People & Places

It’s hard to pigeonhole Andrew Oh-Willeke, the erudite scribe behind the Wash Park Prophet blog. Is he a hard-nosed gadfly? A bookish legal theorist? A flighty postmodern philosopher? A romantic poet? In fact, he’s all four — and much more. One day he’ll be crunching numbers on gang members in Colorado prisons, the next he’ll be detailing the many judicial rulings that have relied on Wikipedia. After that, he’ll write some verse based on a real-life Denver tourist who found the homeless more helpful than the cops. Then he’ll expound on what society’s obsession with zombie attacks suggests about the human condition. The result is sort of like a college semester squeezed into a web page — minus the homework and the parties.

Mixed martial-arts expert and tattoo artist Mike Nickels made his mark on Spike TV’s The Ultimate Fighter. For several months, he lived in a house in Las Vegas with a bunch of bad-ass dudes, chatting for the reality-TV camera and jockeying for position. Nickels was finally knocked off the show in a bloody bout, but while he lost his shot at that title, he’s still got plenty of fight left in him. And when he’s not decorating Denverites at his tattoo shop, Twisted Sol, he’s preparing for another round in the eight-sided ring.

Made you look! And that was the intention when Trinity United Methodist Church in downtown Denver placed an ad in the dailies headlined “Anna Nicole and Jesus” that offered this brief sermon: “Most feel pity for the short life of Anna Nicole Smith. She struggled and searched to find herself. Her loss of identity is a sad story with many twists and turns…. Jesus was tested in the wilderness. He was tested on his identity (…If you are the Son of God…’). He was tempted to power, material things, and the sensational. His temptations were Anna Nicole’s and ours — the temptations to prove who we are or to forge a new identity. Somehow he passed the tests. More would come….” Although Jesus somehow avoided marriage to that Texas bazillionaire, some people still doubt God’s paternity test.

Ted Haggard should be so lucky as to get a gig with Demented Divas!, the Las Vegas-style comedy drag show that takes over Lannie’s Clocktower Cabaret every Tuesday evening. Not only could Nuclia Waste give him a few lessons in being comfortable in his own skin — even if it is silver and three-nippled — but she could also have him promote Nuclia Waste’s Evangelical Free Dating Service, a business she set up after Mike Jones went public with his story. As Nuclia pronounced on her website, www.nucliawaste.com, “It seems our church leaders just can’t keep their hand out of the cookie and amphetamine jars these days…what a scandal! Nobody should ever have to PAY for sex.”

Rita Bertolli was fresh out of film school in 2004 when she battled a housing project slated for a ravine behind her parents’ Green Mountain home to a standstill. Last fall, she set her sights on bigger game, leading a grassroots group that challenged a developer’s plan to trade a “drainage strip” for 22 acres of Lakewood park land. Despite heavy backing by the mayor and ample spending by the developer, the land swap was defeated at the polls by Bertolli’s insurgents. And Bertolli’s not done yet. The website she shares with fellow gadfly Mike Muller podcasts live from city council meetings and provides needed counterpoint commentary. Do we hear a future in politics calling?

Forget the Denver Boot, that dreaded clamp invented here more than fifty years ago that has since immobilized vehicles around the globe — and inspired many choice epithets directed at the city of its origin. Today Denver has an export we can truly be proud of: the Denver Drill. This maneuver, now practiced by every fire department in America, was created in response to the 1992 death of Mark Langvardt, an engineer with the Denver Fire Department who was trapped in a small, second-floor storage room. To avoid repeat tragedies, the drill calls for two firemen to enter a closet-sized room through a second-floor window; one sits against the wall below the window while the other lifts the injured party onto the legs of the first, which are then used to lift the victim toward the ladder and waiting rescuers. Denver’s reputation is saved.

This past year, Men’s Health magazine evaluated the public water supplies of a hundred U.S. cities, examining the “most recent data on levels of arsenic, lead, halo-acetic acids and total trihalomethanes (linked to cancer), and total coliform bacteria, plus the number of EPA water-system violations from 1995 to 2005,” and determined that Denver’s is the best-quality water in the country. And it even tastes good. We’ll drink to that.

Colorado’s water may dry up, but John Orr will keep pouring it on. Orr, who works for the city’s wastewater treatment department, started Coyote Gulch in 2002 as a blog about local and national politics but soon started posting about his passion, water. Although he still comments regularly on topics like Barack Obama’s campaign and the Iraq War, more often than not he’s spouting off about all things hydrated in the Centennial State: well shut-downs on the South Platte River; the thirtieth anniversary of the Big Thompson flood; a proposed Caon City whitewater park; sex-changing fish in Boulder Creek. If you thirst for knowledge, head to Coyote Gulch.

DenverInfill is a geeky love letter to the city of Denver — a nostalgic testament to what it once was, and a joyous celebration of what it could become. Ken Schroeppel, urban planner with Matrix Design Group, has created a comprehensive and interactive guide to all infill development proposed or completed in and around downtown Denver. Through vivid maps, clear charts, a colorful blog and such creative forays as photo essays of LoDo’s remaining painted commercial signs and a mix-and-match guide to cheesy subdivision names that lets you churn out such stinkers as “The Dominion at Buffalo Gap Knoll” or “The Sanctuary at Thunder Brook Butte,” Schroeppel takes the obscure topic of urban planning and makes it understandable, even exciting. You grow, Ken.

When Mike Coffman moved from the Colorado Treasurer’s office to the nearby digs of the secretary of state, he left five-year-old golden retriever Buckley behind. The dog had grown up in the treasurer’s office, and when a staffer asked if the dog could stay on, newly elected Treasurer Cary Kennedy agreed. This is one bipartisan pooch.

What do Spalding Gray, good design, a dog named Maddie, environmental awareness and “Mile High Stories” have in common? Hugh Graham! A longtime fixture on Denver’s arts-and-culture scene — a former Significant Guy, and the other half of artist/River North Arts District co-founder Jill Hadley Hooper — Graham is fascinating to chat with, whether discussing his time as a stage manager for Spalding Gray; the design of the Frederic C. Hamilton Building; his dog, Maddie; the funny environmental newsletter Grist or his involvement with “Mile High Stories.” If you can’t get your daily dose of Graham in person, stop by his blog, which is as eclectic and delightful as Graham himself. And be sure to comment: He likes to know who’s stopping by.

All of politics is personal — very, very personal — for the folks over at ProgressNow.org. Since lawyer (and former Westword intern) Michael Huttner started his troublemaking squad of truth-seekers, they’ve made news as often as they’ve reported it, creating the catchy “Both Ways Bob” campaign that gubernatorial candidate Bob Beauprez could never escape, offering a stylish video response to Marilyn Musgrave’s disabled-vet ads, jumping so fast on inconsistencies in Scott McInnis’s campaign that the former congressman took a pass on the 2008 U.S. Senate race, and now running a Presidential March Madness elimination. But ProgressNowAction.com isn’t all fun and games; the blog’s home is full of information and position papers, and its get-out-the-vote campaign just won a Golden Dot award from the Institute for Politics, Democracy and the Internet. Turn on and tune in.

When David Bennahum, the president and CEO of the Center for Independent Media, a progressive organization based in Washington, D.C., decided to create his first state-based spinoff, he looked to Colorado. His creation went live last year, quickly establishing itself as a lively and journalistically credible blog capable of breaking news about, for instance, irregularities in failed gubernatorial candidate Bob Beauprez’s campaign. Reporters at mainstream outlets haven’t always given Colorado Confidential credit when they’ve followed the site’s lead, but they’re definitely reading — and that’s what matters most.

Like Colorado Confidential, Colorado Media Matters is the initial regional foray by a national organization — in this case, Media Matters, a Washington, D.C., outfit founded by former right-winger David Brock. Overseen by the indefatigable Bill Menezes, an ex-Denver Post staffer, the Colorado branch monitors an incredible amount of local TV, radio and print product with an eye toward ferreting out anything that smells like conservative bias. Knowing such detectives are keeping an eye on them is bound to make ethical journalists even more aware of being evenhanded — and that’s good for everyone.

Conservative pundits constantly fulminate about liberal media bias but seldom bother trying to prove their case. So props to the Independence Institute for “Unabashed Bias,” an analysis that attempted to show that the Denver dailies regularly engaged in slanted coverage of referenda C and D, two 2005 ballot issues. Because Institute honcho Jon Caldara publicly opposed both measures, questions about objectivity are worth raising — yet the findings themselves were often quite persuasive. That’s putting your study where your mouth is.

After being closed since 9/11, this year the State Capitol dome finally reopened to the public. Although you now must sign up for a tour (free, but only available Monday through Friday) and still have to climb 99 steps to the top, your efforts are rewarded with a great view from the pinnacle of political power. And while the final steps leading to the outdoor balcony are still off-limits, that loss is more than made up for by the addition of Mr. Brown’s Attic, a museum packed with Capitol memorabilia that’s named after the man who donated land for the Statehouse.

State senator Ken Gordon didn’t win his bid for Colorado Secretary of State, but his campaign was far from all wet. Building on his Best of Denver-winning ad from 2006, Gordon donned a wetsuit and hopped in a tank full of circling sharks at the Downtown Aquarium — all to emphasize the fact that he never took money from special-interest PACs. “After working in the legislature for fourteen years,” he said, “I found the time underwater with the sharks to be calming and restful.” Clearly, those sharks were unaware that Amendment 41 would soon put the bite on them. But now that Gordon’s back in the Senate finishing his term, he’s making sure that the new law continues to have teeth.

While other political campaigns devolved to the usual heightened rhetoric and low blows, Ken Gordon and Mike Coffman kept the race for secretary of state not just civilized, but downright informative as they assessed problems with the system. And when those problems were so amply illustrated in the November election, Gordon and newly elected Secretary of State Coffman joined together to help sort through the snafus.

The name is familiar, even if the face owes more to Bea than Roy Romer, Colorado’s governor from 1986 to 1998. But Chris Romer is clearly his own man. After winning a three-way primary for the District 32 slot, Romer just kept running right through the election and on into the Colorado Senate, where he’s pushed an impressive array of legislation that hasn’t been limited to education and finance, his private-sector specialty, or Democrat-friendly issues. In fact, he’s been slapped by his own party for suggesting that public-school students be competent in English in order to graduate from high school. “We need to send a signal of assimilation, not just immigration,” said the freshman legislator in introducing SB 73. And so far, Chris Romer’s assimilating very well into the Colorado Statehouse.

Governor Dick Lamm made the mighty stegosaurus our state fossil in 1982, 150 million years after it lived in Colorado. Just a few years later, a new dinosaur moved into Colorado when child psychologist James Dobson established his Focus on the Family headquarters just north of Colorado Springs.

If it’s good enough for Colorado’s second official state song, “Rocky Mountain High” should work just fine as a slogan for the 2008 Democratic National Convention. Not only is it inclusive of the entire region — and planners are touting this as a convention not just in Denver, not just in newly blue Colorado, but in the pivotal Rocky Mountain West, where the next presidential election could well be decided — but it would remind people both inside and outside of the convention to relax, mellow out and recall that the Democratic Party is the party of inclusivity. And drugs.

Paul Fiorino didn’t win the governor’s seat last November — in fact, the artist/dancer’s candidacy registered barely a blip at the polls — but he hasn’t forgotten the little people. He not only feels their pain, but he’s experienced it firsthand as a victim of foreclosure. So he composed “The Foreclosure Blues” to express what thousands of people are feeling, and to commemorate Colorado’s then-status as foreclosure capital of the country. “I got the Foreclosure Blues, they’re gonna take away my house/I got the Foreclosure Blues, I feel like a louse/I couldn’t pay my bills/No money to be had/The heater gave me chills/I really had it bad/The blues, the Foreclosure Blues.” Can’t wait to hear the legislators sing a couple rounds of this one.

Now that the Colorado Legislature has approved “Rocky Mountain High” as the second official state song (joining that ever-hummable ditty “Where the Columbines Grow”), should we upgrade the rest of our slogans and symbols? Starting with the state motto? From Colorado’s days as a territory, the Latin phrase Nil Sine Numine has been part of the official seal — and despite translations that range from “Nothing Without Providence” to “Nothing Without God,” it’s held on for more than a century. But now it’s high time to separate church and state once and for all, which Colorado could do by adopting as its motto one of the last lines in its new state song: “Everybody’s High.” Legislators should be able to get behind this, since they’ve already bought into the explanation that John Denver’s song was not referring to drugs. As for the old motto, Colorado Springs could be looking for a gently used slogan.

Although it marked the hundredth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, 1876 didn’t have much going for it besides the Battle of Little Big Horn and the admission of Colorado to the Union — timing that saddled this state with the dull, dull, dull “Centennial State” nickname. Although boosters responded by promoting Colorado as “The Highest State,” in recognition of this state’s stunning array of chart-topping fourteeners, that title was retired decades ago by prudey-pants promoters worried about drug connotations. Clearly, the name now can — and should — be elevated to its rightful place.

The legislature adopted blue grama grass as the official state grass in 1987, but even though it’s native to Colorado, this state has no business endorsing any ground cover. Besides, as Mason Tvert continues his campaign to get the possession of marijuana legalized in Colorado, our state’s residents may one day adopt a new kind of grass.

The Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep, adopted as the official state animal in 1961, is doing just fine without any help from us. A much more endangered species is the Colorado lobbyist, whose very existence — and legal foraging range — is threatened with extinction by the passage of Amendment 41.

The lark bunting, named the official state bird in 1931, is a migrant — and so are many of the executives who flew in and out of Qwest after collecting their stock options. But now they’re back in Colorado, and as they’ve shown in court, these birds can really sing.

In 1994, the greenback cutthroat trout was named the state fish, supplanting the rainbow trout, which had long been considered the unofficial state fish. Still, when was the last time you saw trout on a Denver menu? Meanwhile, there’s a sushi joint on just about every corner. Such raw ambition deserves official recognition.

Legislators adopted the square dance as the official state folk dance in 1992, but it’s so, well, square — particularly since Colorado is jam-packed with more jam-band fans per capita than any other state in the union. In honor of this peculiar set of folks, the Go Ger Swing — that dazed, trancelike step so often seen at Red Rocks and other dreadlockian venues — should take its rightful place as the state’s folk dance.

Before season nine’s high-profile conclusion at Red Rocks, three ruthless Amazing Race teams had to strip-search Golden’s rustic Clear Creek History Park, amid the squawking heirloom chickens, for the final clue that would lead them to the amphitheater and the million-dollar prize. Though it’s only a minor footnote in the pantheon of Amazing Race lore, Golden got a lot of mileage out of its fifteen minutes of fame on the CBS reality show. Sometimes nice guys do finish first.

The Ailanthus is also known as the Chinese sumac (because it looks like a sumac) and Tree of Heaven — but there’s nothing heavenly about this rapidly growing, unbearably stinky tree that’s springing up from sidewalk cracks and patches of dust all over town. Still, it has one decided advantage over the Colorado blue spruce, our official state tree since 1939: No bugs can kill it. In fact, it’s impossible to kill.

What has rhodochrosite, the state mineral since 2002, done for us lately? Compare that with the titanium sheathing on the Frederic C. Hamilton Building. It’s elemental and should be the state mineral.

Give Girl Scout Troop 357 of Lakewood a special merit badge for convincing the legislature to make Yule marble the official state rock in 2004. Coincidentally, that’s about the time some real rock — as fashioned by the Fray — was coming into its own. C’mon, Colorado: There’s more to this state’s music than John Denver.

One-stop shopping for all you need to know — and more — on state symbols and emblems, including the state tartan, gemstone and insect.

“If you have an ugly girlfriend and she changes her name, she is still ugly,” Commerce City mayor Sean Ford says, by way of explaining his opposition to renaming his town. Not that Commerce City is a town without pretty, he hastens to point out; the ugly truth is that all those johnny-come-latelies to the burg northeast of Denver want to gussy it up with a superficial name that gives no hint of the town’s deep, personality-filled roots. While Ford’s own name won’t be on the April 3 ballot — his eight years on council are enough — he definitely plans to hit the polls to vote down the renaming proposal. Save Commerce City!

There’s a growing threat to the manicured Pleasantville atmosphere of Highlands Ranch: the Question Alliance. Spearheaded by locals James and Diane Schrack, the Question Alliance is essentially the community-outreach wing of the increasingly loud and proud Highlands Ranch Democrats. These inquisitive activists requisition the corner of University Avenue and Highlands Ranch Parkway roughly one Saturday morning a month and wave carefully coordinated signs, which bear a new question each session: “Should more of our soldiers die in Iraq?” “Has our government forgotten Katrina victims?” “Is the U.S. doing enough to stop the genocide in Darfur, Sudan?” These are not the usual thoughts that occupy Highland Ranchers as they go about their weekend errands, but the Question Alliance isn’t going away — at least not until they get some answers.

We thought long and hard about this. Far longer than any member of The Real World: Denver has ever thought about, well, anything. And although a prize should probably go to the Real World producers for finding an entire cast capable of out-vapiding LoDo, Alex is the up-front winner. For a while there, Tyrie was running away with the prize — but then he up and almost smacked a ho. Alex, on the other hand, doesn’t smack girls, he just sleeps with them. Often. We can’t remember the last time we saw a cast member hook up with not one, but two roommates — repeatedly! And then pull whoever he wants out of Monarck to swap some bacteria in the hot tub. Plus, one time he said this: “My penis’s brain is saying, ‘You need to have sex with Colie.’ My penis’s heart is saying, ‘No.'” Our penis’s gut is saying, Our man!

Local artist and arts booster Rodney Wallace hasn’t been exactly glued to The Real World, but the producers were stuck on his bold, graphic paintings. They put five of Wallace’s pieces in the Real World: Denver house — the former home of B-52 Billiards on Market Street — along with pool tables, elk heads, a hot tub, a ski-lift chair and a Jeep turned into a bar. Within hours of the art’s appearance, Wallace was getting calls from would-be collectors across the country. Way to show them what the real Denver looks like!

Fewer and fewer stations employ local DJs today, instead relying on syndicated shows or far-flung jocks who voice-track long-distance, using the same playlists across the nation. So thank goodness for Radio 1190, the outstanding station at the University of Colorado at Boulder, which employs a constantly changing but consistently passionate staff dedicated to finding the greatest possible variety of new and exciting sounds, not serving up the old stuff like the aural equivalent of comfort food. Variety is the spice of Radio 1190, and it tastes great.

From his earliest years on Denver television, Marty Coniglio has been one of the market’s most credible forecasters. Why? He’s cautious about his predictions and aware of technology’s limitations, never implying that he knows with metaphysical certitude precisely what sort of clothes viewers should wear five days in the future. As a result, he tends to be right about the weather more often than not — something plenty of his peers can’t claim.

Longtime residents will remember Rob “Sunny” Roseman as a younger counterpart to the late Leon “Stormy” Rottman on Channel 9 back in the ’80s; they were paired in an ad campaign with the slogan “Sunny days and Stormy nights.” Since then, Roseman has worked as an actor and a silkscreen printer, and is the author of Life’s Little Ahas, a book filled with pithy sayings such as “If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.” Apparently, he decided to take his own advice, since he’s now back doing what he did decades ago: providing a Sunny take on Denver weather.

When he hit Denver screens in 2000, Daru quickly carved out a niche as the resident loon on Channel 2’s morning show. That gig ended when he and his wife, former Channel 2 anchor Wendy Brockman, moved to Florida. But last year they returned, and Fox wisely hired Daru to pick up where he’d left off. Today, he’s once again making the early hours more tolerable by making practically no sense at all. Nice work if you can get it.

Television news is frequently bashed for its superficiality. Frankly, a lot of those gripes are justified — but not in the case of Adam Schrager and Raj Chohan of Channel 9 and Channel 4, respectively. In the run-up to the 2006 election, they did a fine job of examining the myriad claims made in campaign commercials via “Truth Tests” (the name given to Schrager’s segments) and “Reality Check” (Chohan’s umbrella term). Since then, Chohan has branched out to tackle other issues of the day under the same heading, while Schrager is developing Your Show, a new Sunday program devoted to current events. Wouldn’t it be nice if these guys started a trend?

Because Channel 7 isn’t partnered with one of the Denver dailies, the station’s scoops aren’t automatically ballyhooed, as Channel 9’s are in the Post and Channel 4’s are in the Rocky. However, the dogged Tony Kovaleski regularly forces the papers to follow his lead (and to credit his station), most recently with his first-rate work on the insurance-related controversy swamping Reverend Acen Phillips and the New Birth Temple of Praise Community Baptist Church. The kind of convergence Kovaleski’s most interested in results in memorable stories.

Thirty years or so as an almost unassailable ratings champ has made 9News’s 10 p.m. offering Denver’s newscast of record. Anchors Adele Arakawa and Bob Kendrick are supplemented by a reporting team that ranges from veteran power hitters like Paula Woodward to next-generation journalists with something to prove — and the combo of forecaster Kathy Sabine and sports anchor Drew Soicher has star power to spare.

After Ed Greene was transferred to the night shift, Channel 4’s morning program began to drift in ways that suggested the station was ready to concede defeat in the time period. But recently, the show has received an infusion of energy from new meteorologist Stacey Donaldson, a recruit from Channel 31. Her quirky presence complements the efforts of hosts Tom Mustin and Brooke Wagner, not to mention Luan Akin and Lynn Carey, the city’s finest traffic tandem. Once again, the race is on.

When Channel 9 and Channel 20 became sister stations, execs began looking for ways to share resources, including the human kind. One result was the four-hour morning programming block split evenly between the stations. From 5 to 7 a.m., familiar faces like Gary Shapiro, Kyle Dyer, Susie Wargin and Gregg Moss appear on Channel 9; then they repeat the feat from 7 to 9 a.m. on Channel 20 (while also appearing in update segments on Channel 9). The logistics of this task are considerable, and so is the workload. Still, Denver’s most popular morning team makes doubling up seem like a snap.

Jazz radio signals are an endangered species in these United States, and for a while late last year, the folks at KUVO feared their station was bound for extinction, too. But while there have been painful behind-the-scenes changes and job cuts, the format appears to be safe for the time being. And that’s great news, since KUVO, which JazzWeek magazine named the nation’s best jazz broadcaster in both 2005 and 2006, remains a local treasure. Long may it swing.

Talk about growing into a role. During the ’90s, when he was on Channel 9’s staff, Jim Benemann was a solid TV presence, but the passage of years since then has given him a gravitas only hinted at by his earlier work. That’s not to say he’s a stiff — Benemann comes across as downright avuncular at times and can banter with the best of them. When the news is serious, though, he delivers it with a brand of thoughtfulness that only comes with experience.

Joel Davis, the man behind TerraSonic, brings the world to Denver every Saturday afternoon. He’s a veteran musical explorer, and his deep knowledge of indigenous sounds from around the globe results in a program that’s simultaneously accessible and adventurous. Last year, the show moved from Radio 1190 to KGNU, and earlier this month, it became the first to air from the latter’s new studio. This honor was appropriate, since TerraSonic specializes in breaking new ground.

At 1600 AM, KCKK had spun classic country for years — but when execs at Lincoln Financial Media, the station’s owner, decided to flip to ESPN programming, the format seemed doomed. Then Tim Brown of NRC Broadcasting rode to the rescue, striking a deal that moved the style to 1510 AM, call letters and all. The arrangement is a boon for sports fans even as it preserves one of the Denver dial’s true gems — a place where the country music actually sounds like country music. It’s a kick.

The very airwaves that emanate from Studio 1430 AM feel a bit gentler, a bit less abrasive than those that beam from other stations. Judging by commercials for retirement communities and all-inclusive cruise vacations, as well as station IDs that extol the virtues of the Autumn Years (“Relax — you’ve earned it,” assures one soothing female voice), the station’s primary demographic is the seventy-and-up set — but the sounds themselves have classic, timeless appeal, from ’40s big band to ’50s swing to ’60s pop. Studio 1430 plays it all with genuine reverence rather than retro shtick, spinning such artists as the Andrews Sisters, Duke Ellington and Frank Sinatra with equal respect. Go on, tune in, and just see how your day improves after a good long listen to “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy.” You’ve earned it.

Bret Saunders handles his show so smoothly that his efforts don’t always receive the attention they deserve. He’s got eclectic musical tastes — he regularly writes about jazz for the Denver Post — and if KBCO’s sonic signature restrains him to some degree when it comes to song choices, he more than makes up for such limitations with banter, commentary and interviews that are typically smart, feisty and funny as hell. It takes hard work to make things look so easy.

Air America Radio, which supplies most of AM 760’s content, isn’t in the best of health; the network filed for bankruptcy last year, and while it was subsequently purchased by Green Family Media, the recent departure of comic-turned-senatorial-candidate Al Franken doesn’t help. But Jay Marvin gives local liberals an excellent reason to keep tuning in. He may be less excitable than he was during his stint with KHOW in the ’90s, but he remains an impassioned commentator who’s able to balance righteous indignation with personal warmth. He’s the talk of the town.

A reprint of a Washington Post story that ran on page one of the December 3 Denver Post included a subhead identifying former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld as “Donald Armsful.” It was probably a spellcheck error, but there’s always the possibility that a Rumsfeld sympathizer at the Post got into the file. After all, Rumsfeld really did have his arms full.

At the end of an article about an Aspen mansion that Denver Post business scribe Al Lewis wrote last year, his e-mail address — alewis@denverpost.com — was printed as allies@denverpost.com, which he read as Al Lies at DenverPost.com. Lewis says spellcheck was the culprit, and there’s no reason to doubt him. After all, Al Doesn’t Lie at DenverPost.com.

One of Denver’s biggest cable operations is a mystery to most Denver cable subscribers. HDNet and its sister service, HDNet Movies, both owned by Dallas billionaire Mark Cuban, employ a staff of around 200 full-time employees who work at Colorado Studios in Stapleton. The channels have a growing national profile, thanks in large part to Cuban’s hiring of CBS vet Dan Rather to host a weekly news program. But while the stations are available on DISH Network and DirecTV, those who get Comcast don’t get HDNet, and that’s a shame — because they deserve the chance to check out HDNet’s gains, too.

The opening celebration for the Highland Bridge took that old Field of Dreams cliche — “If you build it, they will come” — and gave it a modern twist: “If you build it and are not quite finished but all the speeches have been written, the entertainment booked and the catering tents rented, they will still come.” And they did come, even though the Highland Bridge connecting Highland with the Platte Valley was still clearly months from completion, for festivities that included speeches, the release of some doves that caused at least one fender bender, and fireworks that came as a complete surprise to the Department of Transportation, which oversees I-25.

It’s an honor to be savaged by someone as talented as Dave Barry — and when Congressman Tom Tancredo called Miami a Third World country, he might as well have put a “kick me” sign on Denver’s back. In honor of the Super Bowl arriving in Miami, Floridian Barry wrote a column welcoming visitors and offering this: “Miami is also a world-class party city, which is why the Super Bowl is being held here for a record-tying ninth time. Compare that with — to pick a city at random — Denver, which has been selected to host the Super Bowl a total of let’s see, the 60s, nope, the 70s, nope, the 80s, nope, the 90s, nope, the 2000s, nope…. Gosh, it seems that Denver has NEVER, not one single time in over four decades, been selected to host the Super Bowl. I’m sure there’s a good reason for this, such as that the Denver area has too few hotel rooms, or too many xenophobic dimwits representing it in Congress.”

He could have run for governor, but Andrew Romanoff wisely decided that he belonged at home — as Speaker of the House, where he opens his office door every Tuesday afternoon to anyone who feels like a chat. The District 6 representative also shares on his blog (http://andrewromanoff.blogspot.com/), and oversees official House proceedings with very good humor. But Romanoff is perhaps at his best talking behind the scenes, working toward consensus on even the stickiest issues. Could be that he came by that talent naturally, as the child of a Democratic mother and a Republican father. More likely, though, he picked up his political skills along the way, through his keen intellect and observational skills. Romanoff is term-limited out in 2008, but he’s been so very nice to have around the House.

There’s never been anything like it in Denver — and not just because it looks like a futuristic spacecraft (or maybe what’s left after one crashes). Even as the steel framing of the structure created by Daniel Libeskind and the Davis Partnership was going up, the Frederic C. Hamilton Building was a landmark. And as it came on line last fall, this addition to the Denver Art Museum was reviewed in newspapers and magazines around the world. Although many of the reviews were negative, as Oscar Wilde pointed out, being talked about is better than not being talked about — and talk about the Hamilton they did. Some of the talk was about functional problems, and the roof does leak. But even so, the building has fulfilled its most important promise: raising Denver’s cultural profile a full notch, maybe two.

Although there’s been a lot of new construction in the Golden Triangle, most of it has been absolutely dreadful, with mid-rises better suited to Centennial or Reunion sprinkled between big fat Greek high-rises. But there are some noteworthy exceptions, particularly the Golden Row Townhomes: three out-of-this-world neo-modernist townhouses. The detailing of the buildings is superb, with pierced planar walls creating a restrained and simultaneously complicated massing; also very neat is the orchestration of the rich array of materials, including metal, glass and stone. Sprocket Design-Build, headed up by Bill Moore, has only been around a few years, but it’s clear this creative firm is building for the future.

The Central Platte Valley may be one of the oldest parts of the city, but today it looks completely new, with cool-looking modern architecture filling the once-dusty, desolate railyards. The most recent standout is Glass House, at 23 stories the tallest structure in the area. Designed by the multi-disciplin-ary firm Preston Partnership and developed by Wood Partners and East-West Partners, this condominium project includes two adjacent towers with lively cubic volumes that reflect off each other in the glass walls; the twin structures sit on a unified concrete podium that does double duty as a parking garage. Glass House has great views of both downtown and the Front Range — but it’s looking pretty good itself.

With fins on the roof reminiscent of a cool ’50s cruiser, the swank, sleek Signature Centre presents a striking silhouette against the sky. But this building has far more going for it than flashy good looks: It’s also environmentally friendly, designed by architect Binh Vinh and developed by Aardex to meet LEED certification. Its many ecological features — including warmer air conditioners and individual ventilation and lighting systems that are switched off when not in use — not only look good, but they do good, too.

The innermost stop on light rail’s new southeast corridor, Louisiana and Pearl is also the most citified, with its lot-free “kiss-n-ride” designation (don’t even try to park in the nearby residential neighborhood) and Mark Leese’s welcoming “Jurassic Leaves” sculpture/shelter aboveground. But down below, under the bridge where you catch your ride, the station becomes a truly moving experience: T-Rex traffic rushes by as trains come and go, while Denver sculptor Ira Sherman’s interactive metal-and-neon “Stange Machine” snakes above the platform, whimsical and sleekly spooky at the same time. This is the ultimate urban-transport experience.

If 17th Street is truly the Wall Street of the West, then the Ideal Building — which now holds Colorado Business Bank — lies at the intersection of art and commerce. At the two-story entrance, menacing marble bison guard bronze doors decorated with American Indian dance motifs. Inside, a frieze encircles the richly appointed lobby, paying tribute to the theme of money in history and its sacred importance in our lives today. Designed in 1907 by engineer Montana Fallis for Charles Boettcher’s Ideal Cement Company, Denver’s first multi-level, all-reinforced concrete building celebrates its hundredth anniversary this year. With interest compounded.

Just where Daniel Libeskind’s new building planted Denver on the cultural map is still up for debate. But the weekend-long completion celebration definitely put our city at the center of the party map! From the 10 a.m. Saturday opening under sunny skies to a chilly Sunday-night close, the 35-hour party attracted everyone in Denver who gives a DAM. Watching patrons bump into art and knock their heads on the angled walls only added to the fun, and throughout the weekend, it was impossible not to run into an old acquaintance or make a new friend.

Back in the early ’80s, Ron Binz became the first head of the Office of Consumer Counsel, a consumer-advocacy agency that represented consumers before the Public Utilities Commission — and regularly pissed off not just major utilities, which had previously had the PUC almost all to themselves, but legislators plugged into those utilities. In fact, when Binz was later nominated to a slot on the PUC, legislators shot him down not once, but twice. But two decades later, Governor Bill Ritter named Binz — by then a utilities consultant who ran a vineyard in his spare time — to chair the PUC, and the nomination passed with just one “no” vote. Mr. Binz, please be seated — and keep watching out for the consumer.

If you like to over-plan, are looking for a convenient excuse to cancel unwanted road trips or just want to enjoy the hassles of driving without leaving your home, let this Colorado Department of Transportation website put you in the virtual driver’s seat. The site offers up-to-the-minute road conditions, weather information and travel times. Nervous drivers will particularly appreciate the one-click access to messages posted on any of the fixed variable signs stationed alongside various roadways, and voyeurs should enjoy the wide array of traffic cameras positioned around the state.

During the 2006 gubernatorial campaign, the highly partisan ProgressNowAction sent those who made a $10 donation something extra for their efforts: flip-flops emblazoned with the phrase “BOTH WAYS” and a photo of Republican Bob Beauprez. Proof once again that only a hypocritical stance and one false letter separate scandals from sandals.

This isn’t your father’s Conoco station — unless your father is Jackie Chan. In addition to the usual independent, urban convenience-store hodgepodge of noodle bowls, outdated hair dye, magazines, 3.2 beer, adult diapers and miniature pipes, the sign that greets drivers heading out of downtown on Speer Boulevard promises “souvenirs.” And how! Nothing says “I’ve Been to Denver” more than a jade bracelet, a pair of brass knuckles, an elegantly engraved gutting knife or a throwing star. Okay, maybe a beer-mug magnet, but this Conoco has those, too.

William “Buffalo Bill” Cody may have been the greatest marketing man ever born, so he’d be proud to know that the Denver park that holds his grave also boasts the state’s best souvenir store. Three years after Buffalo Bill was buried on Lookout Mountain, his foster son, Johnny Baker, asked Denver if he could build a structure nearby where he could display historic Buffalo Bill items and also sell some memorabilia — as well as snacks. In 1921 he opened the Pahaska Teepee, a classic neo-West structure of spruce logs that quickly became a must-stop for Denverites motoring up the mountain to take in the stunning view. While the historic Buffalo Bill collection long ago moved into an actual museum built by Denver in 1977, the Pahaska is still a must-stop for anyone who loves souvenirs both cheesy (cow-chip frisbees) and classy.

Remember the University of Colorado at Boulder before Hank Brown took over as president? The institution’s reputation had fallen to subterranean depths after a series of public embarrassments and subsequent investigations, and previous prez Elizabeth “Betsy” Hoffman’s ineffectual attempts to set things right only made matters worse. Enter former senator Brown. His steady leadership and open, plainspoken style surprised skeptics and silenced critics. Despite having given his notice — Brown says he’ll leave by early 2008 — he continues to be CU’s best advertisement, and a real recruiter.

Metrosexuality comes naturally to sportscaster Chris Tanaka. Rather than stick with the typical hair helmet favored by style-challenged on-air males, he rocks a spiky/sexy cut that tells members of the younger demographic that he knows about scoring in every sense of the word. There aren’t many besuited TV dudes who can pull off such a daring look — but on Tanaka, this ‘do is far from a d’oh!

It’s not often that a single station sweeps the much-coveted Best Hair category. But the moment morning forecaster Crystal Egger hit Fox 31’s airwaves, her locks made her a lock for this honor. She wears a blond swoop over her right eye that blends boldly into what appear to be yards of silk whose shifting colors practically throb when seen on a high-def set. Her moniker may seem made up — sounds like a porn name to us — but her spectacular coiffure is the real thing.

Drew Soicher’s the reigning jester of Denver sports anchors, but what happened to his snout back in the day isn’t funny. A childhood accident thoroughly scrambled his cartilage, and before the injury had fully healed, he took a softball in the proboscis that damaged it permanently. Today, one of his nostrils is still longer than the other, making his sniffer look as if it’s melting la Salvador Dal — but on Soicher, it looks perfect. He wins this race by a nose.