U.S. Senate
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(D) J. Hickenlooper*
(R) Somebody
80%
20%
Governor
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(D) Joe Neguse
(D) Phil Weiser
(D) Jena Griswold
60%
60%
40%↓
Att. General
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(D) M. Dougherty
(D) Alexis King
(D) Brian Mason
40%
40%
30%
Sec. of State
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(D) George Stern
(D) A. Gonzalez
(R) Sheri Davis
40%
40%
30%
State Treasurer
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(D) Brianna Titone
(R) Kevin Grantham
(D) Jerry DiTullio
60%
30%
20%
CO-01 (Denver)
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(D) Diana DeGette*
(R) Somebody
90%
2%
CO-02 (Boulder-ish)
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(D) Joe Neguse*
(R) Somebody
90%
2%
CO-03 (West & Southern CO)
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(R) Jeff Hurd*
(D) Somebody
80%
40%
CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado)
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(R) Lauren Boebert*
(D) Somebody
90%
10%
CO-05 (Colorado Springs)
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(R) Jeff Crank*
(D) Somebody
80%
20%
CO-06 (Aurora)
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(D) Jason Crow*
(R) Somebody
90%
10%
CO-07 (Jefferson County)
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(D) B. Pettersen*
(R) Somebody
90%
10%
CO-08 (Northern Colo.)
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(R) Gabe Evans*
(D) Yadira Caraveo
(D) Joe Salazar
50%
40%
40%
State Senate Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
80%
20%
State House Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
95%
5%
June 23, 2007 01:11 AM UTC
44 Comments
Also how little the government is actually asking for.
Why tuition rates are getting clobbered (CSU another 16% for next fall)? Yeah low taxes are great–until you actually want the government to do something.
widening of I-70 (ever try to go skiing on a Saturday morning lately?), a functional judiciary (what Bill of Rights?), an effective educational system (or even a reasonable facsimile thereof), universal health-care (Australia spends less than half of what we do, but Aussies live a year longer), and collective steps toward achieving energy independence, but the Democratic legislature gave us vapid legislation making “Rocky Mountain High” the state song and making bestiality a felony (is it REALLY a problem? Perhaps it still is in Wyoming, but I digress….).
The Republican message has traction — because the Democratic legislature appears so inept. Do something big, bold, and useful, and few will be able to carp.
The Republican “leadership” got us into this mess and the Dems are stepping up to fix it. Tabor was a near disaster for this state and yet many state-level Repubs were running on “everything’s fine with the budget” as late as 2004. Fortunately voters were savvy enough to ignore them and vote Dem.
Ref C gave the state back some much-needed income for those streets, schools and health care, but let’s remember how many Republicans in the state legislature opposed it.
And NOW you want better schools, streets and health care? They weren’t broken overnight and they won’t be fixed that fast either. If you really want to sink your teeth into something, try engaging with Romanoff on his Constitutional reform.
These Dems are taking the long view and fixing the big problems, but it takes time, information and dedication. Not the denial, hand waving and obfuscation we’d become accustomed to with Republican “leadership.”
Privatize them.
Charters work.
And they take parents who give a damn, the ingredient most often lacking in the public schools.
…if you are out to destroy representative government. Why are charter enthusiasts so quick to dismiss the advantages of the oversight of an elected board of education? Is it just fear of the union? What is so wonderful about a charter school, exactly, especially when you can get an education that is just as good or better at your neighborhood school? Why should we allow some people’s fear of the union dominate our discussion of public education?
Like most of the problems in this country, the things that are “wrong” with boards of education could easily be fixed if the voters would just get off their butts, inform themselves, and vote.
Do you live in Colorado?
We have a robust charter school system. We also have school choice.
http://www.rockymoun…
many parents pull their kids out of schools and send them to other schools, charter or outside the district either because their neighborhood school is failing or they see better opportunities elsewhere. By the time DPS annunced Manual high school was closing it had 900 students in a facility that used to serve 3000; 2/3 of the families had voted with their feet.
The problem is a public school system is mission is to educate ALL children, that including students whose parents don’t care. It is a fundamentally American idea, that everyone no matter who ther parents are, deserves to be a full functioning member of society.
We know that not every parent cares. Do we doom their children for that?
If you are going to shill for Thompson, You should read up on the state before you claiming to be an “ordinary Coloradan”.
Charter schools work because they cherry pick the students who already are thriving or who have involved parents….NOT just because they’re charter schools.
If you want X level of services, you should spend X amount of money for it. If you want X+Y level of services, you should be prepared to spend $X+Y for it. You live within your budget, and prioritize. When you need a larger allowance, you come to us and ask. Guess I’m missing the part where there was an actual “crisis.”
Last session, the Dems enjoyed jack-booted control of the courts, the state legislature, and the governor’s mansion. Republicans like Ken Summers and Rob Witwer told me that they had exactly zero power under the Dome, and couldn’t get anything but the most innocuous bills passed. But rather than take on the important issues on which we speak, they frittered that opportunity away with bills to make bestiality a felony, and “Rocky Mountain High” our state song.
Even baby steps toward court reform were stomped on.
Voters lurched to the left on account of the morass in Iraq, the bazaar in Congress (Cunningham, DeLay, Frist, et al., ad nauseum), and the generally profound incompetence of neo-con management (government doesn’t work when WE’RE running it). As a matter of full disclosure, I am a Republican who did the same thing, refusing to support candidates like Beauprez and Suthers in my precinct (which has me in hot water with the County muck-a-mucks). That, coupled with the local ‘Pubs insistence upon running a slate of candidates slightly to the right of Attila the Hun, and you have a recipe for instant minority status. Saying that Colorado voters were “savvy” seems on the face of it to be over-the-top partisan; rather, I think they had a feeling even Alka-Seltzer wouldn’t relieve.
Janet Rowland brought attention to this burning issue which has for too been overlooked.
You are talking about a balanced budget amendment, and that is already in the Constitution. TABOR is very different.
If you don’t have the money, and can’t borrow the money, you can’t spend it. Instant fiscal discipline! Pity our federal government didn’t run on that principle. 🙁
http://www.denverpos…
It was Owens and the republicans who borrowed to pay for the roads. They borrowed from expected money to come from the feds. The same feds who have been running monster deficits during reagan’s time as well during W’s. IOW, we are not likely to see all of it. But that is normal from the deficit spending republicans.
As to tabor, there are aspects that I like about it (force legislation to come to us about tax hikes ), but rather than force the payback, it would be better if it put the money in a fund that is inaccessible to the gov. until we vote to release it.
and then cut taxes.
And for the umpteenth time – the biggest deficits in our history have come under the last three Republican presidents, and surpluses under the last two Democrats.
While I agree that Reagan and W. ran up the deficit, Poppa bush was trying to turn it. Not an easy thing to do. In fact, it was his raising taxes to turn the deficit that cost him his job. His actions laid the groundwork for Willy to raise even more.
EagleEye: If you really want to sink your teeth into something, try engaging with Romanoff on his Constitutional reform.
I like having the ability to actually be heard on the issues that affect me, instead of having no power because mine is a Republican district, and I can’t bribe legislators with sky boxes at Broncos games. The initiative process should stay in place as is. As for letting the jackasses in our Legislature have more power and less accountability, I’d rather pass. We already have out-of-control judges; why should we let another branch run amuck?
We spend a ton of money on our public schools in Colorado, and those public schools fail significant numbers of our children. Throwing more money at them won’t make them functional in my opinion.
We spend roughly $4.7 billion on Colorado public (K-12) schools – $3 billion from state tax revenues and $1.7 billion from property taxes. Keep in mind that the entire state budget is about $17 billion, so education is the largest single component of that budget.
What results do that expenditure produce?
In analyzing statewide graduation rates, the Colorado Department of Education states: “The Class of 2005 had a graduation rate of 80.1 percent. This is a 2.2 percentage point decrease from the Class of 2004 rate of 82.3 percent and a 3.5 percentage point decrease over the Class of 2003 rate of 83.6 percent.”
Those are not the statistics of a successful operation. This means that statewide, one in five 18 year olds in Colorado failed to finish high-school, and the failure rate has increased for the last three years.
Graduation rates in the Denver Public School system, Colorado Springs District 11 and Pueblo School District 60 are much worse than the statewide average. Bear in mind these are the largest public school districts in the state with the greatest access to public tax moneys and among the highest paid teachers. They have graduation rates of only 67%, 69% and 76%, respectively. Roughly one out of three 18 year olds in public schools in Denver and Colorado Springs and one out of four in Pueblo do not finish high school.
These are the students who do not finish high school. How well do students who stay in public schools perform?
Here are the percentages of Colorado 10th Graders in 2006 who had CSAP scores that were either unacceptable or only partially proficient:
Reading – 29%
Writing – 46%
Math – 67%
Science – 50%
Said differently, statewide, 2 out of 3 students attending Colorado public schools fail to perform at grade level in math; nearly half (46%) of 10th graders can’t write at a 10th grade level; nearly one third (29%) cannot read at a 10th grade level.
In Denver public schools, the CSAP scores are much worse. Here are the percentages of students rated unsatisfactory or partially proficient:
Reading – 52%
Writing – 65%
Math – 86%
Science – 74%
Proficient performance in basic skills (Reading, Writing, Math and Science) in Denver schools is the exception rather than the rule. That’s an unacceptable use of our tax dollars.
It is important to note that students for whom English is not their native language and students who enter the system mid-year are specifically excluded from these statistics. Thus, these poor results can’t be blamed on illegal immigrants who come to the school and drag down the average.
Why aren’t parents outraged by these results?
Because the results are statistically obfuscated by how they are reported. Using CSAP scores, Colorado schools are rated as Unsatisfactory, Low, Average, High and Excellent.
Effectively, the public school system grades itself on a curve. School achievement is measured and reported as a Z-score based on aggregate CSAP scores, rather than reporting the raw percentage of students who are failing to perform at grade level.
The Z-score used to rate schools is the difference between the statewide average CSAP score divided by the statewide standard deviation. A school is rated as “Unsatisfactory” only if its results are several standard deviations worse than the statewide average. Schools that are rated as “average” can still have failure rates of 50% if that’s the statewide average failure rate. Using this statistical reporting mechanism masks the poor performance of the entire system.
For high schools, the “cut” Z-scores for classifying schools are as follows:
Excellent = 1.12 and above
High = 1.11 to 0.42
Average = 0.41 to -0.45
Low = -0.46 to –2.36
Unsatisfactory = -2.35 and below
This means that if a school exhibited the same failure rate as the statewide average (e.g., 67% of its students performed below grade level in math), it would have a Z-score of 0, and thus, be classified as “Average” creating the impression that everything is OK. Having CSAP results equal to the statewide average – and being rated as “Average” is not OK in my view.
If you remember your statistics, a Z-score of greater than 1.12 covers roughly 1/3d of a normal distribution and a Z-Score greater than 2 covers only 5% of the distribution. Thus, by using this measure to grade our schools guarantees that about 1/3 of schools will be rated “Excellent” and less than 5% will be considered “Unsatisfactory.” I don’t think so.
I believe we have to make fundamental change in education.
Because most of the parents, especially in the minority heavy big school districts, don’t give a damn. Even a Mexican parent who cares sees that the education Jose Jr. is getting is far better than what he got in Mexico.
I think that the important statistics would be these: What is the white and black graduation rate, since 25 years ago there were far fewer Hispanics and they now completely skew the results, and 2) how do these rates compare with other states and other school disctricts with heavy Hispanic student populations. A huge influx of non-English speakers makes a lot of statistics a frickin’ Cheney dove shoot if you are trying to compare things.
Yes, we spend a lot on education. But that doesn’t mean that it is the effective amount. I think that from what I’ve read, we do an amazing good job for the money we spend. Most of the states lower than us on the dollars per pupil scale are the Mississippi’s of the US.
The Colorado Department of Education CSAP stats EXCLUDE non-English speakers and students who are not full year students. Here’s the description of who’s excluded:
“A. Students who took CSAP-A, or were eligible to take CSAP-A in grades where no CSAP-A was offered will have their scores excluded from computations.
B. Students who were expelled will have their scores excluded from school level calculations, but not from district level calculations
C. Students who entered school after October 1, 2003 will have their scores excluded from all computations.
D. Students who took the English version of the CSAP who were NEP (Not English Proficient) or LEP (Limited English Proficient) and who have been in a Colorado public school for less than 3 years will have their scores excluded from all computations.”
Thus, one cannot argue that the CSAP scores are dragged down by immigrant students.
It is an open question as to whether more money will produce better results. According to the US Census, Colorado ranks 34th in per pupil spending ($8,958). The top spenders are DC ($17,809), NJ ($16,213) and NY ($15,791). The bottom three spenders are UT ($6,540), TN ($7,202) and Idaho ($7,074).
If spending more public money on public schools produces better results, UT, TN and ID ought to suck wind and DC, NJ and NY ought to excell.
Here are the graduation rates for those states
DC 63%
NJ 90%
NY 77%
UT 86%
TN 76%
ID 79%
DC and NY outspend Colorado (by nearly double), but have worse schools. UT spends much less than Colorado) but has better school results. ID spends much less and produces roughly the same graduation rate as Colorado.
Throwing more money at our schools in the hopes that the results will be different seems foolish to me. A systematic change is called for.
…about setting aside Hispanic students. Yes, there is that item D, but that doesn’t address the issue. And I’d bet that plenty of Hispanic students with 3 plus years under their belts still struggle with language issues and/or attitudes about education that aren’t helpful.
To compare two large, minority saturated cities with an entire, mostly rural, mostly Mormon, mostly white state is not apples to apples.
Colorado is 39th in covering the uninsured in a nation that ranks 37th in healthcare internationally, far behind all the other modern industrialized nations, while spending much more per capita? Sounds like you’d be better off being sick and poor in Albania.
Today’s RMN showed the results of some intensive survey comparing those two states, the best and the worst in the country. What was most different was the percentage of salaries that went to health care, and the number of uninsured. OK residents are paying twice as much (granted, probably lower salaries) and yet have several times as many uninsured.
Government can, and often does, work just fine.
is that universal health care is one of those areas where the government is more capable of running the ball than private industry. While everyone on the far Right points to Canada as an example of how not to do it, I would point to Australia as an example of how TO do it. They spend less than half of what we do on health care, but their life expectancy is a year or so longer. Provide basic health care for all, with emphasis on preventative medicine (e.g., subsidize gym memberships), and let people pay for more exotic stuff. The VA has shown that administrative costs can be far lower than what we see in HMOs.
Government doesn’t work often, but this is one place where it can.
Ya almost never know where he is going to land on an issue.
Up above, his analysis of TABOR and the Dems I think he is 100% wrong. Then here, on health care, he “sees the light” and breaks from his ideologue buddies.
Good for you.
comparing the current state of the USA, which definitely can stand improvement, to Stalin’s USSR or some such shit, he usually has something interesting to say whether you agree with it or not. That contributes to the dialogue IMO.
starting with actually making the Bill of Rights enforceable. Fix that, and start holding our public officials *personally* accountable for acts of willful misconduct, and you’ll fix a lot of our problems.
Think about it. Two Republican presidential candidates have actually said that they would pardon Scooter Libby! How can we even have a rule of law if public officials are invariably exempt?
Is it wrong for me to speak plainly about the decrepit state of fascism into which we have descended? I’m not happy about the current state of affairs, but I do everyone a disservice if I lie to assuage your feelings of patriotism.
from hysterical comparisons between truly horrific dictatorships and merely corrupt democracies. Fight the good fight, but don’t make asinine and overblown comparisons and then wonder why you’re not attracting any allies.
All of this is shades of grey, but the simple truth is that over the last 7 years, we have shifted very heavily towards the same government as the Hitlers in many of the same fashions. Hitler slipped his way into his position, and then counted on enemies that everybody was afraid of. But by the time ppl realized what had happened, it was far too late. Even now, many of W’s, et. al. actions should be of concern to every American patriot. As one who has worked on projects for various federal groups, I think that when more of it makes the paper, then perhaps more Americans will start calling for major rollbacks of a number of laws and presidential orders of the last 6 years.
Of course, I assume that some information will make it out. As it is, I notice that the dems have NOT subpoenaed sibel edmunds or a number of CIA/NSA members that they should be talking to.
you use real examples of the current situation. Rio means it’s fascism because he can’t sue the Colorado Supreme Court in the Colorado Supreme Court. So if he happens to be close to the truth, it’s because he’s a broken clock which is right twice a day.
I have stated my case that America has been slouching toward fascism without reference to my situation, although it most certainly is evidence of same. Specifically, I reference the work of Prof. Laurence Britt (http://www.secularhu…) and apply those tests to our own society.
One of the characteristics of fascist states is disdain for human rights — which we see in abundance in modern America. Need I reference Gitmo and the death of habeas corpus, secret searches and the reading of our mail without a warrant, GPS trackers being put on our cars, and the like in excruciating detail again to make this case?
As for my case, you seem to have forgotten that in civilized societies, judges are not permitted to try their own cases — even in Iran, judges are held personally liable in tort for willful misconduct on the bench. The Colorado Supreme Court tells us why the notion of a judge deciding his own case is so odious:
In civilised countries, if a judge were ever to hear a case over which s/he has no jurisdiction as a matter of statutory law, and which s/he had an obvious personal interest in, the shock and outrage would be blinding. In fascist states like Colorado, so accustomed to corruption that it is assumed as a matter of course, it attracts no more than a collective yawn.
Azerbaijan has agreed to be bound to the Optional Protocol of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which means that the ICCPR is enforceable as against the State and state actors who violate their citizens’ fundamental human rights, pursuant to an appeal to a world court.
Can America say that? NO [expletive deleted] WAY!!!!!
In the civilised world, the State is liable for the torts of state actors. In America, many state actors enjoy absolute immunity, which means that there is no such thing as “rights” in this Third World banana republic. Your government can do pretty much anything they damn well feel to you, and there is nothing you can do about it.
For some strange reason, Australians want a Bill of Rights. I propose that we give them ours, as we sure as hell are not using it!
The United States has signed the ICCPR. We have not signed the optional protocol, you’re correct there. I’m guessing we didn’t want to be included in the following list:
Chad
Angola
Albania
China
Russia
Ghana
Boznia, signed in ’95 – helped them out didn’t it?
Ivory Coast
Sierra Leone
Kyrgyzstan
Somalia
Turkmenistan
The first optional protocol allows people to submit ‘communications’ to the UN if they’ve been wronged. Whoopie doo. The second optional provision repeals the death penalty – seeing how we still have that, wouldn’t make much sense to sign that either, huh?
Go live in any of the above countries for any amount of time and come back and tell us we’re still a banana republic. Until you venture out of your sheltered world, stick to what you know. You make an ass out of yourself too easily if you don’t.
just as its inter-American counterpart does. If human rights are violated in Argentina, Bolivia, Colombia, or even Chavez’ Venezuela, citizens of those countries have the right to have their grievances heard by a truly independent international court. The ICCPR is their Bill of Rights (indistinguishable from our own) and here’s the catch: it’s actually enforceable!
Like the old Soviet Union, we only sign human rights treaties, as opposed to enforcing them. Is it better to not have a Bill of Rights on paper, but have it in practice (like Australia), or to have one on paper, but not in practice (as we do here)?
As for my venturing out of my “sheltered world,” I’ve been in First and Third World countries. Et tu?
Rio, Your whole premise is our Bill of Rights is unenforceable, which I disagree with, so we’re at an impasse.
As to traveling, I’ve lived in three of the countries listed above and have lived in many other developing countries. I’ve helped develop NGOs in many of these countries and worked closely with government reps in the Parliaments of former Soviet countries. I’ve visited more countries than you are old.
That is why I think you are such an idiot for comparing the US to banana republics.
“the national debt is astronomically large, even though the nation faced a surplus when Democrat Bill Clinton left office.”
The nation still had a HUGE national debt when Clinton left office. Its the annual budget deficit that was reduced under a Republican Congress and a fiscal-conservative (liberal social) Democrat President.
And thats the irony – when they finally got a Republican president, the Republicans turned into just as big a spender as Dems, thansk to George Bush being a “compassionate conservative”, which apparently means inflating the government (NCLBA, and Medicare Prescriptions), never vetoing Republican Pork, and trying to buy loyalty with appropriations.
…just covered this about a week ago. In the 1993 budget – Dem prez, Dem congress – not ONE Republican voted for the bill. And that, dear friend, is what started the Clinton boom years, even after Congress turn R in 1995.
Gore took on the chore of reducing the size of the federal government, which was very successful. And no, it had nothing to do with the military, another oft repeated Rushism.
Did those republicans congress override Clinton? I don’t think so. But Clinton did fight against the congress for trying to insert garbage in there (all of which made it into the last 6 years.). Just as reagan was responsible for the reckless spending of the 80’s, so to is the W responsible for the 00’s. It is ALL about leadership, or lack thereof.
A simple Google search revealed that:
“From FY 1981 to FY 2003, the Department of Corrections (DOC) General Fund appropriation has grown by a cumulative 307%, compared to total General Fund appropriations growth of 182% during the same time period…”
http://www.ccjrc.org…
In 1999, we were 26th in the nation for incarceration rates (24th in total incarceration/parole/probation rate). By 2005, we jumped to 19th in the nation. This in a nation that holds more prisoners per capita than almost – if not every – other nation on the planet.
Can anyone explain to me how the enormous, spending situation cited above came to be in light of Tabor? I’d love to hear from a legislator who was in office during that time period from ’99 and ’05. And, furthermore, if said legislator could tell us up front how much he or she received from something like the Correction Officers Union, that would be helpful, too.
Run on Get Tough On Crime and No New Taxes at the same time, and this is the obvious outcome. You can’t expect to incur the increased costs of greater incarceration and/or monitoring without having to increase your income to balance the budget.