President (To Win Colorado) See Full Big Line

(D) Joe Biden*

(R) Donald Trump

80%

20%↓

CO-01 (Denver) See Full Big Line

(D) Diana DeGette*

90%

CO-02 (Boulder-ish) See Full Big Line

(D) Joe Neguse*

90%

CO-03 (West & Southern CO) See Full Big Line

(D) Adam Frisch

(R) Jeff Hurd

(R) Ron Hanks

40%

30%

20%

CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado) See Full Big Line

(R) Lauren Boebert

(R) J. Sonnenberg

(R) Ted Harvey

20%↑

15%↑

10%

CO-05 (Colorado Springs) See Full Big Line

(R) Dave Williams

(R) Jeff Crank

(R) Doug Bruce

20%

20%

20%

CO-06 (Aurora) See Full Big Line

(D) Jason Crow*

90%

CO-07 (Jefferson County) See Full Big Line

(D) Brittany Pettersen

85%↑

 

CO-08 (Northern Colo.) See Full Big Line

(D) Yadira Caraveo

(R) Gabe Evans

(R) Janak Joshi

60%↑

40%↑

20%↑

State Senate Majority See Full Big Line

DEMOCRATS

REPUBLICANS

80%

20%

State House Majority See Full Big Line

DEMOCRATS

REPUBLICANS

95%

5%

Generic selectors
Exact matches only
Search in title
Search in content
Post Type Selectors
February 09, 2016 06:43 AM UTC

Tuesday Open Thread

  • 31 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

“When you have no basis for an argument, abuse the plaintiff.”

–Cicero

Comments

31 thoughts on “Tuesday Open Thread

  1. Quote sounds like Clinton 101 in response to any criticism. Can't keep your pants zipped even though you know they're looking for any excuse to bring you down? Not my fault. They're out to get me. Can't pass up fat Wall St. speaking fee checks even though you must know it wil be a thing when you run for president? That's what they offered and they're out to get me. Uncommonly sloppy with e-mail security while SOS? Wouldn't have changed a thing. They're out to get me. Young women like Bernie? Traitors to feminism, boy crazy and, BTW, they're listening to people who are out to get me

    I'd be interested in how many people like me will be voting for HRC in the general even though they don't like her any more than I do. The more important questions?  How many low info apolitical types will not vote for the Dem this time because it's HRC and they don't like her any better than I do. How many of the demos Dems need will turn out in high numbers for her? Scary.

    1. I like Hillary.  But what this election is about is the course of the US Supreme Court over the next 30. Years.  I guess I would even voteb for sanders in a general because of that.  But Bernie would need a huge tax increase to pay for all the free stuff and voters would crush him meaning an R president would name three more movemment conservatives to the court__three more Alitos.  I still think Hillary can win but it is now up to black voters to stop a bernie catastrophe in South Carolina.

        1. In the sense that the court is the overwhelming prize __ you bet your sweet ass.  Any Democrat would make good appointments.  Any Republican will name visagoths.  That is why I would hold my nose and vote for bernie over even a moderate like Kasich if it came to that.  Bernie wont be able to get us free college or free universal health care.  But he will put moderates on the court like kagan.  Forget liberals like Douglas, they wouldn't be confirmed.  All Rs are owned by the evangelicals on court appointments.  Three more alitos means goodbye gay rights hello citizens united and an outlawing of all abortions.  Plus right to work is national law.  And the Oakland Raiders will win the Super Bowl.  

          mcdonalds, by law, will stop serving breakfast.

          1. I'm with Voyager, as anyone who reads my posts knows. The vote for president is the only vote we get for the Supreme Court. With at least 3, and probably more Justices retiring in the next 4 years, a Republican President making those appointments is too scary to contemplate. I wish some of them would retire now while President Obama could appoint their replacements. Then again, they might have trouble being confirmed with this cussedly contrarian Congress (Oops, sorry about that alliteration).

             

          2. The Supreme Court is hardly a one issue concern. It's about almost all the big important issues. There could be nothing more rtagic, given the present state of the GOP, than to give them the power to overwhelm liberal voices on the Supreme Court.  This is no time for  throwing away Dem votes to make a point.

      1. Vger, there is no "huge" tax increase in the Sanders tax plan. There are four new tax brackets from 37% to 52%, for incomes of from 250K to 10 million dollars. All other tax brackets would increase 2%, or about $38/mo for me. This is to pay for implementing universal health care and tuition free college. So the healthcare consumer would also not be paying healthcare insurance premiums, saving $5-10,000 a year, more than offsetting the tax increase.   So the canard that "Sanders doesn't say how he will pay for these proposals" is just not true.

        To pay for paid family medical leave, Sanders supports the FAMILY act, at an average cost of $2 /person/week.  Clinton proposes to only tax the wealthiest earners to pay for her family leave proposal. She defines "wealthiest" as those making over $250,000/year.

        Sanders also proposes capital gains tax increases, a tax on Wall St speculation (often blamed for the last financial crash).

        There aren't "huge" differences between the Democratic candidates on taxes and finances. If you like Hillary because she seems more electable, go for it. But the "Bernie catastrophe" is highly exaggerated.

         

        1. Actually, the "Bernie catastrophe" is NOT exaggerated, if one carefully reads the information provided by the Tax Foundation (Mama's link in the first line). Their study assumes a significant decline in economic activity and potential loss of 6 million jobs. And there are other studies. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a bi-partisan group, estimates that the Medicare for All plan would raise $10.7 trillion over a decade; not the $13.9 trillion envisioned by the Bernie campaign. $3.2 trillion is not "chump change;" or maybe it is for those who fall for the Bernie baloney. To the "soak-the-rich" income tax rate of 52%, add in the payroll tax and state taxes. It's easy to see a real tax rate going well over 60%. That's called "confiscatory taxation."

          To paraphrase another well known politician, "if you like your money, you can't keep it because Bernie wants to re-distribute it." To paraphrase former First Lady Nancy Reagan, "just say no (to Bernie)." 

          1. Can you imagine the reception that President Sander's tax plan would get before the Tea Party-controlled Ways and Means Committee! YIKES!

            To put this in perspective, the Budget Committee yesterday declined to invite Obama's budget director to present Obama's budget which is something that's never been done before. They at least usually extend the courtesy of an appearance and then vote to reject it. And I'm going out on a limb here and guessing that Obama's budget was a hell of a lot more palatable to the Tea Party than anything the Bern could come up with.

            I'm glad to see John Kasich coming in second so far tonight.

             

          2. Conservatives have little credibility on what makes for healthy vibrant economics. Economic catastrophes are pretty much the conservative stock in trade. 

            I agree with Voyageur that the catastrophe that would most likely flow from Bernie winning the nomination would be that he would lose the general, thus killing the recovery, reversing all the progress that's been made since 2008 and dooming us to yet another conservative trickle down voodoo economics catastrophe.

            You know what can't be exaggerated? The disastrous consequences of conservative economic theory, as constantly evidenced every time we're stupid enough to buy it no matter how consistently facts on the ground discredit it.

            Also I think you’re forgetting that none of Bernie’s economic plans could get through even a majority Dem congress without a lot of compromise. The Presidency doesn’t have that kind of power over the legislature on economic issues outside of Trump’s wet dreams.

        2. The bernie catastrophe is that he will lose 49 states as mondale did with a far more moderate tax hike plan.  That costs us the Senate House and most governors and legislatures.  You are too young to remember Harry and Loise but when a trillion dollar industry with a million jobs _ health insurance — fights for its very survival, it doesn't follow marquis of queebsbury rules.  Read Campaign of the century about Upton Sinclairs plan to End Poverty in California if you want a preview.  And right now it looks like Rs may nominate Kasich and thus poach the Democratic moderates that bernies scorn.

          1. Mondale was not the candidate Bernie is; Mondale neglected to really make his case for tax hikes, and he never confronted Reagan on Reagan's tax-hiking hypocrisy.

            Mondale never had the energy and hopes of  voters the way Sanders does (Record turnout during a New Hampshire snowstorm!) However, in the rearview mirror, Mondale's tax plan looks as "moderate" as Hillary Clinton's does. From a Reuters piece comparing Mondale's plan to Obama's constraints in his second term:

            The irony is that President Obama might have been better off taking a page from Walter Mondale and forthrightly arguing that universal health coverage and high levels of public investment and a fairer society and a greener environment and everything else Democrats want from government are actually worth paying for – not just by the top 2 percent of the top 1 percent, but by the top 50 percent. The only real alternatives are rolling back the growth of government, Ryan-style, or accepting sluggish growth for years to come.

            Replace "Obama" with Sanders and you have a recipe for victory: honesty, leveling with voters, superb commuication skills, and a well-thought out plan based on decades of experience. Ya gotta raise taxes to pay for worthwhile stuff. That's reality – not reality TV, but reality.

            Also, thanks for the heads up on Sinclair Lewis – I never knew that he ran for office! He was kind of a crappy, one-dimensional, preachy writer, but apparently he managed to create some waves as a politician. I've got students reading Sinclair's "the Jungle", and will point them to your link.  Sinclair was a for real red-diaper-baby Internationale singing Socialist – Sanders is a pretty mild run-of-the mill provide for the common welfare Democratic Socialist. Will people be able to tell the difference?

            Will the insurance industry attack Sanders with millions of dollars in Harry and Louise type ads? Of course, just as they did with Barack Obama. Will they lie, cheat, and steal to win? Of course they will. Are we smart and sophisticated and organized enough to defend against this? Well, we've done it before. See you at the northeast CO caucuses.

            1. Dont confuse Upton Sinclair. Writer of the Jungle a nd Socialist candidate for gov of Califuornia with Sinclair Lewis author of Mainstreet BAbbit and Elmer Gantry.

                1. That takes me back to high school. My Junior year English teacher couldn't keep them straight to save her life. I got in sent out of the room one day after she'd said Sinclair Lewis for the third time in an hour while lecturing on The Jungle. She mixed them up again and I growled "Upton Sinclair, you idiot! Sinclair Lewis wrote Babbitt!" Sorry, Mama J. 

                  1. cook, so you were a literary smartass? Never would have guessed thatwink

                    Even though both "Sinclairs" were  Socialists at one point in their lives,and American novelists of the early 20th century, they actually had almost nothing else in common. Sinclair Lewis was not named after Upton Sinclair, but after a family friend and dentist. He repudiated communism after the rise of Stalin, to his credit.  I've only read excerpts of Lewis' work.

                    On the other hand, Upton Sinclair's meatpacking expose, "the Jungle", is still famous today, partly on the strength of being a muckraking novel that exposed some of the grosser stuff around the meatpacking industry. Kids read it because of the "Yuck" factor. It's certainly not for Sinclair's character development.

          2. The R's can only nominate Kaisich if they can figure out how to get him more delegates. He's going to be a weak finisher in SC, NV, and most of the Super Tuesday states unless ALL of the other moderates drop out, and I don't see that happening. The bad news for Republicans is that Cruz + Trump + Fiorina is more than 50%. Add in Carson and Paul supporters on the "crazy" side of the fence and the only way Kaisich gets in is through super-delegate override and a whole lot of finagling. No way the crazies will let a contested convention go to the moderate.

    1. Speaking of Tricky Dick, didn't his grandson try to win a U.S. House on Long Island a couple of elections ago? And is Nixon's son in law (Trish's husband, not David Eisenhower) still the N.Y. State Republican chair?

      So there are a couple of Nixons available in the pipeline if the GOP doesn't want to tempt fate and doesn't want to run another Bush…..

  2. Insights into Rubio's character — a profoundly insecure and immature person:

    …to those who have known him longest, Rubio’s flustered performance Saturday night fit perfectly with an all-too-familiar strain of his personality, one that his handlers and image-makers have labored for years to keep out of public view. Though generally seen as cool-headed and quick on his feet, Rubio is known to friends, allies, and advisers for a kind of incurable anxiousness — and an occasional propensity to panic in moments of crisis, both real and imagined.

    .

    .

    For all Rubio’s efforts at image control, he sometimes allows involuntary glimpses at his inner anxieties. For example, Rubio’s 2012 memoir, American Son, is — when read a certain way — less an inspiring tale of his unlikely rise to power, and more a harrowing chronicle of self-doubt and misery in the political arena. Indeed, for a politician defined by his sunny message and soaring rhetoric, Rubio’s 2010 Senate bid sounds, in his telling, like a merciless assault on his psyche: the race a gut-twisting roller coaster ride on which he was constantly convinced the next track-rattling twist, turn, or plummet would throw him from the cart and send him plunging to his death. The account is peppered with words like “inevitable humiliation,” “destined for failure,” and “despair.”

    From the moment the 2010 primary turned negative, the candidate needed a fainting couch every time an attack was lobbed his way, his aides recalled to me.

    http://www.buzzfeed.com/mckaycoppins/the-anxiety-of-marco-rubio#.raYK1kOvwR

  3. Paul Krugman's explanation for why we only hear the same tired old talking points from Republicans (and especially our resident trolls) no matter how thoroughly, and how many years ago, they were debunked:

    The truth is that the whole G.O.P. seems stuck in a time loop, saying and doing the same things over and over. And unlike Bill Murray’s character in the movie “Groundhog Day,” Republicans show no sign of learning anything from experience.

    Think about the doctrines every Republican politician now needs to endorse, on pain of excommunication.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/08/opinion/the-time-loop-party.html

Leave a Comment

Recent Comments


Posts about

Donald Trump
SEE MORE

Posts about

Rep. Lauren Boebert
SEE MORE

Posts about

Rep. Yadira Caraveo
SEE MORE

Posts about

Colorado House
SEE MORE

Posts about

Colorado Senate
SEE MORE

90 readers online now

Newsletter

Subscribe to our monthly newsletter to stay in the loop with regular updates!