Costs of college deliver important message - Thomas Sowell, Townhall.com
Prices force people to economize. Subsidizing prices enables people to take more resources away from other uses without having to weigh the real cost. Without market prices that convey the real costs of resources denied to alternative users, people waste. Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Must Reads on May 1st, 2008 | No Comments »

Supreme Court gets it right on voter fraud - Investors Business Daily
Everyone in the country should be pleased with the news. But, of course, not everyone is. It’s almost as if some are disturbed that the ruling will make it harder to commit voter fraud. Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Must Reads on April 28th, 2008 | No Comments »

Updated April 27

If you think private and religious colleges that take no state tax dollars should be regulated by state bureaucrats, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you think taxing marriage will reduce child abuse, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you plan to pay for new programs with revenues from the oil and gas boom but then punish oil and gas companies with higher taxes and ridiculous regulations, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you believe illegal aliens should get a break on college tuition but decorated veterans should not, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you believe it’s OK to require a photo ID to buy beer or cigarettes but not to vote, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you believe businessmen and women are motivated by greed but labor union bosses are not, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you think making someone pay higher taxes is a "freeze," you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you believe trial lawyers want to sue for more money to help their clients, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you think there’s really a difference between a tax and a fee, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you really believe in governmental efficiency or bureaucratic flexibility, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you believe an unemployed trial lawyer is a bad thing, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you think freedom of religion doesn’t apply to churches, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you believe good education comes from relaxing academic standards but getting tough on soft drink sales, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you think we should raise taxes on working families to hire more college professors, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you worry more about the cost of keeping criminals behind bars than the cost of putting them back on the streets, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you think its wrong for government to legislate morality — except when it pays for that legislation with other people’s money, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you think the way to pay for affordable housing is by raising taxes on housing, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If you would rather pay OPEC $115 a barrel for oil than tap oil and gas resources right here at home, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

If your sense of humor has been surgically removed, you must be a Colorado Democrat.

Filed under: Notes, Capitol Review on April 27th, 2008 | No Comments »

Bill Ritter’s energy insecurity - John Harpole, ALineOfSight.com
I was not trying to embarrass the Governor.  It was not meant to be a trick question.  Rather, it was a simple question that most politicians would shrug off with a predetermined in-the-can answer.

Filed under: Notes, Must Reads on April 16th, 2008 | No Comments »

Obama’s flaws multiply - John Fund, Wall Street Journal
Barack Obama’s San Francisco-Democrat comment about how working class voters "cling to guns or religion" is already famous.  But his aides tell reporters that he is bewildered that anybody took offense.

Hey, Barack, it’s about freedom - Investors Business Daily
You wouldn’t know it from listening to Barach Obama disparage "people in small towns," but they "cling" to their guns and their faith because of a document called the Declaration of Independence, signed in Philadelphia, where church bells rang out on July 4, 1776. Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Must Reads on April 15th, 2008 | No Comments »

The real costs of ‘cap and trade’ - Don Nickles and Charles Stenholm, Investors Business Daily
If you think energy prices are high now, wait until Congress slaps a ‘cap and trade’ carbon tax on top of existing costs — and without any assurance that other all of this ’sacrifice’ will make a difference. Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Must Reads on April 14th, 2008 | No Comments »

Samuel Johnson called second marriages "the triumph of hope over experience." The same might be said for the latest health care reform bill at the State Capitol.

For more than 20 years, crusading politicians have promised to deliver better health care to more people for less money simply by saying "make it so." With rare exceptions, the resulting legislation exacerbates economic distortions, makes insurance impractically expensive, drives insurers out of the state, and creates worse problems than originally existed.

Senate Bill 217 seems to be a desperate attempt to "do something" while buying time to figure out what to do. What it does best is to create case studies in irony, hubris and cognitive dissonance. Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Capitol Review on April 11th, 2008 | No Comments »

Mandating health insurance is big mistake - Paul Hsieh, MD, Denver Post
Sen. Bob Hagedorn would force all Coloradans to purchase mandatory health insurance because it would be "immoral" to "sit on our hands and do nothing."  Massachusetts also requires all residents to purchase health insurance, but rather than creating high-quality affordable health care, the result has been skyrocketing costs, worsened access, and lower quality health care. Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Must Reads on April 11th, 2008 | No Comments »

McCain and Mo Udall - Michael Lewis, Slate.com
An old anecdote about Mo Udall in the hospital reveals something noteworthy about John McCain’s character. Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Must Reads on April 9th, 2008 | No Comments »

It’s an article of faith among Democrats that the state budget is a "moral document." However, if the state budget reflects the morality of Democrats then it’s all too obvious that they still worship at the altar of big government.

The fiscal shenanigans at the root of the Colorado state budget should cause anyone who’s paying attention to ask if the Democrats’ morality is still inspired by Bill Clinton.

The latest estimate from the legislature’s nonpartisan economists forecasts a decrease in expected revenues of $693 million over five years, echoing spreading worries of an economic slowdown. But this year’s proposed budget calls for no slowdown in spending. Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Capitol Review on April 2nd, 2008 | No Comments »

Pentagon study links Saddam, al Qaeda - Stephen Hays, The Weekly Standard
This ought to be big news. Throughout the early and mid-1990s, Saddam Hussein actively supported an influential terrorist group headed by the man who is now al Qaeda’s second-in-command, according to an exhaustive study issued last week by the Pentagon. Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Must Reads on March 27th, 2008 | No Comments »

"If you really believe black people are ‘fellow Americans,’ then treat them as such." — John McWhorter, Losing The Race.

If Barack Obama truly wants to transcend race, he would do well to apply the words of John McWhorter to his "explanation" of his pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

Obama is supposed to be different: a messenger of hope and change, not just another beltway politician; an agent of reconciliation not grievances and reparations; a unifier who transcends partisan and racial divides.

That’s why many gave him the benefit of the doubt when he explained that he didn’t wear a U.S. flag lapel pin because he viewed it as a "substitute for … true patriotism." Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Capitol Review on March 24th, 2008 | No Comments »

We are Americans, and we want the best. Now!

Instant gratification has become the American ethos.

In roughly three generations, American society has been transformed from a nation of penny-pinchers, scrimpers and savers to a nation of consumption-addicted spendthrifts oblivious to tomorrow. Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Capitol Review on March 19th, 2008 | No Comments »

Hamas’ terrorist tactics not debatable - Investors Business Daily
After your house has been burglarized, your family brutalized and crowds who hate you and religion cheer in the streets at your misfortune, would you take the advice of someone who said talking will solve all your problems? No, you would see that your choice is either to move out or stay and fight.  That is exactly the choice facing Israelis.

Worshippers of Death - Alan Dershowitz, Wall Street Journal
A basic premise of warfare — that combatants can easily be distinguished from noncombatants — has changed.  As more women and children are recruited by their mothers and religious leaders to become suicide bombers, more women and children will be shot at.  That too is part of the terrorists’ game plan.

Filed under: Notes, Must Reads on March 7th, 2008 | No Comments »

Freedom means responsibility - George McGovern, Wall Street Journal
Yes, that George McGovern:  "Since leaving office, I’ve written about public policy from a new perspective: outside looking in.  I’ve come to realize that protecting freedom of choice in our everyday lives is essential to maintaining a healthy civil society."

Dems are dumping ‘paygo,’ hiking deficits - Wall Street Journal
The real purpose of pay-as-you-go budgeting to make spending easier but tax-cutting harder.  But after a $152 billion "stimulus" bill, another $35 billion stimulus proposed and a $597 billion farm bill extension, paygo is officially gone. Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Must Reads on March 6th, 2008 | No Comments »

First, I am a conservative; then, I’m a Republican.

Rush Limbaugh, Laura Ingraham and James Dobson hold views much closer to my own and to those of most conservatives than does Sen. John McCain.

I have serious, principled disagreements with the Arizona senator on several issues: freedom of speech, global warming and energy explanation, among others.

In the last two contested presidential primaries, my candidate has been Anybody But John McCain. Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Capitol Review on March 3rd, 2008 | No Comments »

If you lie awake at night anguishing over unemployed trial lawyers, you must be a Democrat politician.

In Congress, 66 trial lawyers who donated $1.5 million to Democrat candidates are "credited" with derailing an anti-terrorism bill that passed the Senate with 67 votes.

Here in Colorado, the immediate stakes aren’t as severe, but businesses will be paying for 66th General Assembly for years to come as Democrats advance an agenda that might be dubbed, "Leave No Trial Lawyer Behind." Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Capitol Review on February 27th, 2008 | No Comments »

Worshippers of Death - Alan Dershowitz, Wall Street Journal
A basic premise of warfare — that combatants can easily be distinguished from noncombatants — has changed.  As more women and children are recruited by their mothers and religious leaders to become suicide bombers, more women and children will be shot at.  That too is part of the terrorists’ game plan.

An inordinate fear of terrorism? - Bret Stephens, Wall Street Journal
Two years after Jimmy Carter warned against an inordinate fear of communism, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. "History teaches, perhaps, very few clear lessons," Mr. Carter said. "But surely one such lesson learned by the world at great cost is that aggression, unopposed, becomes a contagious disease." Mr. Carter learned that the hard way. Will Barack Obama have to learn the same lesson, the same way. Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Must Reads on February 25th, 2008 | No Comments »

Just as local experts were revealing their plans to "fix" what ails Colorado, a heavy-handed health care overhaul crashed on the rocks in California and Democrat presidential candidates clashed over the appropriate size of government’s health care hammer.

Labor Democrats joined with Republicans in California to kill Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s proposed mandate when they realized that working families might not be able to afford health care plans they would be legally required to purchase — logic that equally applies to non-union households.

Meanwhile, Barack Obama has dared to criticize Hillary Clinton’s health care expertise, pointing out that HillaryCare 2.0 "forces everyone to buy health insurance, even if you can’t afford it." Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Capitol Review on February 16th, 2008 | No Comments »

Republicans wouldn’t have dreamed of this storyline, but for the second time in less than a year, Democrat Gov. Bill Ritter is proposing a major tax increase.

And just like last time, he doesn’t want to let you vote on it.

Taxpayers who have just received their property tax bill could be forgiven for mistaking last year’s tax "freeze" for a tax hike. After all, when the legislature and the governor pass a new law that causes you to pay more than you would have otherwise, most people understandably think their taxes have been raised. Read more »

Filed under: Notes, Capitol Review on February 4th, 2008 | No Comments »