Tag: Shawn Mitchell

The Senate pulled the plug on the struggling HJR 1007, leaving the General Assembly out of compliance with state law and the Joint Budget Committee with no consensus revenue projection by which to budget.

The partisan feud over a largely symbolic budget resolution spilled over into the Senate today, where Majority Leader John Morse, D-Colorado Springs, amended Joint House Resolution 1007 to effectively remove a Republican amendment that lowered revenue expectations by 2.7 percent.

In presenting its findings Monday, a state audit committee all but confirmed news reports that Pinnacol Assurance, Colorado's quasi-government health insurance company, lavished executives with suspect bonuses and paid for high-flying executive travel and entertainment expenses.

Members of the national press has been watching the compelling U.S. Senate race in Colorado and, for a change, they seem to be seeing...

DENVER-- Colorado joined Virginia this week in edging closer to charging out-of-state internet sales tax following a final vote on HB 1193 in the Senate Wednesday. The bill, sponsored by Rep. Jack Pommer, D-Boulder, and Sen. Rollie Heath, D-Boulder, would require retailers to either collect the tax or send notices to Colorado customers informing them that they need to pay the taxes.

In heated debate Wednesday over controversial legislation aimed at taxing purchases from out-of-state online retailers, Sen. Shawn Mitchell, R-Broomfield, argued that a proposed amendment to failed to fully guard purchaser privacy. He offered examples. Would you want a government bureaucrat to know that a Sen. John Morse spent money for products from Pfizer pharmaceuticals or from lingerie retailer Fredrick's of Hollywood? he asked, chiding his Democratic colleague. Mitchell said it was one thing to open up your bookstore spending to the state but spending on drugs, for example, or "domestic pleasure appliances" would be something else.

The payday loan industry gouges Coloradans like it does Americans across the country, targeting mostly low-income single women, including military spouses. Denver Democratic state Rep. Mark Ferrandino tried and failed to introduce legislation in 2008 that would have curbed the worst of the abuses, where desperate borrowers take loans at hundreds of percent interest and enter a debt cycle they rarely are able to exit. Ferrandino may try it again this year.

DENVER-- More than a hundred people gathered at a rally convened on the west steps of the capitol today to urge Colorado lawmakers to oppose federal health reform and to launch a state ballot initiative that aims to exempt Colorado from any version of the health legislation set to pass through Congress in the coming weeks. The move here reflects related efforts in states across the country.

Friday night, self-identifying "average person" Dean Madere made his first real candidate appearance at the Ranch in Loveland, where the Tea Party of Northern...

Despite the impression generated by the shouting Tea Party rabble this month, most Americans know very well that health care in the U.S. is...