Tag: Gop

U.S. Reps. Diana DeGette and Jared Polis are calling on President Obama to strengthen environmental and public health standards to protect against risks posed by hydraulic fracturing.

The latest dispatch from the frontlines of the voter wars crisscrossing the country this year comes from Phoenix. The Arizona supreme court ruled that political lightning-rod Governor Jan Brewer failed to justify ousting Colleen Mathis as chair of the state's Independent Redistricting Commission. The court reinstated Matthis.

Warren Buffett, an icon of American super wealth, skewers the anti-tax political theocracy dominating Republican politics in a New York Times op-ed today. GOP justifications for refusing to raise taxes for billionaire Americans at a time of record deficits are preposterous, he writes, adding that taxes have never stopped wealthy people from investing. He points out that Clinton-era tax rates were clearly more effective in adding jobs than the slashed rates of the Bush years. He adds that most of the mega wealthy only pay taxes on investment income, whereas lower- and middle-class Americans pay payroll taxes, too. He says the game has been rigged in his favor by the country's billionaire-friendly Congress and that the country's fiscal policy is unethical and absurd.

In a piece that surveys Republican establishment players on the GOP presidential primary field, which has drawn half-hearted commitments among big donors, the Washington Post says Texas Governor Rick Perry is making a lot of moves that signal he's ready to take the leap. The GOP players Perry has been spending hours calling up tell him the field remains wide open. In the end, though, the Post writers land on former Colorado Republican Party Chair Dick Wadhams, who is measured in his response. Indeed, after the licks Wadhams took in Tea Party Colorado last year, he sounds almost circumspect.

With a blistering multimedia blitz, satirist Stephen Colbert is making an example of Arizona Republican Senator Jon Kyl. Colbert mocked him on television to great effect Monday for launching a disingenuous Senate floor attack on Planned Parenthood and later attempting to explain it away as merely "not intended to be factual statements." Colbert is now setting Twitter on fire with a long list of "not intended to be factual statements" about the Senator, ridiculing in the process all the baloney spinning politicians in the country. There have been roughly fifty tweets in the last couple of days. Twitterati are choosing their favorites. You can, too!

The Wisconsin supreme court election held yesterday is still too close to call. At 9 a.m. this morning Colorado time, conservative Justice David Prosser reportedly led liberal opponent Joanne Kloppenburg by 800 or so votes. An hour later, AP has Kloppenburg ahead of Prosser by 200 votes. (10:30 a.m. update: With 84 percent counted Kloppenburg leads by 35,000 votes). Whether Prosser wins or loses, Wisconsin voters have sent a clear message rejecting Governor Scott Walker's uncompromising pugilist political style if not his anti-union agenda.

On Monday, Colorado Republican Party Chair Dick Wadhams announced he was ending his bid for reelection. He said he didn't want to lead a party dominated by inflexible Tea Party "nuts" who know little about how politics works. If new survey results are any measure, this may be Wadhams' best political move in a long time. Tom Jensen at Public Policy Polling reports Wednesday that the GOP civil war against "rinos" will kill the elephant in the Centennial state.

Muhammad Ali Hasan, a member of the wealthy and influential Colorado Republican Hasan family and a past state House and treasurer candidate, said he is switching parties. Speaking at the University of Colorado-Boulder on his experience growing up Muslim in the American West and later in conversation with the Colorado Independent, Hasan said he is ending his affiliation with the party for the bigotry he believes has shaped Republican politics over the last year. The FOX News regular and founder of Muslims for Bush said he met recently with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the controversial Democratic leader won him over.

Congressional Democrats voted down the first GOP legislative proposal since the midterm elections, Colorado Republican Rep. Doug Lamborn's proposal to strip tax money from...

Newly elected GOP Colorado Congressman Cory Gardner told Politico today that he would resist the Washington siren song that has turned generations of small-government...