December 14, 2015 12:39 PM UTC

Get More Smarter on Monday (Dec. 14)

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• by: Colorado Pols

Our favorite jam back in the day was Eric B. for President. It’s time to Get More Smarter with Colorado Pols! If you think we missed something important, please include the link in the comments below (here’s a good example).

TOP OF MIND TODAY…

► CNN has announced the lineup for Tuesday’s Republican Presidential debate in Nevada. Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul just made it onto the main stage, which relegates George Pataki, Mike Huckabee, Rick Santorum and Lindsey Graham to the never-popular “kids’ table” debate beforehand.

► An effort to change the redistricting/reapportionment process in Colorado is not going well after proponent laid an egg in their first effort at gaining ballot access in 2016.

► Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Yuma) told the U.S. Supreme Court that he believes religious schools should get public funding, a key issue in a voucher case involving the Douglas County School District’s Choice Scholarship Program. From Marianne Goodland of the Colorado Independent:

The state Supreme Court rejected the appeals court decision last June, and the school district appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court in October.

In the 4-3 state Supreme Court ruling, Chief Justice Nancy Rice wrote that the state constitution bars public school districts from paying for students to attend religious schools, which the Choice Scholarship Program would have allowed.

The section of the constitution referred to by Rice is known as the “Blaine amendment,” which Gardner argues is unconstitutional and why the court needs to review the lawsuit.

The Blaine amendment prohibits the use of taxpayer money to fund religious or otherwise sectarian schools. At least three dozen states have Blaine amendments in their constitutions, passed in the 19th century as a prohibition against funding Catholic schools.

Get even more smarter after the jump…

IN CASE YOU ARE STANDING NEAR A WATER COOLER…

► Colorado business leaders are pushing a proposal that would fund transportation projects in Colorado with a $3.5 billion bond measure. As Peter Marcus reports for the Durango Herald:

The coalition is asking the Colorado Legislature to refer a ballot question to voters in 2016 that would authorize the $3.5 billion bond program.

Bonds are a form of debt, or a loan. For governments, there is a promise to pay the debt back in full. In the case of the Colorado proposal, the state would have 20 years to make good on its promise. Governments often use bonds to raise money for infrastructure.

Voters would have to approve the proposal because Colorado law prohibits government from raising debt without voter approval.

► Republicans around the country — and here in Colorado — have had little hesitation when it comes to speaking out against anti-Muslim comment from Republican Presidential frontrunner Donald Trump. Oddly, Rep. Mike Coffman (R-Aurora) continues his refusal to speak against Trump, even though he has more than enough political cover to do so.

► Today is the three-year anniversary of the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut that killed 20 children and six adults. On Saturday, churches around the Denver metro area held candlelight vigils in remembrance of the victims of gun violence. Several events were held in the Denver area over the weekend as part of a broader call to end gun violence in America.

► Muslim-Americans in Colorado are growing increasingly concerned about the potential for violence against their community following terrorist attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, California.

► Former Montrose County District Attorney Myrl Serra learned last week that he will not be retried on charges including harassment and violating a protection order. The Colorado Attorney General’s Office is still pursuing charges of felony criminal extortion and unlawful sexual contact that were originally brought up in 2011.

► Elbert County Clerk Dallas Schroeder didn’t quite get his 15 minutes of fame — it was more like 45 seconds — for hanging a discriminatory poster on the wall of the office where marriage licenses are granted. It didn’t take long for Schroeder to remove the poster after Colorado media outlets began questioning its existence.

► Former State Rep. Robert Ramirez — a one-term Republican legislator from Westminster — is pretty concerned that President Obama is somehow trying to subvert the law so that he can serve a third term in the White House. There’s no truth to the rumor that Obama is considering replacing Vice President Joe Biden with Peyton Manning.

►The Colorado legislature will reconvene in about a month (Jan. 13), and it looks like a foregone conclusion that local control over oil and gas development will be a major topic at the State Capitol again.

► Donald Trump’s Presidential campaign can really be a lot of fun sometimes. Trump’s personal physician believes that his Hairness would be the “healthiest President ever elected.” Why stop there? Let’s just call Trump the healthiest being to ever walk the earth on two legs.

► Speaking of Trump (or writing of Trump? Reading of Trump? Whatever), the Republican Presidential frontrunner has reached a new high in national polling, picking up the support of 41% of Republican voters. Elsewhere, a new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll shows Democrat Hillary Clinton easily besting both of the top GOP contenders, Trump and Ted Cruz, in a hypothetical General Election matchup.

OTHER LINKS YOU SHOULD CLICK

► John Tomasic of the Colorado Statesman reports on a commemoration for the victims of the terrorist attack at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs earlier this month.

► Former Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl will face a court-martial on charges of desertion and endangering troops related to a 2009 incident in Afghanistan inn which Bergdahl allegedly abandoned his post. The 29-year-old Bergdahl could face a sentence of life in prison.

ICYMI

► The 2016 election is proving to be more difficult to buy than Republican billionaires would have hoped.

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