Connect with us

Colorado

Colorado’s left-captured legislature at its best with bizarre bills | CALDARA

Published

on

Colorado’s left-captured legislature at its best with bizarre bills | CALDARA







Advertisement

Jon Caldara



While Colorado’s governmental core functions are going unattended, as witnessed by crime, traffic and crumbling roads, the legislature is busying itself with the most critical work of all — coming up with wing-bat crazy bills to promote the trans agenda by disempowering parents, crushing needed industries and torturing puppies.

By far, my favorite is House Bill 1039. In its original version it empowers any kid in school to choose his own name “to reflect that individual’s gender identity.” The school must use the new name he, she or “they” chose in all their record keeping, teaching, activities — even the yearbook.

Stay up to speed: Sign up for daily opinion in your inbox Monday-Friday

Mind you, at 18 years old any young adult can legally change their name to whatever they like. But why wait to go against your parents’ wishes when the state can enable you to anger them right now, today.

Advertisement

The same logic would allow 8-year-olds get tattoos without parental consent.

The problem is there are plenty of kids who have my sense of humor. I would have loved to force my teachers to call me by any name I desired.

School will turn into a Saturday Night Live skit.

Let me offer some name suggestions, with apologies to Bart Simpson, for the middle school crowd who will understand the sophistication:

I.M.A. Wiener, Homer Sexual, Oliver Klozoff, Seymour Butz, Al Coholic, Tess T. Culls, Hugh Jass, Mike Rotch, Jacques Strap, Amanda Huginkiss, I.P. Freely, Ollie Tabooger, Lee Key Bum, Ivana Tinkle, Maya Buttreeks, Eura Snotball, Ahmed Adoudi, Maya Normousbutt, Drew P. Wiener, Yuri Nator, Moe Ron, Ben Dover, Fannie Licker or Moe Lester

Advertisement

Parents should encourage their kids to change their first name to “Doctor” or “President.” Little girls can finally name themselves “Princess.” And, of course, the smart-aleck in class will change his name so that under his yearbook photo it will read “School Shooter.”

Next on the giggle list is House Bill 1114. It requires that before an animal shelter euthanizes any pet, they must call every other known animal shelter to see if that shelter is stupid enough to take the thing.

So, a shelter in, say, Limon has 500 pet rats no one wants to adopt. Before they put the vermin down, they must call every single shelter in the entire state and see if they would like to take them first. And if this shelter in Durango says yes, are they really gonna drive to Limon to get them?

“Excuse me, we have this very elderly rattlesnake we need to put down. Do you want to take it so when you realize it needs to be put down, you’ll be required to call every single shelter in the state like we’re doing right now? Sure, we’d rather be tending to our needy animals, but some busy-body lawmakers thought this is how we should spend our time.”

The unintended consequence is pet shelters will be much more hesitant to accept animals. Why take in animals if the risk is you’re gonna be spending all your energy trying to pawn them off on another shelter?

Advertisement

As usual with this type of feel-good-but-poorly-thought-through legislation, it will harm more animals as they are turned away from shelters in the first place.

And why do people give away their beloved pet? Often it’s because they can no longer afford to keep it. So, one of the great things you can do to save animals is to make sure their human beings don’t lose their jobs or that rising costs don’t eat away their paychecks.

To help with that is Senate Bill 159, which ends all oil and gas development in Colorado by 2030. This bill will destroy the largest industry in Colorado, the one that accounts for some 11% of the state’s GDP.

So, not only will the thousands of people who depend on the industry for employment lose their jobs, but working families will pay more and more for the natural gas that heats their homes and the fuel that runs their cars.

Fortunately, parents who can’t afford to feed their kids, even though they don’t know what those very kids’ names are at school, will still be able to put dinner on the table. When the shelter won’t take their dog, they can serve him for dinner.

Advertisement

Jon Caldara is president of the Independence Institute in Denver and hosts “The Devil’s Advocate with Jon Caldara” on Colorado Public Television Channel 12. His column appears Sundays in Colorado Politics.



Source link

Colorado

Warm storm delivers modest totals to Colorado’s northern mountains

Published

on

Warm storm delivers modest totals to Colorado’s northern mountains


Arapahoe Basin Ski Area recorded 8.5 inches of snow through Friday morning.
Lucas Herbert/Arapahoe Basin Ski Area

Friday morning wrapped up a warm storm across Colorado’s northern and central mountains, bringing totals of up to 10 inches of snowfall for several resorts.

Higher elevation areas of the northern mountains — particularly those in and near Summit County and closer to the Continental Divide — received the most amount of snow, with Copper, Winter Park and Breckenridge mountains seeing among the highest totals.

Meanwhile, lower base areas and valleys received rain and cloudy skies, thanks to a warmer storm with a snow line of roughly 9,000 feet.



Earlier this week, OpenSnow meteorologists predicted the storm’s snow totals would be around 5-10 inches, closely matching actual totals for the northern mountains. The central mountains all saw less than 5 inches of snow.

Advertisement

Here’s how much snow fell between Wednesday through Friday morning for some Western Slope mountains, according to a Friday report from OpenSnow:



Aspen Mountain: 0.5 inches

Snowmass: 0.5 inches

Copper Mountain: 10 inches

Winter Park: 9 inches

Advertisement

Breckenridge Ski Resort: 9 inches

Arapahoe Basin Ski Area: 8.5 inches

Keystone Resort: 8 inches

Loveland Ski Area: 7 inches

Vail Mountain: 7 inches

Advertisement

Steamboat Resort: 6 inches

Beaver Creek: 6 inches

Irwin: 4.5 inches

Cooper Mountain: 4 inches

Sunlight: 0.5 inches

Advertisement

Friday and Saturday will be dry, while Sunday will bring northern showers. The next storms are forecast to be around March 3-4 and March 6-7, both favoring the northern mountains.





Source link

Continue Reading

Colorado

Avalanche discipline, power play falters, Central Division lead shrinks in 5-2 loss to Wild

Published

on

Avalanche discipline, power play falters, Central Division lead shrinks in 5-2 loss to Wild


The Colorado Avalanche had a chance Thursday night to regain some real separation between them and the Minnesota Wild.

It didn’t happen, and special teams were again an issue.

Minnesota’s Joel Eriksson Ek scored a pair of power-play goals, while the Avalanche took too many penalties and did not convert its chances with the extra man in a 5-2 loss at Ball Arena. The Wild scored on two of six power plays, both in the second period, then added a shorthanded goal into an empty net for good measure.

“We took six (penalties). Six is too many, especially against a power play like theirs,” Avs coach Jared Bednar said. “We had a slow start to the second and then just kind of started getting going, then took a bunch of penalties and kind of took the momentum away and swung it back in their favor again.”

Advertisement

Mackenzie Blackwood was excellent early in this contest and stopped 31 of 34 shots for the Avs in his first start since the Olympic break. Colorado, which went 0-for-3 on the power play, has not scored an extra-man goal in back-to-back games since Dec. 31 and Jan. 3. The Avs are 2-for-31 with the man advantage since Jan. 16, and at 15.1% are last in the NHL.

The Wild are now just five points behind the Avs in the Central Division, though Colorado has two games in hand. Filip Gustavsson made 44 saves for the visitors.

“I think we crated enough chances to win the hockey game,” Bednar said. “We give up the (second power-play goal) and that’s the difference in the hockey game for me. We had a chance (on the power play) … we score and it’s a tie game. We haven’t had an easy time capitalizing on some of our chances that we created in the last month.

“I’d like to see that turn around a little bit.”

Minnesota took advantage of three penalties on Colorado in a span of 53 seconds to take the lead with 2:23 left in the second period. Captain Gabe Landeskog was sent to the box for elbowing Eriksson Ek away from the play at 14:15 and Valeri Nichushkin was called for cross-checking at 15:04.

Advertisement

That gave the Wild a 5-on-3, but it went from bad to worse in a hurry for the home side. Brock Nelson won the 3-on-5 in his own end, but Brent Burns’ backhanded attempt to clear the puck out of the zone went into the stands for a delay of game.

Minnesota had a 5-on-3 for 1:56, which Colorado successfully killed off, but because Burns’ two minutes didn’t start until Landeskog’s penalty ended, there was more 5-on-4 time and Eriksson Ek scored his second of the night. The Swedish Olympian was trying to send a cross-crease pass to Kirill Kaprizov, but it hit the inside of Blackwood’s right leg and pinballed across the goal line.

Because of the extended penalty time, both Eriksson Ek and Boldy officially logged a shift of more than four minutes, leading to that goal.

“I’m not a big fan of the penalties we took, necessarily,” Landeskog said. “Obviously, mine is a penalty. Val, I felt like he was protecting himself and Burns, that’s a penalty. There’s nothing to argue about there. But yeah, that tilts the ice for sure and just gives them unnecessary momentum.

“So yeah, undisciplined and we’ve got to be better there for sure.”

Advertisement

Eriksson Ek put Minnesota in front at 7:48 of the second period. Cale Makar was called for slashing when his one-handed swipe while Yakov Trenin was attempting to shoot from the left wing. Trenin’s stick broke, so Makar went to the box.

Blackwood made the initial save on Matt Boldy’s shot from the high slot, but Eriksson Ek was there near the left post to clean up the rebound.



Source link

Continue Reading

Colorado

Firefighters stop spread of wildfire in Colorado’s Golden Gate Canyon

Published

on

Firefighters stop spread of wildfire in Colorado’s Golden Gate Canyon



Late Thursday morning, a house fire spreading into the nearby woods in Colorado’s Golden Gate Canyon prompted officials to issue a pre-evacuation order to nearby residents. Firefighters have since brought the blaze under control.

According to the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office, a house fire broke out around 11:30 a.m. in the 10600 block of Ralston Creek Road in Golden Gate Canyon, located around 25 miles west of Denver. The fire then began to spread into the nearby trees and grass.

Advertisement

Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office


Multiple fire units quickly responded to the scene, and the JCSO issued a pre-evacuation notice to all residents within a three-mile radius, warning them to be prepared to leave at a moment’s notice.

At 12:34 p.m., the sheriff’s office announced that the fire is no longer spreading and the burn area has been contained to less than an acre. A photo shared by JCSO shows a structure nearly completely destroyed by the fire.

Pre-evacuation orders were lifted around 1 p.m.

Advertisement



Source link

Continue Reading

Trending