John Hickenlooper had a chance to bring a breath of fresh air to the governor’s office. Imminently likable and with a charmed political career, he could have been the rare maverick moderate Democrat – strong enough and bold enough to be a governor for all Colorado.  He could have been the adult in the room [...]

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The culture of Washington is one of compromise.  Go along.  Get along.  Get something done – good, bad or otherwise. Sometimes compromise is necessary.  When the levers of power are divided, reality dictates two choices: live with the status quo or do some “horse trading” in order to make changes that are marginally better. When [...]

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As many have requested my recommendations regarding amendments and judges on the 2012 Colorado General Election ballot, I am posting them for readers’ information. Amendment S – State Personnel System Recommendation: YES Explanation: Makes modest changes to the state personnel system (written into the constitution in 1918) in order to give the Governor greater flexibility [...]

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What’s more frustrating about President Obama – his ignorance of how difficult it is to make a profit in business or his arrogance that there’s so little he doesn’t know? Here’s a man with less business experience than a third-grader with a lemonade stand and who has said that during his one, brief private-sector job [...]

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For anyone who naively thought the Supreme Court would render a clean and tidy decision on ObamaCare, Chief Justice John Roberts’ majority-of-one opinion should be instructive. Rarely does the high court render an opinion that draws bright lines by simply applying the constitution as written. More often, the court’s opinion is sufficiently muddled that a [...]

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Editor’s Note: My recent Capitol Review contained an old headline, but new text. Nice guys don’t always finish last.  Sometimes they win three states in a single day. Rick Santorum’s improbable hat trick — sweeping Republican presidential contests in Missouri, Minnesota and Colorado — provided yet another surprise in a wildly unpredictable nominating process.  It [...]

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Budgeting is about setting priorities. In most states, K-12 education is the top priority and receives the lion’s share of funding.  Yet across the country, states are grappling with a budget monster that pits education funding against federal health care mandates. In the last three years, total spending on K-12 education in Colorado has fallen [...]

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When Gov. John Hickenlooper announced that the state will appeal a Denver court’s ruling that the state inadequately funds education, he acknowledged what Judge Sheila Rappaport — and previously the Colorado Supreme Court — would not: money is a finite resource, even when it’s spent on worthy causes and when it’s spent by government. The [...]

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Because those doggone Coloradans just won’t vote to increase taxes often enough, a cadre of folks who just can’t bear to see state government spend less is asking a federal judge to do something voters won’t – to strike down voters’ constitutional right to approve tax increases. Led by Democrat State Rep. Andy Kerr, plaintiffs [...]

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Say this for President Barack Obama: he doesn’t lack for vision. As a candidate, Obama spoke of “chang(ing) the trajectory of America” in a way that no president has since Ronald Reagan. Obama’s vision is, of course, antithetical to Reagan’s. Reagan said, “Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.” Obama [...]

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