The Obama campaign continues to surprise and amaze.  Admittedly it’s hard to top the April endorsement by Hamas top operative, Ahmed Yousef, or that of Weatherman Underground domestic terrorists, Bernadine Dohrn and Bill Ayers, but the young Illinois Senator may have found a way. 
As reported in the World Tribune, North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Il is the latest of the world’s leading anti-American terrorists to endorse Obama. 

Should the fact that a sworn enemy of America prefers Obama to John McCain have significant meaning to voters come November? We sure hope so.

In a thoughtful guest editorial in the Rocky Mountain News, Peggy Rector makes the case for moving forward with the process of potentially tapping the estimated trillion barrel oil reserve in northwestern Colorado. Rector is from Rangley, the small town in the heart of the impacted region and serves as chair of the Environmentally Conscious Consumers for Oil Shale.

Bill Moloney, a Line of Sight Contributing Editor, has written an excellent op-ed on education reform that appeared in Tuesday’s  Rocky Mountain News. Bill is a former Commissioner of Education, a post that makes him exceedingly qualified to comment on how much damage will be done to Colorado’s educational system by current “reforms.” 

As if Americans weren’t already reeling enough from rising gas prices, The New York Times  thinks adding additional taxes to the cost of your next fill up would be a good idea. 

With gas prices shooting up, sales of SUVs and pick-up trucks have fallen significantly – something the Times takes great satisfaction in – the editors apparently reason that this may be a golden opportunity to inflict even more pain through an added tax until we all finally behave.

“…Americans’ response to rising gasoline prices makes an excellent case for a gas tax. It proves that drivers will change their behavior in response to high fuel prices.”

Governor Ritter and the Democrat controlled state legislature tried to pull a fast one on the citizens of Colorado with SB 199.  With their “freeze” of property tax rates, the elected leaders planned to skim $1.5 billion or so in just the next five years from Coloradans without asking for approval at the ballot box.  Republican officials and many enlightened citizens saw this for what it was – a violation of the TABOR (Taxpayer Bill of Rights) Amendment to the Colorado Constitution.  But, it took the commitment and perseverance of the Mesa County Board of Commissioners and the Independence Institute, lead by Jon Caldara, to sue the state and right the wrong.

With able legal representation from Alan Hale and Richard Westfall (see his feature article in the Policy Resource) the plaintiffs convinced Denver District Court Judge Christina Habas that “the legislature and governor ignored the state Constitution last year when they approved a law governing property taxes for schools,” as the Rocky Mountain News reported.

Maybe the poor reading skills that have afflicted Colorado’s public schools have permeated the leadership at the state capitol, because a simple reading of TABOR should have tipped off the Governor and legislative leadership that any “tax policy change directly causing a net tax revenue gain to any district” is prohibited without a vote of the people.  Judge Habas’s reading skills are apparently up to speed because she determined that “the direct impact of SB 199 was to change ‘tax policy,’” and ruled against the state. 

Now, the Democrats and Governor find themselves in an $118 million budgetary hole.  That’s the amount they plugged into the state budget during the recently completed session that Judge Habas says is illegal. Not to worry, according to the Governor’s office – they are appealing to the activist and democrat dominated Colorado Supreme Court.  Rather obviously, the Governor’s expectation is that the majority of the high court either shares in their same reading deficiency, or is willing to invent new law rather than interpret law as it already exists.    

The Democrats in control of the state government might not like the rules, but they ought to have to play by them.  Our Tip of the Hat for June goes to the Mesa County Commissioners and the Independence Institute for sticking up for the taxpayers – and sticking it to the Democrats.

It wasn’t seen on a bumper, but it was too good to pass up…

The Bureau of Land Management announced recently that they were moving forward to implement the cautiously restrictive resource development plan for the Roan Plateau in western Colorado estimated to contain 9 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. 

We see that as Good News for at least four reasons. First, Colorado’s economy could use the boost from the estimated billion dollars of royalty payments that will be shared with the federal government plus the effect of good paying jobs in the energy industry.  Secondly, increasing the domestic production component of the nation’s energy demand only makes sense. Third, the planning process to draft the development plan took seven years, involved everyone from industry representatives, environmentalists, wildlife experts, local officials, and private citizens.   It was by all accounts the most extensive and restrictive plan ever crafted west of the Mississippi.  Fourth, in announcing the August 14 auction of the Roan leases per the adopted plan, the BLM resisted efforts by Governor Ritter, Senator Ken Salazar and Congressmen Mark Udall and John Salazar – all Democrats – to delay, stall, and limit production on the Roan. 

Over half of the 74,000 acre plateau just east of Grand Junction will be completely off limits to development.  Furthermore, development will be confined to a single operator and restricted to less than 1% of the area at any one time and done in a phased ridge-by-ridge progression.  Latest directional drilling will allow for multi-well single pad operations.  The BLM believes that the single lease plan gives them the maximum degree of environmental control and protection by limiting development to one operator.  The phased plan promoted by the Democrats would almost certainly lead to more roads and infrastructure demands by multiple leases creating an expanded environmental footprint according to Stephen Allred, Deputy Secretary of the BLM. 

There is one more reason why the BLM decision is our Good News for June- Senator Ken Salazar was “deeply disappointed.”  Salazar, you see, pulled out ever trick in his bag to impede progress on the Roan.  But, while Salazar stewed at being on the losing side, Colorado’s Senior Senator Wayne Allard smiled.  A spokesman for Allard said, “If Sen. Salazar would stop pulling the rug out from under Coloradans and the private industry willing to invest in developing this resource, Colorado would be better for it.”
In 1997 Congress and the Clinton Administration directed leasing of federal land including the Roan as soon as practical.  Eleven years later and following an inclusive and exhaustive public planning process the day may finally have come.  Only in government could anyone think the BLM’s decision to finally move forward on the Roan is still “too soon.” Anytime government actually ends “process” and gets to “production” we think it is Good News. 

As if the outrageous antics of Barak Obama’s preachers aren’t enough, yesterday a 16 count guilty verdict  was handed down against Obama real estate business partner and fundraiser, Tony Rezko.  Convictions include crimes of money laundering, fraud, and kickbacks.  Oh, it was Chicago politics after all!

And, then there are the other good friends of Obama – Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dorhn – the ‘70s domestic terrorist leaders of the Weatherman Underground. 

Generations of parents have told their children that “you are known by the company you keep.”  You have to wonder what an Obama Cabinet or Supreme Court would look like?  May we never find out.

Planned Parenthood – far and away the leading provider of abortions in America – gives Barack Obama a 100% rating on their “issues.” Yet, a group calling themselves “Roman Catholics for Obama” defend their endorsement of the Illinois Senator for President by quoting words from Denver Archbishop Charles J. Chaput that they contend give them a pass to support a rabidly pro-abortion candidate. They fail to mention that they have taken the Archbishop’s words seriously out of context and carefully excluded the critical portion of his statement.

In the most recent Denver Catholic Register, Chaput fires back at the rationalizing political activists that have decided they are more Democrat than they are Catholic.

The sentence of Chaput’s words that the Obama Catholics initially failed to acknowledge is:

“But [Catholics who support 'pro-choice' candidates] also need a compelling proportionate reason to justify it. What is a ‘proportionate’ reason when it comes to the abortion issue? It’s the kind of reason we will be able to explain, with a clean heart, to the victims of abortion when we meet them face to face in the next life – which we most certainly will. If we’re confident that these victims will accept our motives as something more than an alibi, then we can proceed.”

That’s a pretty high standard to meet. A lot of Catholics rationalize support of pro-choice candidates by contending that they will soften their ‘pro-choice’ politician’s views once they get elected. Chaput went through that same experience when he supported Jimmy Carter and Bobby Kennedy years ago. However, with the benefit of years of experience he now says, “I can’t name any ‘pro-choice’ Catholic politician who has been active, in a sustained public way, in trying to discourage abortion and to protect unborn human life – not one.”

Lest Catholics think Chaput is the only one taking a strong stand against pro-choice politicians, Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio of Brooklyn had a few words of his own on the issue. “Only in circumstances that are extraordinarily hard to contemplate may a Catholic voter support a proponent of so great an intrinsic moral evil,” DiMarzio said.

Chaput’s conclusion is fitting: “Changing the views of ‘pro-choice’ candidates takes a lot more than verbal gymnastics, good alibis and pious talk about ‘personal opposition’ to killing unborn children. I’m sure Roman Catholics for Obama know that, and I wish them good luck. They’ll need it.”

UPDATE: After the Archbishop’s article was published, the group, Roman Catholics for Obama, updated their website to include excerpt above that was originally left out. The quote is still used, however, in justifying their position.   

Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) reminded his colleagues recently of another of the 2006 campaign season promises made about two years ago by the soon to be elected Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA). 

“Elect us and we will produce a common-sense plan to help bring down the price of gasoline at the pump.”

According to Senator Cornyn gas was about $2.33 per gallon then. You know how close it is to $4.00 now. I guess we can file that broken Pelosi Promise in the same place as the “no more earmarks”, “we will not raise your taxes”, and “we’ll bring the troops home and end this war” broken promises. There are many things that Congress could do to address the rising cost of gas, but apparently electing the Democrats isn’t one of them.