MY FRIEND KELLY MAHER IS FIRED UP I've known Kelly for years and if you follow Republican party politics in Colorado you've seen her work somewhere even if you didn't know it was hers. She and I were talking a few years ago about starting a podcast called "Politics Sucks And We Hate It" but instead, she's created a Super PAC with one goal in mind: get rid of the crazies running Colorado politics. And she's bipartisan, if you're nuts and in power, she's coming for you. She joins me today at 1 to discuss and will also be riding shotgun tonight for our KOAKast on our Facebook page. If you want to support these efforts you can do so here.
NORTH CAROLINA HAD AN INTERESTING PRIMARY And the knives are out for the black Republican who won the primary there. I've got WBT radio's Brent Winterble on the show at 12:30 to discuss, and oh yeah, he's going to be on the Christmas Cruise with me in December!
GO TO THE CHRISTMAS MARKETS WITH ME THIS YEAR! It's another Mandy Connell Adventure, this one a floating luxury trip down the Danube to visit Christmas markets in Austria and Germany. Find out more by calling 1-800-383-3131 or visit here for more!
JOIN ME TONIGHT ON KOA'S FACEBOOK PAGE AT 7 For a ridiculous KOAKast of the State of the Union address. Check this space later for our Bingo card, I left the list at the office so need to create it after I get there today.
TAY TAY ANDERSON HAS A BIG FAT BILL TO PAY And I am not going to lie, I laughed out loud and hard about this when I saw it. Tay Anderson is a grifter of the highest order. He has no apparent means of income and didn't while he was on the Denver Public School Board. He often created legal situations that he could turn into "settlements" with parties he says aggrieved him, including DPS. But now the shoe is on the other foot and he's been ordered to pay the legal fees of BLM 5280 and an activist he sued for defamation. The judge tossed the case and a Colorado law designed to stop nuisance lawsuits like this has allowed them to seek legal fees from him. A judge just awarded them over 61 grand in legal fees and Tay Tay has no way to pay them. I find this part of this Denver Gazette story interesting:
Anderson estimated that his legal fees could hit $100,000, adding Wednesday that “others will be responsible” for his legal bills.
Others? Who are these "others"? And why are they responsible for his legal bills? I tweeted this out yesterday before I saw this and now I know I'm right.
Remember when he was the rising star of the Democrat party? Good times, good times.
WE NEED TO WAIT A HOT MINUTE BEFORE COVERING WEIGHT LOSS DRUGS I am not anti-weight loss drugs but I am wait-and-see before requiring insurance companies to cover them in Colorado. Why? Because it will jack up Medicaid costs by $200,000,000 and raise insurance premiums on everyone who has private insurance because these drugs are EXPENSIVE. More importantly, we simply don't have evidence that people can ever come off these drugs and not regain all the weight they lost. So we are committing people to a lifetime of very expensive drugs or we're committing people to the failure of regaining all the weight they lost. It's too soon for Colorado to force insurance companies to cover these drugs but that is exactly what is being considered now.
THE MAYOR IS FIGHTING FOR THE SOUL OF DOWNTOWN But he's got a long way to go. He's now pushing for more affordable housing in Downtown but isn't offering a solution to the biggest issue stopping that: Construction Defects litigation. Can you imagine trying to get insurance to convert office space to living space when it is incredibly easy to sue a builder as it is now in Colorado? The Mayor says we need to get people living downtown so they will work downtown, but at what jobs? Do they have the skill set to do the high tech office jobs that have moved from office to home? I admire his moxie but there are a LOT of unanswered questions here.
BEING A DUMBASS IS GREAT FOR MARKETING I told you the story of Nick Swardson being pulled off the stage at Beaver Creek after being incoherent during his planned set. He blamed edibles and drinking at high altitude but the kerfuffle seems to have only helped, as Comedy Works has added more shows due to increased demand.
BIDEN'S HOPE FOR A SPEEDY TRUMP TRIAL SEEM TO HAVE BEEN DASHED And this opinion piece from the New York Times seems to believe that Biden will lose because of it. When the Supreme Court agreed to hear Trump's immunity argument (which I still think is the dumbest argument ever) they did NOT expedite the hearing, which means a ruling will not come down in time to try him on federal charges before the election. From the column:
Because so many of the anti-MAGA voters are not enthusiastic about Biden, Podhorzer wrote, Democrats need to make the case that “in November, we are not choosing a leader; we are choosing the nation we will become.”
The federal trials that now appear as though they may be deferred until after the election — possibly permanently deferred — may well have persuaded hesitant voters that American constitutional government was on the ballot.
Celinda Lake, a Democratic pollster, argued in an email that in the drive to mobilize low-turnout voters, it is not so important whether Trump goes on trial but whether he is convicted: “It’s not trials but convictions that matter. If Trump is convicted of a criminal felony by a jury, of plotting to overturn or steal the election, that will matter.” Lake added: “A Trump conviction would increase voting among low-turnout Democratic men, and it would come second to abortion in mobilizing low-turnout Democratic women.”
And now those convictions will not come but we know the strategy for the Democrats and I fully expect to hear it on full display at tonight's SOTU.
JUVENILES ARE COMMITTING FEWER CRIMES BUT MORE OF THEM ARE VIOLENT And this is horrible, horrible news. The Common Sense Institute has been studying crime rates and have a study out now which you can read here. A story in the Gazette is linked here.
DO WE WANT TO CHANGE HOW WE DO ELECTIONS? Kent Thiry is a very successful businessman who is working to do just that. He is behind the Unite America which is trying to get ranked choice voting and open primaries the norm in the US and they are working to get a ballot initiative done here in Colorado now. This is a long article with a LOT of criticism on Thiry's business practices and howling from left wing Democrats who hate the thought of ranked choice voting, but there isn't a lot on why it's bad other than it makes it easier for a rich person to get on the ballot. Newsflash, rich people can already get on the ballot now. I am going to have Arod track down Kent to do a deeper dive on this issue.
OUR ELECTRIC GRID IS UNDER STRESS ALREADY And our Governor is pushing for the full electrification of Colorado. This article talks about the hugely rising demands on existing power grids and creation and solar and wind aren't going to be able to create enough energy to sustain this new economy. It's time to get real about nuclear energy or we are done for.
TWO MINUTE DRILL!
THIS IS QUITE THE FISH TALE A tiny little trout was the big winner in the first Evergreen Lake Ice Fishing Tournament this past weekend. The winner came it at just UNDER a pound. The big winner needs to learn that holding the fish out towards the camera makes the fish look bigger, but in this case I'm not sure it would have made much of a difference.
GREELEY WAS PLANNED AS A UTOPIA This is a fun bit of Colorado history I didn't know. Check this out:
The town’s name comes from Horace Greeley, a 19th-century newspaper editor and publisher.his is important because Greeley played an important role in the life of the city’s founder, Nathan Meeker, who worked as an agricultural reporter for Greeley’s newspaper the New York Tribune. The two even drafted a charter for the utopian colony Greeley was supposed to become.
The principles that guided the colony included agriculture, religion, family values and temperance, or abstinence from alcohol.
That last bit kept Greeley a "dry" town until the 1970s. Now there's something you know now.
THE FRAMEWORK FOR PSYCHEDELIC THERAPY IN COLORADO IS UNDERWAY As rules and regulations for therapists who want to use mushrooms with patients are being hammered out. This as a new study shows that a single dose of LSD in a therapeutic setting can eliminate anxiety disorder for many, many months, if not permanently.
WATER ALWAYS RUINS HAIRSPRAY And it did just that at the DCPA where two performances of the show Hairspray had to be postponed after the sprinkler system went off at the Buell. If you had tickets they will be refunded or exchanged.
GRAY WHALES HAVE COME BACK TO NEW ENGLAND For the first time in centuries. Scientists are speculating that less ice in the Northern Passage has allowed these whales to make the trip over from the Pacific where they normally live. Now one has been spotted off the coast of New England.
COULD AI KILL THE PORN STAR? That's the worry among porn stars who say they could be put out of business by an industry that can create perfect looking people that they can make do anything. I wouldn't be sad if an industry that preys on vulnerable people changed direction, but I do worry about what these new perfect people having outrageous sex could do for the expectations of young men and women.
THE ARGENTINIAN PRESIDENT IS TAKING IT TO TROLLS ONLINE Javier Milieu is an interesting dude and this is unsurprising. Instead of ignoring the haters and trolls online, he gives as good as he gets, in the same vein as Donald Trump when he used to be on Twitter where the trolls and haters are. His popularity has dropped since taking office but he's still over 50%. I'm more inclined to believe it's because he's been slashing the government handouts rather than his tweets but who knows.
SNOPES IS A PARTISAN HACK SITE OF GARBAGE And you can read about their latest lies to protect their belief system here. They are GARBAGE.
IT'S A BEEN A MINUTE SINCE WE CHECKED WITH THE KIFFNESS So here you go.
HAS SAN FRANCISCO HAD ENOUGH OF PROGRESSIVE POLITICS? It sure looks that way as moderates had a great day in recent elections. They will never go Republican, but more reasonable Democrats are winning races on a variety of issue, including public safety. Read it here.
NATIONAL READING DAY MEANS POLITICS IN KANSAS A bunch of elected officials in Kansas City celebrated National Reading Day by reading a children's book in an online video. That's good, right? Not so much.
CONGRESS REMOVES MONEY FOR BDSM PARTIES FROM THE OMNIBUS You want to know why an omnibus spending bill is bad? Watch this.
THE BENEFITS OF EATING ONE MEAL A DAY This isn't sustainable for everyone, but here's some good info if you want it. Watch below or click here.
BETTER OUT THAN IN And if we're talking farts, we really mean it. Watch below or click here.
ANOTHER WAY TO CLEAN YOUR CAR'S CARPETS Watch below or click here.
WOULD YOU LIKE SOME LEAD IN YOUR CINNAMON? If you have one of these six brands in your kitchen you probably have enough lead because they all have it and are being recalled. Really great cinnamon is such a game changer which is why I buy mine from Savory Spice. NEXT LEVEL.