Colorado Pols

Protect the results: what you can do to fight back this week (October 19)

Mon, 19 Oct 2020 20:47:10 GMT

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We’re two weeks and a day from the most anticipated and most important election of our lifetimes. The polls say this election will not be close. Across the country and here in Colorado, voters are turning out in massive numbers to change the course of our nation for the better.

The time has come to discuss a deeply troubling possibility that we as Americans have never faced before. What happens if Donald Trump refuses to accept the results?

The best way to ensure the United States of America continues our unbroken tradition …

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Trump Reaches "Old Man Yells at Cloud” Stage of Campaign

Mon, 19 Oct 2020 19:07:08 GMT

Things are not going well for President Trump. Ballots are being cast in record numbers across the country, and polling shows that Democratic Presidential candidate Joe Biden maintains an historic lead over Trump as we enter the final two weeks of the 2020 election cycle. To nobody’s surprise, Trump is not reacting well to any of this…but he’s still figuring out new ways to make a fool of himself.

Trump is making new headlines today for attacking …
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Oops! Joe Ricketts Botches Cory Gardner Rescue Mission

Mon, 19 Oct 2020 18:27:15 GMT

A press release last Thursday from Democratic U.S. Senate candidate John Hickenlooper’s campaign took note of a late investment in the flagging fortunes of GOP incumbent Sen. Cory Gardner by Joe Ricketts, the billionaire owner of the Chicago Cubs:

With ballots already coming in at record speed, Senator Cory Gardner’s wealthy corporate backers are panicking about losing their top ally in the U.S. Senate and pumping another million dollars into false ads. Hickenlooper for Colorado press secretary Ammar Moussa released the following statement regarding the latest attack from Gardner’s shady billionaire backers:

“With 19 days left to vote in …
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Szabo vs TKT: The Bellwether County Commish Race In Colorado

Mon, 19 Oct 2020 17:09:14 GMT

With so much attention focused at the top of the ticket in this highest-stakes-ever presidential election year, the situation down the ballot is as always somewhat less clear than the emerging consensus in polling locking down the big races. It’s generally expected that voters in Colorado will be engaging in much less “ticket splitting” in 2020 than was the case in previous election cycles, owing heavily to the declining Republican brand and a strong sense among voters that Republicans at all levels have enabled the President they’re turning out in droves to vote out.

In one particular race in Colorado’s …
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The GMS Podcast: Laura Packard and Mayor Michael Hancock

Mon, 19 Oct 2020 14:48:56 GMT

We’ve got two big interviews his week on The Get More Smarter Podcast.

First, your hosts Jason Bane and Ian Silverii talk with Laura Packard — health care activist, stage-four cancer survivor, and a powerful voice against Republicans who want to destroy the Affordable Cara Act. Next, we talk with Denver Mayor Michael Hancock to discuss Denver’s lengthy ballot, rising COVID-19 concerns, Black Lives Matter protests, and right-wing disinformation campaigns (the City of Denver is, in fact, not a smoking pile of …
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Monday Open Thread

Mon, 19 Oct 2020 04:09:43 GMT

“Sometimes the truth hurts. And sometimes it feels real good.”

–Henry Rollins

Grassroots Action at a Lakewood Intersection near you

Sun, 18 Oct 2020 18:35:08 GMT

As usual, I heard many car horns honking as I pulled up to the intersection of Alameda and Wadsworth last Saturday, October 17, 2020. But it wasn’t an accident, sports fans, or a wedding parade – it was the usual coterie of local Lakewood activists that have been demonstrating on various intersections each week since last spring. I tapped out a quick “Shave and a haircut” on the horn and hurried to park and join about 70 of my friends and comrades in peaceful protest.

Since spring of 2020, Lakewood Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (JEDI) had been organizing …
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Don’t Believe The Hype: Cory Gardner Did This To Himself

Sat, 17 Oct 2020 17:24:38 GMT

We’re 17 days out from the 2020 general election, and in Colorado certain inevitabilities are beginning to come into focus. Driven by unprecedented early turnout overwhelmingly led by Democratic and what’s assumed to be left-voting unaffiliated voters, an historic landslide election is shaping up for Colorado Democrats once again–with a strong possibility of further growing already historic majorities won in the 2018 midterms.

With Joe Biden polling as high as 14 points ahead of Donald Trump in Colorado, and by all expectations very little ticket-splitting expected from Colorado voters in 2020, it’s easy to make excuses for the …
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Weekend Open Thread

Sat, 17 Oct 2020 12:49:40 GMT

“The more desperate you are, the more mistakes you make.”

–Canelo Alvarez

Team Gardner Hunkers Down with Bucket of Rocks

Fri, 16 Oct 2020 19:35:06 GMT

Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner is not going to be re-elected next month. The writing was on the wall this week, and today it became super-duper official when a major Democratic SuperPAC decided to pull out of Colorado altogether.

Gardner and his staff understand that there will be no second term for the Yuma Republican, and they’re not handling the news very well. As Alex Burness of The Denver Post reported, Gardner popped up in Aurora today and then refused to talk to the media:

Cory Gardner made a rare public appearance a bit ago, at …
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Who’s It Gonna Be in CO-03?

Fri, 16 Oct 2020 18:48:54 GMT

Alright, Polsters, it’s time to crack open those crystal balls for the open congressional race in CO-03.

Will Republican Lauren “Q*Bert” Boebert be able to hold onto a seat that has been safely in Republican hands for the last decade? Or will Democrat Diane Mitsch Bush and her not-crazypants campaign pull out the victory?

As always, we want to know what you think will happen here — not what you want to happen or who you personally might support. If you had to place a bet — right now — on the outcome in CO-03, where would you put your money?
…
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YouTube Bans QAnon Accounts Once Followed by Boebert

Fri, 16 Oct 2020 16:03:41 GMT

(Boebert would love for you to believe that she doesn’t support QAnon, but…facts — Promoted by Colorado Pols)

Saying it wants to stop conspiracy theories used to justify harassment and violence, YouTube yesterday banned QAnon channels from its platform–two of which were followed by Colorado Congressional candidate Lauren Boebert.

Before running for Congress, Boebert followed multiple QAnon channels, including “Official QAnon Movement” and “Destroying the Illusion,” both of which have been removed by YouTube.

After defeating U.S. Rep. Scott Tipton (R-CO) in the GOP primary, it was revealed that …
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It’s Official: Cory Gardner’s Plug Is Being Pulled

Fri, 16 Oct 2020 15:14:10 GMT

At the end stage of any once-contested political campaign whose outcome has become clear as the season wore on, always a watched-for indicator of fateful decisions being made behind the scenes, is the curtailment of spending in races that national strategists in either party have written off as unwinnable. In races that stay close down to the wire, this may never happen–in 2014, Democratic Sen. Mark Udall and GOP gubernatorial loser Bob Beauprez kept their races sufficiently close to retain national support more or less all the way through to Election Day. In other cases, such as Andrew Romanoff’s losing …
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Friday Open Thread

Fri, 16 Oct 2020 12:50:05 GMT

“So near is falsehood to truth that a wise man would do well not to trust himself on the narrow edge.”

–Cicero

Cory Gardner Totes a Fishing Pole, Not a Gun, in NRA Political Ad

Thu, 15 Oct 2020 20:32:40 GMT

Cory Gardner brought a fishing pole to gun fight.

The National Rifle Association’s (NRA) latest digital ad for Cory Gardner stresses not just that he’s your choice for “defending the Second Amendment” but specifically, “your right to self-defense.”

Pretty standard stuff for a Republican senator with a history of voting solidly with the NRA, and for cashing millions of dollars of campaign checks from the group. It’s one of several Facebook ads the NRA has run on Gardner’s behalf over the past two months, spending about $10,000 per week.

However the ad doesn’t show Cory packing heat, but …
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Throwback Thursday: Laura Carno Reckons With Donald Trump

Thu, 15 Oct 2020 18:37:49 GMT

We’ve had plenty of opportunities this election season to revisit the moment four years ago when Sen. Cory Gardner showed intraparty courage not seen before or since: when he declared “I cannot and will not support someone who brags about degrading and assaulting women” and vowed to write-in Mike Pence for President of Donald Trump did not withdraw from the 2016 presidential race.

Gardner was certainly not alone in washing his hands of Trump in 2016, as Colorado Republicans high and low made the transition from subverting the state assembly in favor of Ted Cruz to …
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The Suspense Might Not Be Killing You in November

Thu, 15 Oct 2020 18:08:05 GMT

Three new polls of likely voters in Colorado are telling the same story:

Get More Smarter on Thursday (October 15)

Thu, 15 Oct 2020 17:13:49 GMT

Happy “National Grouch Day.” Now piss off. Let’s Get More Smarter. If you think we missed something important, please include the link in the comments below (here’s a good example). If you are more of an audio learner, check out The Get More Smarter Podcast. And don’t forget to find us on Facebook and Twitter.

CORONAVIRUS AND VOTING INFO…

*Colorado Coronavirus info:
CDPHE Coronavirus website
…
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Colorado Is Voting In Historic Numbers

Thu, 15 Oct 2020 16:12:04 GMT

It’s unprecedented:

Sec of State Jena Griswold says 300,795 Coloradans have already voted! She says that’s 24 times the number that had cast ballots at this point in 2016. pic.twitter.com/OOInHYLPUC

— Lance Hernandez (@lancehernandez7) October 15, 2020

Much as we have no frame of objective reference with which to compare John Hickenlooper’s game-ending $22 million fundraising haul in the third quarter, there is simply no way to adequately put in perspective the massive and swift rate of return of ballots that just arrived this week in Colorado mail boxes. Here’s the breakdown of …
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Thursday Open Thread

Thu, 15 Oct 2020 13:02:18 GMT

“Where doubt is, there truth is–it is her shadow.”

–Ambrose Bierce