on the three nominees (the governor [...]

Democrat “Triage” won’t stop their bleeding

by Rossputin | 7:36 am, September 6, 2010

Much has been made in recent days of the NY Times’ weekend story entitled “Democrats Plan Political Triage to Retain House.” The short version of the story is that the Democrats will abandon trying to help incumbents whom they think are pretty much dead in the water – the apparent poster child being Colorado’s own Betsey Markey, who was against Obamacare before she was for it, and is going to get demolished by State Rep. Cory Gardner.  They’ll take the money they would have spent on those lost causes and try to focus it on enough closer races to keep their House losses below the 40 seats the GOP needs to take back a majority.

Nancy Pelosi, who until recently has never expressed any fear of losing her gavel, is singing a different tune: “She called out Democrats who were delinquent on paying their party dues and instructed members with no re-election worries to tap into a combined $218 million from their campaign accounts to help save their majority.”

Some Republicans argue that it would be better for the GOP, especially for their prospects in the 2012 presidential election, for Democrats to keep control – but not enough of a majority to get anything done – so that Republicans can run against the image of an utterly ineffectual Democrat government.  I think that’s too clever by half.  Having control of the House brings so much power and visibility, the GOP would be crazy to even consider thinking not having it might be a good idea.

The main value, of course, is the committee chairmanship.  The party with the majority controls the committees, meaning they control what subjects become committee hearing topics and who is summoned to testify before those committees.

Imagine the value, not just political, but in terms of true education for the citizens, of hearing Donald Berwick, Obama’s socialist recess-appointee to run the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, pontificate on the virtues of British socialized medicine…which is bankrupting England while providing a far lower quality of care than we receive here.  Imagine the value of making EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson explain the radical – I would argue insane – positions her organization is taking in trying to control the nation’s economy.

And, politically, imagine the value of the GOP finally being in a position to prove that it is currently the Party of No, but not the Party of No Ideas, as the left likes to portray it.

This presumes of course that the Republicans have ideas and that they’re willing to campaign on them.  So far, few other than Paul Ryan (R-WI) have shown that courage.  But I think Ryan is leading the way toward, dare I say it, a new spirit of intellectually- and philosophically-based government, a government which can (and should) be truly based on outcomes rather than claims of good intentions.  It remains to be seen whether the GOP leadership understands that the public is ready for principle-based leadership – and that it has almost always been a success when tried.

Meanwhile the Democrats have a real problem: their own agenda and the president.  As Politico.com points out, several Democrats who voted against Obamacare are running ads trumpeting their opposition to Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi’s signature “achievement”, while not one of the 219 House Democrats who voted for the legislation is running an ad highlighting their vote or their part in destroying the quality and raising the cost of American health care.

A few political bettors have apparently read the NY Times article and think the Dems may have some success, with the chances of the Democrats keeping control of the House rising by 8%, a very large move in a short time with no “real” news.  Still, the betting still has the Democrats with just under a 1/3 chance of keeping the House, quite a remarkable thing to see given the party’s 77-seat majority.

Nancy Pelosi seems like to be encouraging her minions to spend millions of their campaign war chest dollars on hopeless races.

A little research into the history of campaign finance shows that one of the most imbalanced years in terms of various industry groups giving to Democrats more than giving to Republicans – which is what’s happened in this cycle – was the 1994 cycle.  And since money is fungible – meaning it will have the same effect, or lack of effect, whether it comes from Democrats’ campaign coffers or a trial lawyers PAC, it’s hard to see Pelosi’s efforts having much impact.  In all but the closest races, wherever a Republican is tied or in the lead in polls now, I expect the Republican to win by a wider margin than the current polls show, even if the Democrat spends 50% or 100% more money than the Republican.

A really expensive ad campaign trying to get me to buy rotten meat won’t overcome the cheap and infrequent ad campaign reminding me that no matter how that stuff is packaged, it’s still rotten.

That said, one can’t underestimate the importance of the Republicans having at least some money to respond to the Democrats packaging their rotten meat as gourmet steak tartare.  Furthermore, if the election ends up being closer than I currently expect, it’s not out of the question for several million dollars dumped into a small number of races to be the difference between a GOP and Democrat majority.  I don’t think the election will be that close, and political betting still has an over 40% chance of the Republicans taking 50 seats or more. (They need 40 to have the majority because the Dems have a 77-seat lead right now and there are two vacancies.)

One likely (and pleasing) outcome could be Democrats spending millions to defend seats they lose anyway, and then not having that money available in 2012.  If I were a relatively safe Democrat sitting on a pile of campaign cash, I’d be very worried about that outcome, especially if a strong GOP presidential contender were to arise for 2012, someone whose coattails could pose electoral danger for a Democrat who manages to skate through this cycle.  Therefore, I think Nancy Pelosi will have minimal success in her call for Democrat congressmen to spend their money helping other Democrat congressmen.  I also think her lack of fund-raising success will snow-ball, with more and more industry groups moving away from donating to Democrats, as the securities industry has done in rather spectacular fashion, going from 70% to Democrats in March, 2009 to 68% to Republicans in June of this year.

DCCC Chairman Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) and Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama are about to reap the whirlwind.  It couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of tyrants.

Nominees to replace outgoing Chief Justice Mary Mullarkey on Colorado Supreme Court profiled in Denver Post (part 2)

by CTBC Director | 9:12 am, September 5, 2010

For the first time in the history of Colorado’s “merit selection and retention” process for placing and removing the occupants of judicial office, Colorado Citizens are being presented with substantive information not only on the three incumbent Colorado Supreme Court justices who will appear on the November ballot, but also on the three nominees (the governor [...]

“Consumer protection” vs. thinking for yourself

by Brian T. Schwartz | 5:04 pm, September 4, 2010

From an article by Linn and Ari Armstrong: We have nothing against restaurants posting calorie notices, so long as they do it voluntarily in accordance with their customers’ shopping preferences. But mandatory postings violate the rights of property and voluntary association. Moreover, mandatory calorie postings insult the intelligence of shoppers. Do we really need some [...]

Cost Shifting Argument Against Amendment 63 ´Wrong And Deceptive´

by Mike Krause | 11:50 am, September 4, 2010

Over at the opinion page of the Colorado Springs Gazette, Independence Institute research associate and health care blogger Brian Schwartz exposes both the flaws and deceptions in the ¨cost-shifting¨ argument being used against Amendment 63, the ¨Right to Health Care Choice¨ citizens amendment.
While seductive at an emotional and superficial level, the ¨cost-shifting¨argument [...]

Nominees to replace outgoing Chief Justice Mary Mullarkey on Colorado Supreme Court profiled in Denver Post (part 1)

by CTBC Director | 11:11 am, September 4, 2010

For the first time in the history of Colorado’s “merit selection and retention” process for placing and removing the occupants of judicial office, Colorado Citizens are being presented with substantive information not only on the three incumbent Colorado Supreme Court justices who will appear on the November ballot, but also on the three nominees (the [...]

Save Our Tree

by Al Maurer | 10:11 am, September 4, 2010

In the field behind my house on the other side of the cattle fence were two Ponderosa pine trees infested with pine beetles. I asked the owner to cut them down; he wouldn’t. I asked the county to force him to cut them down; they couldn’t. Finally, I cut one of them down. But by [...]

Ken Buck and Dan Maes

by Rossputin | 9:00 am, September 4, 2010

I wrote the following as a comment on Ken Buck’s Facebook page in response to some who were criticizing Buck’s withdrawal of support from Dan Maes…

As many of you know, I was a supporter of Jane Norton (though not because I thought badly of Ken.)  As the campaign went on, however, I came to like Ken’s style and policy views more and more, and I’m gladly supporting him now and have contributed to his campaign. 

I called for Maes and McInnis both to get out of the governor’s race, while knowing they probably wouldn’t.  While I like Tom Tancredo personally, my preference was for a different candidate entirely, with quite a few names that would have satisfied me.

[I offer all that information as context to show that I am not an “anything Ken says” person, nor a supporter of any of the current candidates for governor, and therefore relatively neutral among politically active Republicans on these issues.]

I am very pleased with Ken’s decision to withdraw support from Dan Maes.  I’m sure it wasn’t an easy decision, but it was the right one.

Dan Maes, while probably not a bad person, is a horrendous candidate, hopelessly unqualified for the job of governor.  Every week brings a new story of a gaffe or lie.  And he hasn’t hired a campaign manager which says something about his fund-raising or his giant ego or both.

At this point, my focus is keeping conservative and libertarian voters motivated to support the good candidates who can win, including particularly Ken Buck but also Cory Gardner, Ryan Frazier, and Scott Tipton as well as the many solid Republican candidates for the state legislature.  Indeed, the state legislature could be the most important races for the state with redistricting coming up and the Maes candidacy likely to give the governorship to Hickenlooper.

Finally, I will add that although I have been leaning toward voting libertarian in the governor’s race, I am reconsidering.  If I can be convinced sometime soon that Tom Tancredo really could win this thing, I will encourage voters to support Tancredo even though I am not on the same page as he is regarding his signature issue of immigration.  (In particular, while I want to enforce our borders, I want to increase the level of legal immigration into the country.)  The governor is not someone who has much impact on federal immigration policy, and I would support a move to eliminate “sanctuary city” policies.  Tom is smart and principled, though of course he is still a politician.  Unlike most politicians, however, you can almost always guess what his position will be on an issue because he’s not shy about telling the truth, whether he thinks you want to hear it or not.  I’d rather have him than Dan Maes or John Hickenlooper.  (I’m not even sure I can honestly say I’d rather have Maes than Hickenlooper, speaking as someone who thinks we need to live through a bad government from time to time to remind people what bad government means.)

Anyway, I repeat that I am pleased with Ken Buck’s decision to withdraw support from Dan Maes.  Just because some group supported both candidates, i.e. a particular Tea Party group, that doesn’t mean the two candidates need to be joined at the hip.  Republicans need to get away from Maes as quickly as possible and move on to candidates who can win.

Backbone Radio, September 5, 2010: Of Maes, Missions and Multipliers

by Rossputin | 8:46 am, September 4, 2010

Topic 1: Maes (and the state of the 2010 election in Colorado)

Earlier this week, former Senator Hank Brown withdrew his prior endorsement of Republican gubernatorial hopeful Dan Maes. Brown was soon followed by others, not least Backbone Radio’s own former President of the State Senate and candidate for governor, John Andrews, withdrew their prior endorsements of Republican gubernatorial nominee Dan Maes.  (Other unendorsers included Ken Buck, Mike Coffman, Hear Us Now, Pete Coors, and Bob Beauprez.)

Maes, the gift who keeps on giving (to talk radio) is losing support even faster than Barack Obama is.

Nevertheless, despite intense pressure, Maes decided to stay in the race, dashing the hopes of people (like me) who had hoped beyond hope that we’d get a good last-minute replacement (I was rooting for Jane Norton.)

In our first hour, we’ll talk about the governor’s race with John Andrews, including the implications for Colorado politics on a broad scale.

Topic 2: Mulitpliers (and the cost of government)

When it comes to economic policy, the president and his advisors are full members of the Keynesian cult of big-spending lovers of government power. They only consider the cost of their beloved Nanny State to the extent that it might impact their next elections.

The cost of government is truly massive. Much more massive than most people understand. But the good people of Americans for Tax Reform are trying to remedy that educational gap with their “Cost of Government Day” project.

In the 6-o’clock hour, we’ll speak with ATR’s Mattie Corrao about the project which recently reported that “In 2010, Cost of Government Day falls on August 19. Working people must toil 231 days out of the year just to meet all costs imposed by government - 8 days later than last year and a full 32 days longer than 2008. In other words, in 2010 the cost of government consumes 63.41 percent of national income.” Colorado comes in 33^rd, with 2010’s Cost of Government Day landing on August 21^st.

The freedom of a people should, at least in part, be measured by the cost of its government. Learning just how massive this burden is on Americans is a sobering event. We can only hope that rather than lead to sadness and resignation, this sort of information encourages anger and non-violent anti-government pushback, with citizens reclaiming our republic at the ballot box and returning government, even if it takes generations to do so, to the limited scope and cost which our Founders envisioned.

The concept behind “stimulus” spending, responsible for much of the recent increase in the cost of government, is the fatally flawed idea that each dollar of government spending creates more than one dollar of economic activity. This “multiplier”, assumed by Obama and friends to be more than one, is more likely less than one and perhaps less than zero, meaning that each dollar of government spending probably creates, at best, something less than a dollar of net economic activity and perhaps actually causes a contraction of the economy as the private sector anticipates the future tax increases necessary to pay off the spending.

We’ll discuss the idea of the multiplier in some detail as it represents perhaps the most important and least well understood basis for essentially the entirety of the Democrats’ policy suggestions for helping the economy. The reality of a near-zero multiplier means that the government’s demanding more “stimulus” to pump up the faltering economy is like a medieval doctor who treats a worsening patient by taking even more blood from his veins.

Topic 3: Missions (and a president who views them as distractions.)

On Tuesday evening, President Barack Obama gave a speech from the Oval Office. While the topic of the speech was ostensibly the departure of the last American combat troops from Iraq, much of the speech was focused on the mission in Afghanistan and on the sputtering American economy.

The speech was, in usual Obama style, read from his teleprompter with very few mistakes while delivering a message almost entirely free of substance. With the word “victory” uttered only once, and that in a context of the success of “our partners”, with yet another subtle jab at George W. Bush, and with some of the most meaningless rhetoric yet used to describe the current economic situation and his counter-productive plans to improve it, Barack Obama proved again that, as others have noted, war is to him little more than a distraction on his intended path to “fundamentally transform America.”

We’ll talk about the speech, about the prospects in Afghanistan, and about the American economy.

In the 7-o’clock hour, you’ll hear this month’s installment of Backbone Business by Joshua Sharf. This month’s topic: Entrepreneurs, covered in four segments:
1 – Rolling your own: Shop-at-Home
2 – Franchising
3 – The other side of the coin: VCs
4 – Startup Culture, Startup Nation

Please join me by listening to (and calling in to) this week’s Backbone Radio program from 5 PM to 8 PM on 710 AM KNUS in Denver and 1460 AM KZNT in Colorado Springs.

If you’re not in range of the radio waves, you should be able to listen to the show online by clicking HERE.

I hope you’ll actively participate in the conversation with me: Call the studio at 303 696 1971, e-mail me at ross(at)710knus.com, or instant message from my site at http://rossputin.com or through AOL Instant messenger to screen name Rossputin.

Friday Funnies: Colorado Supreme Court promotes lawlessness

by CTBC Director | 9:33 pm, September 3, 2010

A rash of recent thefts may have been inspired by a Colorado Supreme Court ruling…
The Colorado Supreme Court’s ‘Gang of Four’ under their ringleader Chief Justice Mary Mullarkey (who’s skipping town rather than face justice in November) have gotten away with a series of crimes against our Constitution over the last few years, including:

‘Mill Levy [...]

Maes stays in; Tancredo dismisses him, challenges Hick to Mano-a-Mano debates

by Jimmy Sengenberger | 5:14 pm, September 3, 2010

In a press release sent out late this afternoon, American Constitution Party gubernatorial candidate Tom Tancredo took the unprecedented step of dismissing embattled Republican nominee Dan Maes as “no longer a viable opponent” and challenging Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper to six one-on-one debates that would not include the Maes. “Today the Secretary of State will [...]

Where would Dan Maes go?

by Rossputin | 3:35 pm, September 3, 2010

Reader “Airbus” says he thinks Maes will withdraw, but not until after the deadline “so he can stick it to the party.”

I think that’s not a bad bet, but I disagree.

My guess is that Maes stays in to the end.

At this point, it’s about his ego and his future.

Remember, he’s a very modestly successful businessman…or rather he was.  Now he’s an unemployed former re-seller of credit reports and voice mail services.

Where’s he gonna go if he drops out?

At least if he stays in, he can put a few bucks into his bank account by draining his campaign contributions via “mileage reimbursements.”

He probably thinks – and it probably would have been right a few weeks ago but no longer – that his chances of winning some other political race in the future would be damaged by dropping out.

At this point, I repeat, where’s he gonna go if he drops out?

He doesn’t have money to start a new business.  At least one former employer has said publicly that he would not re-hire Maes, not least because Maes secretly planned started a competing business while working for him.

Maes has become the butt of insults and even jokes. If I were Maes, I’d almost feel like I need to move out of the state if I don’t win the election.

Furthermore, if Maes really wants to spite the GOP, he’d be better off staying in the whole time than getting out after the ballots are certified.

What else?  It basically doesn’t cost Dan Maes anything to stay in.  He gets to extend his 15 minutes of fame while having no responsibility other than keeping track of the very small number of campaign contribution dollars he’ll receive in the future.  He hasn’t hired a campaign manager, though he does have a “communications director” (quite a decent guy whom I feel sorta sorry for at this point.)

 

I hope, for the sake of Colorado, that Dan Maes has the good sense to quit the race within the next hour.  But I doubt he will.  After all, where’s he gonna go if he does?

The ¨New Energy Economy¨A False Bill Of Goods

by Mike Krause | 2:52 pm, September 3, 2010

Over at the Denver Post, Amy Oliver-Cooke from the Independence Institute and William Yeatman from the Competetive Enterprise Institute have a teriffic co-authored op-ed on the ¨false bill of goods¨ being sold to Coloradans as part of the ¨New Energy Economy.¨ Money quote from the piece:
Up until 2007, Xcel was obligated to provide electricity at [...]

Back To Work

by Nikki | 2:49 pm, September 3, 2010

I admire Dan Maes for what he has accomplished. I admire all my fellow grass roots groups for what they have accomplished. We rose up, took the bull by the horns, taught ourselves the process and have given up countless hours to stop the destruction of our country and state. We all had to get [...]

The race to unendorse Dan Maes

by Rossputin | 2:23 pm, September 3, 2010

UPDATED as of 2 PM Friday, 3 hours before Maes can “do the right thing” or all but ensure we live through at least one term of Governor Hickenlooper.

This probably won’t last long, one way or another, but just for fun let’s keep a running track of those calling for Dan Maes to get out of the race, particularly those who had endorsed him before.  I’ll update the list as more people join the chorus:

Senator Hank Brown

State Senator John Andrews

Bob Beauprez

Pete Coors

Hear Us Now!

Erick Erickson of RedState.com

Ken Buck

Mike Coffman

Breaking: Rep. Mike Coffman to withdraw support for Dan Maes

by Rossputin | 1:41 pm, September 3, 2010

UPDATE: It’s official.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 3, 2010
CONTACT:  Debbie Brown, 720-280-0511
debbie@coffmanforcongress.com

Breaking: Coffman Withdraws Support for Maes

by T.L. James | 1:14 pm, September 3, 2010

Hot on the heels of Republican Senate candidate Ken Buck’s announcement, Rep. Mike Coffman (R-CD6) will announce shortly that he is also withdrawing his support for Colorado Governor candidate Dan Maes. Time is running out for Maes to make a decision — SoS Buescher is looking to certify the ballot by close of business today. [...]

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