Opinion & Commentary

I felt like Ed McMahon. Only alive. On Friday, I contacted five local artists to let them know they’d been chosen as 2010 MasterMinds — an honor that comes not just with a title, but with cold, hard cash. Money with no strings attached, money they can use for anything…

The panhandler outside looked happy. The hostess inside looked happy. The server looked happy. And we were happy, to take a break from our marathon drive across Colorado to look at colleges and sit down in a booth in a Boulder restaurant with a nice view of the Pearl Street…

Before Michael Bennet’s fundraiser with President Barack Obama on Thursday afternoon, the incumbent senator has another important date: He and Democratic challenger Andrew Romanoff will meet for their first debate at 8 p.m. tonight. The faceoff at St. Cajetan’s on the Auraria campus (it’s sponsored by Denver Young Democrats) should…

For decades, as both a Denver City Council member and then a member of then-Mayor Wellington Webb’s administration, Cathy Donohue helped steer the course of Denver. She just never expected to steer into Denver. But on November 24, 2008, Donohue was behind the wheel when her car crashed into CityGrille,…

Smashburger got its start here in Colorado in 2007, and since then the local chain has been a smashing success as it expanded into other markets, often offering up regional variations on the their great burger formula. Now, finally, Smashburger is showing Colorado some home-state love. On February 14, it…

You won’t find Michelle Malkin, the conservative commentator who now calls Colorado home and was just named one of the right’s top 25 journalists, out at the Denver Federal Center today. That’s because the National Park Service will be holding a meeting at 10 a.m. on $3 million in grants…

Mayor John Hickenlooper is stranded in Washington, D.C., where he went to make a fast speech — and now is stuck in that snowbound city. Which means he probably won’t make the Colorado Restaurant Association “Candidates & Cocktails” event that starts at 5 p.m. today at Elway’s in Cherry Creek,…

HBurgerCo, the new gourmet burger and contemporary cocktail joint going into 1555 Blake Street (fair warning: the entrance is on the 16th Street Mall) didn’t open yesterday, as originally planned. A series of parties and friends-and-families dinners over the last week highlighted a few glitches in the new space, which…

It’s not easy to find a cure for the common code, as Kenny Be showed in “”Everybody Must Get Zoned,” his cartoon feature that lives on the web and inside numerous lockers in city facilities. Denver’s zoning code is more than fifty years old — so a five-month delay in…

“We know we’re on the right track if nobody’s happy,” says state representative Tom Massey of his medical marijuana proposal, and he’s right about one thing: No one’s happy. Supporters of medical marijuana will be sharing their unhappiness at a Coloradans for Medical Marijuana Regulation meeting at 7:30 p.m. tonight…

The 4,547 square foot space in Belmar vacated by the doomed Mark & Isabella and, before that, Chama, has been snapped up — by the fourth location of Little India, which should open this spring. “Belmar is very excited about this new addition,” spokeswoman Lisa Wieting says of the new…

Wesley Fazio waited twelve hours — in a cold car, in his long underwear — for a shot at making his soon-to-open dispensary legal. Yesterday, the Denver Department of Excise and Licenses started accepting applications for medical marijuana dispensary licenses — which every operational dispensary must apply for by March…

Alert for dispensary owners: You’ll want a clean (for the last five years) record and clean hands when you appear at the Wellington E. Webb building to file your application for a medical marijuana dispensary license. Under the ordinance passed by Denver City Council last month, anyone who owns at…

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration announced that it was investigating the brake problems reported by owners of the 2010 Prius, a model that hasn’t been recalled by Toyota. Yet. But owners of earlier Prius models have also reported some hair-raising rides. When they survived them, that is…

Billy Lam was born into restaurants: For forty years, his father owned a place in Can Tho called Hoi Ky. When Billy Lam left Vietnam and landed in this country in 1978, he didn’t know English — but he did know kitchens. “The only thing to do was work in…

Despite numerous complaints from customers about accidental acceleration, the Prius was not included in Toyota’s recent recall of eight models. But this week concerns about the Prius have accelerated, and Steve Wozniak — yes, the co-founder of Apple — has been in the driver’s seat, steering the conversation to problems…

Paul Weissman has the best resume of anyone at the State Capitol: He’s a manager at the Blue Parrot Restaurant, the Italian joint in Louisville where he also bartends. And this isn’t just any Italian joint: The Blue Parrot has been open since 1919, and is owned by the Colacci…

Daniel Junge is an accomplished filmmaker who just netted an Academy Award nomination for his short documentary The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardner — and he manages to make his movies from a home base of Denver. Junge, who traveled to the Amazonian jungle to film They Killed Sister…

No sooner had we published our January roll call of restaurant openings and closings than we got word of a new watering hole that opened last night at 3090 Downing Street. That’s the former home of Blackberries Grill, the Kiva and the legendary Tosh’s Hacienda (whose southeast Denver offshoot recently…

“I don’t think any of us who were here a year ago thought we would be here debating a new industry in our state, but the truth is, it’s here,” said state senator Chris Romer, after his much-pared down medical marijuana bill was passed by the full Colorado Senate yesterday…