"If the people of Colorado want a politically correct United States Senator, they can vote for Michael Bennet. When it comes to our nation's defenses and the war on terror, we need candor and steel and resolve - not political correctness," Norton said. "The advertisement is not coming down."
I'm going to give Penry the benefit of the doubt and say that I don't believe he's stupid, he's just evil.
The reason people don't believe in the Republican (Tea) Party is because they have yet to offer sustainable solutions to the barrage of problems we face. I look forward to the day when we have more intellectual honesty in policy discussions that pave the way to real solutions.
Here's the ad that will get you in your sleep if you don't watch it:
God, she reminds me of GWB before he was...uhm... elected??
The 2010 Colorado Democratic Senate Primary signifies two different directions in Education in our Country - between a business person's view of education vs an educator's view of education.
Our choices include Michael Bennet and challenger Andrew Romanoff.
Michael Bennet is the incumbent appointed Senator who was also appointed to be Superintendent of Denver Public Schools. Bennet was appointed to Superintendent because of his financial experience in business as a corporate manager for billionaire Phillip Anschutz. Andrew Romanoff is the former Speaker of the House. He also worked as an educator in the State of Colorado as well as teaching in rural schools in Costa Rica and Nicaragua.
Speaker Romanoff's website mentions that he formed a coalition to pass the Building Excellent Schools Today or BEST Act, which provided the largest investment in Schools in Colorado history, while Michael Bennet states he gave Denver teachers the largest pay raise in Colorado history.
Let's have a closer look at each candidate's claims and philosophy on education.
"Too often these days we're waking up to newspaper headlines that prove what all of us already know: the old ways just aren't working.
In the past few weeks we've seen profound examples of this, with lax regulations and long-standing corporate loopholes leading to catastrophic financial and environmental disasters.
This is completely unacceptable. I know we can do better."
Yesterday Senator Bernie Sanders offered an amendment to close one of those 'long standing corporate loopholes' - Huge Tax Credits to Big Oil companies.
But Senator Bennet, the same one sending out fundraiser appeals on closing corporate loopholes, decided to vote with the Republicans to keep that loophole open.
This past week, the headlines reported that the White House tried to limit the Colorado Primary via a list of possible administration positions to Senate Primary candidate Andrew Romanoff. This type of insider politics does not rise to the level of a violation of the law, but it does show a continued pattern of questionable use of the White House's and President's reputation to influence and interfere in Senate primaries - the other being a similar offer to Joe Sestak in Pennsylvania.
Now, information has surfaced about the timeline of that interference that raises some interesting questions about whether there was any coordination between Senator Bennet and the White House.
These new facts seem to indicate that Bennet was also part of the 'Pay to Play' mentality that is part of the Rahm Emanuel or Jim Messina playbook. We need to make sure these kind of deals are stopped so that they don't harm Obama's reputation or the Democratic party. We also need to find out what, if any, was Senator Bennet's involvement.
Consider these facts:
As we all now know, a second alleged job 'dangle' was made by the White House to a potential Senate Primary candidate - this time it was Andrew Romanoff to prevent his primary challenge to Appointed Senator Michael Bennet.
Republicans like Darrel Issa (who it now seems is less than honest about his military record) are trying to gin up an attack on the President over this non job offer. Is there something there? I doubt it. But the fact that the White House has been meddling in primaries by the clearing the field for Kirsten Gillibrand and by endorsing Conservative Dems like Arlen Specter, Blance Lincoln, and now Michael Bennet for Senate races is both historically unwise and potentially dangerous to Obama.
If you are like me, you can see that there is a distinct difference between the Obama organization on the campaign, and the Obama White House.
I smell a rat, and he is Rahm Emmanuel. If Obama is as smart as I know he is, he will learn from FDR's mistake and change course in regard to Rahm.
Given that our Democratic State Convention is happening this week and that our race for the nomination for US Senator is hotly contested by our former Democratic long time Colorado House Speaker Andrew Romanoff and the appointed Senator Michael Bennet,
You all should read this diary by Wade Norris
He appears to have proof that someone, at Huffington Post perhaps, deleted Michael Bennet's name from a list of Senators who Voted Against Breaking Up the Mega Banks, on the same day that Bennet sent our a major fund raising letter on teh topic of reforming Washington DC.
A week and half ago, the Senate took up the Bank reform act called the Kaufman-Brown SAFE amendment which would have broken up the monopoly of the largest banks.
MSNBC commentator Dylan Ratigan called out the Senators who voted against this bill and berated them as belonging to the 'Bankster' Party.
He listed this group of Senators in an article on Huffington Post.
A few days later, one of the Senators who were on the Bankster party list was somehow mysteriously removed from Ratigan's Huffington Post story.
What's interesting is that this Senator is involved in a heated Primary, and the very same day as his 'Nay' vote, that very Senator emailed his plan to 'reform' Washington.
The real question here is - Does Dylan Ratigan know that his article was changed or did a Huffington post editor change it without his permission?
And what did the Senator whose name was removed know and what was his involvement?
This week on Huffington Post's Denver page, Michael Bennet posted an article - Close the Revolving Door, which talks about his efforts to reform the Lobbyist ways of Washington.
It would seem the readers from Colorado did not take comfort in the Senator's words in light of his recent votes.
I have a friendly tip for Senator Bennet's staff, next time your Candidate writes an article, remember to turn off the "Comments" section of his article - which Huffington Post allows diarists to do.
The resulting comments in response to Bennet's post can only be summed up as 'devastating' for a candidate trailing his Republican opponents and facing a grassroots backed primary challenge from Andrew Romanoff.
It's simple really, to hold on to a Senate seat, don't start out a re-election campaign without the support of base democratic voters.
But here in Colorado, Senator Michael Bennet is starting out his re-election bid with that strategy.
In addition to that some lifelong Democrats are saying
"they will vote Republican before they will vote for Michael Bennet"
Denver Teachers told me that was the sentiment among Denver Public School teachers about incumbent Democratic Senator Michael Bennet. (See video)
That statement should give any democrat reason for pause, considering the Democrats need to hold on to every vulnerable Senate seat in what looks to be an anti-incumbent election year - and 'Colorado is in the Toss up category' - with Republicans seeking to take back the Senate.
Senator Bennet was appointed Superintendent of Denver Public Schools, and a few years later was appointed to the Senate to replace Senator Salazar.
However, the Teachers who worked under Michael Bennet's tenure as the Denver Public Schools Superintendent have some choice words about his re-election efforts to the Senate.
(yikes!)
Challenger Andrew Romanoff won more major caucus victories in Colorado's U.S. Senate race Saturday, taking large margins over incumbent Michael Bennet in urban county assemblies.
Romanoff, former speaker of thhttp://www.squarestate.net/newDiary.doe state House of Representatives, won in Arapahoe, Douglas, Boulder, El Paso and Pueblo counties, among others, in early reports from the largest gatherings. Many of Colorado's most populous counties met Saturday to elect delegates to the state Democratic convention in May.
(so much for the Spin that Romanoff's only stronghold was in Denver)
One point of note - Boulder and El Paso Assemblies had formerly been for Bennet, but today switched to Romanoff.
