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Transit Equity Day and the price of “equity”: Who pays when fares go to zero?
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Colorado Accountability Project, Approved, Commentary, State

Transit Equity Day and the price of “equity”: Who pays when fares go to zero?

By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project Did you forget to celebrate Transit Equity Day? A reader pointed out the recent RTD press release linked first below. It touts how RTD celebrated Transit Equity Day on the 4th by giving everyone a free ride.Transit Equity Day itself is observed in remembrance of Rosa Parks and her stand against segregation of city busses. Quoting the press release (with links intact):"Transit Equity Day is observed annually on Parks’ birthday in recognition of public transit as a civil right and a critical pathway to opportunity. On Dec. 1, 1955, Parks was arrested after refusing to give up her seat on a segregated bus in Montgomery, Alabama, an act that helped galvanize the Civil Rights Movement and launched the Montgomery Bus ...
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Jay Bhattacharya’s Senate testimony signals the end of a public health era
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Rational Ground, Approved, Commentary, National

Jay Bhattacharya’s Senate testimony signals the end of a public health era

By Justin Hart | Commentary, Rational Ground Substack The man they tried to destroy is now dismantling the machine piece by piece. There he sat — our friend, Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, the Stanford professor who dared to question lockdowns when questioning was heresy, who co-authored the Great Barrington Declaration when such thoughts were considered dangerous misinformation. The man who was shadow-banned, fact-checked, and ostracized by the very institution he now leads. (I wrote about his censorship in the Wall Street Journal back in 2022 — it’s worth revisiting today.) Today, February 3rd, 2026, Jay Bhattacharya testified before the Senate Health Committee as the Director of the National Institutes of Health. The irony was so thick you could cut it wi...
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Colorado’s Original Constitution Was a Bold Blueprint for Liberty
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Complete Colorado, Approved, Commentary, State

Colorado’s Original Constitution Was a Bold Blueprint for Liberty

By Rob Natelson | Commentary., Complete Colorado This year marks the 150th anniversary of the original Colorado Constitution, which in a recent column I called “an extraordinary testament to human freedom.” The state constitution remains in effect today, but in a mangled form far less protective of liberty than when it became effective on August 1, 1876. As my prior column pointed out, the document imposed severe limitations on taxes, spending, and state debt—limitations far more restrictive than those currently mandated by the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights (TABOR). The Colorado founders’ dedication to freedom also appeared in their constitution’s bill of rights. The U.S. Bill of Rights consists only of ten relatively short amendments; the original Colo...
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The camel’s nose under the tent: Why Colorado’s “captive customer” bill matters
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Colorado Accountability Project, Approved, Commentary, State

The camel’s nose under the tent: Why Colorado’s “captive customer” bill matters

By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project Captive customer price controls--the camel’s nose under the tent? Colorado Democrats are tinkering in the market again, going after a variety to things including so-called "captive customers".Quoting the Complete Colorado article below (with links intact):"House Bill 26-1012 is part of a package of legislation majority Democrats have in mind to regulate consumer prices and limit what the bill sponsors claim is price gouging. “Consumer Protections to Promote Fair Market Pricing” is the only bill in the package introduced so far."There's more to the bill, but the part relevant to this post relates to what the sponsors define as captive customers. Quoting again:"The bill also requires all vendors selling to...
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The road to nowhere: When planners decide how people should live and travel
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GregWalcher.com, Approved, Commentary, State

The road to nowhere: When planners decide how people should live and travel

By Greg Walcher | Commentary, GregWalcher.com At Club 20 in the 1990s, we often fought against diverting highway funds for non-highway purposes, such as mass transit. We reminded national officials that “there will never be a Japanese bullet train from Slick Rock to Egnar.” They had never heard of either place, of course, so it was a succinct way to explain that what might work in Boston and New York can never work in Colorado, or anywhere in the West, where cities evolved around the automobile. People here do not live 20 floors above their offices. Even in Denver, hundreds of thousands of people live in single family homes strung out one after another, mile after mile, and workers commute great distances along the Front Range every day. Suburban commuters in Jefferson, Arapa...
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Lawmakers press agencies as SMART Act hearings expose budget growth and policy shifts
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Christian Home Educators of Colorado, Approved, Commentary, State

Lawmakers press agencies as SMART Act hearings expose budget growth and policy shifts

By Colleen Enos | Commentary, Christian Home Educators of Colorado The hearings were billed as SMART. The answers raised harder questions. The last two weeks have been full of SMART Act (State Measurement for Accountable, Responsive, and Transparent Government) hearings at the Capitol with a smattering of committee work on bills. The Joint Judiciary Committee met for three days, and the Joint Health and Human Services Committee met for two. Here are some of the highlights from the hearings. Attorney General Phil Weiser presented to the Joint Judiciary Committee on behalf of the Department of Law (DOL). During his presentation, he stated that Colorado, at his direction, has filed 51 lawsuits against the Trump Administration for a cost of approximatel...
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Lawmakers admit the problem: One-time money built permanent government
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Colorado Accountability Project, Approved, Commentary, State

Lawmakers admit the problem: One-time money built permanent government

By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project Reporters talk about shared reality, some want it to be their reality. Over and over I have heard and read journalists discussing our "shared reality"--the need to operate from a basis of fact.I don't disagree.The problem is that many of those same journalists want to substitute their take on reality, they want to be the arbiters of fact.This is not their role.I wrote an op ed on this dynamic using some statements and "reporting" by 9News' Zelinger and Clark as an example.More on the topic in the link below.https://completecolorado.com/2026/01/08/colorado-journalists-shared-reality-deciders/ Were it not for TABOR (weakened as it is) … I wanted to share the Sun article below, but per...
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Medicaid billing error cost Colorado tens of millions, officials acknowledge
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Approved, Colorado Accountability Project, Commentary, Red State

Medicaid billing error cost Colorado tens of millions, officials acknowledge

By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project HCPF really did accidentally pay millions in Medicaid claims. In an earlier op ed about Colorado's Medicaid expansion (see the first link below) and how that puts our state at higher risk of fraud, waste, and/or abuse, I asked the Colorado Division of Healthcare Policy and Financing, HCPF, the state unit which adminsiters Medicaid, about what they do to prevent or stop such problems.Their spokesperson responded with:“We constantly look out for fraud, waste and abuse (FWA) across all services & programs, but some programs or services are more susceptible to FWA than others. We have various processes/procedures in place for ‘high risk’ services to prevent inappropriate payments from going out the door. Tho...
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Colorado’s political shift meets a population reality check
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the Aspen beat, Approved, Commentary, State

Colorado’s political shift meets a population reality check

By Glenn K. Beaton | Commentary, the Aspen beat Last year, more people moved out of Colorado to other states than vice versa. Interstate “net migration” was negative. After factoring in births, the state’s overall population increased less than half a percent. That’s the lowest since the oil and gas bust of 1989 nearly a half century ago. These figures put Colorado in the bottom half of population growth. We’re 29th of the 50 states. Neighboring Utah grew at the fifth-highest rate, so Colorado can’t blame it on the demise of the carbon-spewing, environment-wrecking, injury-causing, traffic-jamming ski industry which is mired in a record snow drought. Colorado used to be cool. It was young, vibrant, virile. Colorado often led the nation in th...
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Why a voter ID filibuster could become a 24/7 GOP campaign ad
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The Federalist, Approved, Commentary, National

Why a voter ID filibuster could become a 24/7 GOP campaign ad

By Rachel Bovard | Commentary, The Federalist What if I told you Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., has the power and the votes — right now — to save Republicans’ congressional majorities, President Trump’s second-term agenda, and may be the republic itself, all while poleaxing Democrats on the short side of an 84-15 issue? It sounds like fantasy. But like the Lady of the Lake from Arthurian legend, 2026 is offering up to the GOP a political weapon almost as powerful as Excalibur itself: an extended Democrat talking filibuster of national voter ID legislation. Popular Idea, Toxic Opposition Requiring voters to prove their citizenship is one of the most popular ideas in the country, with 84 percent of Americans supporting and only 15 percent opposed....
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