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Sean Paige, Mike Kazmierski and High School Confidential!
Remember high school? Remember the cliques, the jealousies, the maneuvering to become one of the popular kids, the incredible nastiness over trivia? Remember how distressing it was when two or three of your friends got into a particularly nasty fight, and all of them demanded that you take their side? Remember wishing that your parents [...]
Continue reading...Utilities employee wins World Series of Poker
26. August 2010
Suppose you’re at the final table in the World Series of Poker. Play has gone on for hours, and it’s just you and another guy at the table. The pots aren’t six figures, or seven figures - they’re eight figures. You’re holding your own, and you see that your opponent is tired and distracted. His concentration [...]
Continue reading...Tonight: Debates, dispensaries and the demon weed
18. August 2010
For free entertainment, head for the downtown library to listen to Sean Paige, Tom Gallagher, Mark Waller, and Dan May square off in passionate debate at 7:00 p.m. The subject:Marijuana dispensaries. Will there be tendentious position-defining? Meaningless posturing? Bewildered, clueless politicians and/or law enforcement officials? A packed house, thanks to folks with a dog in [...]
Continue reading...The Primary is over, now the fun begins
11. August 2010
Thanks to would-be Sheriff Jake Shirk, I narrowly missed a perfect primary prediction record. Had I picked Shirk, I would have made a perfect zero - but even the best prognosticators sometimes fall short. Forced to choose between two experienced, intelligent, and eminently well-qualified candidates, Democrats went with Michael Bennet. The incumbent Senator has [...]
Continue reading...Tancredo enters the gubernatorial race
26. July 2010
Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory used to be the preferred strategy of Democrats, while those calculating, cold-hearted, practical Republicans concentrated on winning. A few years back, when I was a candidate for “weak mayor”, I was regaling then state Sen. Ken Chlouber with my visionary ideas. Ken listened for a while and then [...]
Continue reading...A grim new world awaits
22. July 2010
“We’re just another country,” said a San Francisco venture capitalist at an amiable gathering of his peers last week. “As long as ours is the reserve currency we have an advantage,” he said, “but that won’t last forever.” So what does the future hold? His guess: permanently high unemployment, a stagnant economy, an unsettled political climate, [...]
Continue reading...McInnis: ‘We’ve moved on’ from plagiarism
21. July 2010
There’s nothing quite as dispiriting as a political campaign gone bad. Staff members jump ship, support evaporates and the candidate has to soldier on and pretend that everything’s just hunky-dory. To make matters worse, the media just won’t let it (whatever “it” is) go. They ask the same pesky questions, they roll their eyes, they uncover [...]
Continue reading...The McInnis mess - part II
15. July 2010
Political scandals such as this one have a predictable arc. The candidate/elected official/senior appointed official is caught red-handed in behavior so questionable that denials are futile. Loyal spinmeisters blame the press, or focus on some minor detail of the alleged transgression that can be effectively disputed, thereby (they hope!) discrediting the rest of the accusations. If the [...]
Continue reading...County press release toes party line
12. July 2010
Here’s the text, in its entirety, of an El Paso County press release sent Friday afternoon. “Commissioners Encourage Citizens To Attend Upcoming Opportunity to Hear U.S. Senate Candidates on Jobs Trade and Economic Recovery Colorado Springs, July 9, 2010 - The Board of County Commissioners joins with the Greater Colorado Chamber of Commerce, the Colorado Springs Regional [...]
Continue reading...Hizzoner states the state of the city
1. July 2010
Events such as the mayor’s state of the city speech are, to a veteran event - attendee, comforting and familiar. Drive to the venue. Park. Make your way to the event room. Make sure you’re on the list. Get your table number. It’s 11:40 - so you have 20 minutes to schmooze. That’s the fun part. [...]
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31. August 2010
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