December 04, 2015 01:05 PM UTC

Get More Smarter on Friday (Dec. 4)

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• by: Colorado Pols

Christmas Day is three weeks away; sorry to freak you out. It’s time to Get More Smarter with Colorado Pols. If you think we missedsomething important, please include the link in the comments below (here’s a good example).

TOP OF MIND TODAY…

► Senate Republicans have finally advanced legislation to President Obama’s desk — where it will be swiftly vetoed — that would gut Obamacare, defund Planned Parenthood for a year, and cripple Medicaid. From the Associated Press:

Openly welcoming a preordained veto, Republicans on Thursday drove to Senate passage some legislation aimed at crippling two of their favorite targets: President Barack Obama’s health care law and Planned Parenthood.

With a House rubber stamp expected in days, the bill would be the first to reach Obama’s desk demolishing his 2010 health care overhaul, one of his proudest domestic achievements, and halting federal payments to Planned Parenthood. Congress has voted dozens of times to repeal or weaken the health law and several times against Planned Parenthood’s funding, but until now Democrats thwarted Republicans from shipping the legislation to the White House.

Thursday’s vote was a near party-line 52-47. Colorado’s U.S. senators, Republican Cory Gardner and Democrat Michael Bennet, voted “yes” and “no,” respectively…

…Republicans said an Obama veto — which the White House has promised — will underscore that a GOP triumph in next year’s presidential and congressional elections would mean repeal of a statute they blame for surging medical costs and insurers abandoning some markets. They lack the two-thirds House and Senate majorities needed to override vetoes, ensuring that the bill’s chief purpose will be for campaign talking points.

In short, Congressional Republicans spent a good deal of time on legislation that will never be enacted that was only pushed through to create “campaign talking points.” Republicans felt compelled to do something that would appeal to their base — rather than doing something to deal with rising gun violence — but as we noted yesterday in a separate story, Democrats are prepared to bring the political sledgehammer down on their GOP counterparts.

IN CASE YOU ARE STANDING NEAR A WATER COOLER…

► Law enforcement officials continue to probe into potential terrorism connections in this week’s mass shooting in San Bernardino, California — though officials still think there is also a workplace argument connection as well. As the New York Times reports, there is no evidence that the San Bernardino shooters were being directed by any outside terrorist organizations, but law enforcement officials are questioning whether the couple became “self-radicalized.”

► Senator Michael Bennet (D-Denver) wants the Army to research misconduct charges given to soldiers with mental illnesses.

► Legislation intended to help fix and maintain America’s transportation infrastructure passed with broad support in the U.S. House on Thursday. Greeley Rep. Ken Buck, however, was not among those to vote YES. As the Greeley Tribune explains:

Congress on Thursday overwhelmingly approved a 5-year, $305 billion bill that boosts highway and transit spending and assures states that federal help will be available for major projects.

The bill, which provides $3.4 billion to Colorado over five years, was approved by a 359-65 vote in the House. The Senate passed the bill 83-16. Still, Rep. Ken Buck, R-Colo., a Windsor resident, joined 64 other Republicans in voting against the measure, known as the FAST Act.

“With the FAST Act, Washington, D.C., voted to continue its tight-grip on transportation spending in America,” Buck, who represents Weld County as part of the 4th Congressional District said in a news release. “I trust the commissioners in the 4th Congressional District to build a better, cheaper road than bureaucrats in Washington, D.C.” [Pols emphasis] 

The bill doesn’t include as much money or last quite as long as many lawmakers and the Obama administration would have liked. Nor does it resolve how to pay for transportation programs in the long term.

Even so, the 1,300-page bill was hailed by industry and public officials as a major accomplishment that will halt the cycle of last-minute short-term fixes that have kept the trust fund teetering on the edge of insolvency for much of the past eight years.

That’s some good logic, Rep. Buck. We don’t need no federal funding for roads and stuff — Coloradans will just build them with fairy dust and magic beans.

► State Rep. JoAnn Windholz (R-Commerce City) has become a walking sandbag for the Republican Party. Windholz continues to take heat over her absurd comments earlier this week that cast blame on the victims of the Planned Parenthood terrorist attack. Democrats are using Windholz to bludgeon other Republicans over a tepid response to last week’s attack.

► El Paso County Commissioners are wary of accepting Syrian immigrants into the Colorado Springs community…nevermind that the real threat to residents appears to be coming from violent white guys. No doubt Syrian refugees have Colorado Springs at the top of their list of places to move in the United States (insert eye roll here).

► The Colorado Supreme Court backed away quickly from making any sort of decision involving “politics” when they chose not to get involved in Gov. Hickenlooper’s legal feud with Attorney General Cynthia Coffman. But as the Denver Post reports, Thursday’s decision doesn’t mean much in terms of the broader argument:

Legal experts said they doubted the action would bring a close  to the dispute between Coffman and Hickenlooper and predicted the governor would continue to press his case in a lower court in the state.

The one-page order was posted on the Supreme Court’s website Thursday afternoon. It cited a 2003 Colorado Supreme Court ruling that stated appellate courts will not weigh in on such constitutional questions when an “adequate alternative remedy exists.”…

…”It’s a little disappointing; we were hoping they could just cut to the chase,” Hickenlooper said of the high court. “But they are the authority. … Now we just have to decide if District Court is the right place to go.”

► A group of Colorado politicians and activists are pushing the idea of asking for state funding to help grow local recycling programs in the state.

► Famous rich person and GOP Presidential candidate Donald Trump now has the support of more than 1 in 3 Republican voters, according to a new CNN/ORC poll. Former Florida Gov. Jeb! Bush, once thought to be the likely frontrunner among Republican candidates, is moving in the opposite direction of Trump. About 3% of Republicans say they still support Jeb!, whose campaign is redefining the meaning of the word “cratering.”

► Trump says he will participate in the Dec. 15 Republican Presidential debate hosted by CNN, despite the network’s refusal to give in to The Donald’s demands of a $5 million donation to charity in exchange for his appearance. Color us unsurprised.

OTHER LINKS YOU SHOULD CLICK

► Not convinced that gun violence is more of a problem in the United States than anywhere else in the world? Consider this: In other countries, you are more likely to die in an agricultural accident or by alcohol poisoning than in a gun-related homicide.

► Republican Presidential candidate Ben Carson continues to demonstrate his complete inability to understand foreign policy issues. Carson flopped, big time, while speaking in front of a group of influential pro-Israel donors on Thursday. Remember, kids, “Hamas” is not pronounced like “Hummus.”

ICYMI

► The editorial board of the New York Times absolutely blisters Congressional Republicans over their response to a week of mass shootings:

While the nation suffered through the shock of another bloody massacre, on Thursday every Senate Republican except Mark Kirk of Illinois voted against legislation to prevent people on the F.B.I.’s consolidated terrorist watchlist from purchasing guns or explosives.

The measure has been introduced repeatedly since 2007. The Government Accountability Office has documented that over years of congressional blockage, hundreds of suspected terrorists on the watchlist bought guns.

Another bill that would have expanded background checks to gun show and online firearms sales to screen out convicted felons and the mentally ill also failed on Thursday. The four Republican senators running for president — Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Rand Paul and Lindsey Graham — all turned up to vote against these common-sense measures.

“If you need proof that Congress is a hostage to the gun lobby, look no further than today’s vote,” said Senator Dianne Feinstein, who sponsored the terror watchlist measure…

…Since the Paris attacks, Republicans have been trying to outdo each other in describing how they’d crack down on global terrorism. But when a mass shooting at home calls attention to laws that put guns into the hands of suspected terrorists, they ask for a moment of silence, while taking action that speaks volumes.

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