Month: July 2023

(Colorado Peak Politics)

The best political news of the summer is Denver DA Beth McCann’s decision to step aside when her second term ends and let someone else take the reins in 2025 who might actually prosecute and jail violent criminals.

Her decision may be a signal the tide is turning among Democrats who for years have preached that criminals should be coddled instead of punished. It’s likely she ran the poll numbers and saw the exit sign flashing over the door before it kicked her ass goodbye.

Even outgoing Denver Mayor Hancock admitted to The Gazette that the courts under her reign have failed to hold criminals accountable.

“I think the DA and her administration have not really held up their end of the bargain in terms of dealing with repeat offenders, in particular ex-felons carrying weapons,” Hancock said. “You know, even on some of the drug charges, we simply have not done the job in the district attorney’s office in terms of holding people accountable.”

We know we’ll get bashed by 9News’s Kyle Clark for failing to thank McCann for letting the 9News security guard shooter off the hook for all her years of service to criminals, but it’s a risk we’re willing to take.

We expect she will eventually go down in history as the worst prosecutor in Denver history. And not just because she failed to prosecute the 9News security guard who shot and killed a rally protestor.

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(Complete Colorado Page Two)

A common expression says, “You can’t have your cake and eat it, too.” That makes no sense, as one cannot eat cake if one doesn’t have cake. Of course, that is not how the saying really goes; it’s just a modern lazy version. The idiom dates from 1546, when John Heywood wrote, “would you both eat your cake and have your cake?” By 1611 John Davies explained it as “A man cannot eat his cake and have it still.” That makes more sense, but it’s easier just to say, “you can’t have it both ways.”

That is the conclusion of a Colorado State Supreme Court ruling that has finally addressed decades of argument about whether one has the right to wade and fish in streams that flow across private property. The case began with activist Roger Hill, who pushed the issue by purposely “trespassing” in the Arkansas River on private land in Fremont County. The landowner threatened him, called the sheriff, even threw rocks at Hill, who sued, and the matter has been in court for years.

The case attracted dozens of briefs from a wide array of groups raising varying and contradictory arguments. Some argued “public trust doctrine,” asserting a public right to all natural resources including water. Others argued the “equal footing” doctrine, the constitutional principle that new states have the same rights as existing states. That is an issue because federal law granted states joining the union the title to riverbeds in waterways that were “navigable” at the time of statehood.

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(Colorado Peak Politics)

Gov. Polis is blatantly stacking the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission with animal rights activists in appointing three new members in the last week.

One of the new representatives for hunters and anglers on the commission is none other than Gary Skiba, author of the controversial wolf conservation plan.

Colorado Politics reports Skiba has close ties to the backers of the wolf ballot measure, and is also a member of the extremist group, Defenders of Wildlife.

Also appointed by Polis last week to the commission were Jessica Beaulieu, an attorney that advocates for animals, and Jack Murphy co-founder and president of Urban Wildlife Rescue.

We’re guessing the First Gentleman, a noted animal rights advocate, had a hand in these decisions.

PeakNation™ will recall with some hilarity and frustration Polis’s notorious appointment of Ellen Kessler to the State Board of Veterinary Medicine. She finally resigned last year after numerous scandals.

These latest appointments aren’t sitting well with sport fishing and hunting advocates who see the deck being stacked against them.

Grant Jerry of Woodland Park didn’t mince words when he told the commission that hunters and anglers “will not stand aside as powerful anti-hunting groups, veiled as animal rights activists, attempt to dismantle (or) discredit the North American Model and exclude hunters from wildlife management, while slowly whittling away at hunting opportunities for Coloradans.”

Colorado Politics reports:

The coalition had recommended Pat Dorsey,

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(Complete Colorado Page Two)

ARAPAHOE COUNTY — While property owners across the state are facing a looming jump in property taxes as high as 40 percent or more, Arapahoe County residents are likely to see a ballot initiative that would deliver yet another hit to their wallets by way of their Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights (TABOR) refunds.

Arapahoe County Commissioners appear likely to place some form of a de-TABOR question on the 2023 ballot asking if the county can keep all taxes collected, foregoing the refund of excess revenue. Commissioners claim a severe deficit in funds to keep up with the growth of the county and threaten a reduction in services if the increased revenue is not granted.

“The County has significant infrastructure, public safety and general service needs, and funding has not kept pace with inflation or community expectations,” the five commissioners wrote in an editorial published in the Villager newspaper. “The stark reality is that without new sources of revenue, the Board will be forced to eliminate or reduce (vital) county services.”

Although the commissioners have not officially introduced a measure to refer to voters, they have discussed the matter in three separate executive sessions, according to minutes of the three separate meetings.

Natalie Menten, a long-time political activist from Lakewood who was instrumental in defeating two different Jefferson County de-TABOR ballot initiatives and who is a TABOR Foundation board director, said in a recent interview with Brandon Wark from Free State Colorado,

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(Colorado Peak Politics)

It’s come to this.

Coloradans will have to bypass our state legislature to ensure violent criminals serve most of their sentence behind bars instead of being released after a few years to cause even more mayhem.

And who better to lead the cause than the protector of our hard-earned paychecks and Taxpayer Bill of Rights champion Michael Fields, president of Advance Colorado.

Page Two over on Complete Colorado reports Fields is pursuing such a measure to appear on next year’s ballot alongside the presidential contenders.

The measure before the Title Board is currently known as Initiative 71, and it would require violent offenders serve most of their sentence to reduce recidivism rates and crime in Colorado.

Violent criminals shouldn’t be getting out of prison after only serving 43% of their sentences. We need to pass a ballot measure to change this. #copolitics #coleg https://t.co/uwEKVBTFhy

— Michael Fields (@MichaelCLFields) July 24, 2023

The effort was sparked by the infamous case of Kenneth Dean Lee in 2021, who was released on a life sentence after serving less than 10 years. While on parole, he assaulted a seven-year-old girl in Aurora, gaining access to her through her parents by impersonating a federal immigration officer.

From Page Two:

“Why do we have the fourth worst recidivism rate (in the country), but we’re letting people out after only serving 40 percent of their sentence,” Fields said.

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