11 Colorado counties to vote on secession on Tuesday

By Arturo Garcia/Raw Story

A group of 11 counties in northern Colorado will decide on Tuesday whether to express their discontent with state lawmakers through a push to form their own state,CNN reported.

“We’re tired of being ignored, we’re tired of being politically disenfranchised,” Weld County commissioner Sean Conway told CNN. “If you don’t wake up and you don’t start to change things, you’re going to see more movements like this begin to take a more serious face and move towards creating our own political entity that we believe will protect our very way of life and our economy.”

The non-binding resolution will ask voters in Weld and the other affected counties whether they support breaking away to form their own state, North Colorado. But a formal plan would require approval at both the state and federal level.

Conway told CNN that the initiative was spurred by the signing of state Senate Bill 13-252 in June 2013, which he felt hurt rural communities by increasing the renewable-energy minimums for the state’s energy providers.

“We’re not renewable-energy unfriendly out here in rural Colorado, but when you start imposing mandates different on other folks than yourself, that’s the definition of tyranny,” Conway explained. “I think it’s kind of where this whole issue started to manifest itself.”

However, Weld County District Attorney Ken Buck has gone on record with his opposition to the measure, dubbed the “51st State Initiative,” arguing that the existing political system is still the best way for rural residents to voice their opinions.

“I think what’s happening is that things are moving so fast the people don’t feel included in the process,” Buck told CNN. “We’ve legalized marijuana. We’ve legalized civil unions. We’ve legalized a lot of things very quickly. That’s a lot of change for people to accept.”

Earlier this year, residents in a pair of California counties began voicing their support for the idea of also forming a state of their own, Jefferson.

Watch CNN’s report, aired on Monday,

 below.

Colorado Legislator: Poverty Higher Among ‘Black Race’ Because They Eat Too Much Chicken

BY JOSH ISRAEL/Think Progress

In a meeting of the state’s Economic Opportunity Poverty Reduction Task Force Wednesday, Colorado State Sen. Vicki Marble (R) delivered a long monologue suggesting that the reason for poverty among certain minority groups was that they eat too much chicken and barbecue.

Discussing statistics about racial disparities in the poverty rate, KVDR Denver reports, Marble claimed that the studies ignored drug addiction and poor diets common among Latino- and African-American families.

MARBLE: When you look at life expectancy, there are problems in the black race: sickle-cell anemia is something that comes up, diabetes is something that’s prevalent in the genetic makeup and you just can’t help it… Although I’ve got to say, I’ve never had better barbecue and better chicken and ate better in my life than when you go down south and you — I mean love it and everybody loves it. The Mexican diet in Mexico with all of the fresh vegetables. And you go down there and they’re much thinner than when they come up here… they change their diet.

Listen to the hearing here.

A July study by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization found that obesity rates are actually higher in Mexico than in the United States.

Another task force member, Rep. Rhonda Fields (D) responded, saying, “The title for this committee is Economic Opportunity Poverty Reduction; and one of the things I will not tolerate is racist and insensitive comments about African Americans, the color of their skin. What you mentioned that we eat — I was highly offended by your remarks.” She added that she would not “engage in a dialogue where I’m in the company, where you are using these stereotyped references about African American and chicken and food… this is not what this committee is all about… it’s not about chicken.”

The chairman then adjourned the meeting so the task force’s members could “all take a deep breath.”

In a statement Wednesday night, Marble said, “My comments were not meant to be disparaging to any community… I am saddened they were taken in that regard. I take my responsibility seriously and I hope our work on this committee will offer real solutions to the health and financial challenges of our vulnerable populations.”

Colorado Launches $2 Million Public Education Campaign To Spread The Word About Obamacare

By Sy Mukherjee/Think Progress

Colorado is bringing health care reform to a TV ad near you.

With over 40 percent of Americans still unsure whether or not Obamacare is even the law of the land, and an open enrollment period for its statewide insurance exchanges that begins in less than five months, Colorado is pumping $2 million into an outreach effort aimed at preparing consumers for upcoming changes under the health law. This makes Colorado the first state to mount an aggressive push to raise awareness of one of Obamacare’s most important provisions for uninsured individuals and small businesses — although Oregon and Kentuckyaren’t far behind with their own PR campaigns planned for next month.

Colorado is unveiling a state-run website to give residents more detailed information about Obamacare, and help them figure out whether they will qualify for federally subsidized individual or small business coverage once Colorado’s insurance marketplace opens up in October. For the next two months, the state will also run television spots and print, radio, and billboard ads highlighting the insurance marketplaces, where insurers must compete to offer Americans health coverage:

(Credit: Kaiser Health News)

While the vast majority of Americans are already benefiting from Obamacare’s consumer protections and insurance reforms, enrolling the previously uninsured into health plans on the state-level marketplaces will be critical for successful implementation of the law, and integral to reducing America’s uninsurance rate while improving public health. Some 24 million Americans are expected to receive insurance through the marketplaces by 2016.

But not everybody agrees that now is the proper time to begin the outreach efforts. Some federal officials worry that such education campaigns may be premature, and end up confusing consumers by advertising a product that doesn’t even exist yet. “Our research has shown if you go too early, you don’t have anything to offer, and people lose interest. It will be intense, but the timing is important,” Medicare chief Marilyn Tavenner explained to the Washington Post.

On the other hand, state leaders argue that the early outreach is necessary because there’s so much confusion — and general lack of information — surrounding Obamacare. “We needed to get a wider awareness of our organization in a short amount of time to help prepare people for the changes that will be taking place,” said Myung Oak Kim, the communications and outreach director for Colorado’s health exchange. Colorado also plans to run more detailed ads closer to October’s enrollment period.

Strikingly, Colorado’s PR push never even mentions “Obamacare” — it just presents the exchange as a new public health innovation coming to the state. Considering the hyper-polarized nature of political debates over Obamacare, and the fact that much of the confusion over the landmark reform law stems from deliberate misinformation campaigns by conservative critics and some in the media, that may just be a necessary omission.

Colorado Legislature Passes Major Voting Rights Expansion Bill

By Nicole Flatow/Think Progress

Both houses of the Colorado legislaturepassed a major overhaul of state election law that would implement same-day registration and voting, automatically send mail-in ballots to every voter, and create a real-time statewide voter database to prevent fraud. Proponents view the bill, written by a bipartisan group of county clerks, as a national model for other states.

The same-day registration provision prompted most of the resistance from Republicans, who largely voted against the bill in both houses. The bill, however, did garner Republican support from county clerks, and former Republican Secretary of State Donetta Davidson. The Denver Post explained:

Those promoting the changes said the bill is uniquely Colorado, and the state could take the lead nationally on making elections more convenient to voters. They are confident other states will follow — because voters like mail voting (74 percent in Colorado last November), while preserving in-person voting at a few early voting centers, and, eventually, saving millions of dollars for counties. [...]

Other clerks, though, said switching to mail will mean buying less equipment to operate and maintain for a ever-shrinking number of people who still vote in person. That could save millions of dollars in some county over a longer period of time. Denver expects to save a total of about $730,000 in next year’s general election alone, director of elections Amber McReyholds said.

Before the bill goes before Gov. John Hickenlooper (D), the Senate must approve a slight amendment to the House bill. If signed into law, the bill is likely to give a significant boost to turnout in Washington and Colorado, the two states that now have universal vote-by-mail. Their turnout rates exceed the national average by more than five percentage points. And studies have found that Election Day Registration laws boost turnout 7 to 14 percentage points.

Since the November election, 195 bills to expand the franchise have been introduced in 45 states, according to a recent Brennan Center for Justice study. Thirty-one states, however, also introduced 80 new bills to roll back the right to vote.

Vandals spraypaint swastikas on Obama Colorado campaign office

By Arturo Garcia/Raw Story

For the second time in a week, a Colorado field office for President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign has been targeted.

KUSA-TV reported Friday that the campaign’s field office in Conifer, Colorado, was found with swastikas spray-painted on it.

According to The Denver Post, a spokesperson for the Johnson County Sheriff’s Department said a deputy answering a vandalism report that morning found three windows and five campaign signs for the president had been vandalized, though he did not know what had been spray-painted on them.

The swastika symbol is widely associated with the Nazi parties and accompanying philosophies like white supremacy.

Conifer is less than 60 miles away from Denver, where a gunshot was fired at an Obama campaign field office Oct. 12. A Denver Police spokesman said the bullet was recovered from inside the office, but he did not have an update on that investigation.

Members of the Obama campaign at the Conifer office refused to comment on Friday’s incident.

KUSA’s report on the swastika incident, aired Friday, can be seen below.

NRA Magazine Sends Insensitive Tweet Hours After Colorado Shooting, Then Deletes Social Media Accounts

By Adam Peck/Think Progress


Just after 9:00 am EST, as most of the country was just learning about the tragic shooting in Aurora, Colorado, the National Rifle Association’s publication American Rifleman sent out a tweet that, in context of the day’s news, was very poorly received:

The message was widely circulated around Twitter for several hours this morning, before the organization first deleted the tweet, then nixed their entire account. Commenters also noticed the website appeared to be down early in the afternoon, supposedly for maintenance. A representative from the NRA’s publications division wasn’t immediately available to comment.

By 2:30 pm, the website for the American Rifleman was back up, but links to the publication’s Twitter and Facebook accounts were removed, and the accounts themselves no longer exist. Here is what the menu bar looked like earlier this year versus this afternoon:

This would not be the first time the NRA is accused of insensitivity following a tragic shooting spree. Thirteen years and thirteen miles is all that separates Aurora from Colorado’s last massacre, when two teenaged gunmen killed 13 people at Columbine High School in Littleton, CO. Back then, the NRA ignored pleas by the city and its residents to relocate their annual convention away from Denver, instead inviting 3000 gun advocates to town less than two weeks after the massacre in the city suburbs. And that winter, the NRA gave thousands of dollars to state lawmakers to beat back attempts at strengthening gun regulations.

UPDATE

NRA responds: “A single individual, unaware of events in Colorado, tweeted a comment that is being completely taken out of context,” NRA spokesman Andrew Arulanandam said in a comment issued to CNN. “Our thoughts and prayers are with the victims, their families and the community. NRA will not have any further comment until all the facts are known.”