Last month, two new reports on Colorado’s prison system urged officials to get smarter in how they spend precious tax dollars — specifically, in how they classify and monitor high-risk offenders, while figuring out which inmates are more in need of rehab than expensive cell time. Now, a pilot program…
The 2014 elections may seem a long way off, but not to Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America. Hogue came to Colorado to speak at a weekend fundraiser for Colorado NARAL that attracted numerous political heavyweights. But she’s sticking around today to meet with locally based activists, in order…
If you see the Independence Institute’s Jon Caldara smiling today, here’s one likely reason: He provided the de facto name for the lead segment on Rachel Maddow’s MSNBC show last night. Sitting to the side of a continental-U.S. map plastered with the Caldara-uttered phrase “Wave of Fear,” Maddow explored the…
Late last night, it became official: Senator John Morse and Representative Angela Giron lost recall elections prompted by their support of firearms-control bills. The defeats thrilled gun-rights groups and conservatives, while disappointing progressives who’d recently rejoiced over the measures’ passage. Below, get reactions from the National Rifle Association, Rocky Mountain…
“Oh, can’t you see/This award shames our degrees/Brought a criminal to town/So we’re marchin’ all around.” This was one chant repeated by a group of students, professors, Occupy Denver leftovers and other activists Monday afternoon outside the Hyatt Regency. They were expressing dismay over the University of Denver’s decision to…
It’s been a long, long 25 years since Donny Andrews, barely out of his teens, ended up behind bars for a string of burglaries he embarked upon to support his cocaine habit. But that quarter-century represents less than a third of the sentence heaped on Andrews, one of the harshest…
Like many reporters, I’ve written plenty of stories about guns over the years. But I’d never fired one — not a real one, anyhow. A gun-owning friend thought that was wrong given what I do for a living and set out to change it in a big way — by…
David Gunn knows he’s stepping into the crossfire. He knows the gun-control folks are likely to view him as a crank while gun owners denounce him as the Antichrist. But the former gun shop owner is an inventor by inclination and has been a firearms buff ever since he was…
On September 10, as we’ve reported, voters in southeastern Colorado will decide whether state senators John Morse and Angela Giron should be recalled because of their advocacy of gun-control measures. But with the election looming, a technical question over the vote threatens to make a controversial matter even messier. Hence,…
Senator Vicki Marble, come on down! You’re the next contestant on The Politics is Wrong! Marble, a Republican from Fort Collins, was apparently trying to be sympathetic to African-Americans at a State Capitol meeting yesterday, but her words sure as hell didn’t come out that way — unless you think…
Gun enthusiasts have long accused Colorado’s Democratic leadership of “following the script” established by major gun-control advocacy groups, such as Mayors Against Illegal Guns (MAIG), in their campaign to pass legislation expanding background checks and limiting magazine capacity — two measures that now have state senators John Morse and Angela…
The long-simmering battle over the future of a major hunk of southeastern Colorado may have taken a giant step toward resolution in Pueblo yesterday. A senior Army official assured ranchers that the Pentagon has no plans to expand the sprawling, 367-square-mile Pinon Canyon Maneuver Site — and might even rescind…
Last month, we told you about Jaxine Bubis, a political hopeful whose campaign for embattled state senator John Morse’s seat was derailed after it was revealed she’d written several steamy books — read excerpts below — and referred to herself as a “grammy who writes erotic romance.” Now, however, she’s…
Surrounded by friends and advocates at a sunny park in Aurora today, immigrant Jeanette Vizguerra celebrated a victory: She was released yesterday from the immigration detention center where she’d been held since July 24. But her fight to remain in the U.S. isn’t over. Federal authorities have given Vizguerra a…
Immigrant Jeanette Vizguerra has been fighting for years to stay in the United States. The mother of four ended up in deportation proceedings after she was pulled over in 2009 for driving with expired tags. Vizguerra was arrested and put in an immigration detention center. After being released, she fought…
This week’s feature points out that for those living off the grid, the world is full of free stuff — and freedom. At the heart of the radical movement is an emphasis on community — because it would be difficult to maintain a lifestyle of conversation, creative projects and no…
This week’s cover story, “Free for All,” talks about living off the grid and anarchism in the radical community — topics of great interest to Stephen Polk, who not only lectures on political science, ecological crisis and the Occupy Wall Street movement at University of Colorado Denver, but has over…
It’s no secret that private, for-profit prison operators such as Corrections Corporation of America pay their employees far less than what correctional officers earn in the public sector. But Republican state senators have managed to put thousands of state workers on their guard, as it were, by suggesting that the…
Update to our update, July 18, 4:10 pm: In response to Judge Robert Hyatt’s ruling, below, Governor John Hickenlooper has signed an executive order designating September, 10, 2013, as the date for the recall elections of state senators John Morse and Angela Giron. “We appreciate that the court acknowledged we…
The acquittal of George Zimmerman in the fatal shooting of Florida teen Trayvon Martin has sparked protests and prayer vigils and a seemingly endless discussion about race and guns, self-defense laws and justice in America. One of the oddest responses to cross our desk comes in the form of an…
The Denver District Attorney’s Office is still sorting out its response to a fatal shooting on South Glencoe Street last week. It may well be that the death of 29-year-old Charles McLaughlin, who allegedly fought with the male occupant of a home and attempted entry before he was shot, is…
The language is similar, to some extent, and both laws were intended to clarify a person’s right to self-defense. But there’s a world of difference between Colorado’s 28-year-old home- protection statute, commonly known as the “Make My Day” law, and Florida’s 2005 “Stand Your Ground” law, which has been a…
