25 thoughts on “Thursday Open Thread”

1. Disturbing that the Denver Post had no mention of the Everett/RMGO attempt to skirt around the rules in the House in order to repeal High Capacity Magazines.

   I didn’t even see coverage in the Post (at least the print edition) on the fate of the gun bills in the committee hearings. 

   Apparently, all the Post is now is full-page furniture/mattress and hearing aid ads.  News and balanced commentary are but minor inconveniences to its mission.

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   1. I was a little surprised by that too. Then it occurred to me that it’s the Denver Post so the mystery was solved. 

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      1. “Excellent,Holmes” I shall call this episode the Dog that didn’t bark” (Dr. Watson) lol

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2. The Colorado Court of Appeals issued its opinion in Weisfield v. City of Arvada on Thursday, April 9, 2015.

   Lack of Standing—Secret Ballots and Open Meetings Law.

   This case concerned the use of secret ballots by Arvada’s mayor and city council members to fill a vacancy on the council for Arvada District 1. Plaintiff is a resident of that district. Defendants Mayor Williams and council members Dyer, Fifer, Allard, Marriot, and McGoff participated in the vote, and defendant Marks was selected to fill the vacancy.

   After proper notice, a special meeting was held by city council on January 10, 2014 to select among five candidates for the vacancy. The meeting was recorded and televised. The council conducted four rounds of secret ballot voting in which candidates were eliminated if they didn’t receive a sufficient number of votes. Total votes were reported after each round, but it was not reported who voted for which candidates. At the end of the process, Marks was the only remaining candidate. The council then held an open vote in which they unanimously elected Marks.

   Plaintiff sued, alleging that the use of secret ballots violated Colorado’s Open Meetings Law. Defendants moved to dismiss. The trial court granted the motion, holding that plaintiff lacked standing because he failed to allege an injury in fact to a legally protected interest.

   The Court of Appeals reversed. The Open Meetings Law explicitly prohibits the use of secret ballots and provides that “any citizen of this state” may enforce the Open Meetings Law in Colorado courts. Plaintiff had a legally protected interest in having the city council fill its vacancy in an open manner in compliance with the Open Meetings Law. He also sufficiently alleged an injury in fact to this legally protected interest. He is a citizen of Colorado and a resident of Arvada District 1. As a direct result of the alleged violation, plaintiff did not know how each council member voted during the process of selecting the new council member who now represents him. The case was remanded for further proceedings, including the district court’s consideration of the alleged grounds for dismissal asserted in defendants’ motion to dismiss under CRCP 12(b)(5).

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   1. Nice attempt to circumvent the Open Meetings Law, but Fail.

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3. The sad, and one can hope, short, legacy of Senator Michael Bennet the Green, who Co-Sponsored this bill, builds:

   Negotiators for Iran and six major powers are trying to ensure Iran does not acquire an atomic bomb by securing an agreement by June 30 under which Iran would curb its nuclear program in exchange for relief from international sanctions.

   “If I were an Iranian negotiator, I would walk into that room and say ‘you told us all along you were going to stop legislation,'” said Richard Nephew, a former U.S. negotiator with Iran now at Columbia University.

   “‘How can you guarantee us that we’re not going to have this problem when we bring the deal forth?'”

   “Will it be fatal? No,” he added. “It’s going to make things a lot harder, a lot more complicated, a lot more difficult for the (U.S.) negotiating side.”

   Basically, Democrats stabbed him in the back and it’s fairly obvious they did it under pressure from outside groups who want to scuttle this nuclear arms deal.

   They surely will say that it’s because they think that it’s important that congress preserve its prerogatives but congress has never before insisted on announcing its prerogatives in advance of agreements such as these and it’s bullshit anyway. This is a nuclear arms agreement the success of which could prevent WWIII. Are their prerogatives are more important than that?

   The president caved on this because a big Senate spectacle was the last thing they needed. And the truth is that the bill doesn’t seem affect the agreement substantially.

   But it makes the negotiations harder for no good reason.

   Bennet is representing Colorado by siding with Republican Warmongers how?

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   1. Cheer up.  His term ends in another 19 months.

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      1. And then what? Coffman?  Out of the frying pan….

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         1. Some say that we are better off having a real Republican than a DINO voting with the GOP.

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            1. The some who say have strange memories.

               Senator Buck would have defeated ACA. Whoops , 12 million more unissued Americans, big insurance running 50% margins, no fix to Medicare.

               Rs vote for anti- choice federal judges.

               Ds vote to de-privatize student loans.

               i could go on (and on) but the suggestions that it doesn’t matter and that a far left D has a chance statwide give me migraines. thanks, Obama.

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            2. Some are wrong because there are still many important issues on which Bennet votes the way we would want him to. Further increasing the R majority can’t possibly be better. Not on LGBT rights, voters rights, workers rights, women’s rights, environmental issues, minority issues, immigration issues, and a host of others. I agree it’s frustrating but I’m not ready to say that Coffman and another R in the Senate wouldn’t be worse. It would be. If Bennet was also a social conservative, I’d agree.

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   2. Cheer up – it’s not all that.

      No. Committee’s passage of review bill is NOT a setback for a deal limiting Iran’s nuclear program

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4. I preferred Disraeli’s advice, “Never apologize, never explain.”

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   1. That must be in the TV meteorologists’ oath or something because it can be 70 and sunny on a day they forecast for a blizzard as of the night before and they never so much as mention the bad forecast much less apologize or explain. Is it like their Hippocratic Oath?

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5. Turns out  reserve Sheriffs deputy Bate’s (Tulsa’s lethal Barney Fife) supervisors were ordered to falsify his training records to show he received training he never actually received. Why am I not surprised? Because we spent the worst three years of our lives in Oklahoma for job reasons in the early 80s when it seemed like every county commissioner was under indictment at the same time. Well. it wasn’t every one. Just a bunch in each of 60 out of 77 counties. This charming bible belt solid red state had corruption levels that would put Illinois and New Jersey to shame and, oh yeah, one of the nations highest divorce rates. Good solid conservative Republican Christians all, though. Not like them east and west coast depraved blue staters who aren’t real Americans. No Sir.  

    The commissioner probe ended in early 1984 with more than 230 convictions or guilty pleas. “Okscam,” as it became known, netted convictions in 60 of Oklahoma’s 77 counties. Those convicted included 110 sitting county commissioners and numerous other prior office-holders and contractors.

   http://newsok.com/remembering-scandals-as-political-fraud-claims-linger/article/3147194

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6. Denver Post also had nothing in coverage of the defeat of the 6 gun bills on Monday.

   Bird cage liner?

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   1. Not if you want your bird to have a basic grasp of current events.

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      1. Snerk.

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7. CNN is reporting that the only remaining white RINO (rhino) is now under 24-hour guard as they hope he will make with one of two remaining females. Looks like the Tea Party’s purification of the GOP is nearly complete.

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8. 

   TN lawmakers to Feds: Give us funds for Medicaid expansion, just not Obamacare money

   http://www.bizjournals.com/nashville/blog/2015/04/tn-lawmakers-to-feds-give-us-funds-for-medicaid.html

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9. See!  Republicans will always stand by their deeply held principles and will defend our children’s futures by cutting the deficit no matter what those big-spending libs try to do!  

   They told us they have refudiated the Bush/Cheney big deficit years!  Here’s the proof:

   The House of Representatives voted Thursday to give a tax break worth $269 billion to the richest few thousand estates in the country, and add that cost to the federal debt.

   Oh, wait… I think they even called it the Paris Hilton Welfare Act.  You know, the truly needy, unlike those low income layabouts that don’t attend the latest Broadway premieres wearing the latest fashions and get their pictures all over social media and the entertainment shows!

   http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/16/estate-tax-house_n_7079744.html

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   1. The soul of the Republican party is laid bare for all to see…

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10. This is funny: Colorado Republican Party invites Log Cabin Republicans to share their booth at the Western Conservative Summit. John Andrews is okay with that since it’s “not an official presence”.

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    1. but there will be practicing sodomites at Andrews’ gathering……and some no longer need to practice since they’ve gotten good at it.

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11. Denver “2015” Auditors Election

      O’Brien was approved by the Colorado Legislator to be the State Auditor 12 years. He has guided a large department of people to conduct 750 State audits. Saving the state $200,000,000. He has been a licensed CPA in the state since 1974.  Look at his web site, seeing all of these facts, O’Brien has the leadership and experience for the best auditor for our city.                                                                                                                                   I don’t see any Auditing or Accounting experience in the background of Nevitt.He keeps saying “none of the others have”.  Noting Nevitt has been on the City Council for 8 years, how can he conduct an audit of the Council with out it being a conflict of interest? He has accepted money from devlopers that are chosen by the Council.   

      Watching the two debates, Nevitt stumbles his way with his answers to the questions. He clearly has no idea how to run this office.

      Mr. O’Brien is also running as an Independent.

    – See more at: http://coloradopols.com/diary/70073/wednesday-open-thread-108#sthash.GaG6SvQX.dpuf

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