What's the frequency, Colorado?

[BrotherMan]

Originally Posted by ChuckF

A marriage? One marriage? Which one? Whose? If WORDS HAVE ANY MEANING, this must be referring to exactly one marriage, right?

APPLESAUCE!

Originally Posted by Stephen Maturin

Maybe the authors of this scatterbrained nonsense are trying to go all Rand Paul/[quote henry] and get government out of the marriage business entirely.

[Stephen Maturin]

Originally Posted by ChuckF

We're talking about same sex couples here, not an identifiable and vulnerable minority group like the top 1% of income earners, for example.

Yes indeed, we must protect our jerb creators from arbitrary and capricious populist bullying at the hands of ill-informed voters, especially in view of the scientifically established fact that one-percenters have no influence whatsoever on election outcomes.

[Stephen Maturin]

Originally Posted by Stephen Maturin

The Jefferson County, Lolorado School District is run by a five-member board. Far-right Republican wingnuts Ken Witt, Julie Williams and John Newkirk ran a joint campaign last year and all three won. Who could have ever predicted that far-right Republican wingnuts, having gained a majority of seats on the board, would start doing far-right Republican wingnut things?

Recall efforts are under way as to each wingnut. County officials have approved recall petitions, and recall proponents are free to start collecting signatures. Each petition requires some 15,000 valid signatures, which should be no problem at all given the tsunami of disgrace said wingnuts brought to the district.

[lisarea]

I have decided to put this in the Colorado thread, even though it would be applicable in any number of different places here:

Warren Buffett’s Family Secretly Funded a Birth Control Revolution - Bloomberg Business

This is the program where an anonymous donor funded a program to provide free IUDs in Colorado, which reduced teen pregnancy rates here by 40%. After the funding ran out, there was a proposal to continue the program based on its proven success, but Republicans love impregnating non-consenting teenagers, so it failed.

Anyways, the anonymous donor isn't anonymous anymore. That was a Buffet joint.

[lisarea]

Colorado 2014 : Nathan J Winograd

Data for Colorado shelters and rescue groups was released this week for 2014. Overall, 89% of dogs were saved, 82% of cats were saved, 86% of birds, 82% of rabbits and other small mammals, 87% of reptiles, 85% of farm animals, and 77% of “other” animals. There was great hope, given 2013’s numbers, that Colorado would be the first state to verifiably save 90% or more of all the animals. That did not occur, but they remain close and exceed many states.

[Stephen Maturin]

The shithead who killed all those people at the movie theater three years ago will go to prison for life after the jury couldn't reach unanimity on whether to impose capital punishment. (Nine jurors wanted to impose the death penalty, two were on the fence and one was vehemently opposed.) Jurors shouldn't be placed in these positions to begin with (i.e., the state shouldn't be in a position to off its own citizens), but results like this will have to do unless until First World style notions of civilization make their way into our criminal justice systems.

The brother of one of the victims correctly noted that the defense offered a guilty plea in exchange for a life sentence long ago. Three years and $5 million later, that was end result anyway.

This ain't good for wingnut District Attorney George Brauchler, who wanted to use the death sentence he was planning to get in this case as a springboard for higher office. Back in June, Brauchler was caught tweeting from the courtroom about the testimony of a witness. His excuse was that he didn't know he was tweeting; he thought he was responding to a text message. The judge basically told him to put his fucking phone away and pay attention or gtfo.

Brauchler no doubt hoped that the verdict would make people forget about the Twitter fiasco. No such luck.

[Janet]

A Michigander caught bubonic plague in Colorado. Thanks, guys.

[lisarea]

Waah waah waaah, I'm from Michigan and I have to alert the media because I got a bubo!

[BrotherMan]

Originally Posted by lisarea

...because I got a bubo!

[Stephen Maturin]

The Denver Post in its October 10, 2014 editorial endorsing Cory Gardner in the U.S. Senate race:

And contrary to [incumbent Sen. Mark] Udall's tedious refrain, Gardner's election would pose no threat to abortion rights.

And then there was Tuesday's vote to end a filibuster on a bill that would outlaw abortions after 20 weeks except in extremely restricted circumstances. Guess how Sen. Gardner voted.

----------------

Tip of the hat to lisarea for pointing out that James Ellroy, who's as identified with Los Angeles as just about any writer ever, is now a loloradan.

[Stephen Maturin]

Boulder, Colorado is trust fund hippie Buddhist heaven, so the news that the Dalai Lama is cancelling next month's appearance at the University of Colorado for medical reasons will not be well received.

The disappointed will likely include the opposing party in one of our past cases, who's now living in Boulder.

[Corona688]

Originally Posted by Stephen Maturin

The brother of one of the victims correctly noted that the defense offered a guilty plea in exchange for a life sentence long ago. Three years and $5 million later, that was end result anyway.

Question: How is a public statement that one will confess given a palatable enough deal different from an actual confession? Outside a courtroom, I'd have thought that sort of statement would pretty much damn you, and demonstrate why people have the right to remain silent.

[erimir]

Well, I suppose your view on the probability of conviction, the importance you place on being seen as innocent, the amount of influence your plea will have on that, and whether you actually are innocent are four different things. Oh, and whether you can afford the kind of lawyer needed to bring the probability of conviction down, or if you can afford to pay a lawyer for a protracted court case vs. a negotiated plea.

Of course, ideally, there is a negative correlation between innocence and the probability of conviction.

So, you can agree to plea guilty because you view the probability of conviction as high and don't value your image and/or don't think your plea will have much of an effect on it, and yet still be innocent.

[Corona688]

So a confession is not made under oath, then? It's permissible to lie for your own advantage there, and only there, in a court of law with no repercussions outside the 'admission' itself? What happens if the admission is later found to be false?

I understand the principle, but it's more complicated than it looks.

[Sock Puppet]

The Illustrated Guide to Law is pretty good on spelling out these complications. It goes into both the underlying principles and the history of where they came from. Self-incrimination stuff starts here.

[Corona688]

Well, that makes it even harder to understand... You can't be compelled to incriminate yourself, but bargaining about it by remove is A-OK. Or is it frowned upon, and accepted because there's no real way to stop it?

[Stephen Maturin]

Originally Posted by Corona688

Question: How is a public statement that one will confess given a palatable enough deal different from an actual confession?

Plea negotiations generally aren't public for just that reason. In this case, it was the defense that made the plea offer public in a filing with the court. There was never any dispute that the defendant did what he was accused of, thus no danger of screwing up an "it wasn't me" defense. The only issues were whether the defendant had a viable insanity defense (defendants rarely win on that issue) and, if not, how severe the penalty should be. I'm guessing defense counsel was trying to tell the pool of potential jurors, "Hey, we're proposing a reasonable and just outcome that'd provide some genuine closure for the community at a minimum of cost to the taxpayers, whereas the clowns on the other side are a bunch of death penalty zealots who insist on having their way regardless of how long it takes or how much it costs."

[Stephen Maturin]

So Julie Williams and her wingnut compadres on the Jefferson County Board of Education are facing a recall election next month. The three wingnuts are opposing recall by multiple means, including social media.

Yesterday one of Williams' Facebook buddies commented that teachers union members need to be purged and executed. If you click on the image of the Facebook post, you'll open a larger version showing that the author of that ever-so-classy post was none other than failed Colorado House of Representatives candidate, thief and Stormfronter Nate Marshall.

Attaway, Julie. We are indeed known by the company we keep.

[Stephen Maturin]

It's an off-year election, and this one's a little more "off" than others. There's almost nothing to do, so little in fact that I forgot to fill out my goddamn ballot until yesterday.

Here in Juggalonia, we're electing a mayor, city councilors and board members for the local school district. By law, these particular elections are "non-partisan" so no one's allowed to call himself a Republican or a Democrat or whatever. We all know who's who, though.

Our Republican mayor is running unopposed. I voted for the guy because he's competent, experienced, generally reasonable and not some batshit insane teabilly. Besides, the mayor's job is basically limited to presiding over city council meetings and being a spokesmodel for the town. The charter vests pretty much all the executive authority in a city manager, who serves at the pleasure of council.

We're in the most Republican precinct in the Republican ward in town, so my vote for a Democrat and genuinely good guy in our city council race is destined for the toilet.

Our school district wants permission to get into the internet service provider biz. Srsly. lol fuck that.

The only item worth getting worked up about is Proposition BB. State government here is kinda fucked up. Back in 1992, the voters amended the state constitution by passing this abomination known as the Taxpayers Bill of Rights. It was a bad idea, and was poorly executed to boot. For present purposes, TABOR requires that collected tax revenues in excess of certain projected revenues must be refunded.

The lion's share of the revenue from taxes on legal weed is supposed to go to schools. Not for teacher salaries or textbooks or anything like that, but instead for capital improvements. That's not ideal, but it's definitely worthwhile given the sheer number of broke-ass public school buildings in this state.

The legislature is currently holding $66 million in weed excise tax proceeds that it's not allowed to spend thanks to TABOR. Prop BB is the legislature's request to spend the money rather than refunding it to weed retailers, weed users and taxpayers in general.

Normally, I'll vote for ANYTHING that short-circuits some jackass TABOR refund. State government isn't supposed to operate in accordance with dumbfuck cookie cutter formulas. Let the goddamn legislators decide how to spend tax revenues. If you don't like how they do it, throw the fuckers out come election time.

In addition, school districts need the goddamn money. Shit's busted and needs fixed. What can't be fixed need torn down and rebuilt.

So naturally, I voted NO. Why? No, I don't want the rinky dink refund. No, I haven't changed my mind about the wisdom of TABOR. No, I haven't taken leave of my senses and become a Grover Norquist fanboy.

Trouble is, only $40 million of that $66 million would actually go to capital improvements in school districts. The rest would get divvied up among a variety of ill-defined programs, many of which would be administered by law enforcement. Such programs would include "marijuana education and prevention campaigns," "substance abuse screening and intervention," and "roadside impaired-driving enforcement training" for cops.

At the risk of sounding like some Cato Institute wingnut, local law enforcement agencies have gotten totally out of hand.1 Abuses of power are legion. There's no way in hell I could vote yes on BB knowing that Piggy McPiggerson and his colleagues may end up with brand new fully automatic weapons and large-capacity magazines as a "marijuana prevention" measure or some such shit. The pigs simply can't be trusted not to spend money on additional militarization.

So yeah. I'm basically voting for a TABOR refund.

Thanks, Obama.

1Cute story here. A year or so ago some Denver morning radio DJ posted on his Facebook page a photo of an armored vehicle with Jefferson County Sheriff's Department logos all over it, with the caption "JeffCo Sheriff has a TANK" or something along those lines. The photo caused a very small furor, to which the Sheriff responded by saying something along the lines of, "Geez breh, it's not a tank; it's just an armored personnel carrier."

[lisarea]

Our school district wants permission to get into the internet service provider biz. Srsly. lol fuck that.

WHAAA? MATLOCK!11!!! YOU CANCELLED MY VOTE.

This particular incarnation is stupid and weird, but from now on, we always vote for any internet competition, especially municipal broadband.

[Stephen Maturin]

It's the stupid and weird incarnation part that made me vote no, along with the whole idea of selling internet access being way outside the proper mission of a limited purpose governmental unit like a school district.

Get me some municipal broadband to vote on, though, and it'll be yeses all the way.

[lisarea]

NOOOOOOO!

You know what I do when we fight, right? The underpants thing?

[BrotherMan]

[Stephen Maturin]

I'm pretty goddamn happy with the results of this rinky dink off-year election. The three wingnuts on the Jefferson County school board who wanted to rewrite American history got recalled by margins that exceeded the Nixon-McGovern popular vote blowout in 1972. It feels good knowing that there really are limits to amount of right wing lunacy voters in these parts are willing to endure.

That Democrat and genuinely good guy who I said would have no chance of getting elected to city council from our ward? He fucking WON. The unofficial tally was 2141 to 1916.

As expected, that Proposition BB thing I voted against passed overwhemingly. It's mostly a good thing. School districts will get $40 million for capital improvements, anti-tax whackadoos got cock-slapped, and the Taxpayers Bill of Rights got a big ol' shitburger to eat. Still, the pigs are getting way too much money with way too few restrictions on how to spend it.

That measure allowing our school district to go into the ISP biz also passed overwhelmingly. Thank goodness. Mr. Pea would have been apoplectic had things gone the other way. I'll just have to settle for being objectively correct on the issue.

[lisarea]

So, Matlock, you know what's weird?

One of my socks was in your sock drawer.