April 29, 2016 01:59 PM UTC

Get More Smarter on Friday (April 29)

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• by: Colorado Pols

How do the Broncos replace 6’7″ QB Brock Osweiler? No problem — just draft another humongous quarterback in Paxton Lynch. 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…

► In. Out. Off. On. The Republican race for the U.S. Senate nomination in Colorado has been crazier than Ted Cruz in gym class. Darryl Glenn and Jack Graham were officially on the Primary ballot as of yesterday, and today, Jon Keyser managed to convince a judge to let him on the ballot as well. Robert Blaha and Ryan Frazier are not on the Primary ballot — not right now, anyway — but Frazier has already hired former Secretary of State Scott Gessler to assist him in the legal department.

Confused? Then check out this Colorado Pols Q&A on the State of the GOP Senate Race.

► Remember that so-called “alliance” announced last Sunday by Ted Cruz and John Kasich as part of a coordinated effort to stop Donald Trump from winning the GOP nomination for President? Yeah? Well, that’s over now. This “alliance” didn’t just fail spectacularly; as the Washington Post reports, it actually backfired:

The agreement, and the way it was announced, has fed perfectly into Trump’s argument that party bosses are trying to rig the system to steal the nomination from him. Many supporters of Cruz and Kasich do not like the other, and  the deal rubs them the wrong way.

► We wish we could say, “At Least He’s Not Your District Attorney,” because, well, he might be. Democrat Bruce Brown is the District Attorney in the 5th Judicial District (Clear Creek, Eagle, Lake, and Summit counties) and is running for re-election in 2016. Apparently Brown took 6.5 weeks of paid vacation in 2015 alone. In a follow up with reporters, Brown made sure to go heavy on the stupid:

“I don’t answer to anybody within the office,” he said. “The reason why I take time off is because I’m a public servant, and I’m not a public slave.”…

…Employees in Brown’s district can accrue up to 22 vacation days each year if they’ve been on the job at least 10 years. But Brown said the taxpayers didn’t elect him to be present. They elected him, he said, to oversee an efficient and responsive office, which includes monitoring and mentoring 13 deputy district attorneys.

“Brown said the taxpayers didn’t elect him to be present.” All this vacation time must have turned Brown’s political brain into meatloaf.

Get even more smarter after the jump…

IN CASE YOU ARE STANDING NEAR A WATER COOLER…

► Controversy is brewing in an attempted recall of Castle Rock Mayor Paul Donahue. We’ll have more on this story — which is weirder than this story would indicate — a bit later in a separate post.

► Nebraska and Oklahoma are trying to sue Colorado, and now Nebraska and Montana want to poison us. From the Denver Post:

An oil and natural gas field in the western United States is largely responsible for a global uptick of the air pollutant ethane, according to a new study.

The team led by researchers at the University of Michigan found that fossil fuel production at the Bakken Formation in North Dakota and Montana is emitting roughly 2 percent of the ethane detected in the Earth’s atmosphere.

“These findings not only solve an atmospheric mystery — where that extra ethane was coming from — they also help us understand how regional activities sometimes have global impacts,” said Colm Sweeney, a study co-author from the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado in Boulder. “We did not expect a single oil field to affect global levels of this gas.”

Along with its chemical cousin methane, ethane is a hydrocarbon that is a significant component of natural gas. Once in the atmosphere, ethane reacts with sunlight to form ozone, which can trigger asthma attacks and other respiratory problems, especially in children and the elderly.

► Democratic Presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton is staffing up in Colorado in preparation for the General Election.

► Indiana Gov. Mike Pence endorsed Ted Cruz for President on the eve of Tuesday’s Indiana Primary. As “The Fix” explains, Pence isn’t any better at making endorsements than he is at handling questions about LGBT rights:

Pence’s actual “endorsement” was more like the world’s most obvious attempt to have it both ways.

Before he said anything about Cruz, Pence went out of his way to “particularly commend Donald Trump” for, among other things, “giving voice to the frustration of millions of working Americans with the lack of progress in Washington, D.C.”

“I’m not against anybody,” Pence then added just in case you hadn’t realized that yet. “But I will be voting for Ted Cruz in the upcoming primary.”

► Republicans in Colorado’s Congressional delegation go out of their way to shit on the Environmental Protection Agency whether the EPA is helping their constituents or not, as the Durango Herald reports.

► Both of Colorado’s U.S. Senators are supportive of President Obama’s latest choice for an opening on the federal bench in district court: Coloradan Regina Rodriguez.

► House Speaker Paul Ryan promised to have a budget deal ready by the end of the first quarter of 2016. That didn’t happen, but he’s still trying to herd his cats.

OTHER LINKS YOU SHOULD CLICK

► The editorial board of the Indianapolis Star suggests that Republican voters in Indiana support John Kasich in a particularly tepid endorsement.

► It’s…it’s…it’s moving! Progress is being made in discussions over Colorado’s budget and the Hospital Provider Fee.

ICYMI

► Congressional Republicans are doing what they can to protect their constituents — so long as those constituents happen to have the last name of “Koch.”

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