Governor Jared Polis on April 6 signed Senate Bill 26-004, dramatically expanding those eligible to petition courts to confiscate guns under Colorado’s “red flag” law.

DENVER–A series of gun rights restrictions are at various stages in the Colorado’s legislative process, with some bills awaiting action by Gov. Polis, others still in the committee process, and a heavily negotiated gun barrel regulation bill held up in its final reading in the House.

Red flag expansion

Senate Bill 26-004 ‘Expand List of Petitioners for Protection Orders’ passed third reading in the House on March 20 with...

Though most of us celebrate “No Kings Day” on July 4, the Trump-deranged got a head start last weekend with rallies around the state.

Attendees bravely fought oppression by blocking traffic for people with jobs. Rally-goers demanded freedom from tyranny, many right after voting to ban all but beige house paint at their HOA meetings.

After pausing briefly to DoorDash something gluten-free, they returned to the barricades to secure democracy in Colorado for one more day.

They risked everything, except mild discomfort, to call the guy who won both the popular vote and the elec...

Obviously, the outcome of the war with Iran remains to be seen. The best outcome is a US military victory followed by regime change freeing Iranians from the tyranny of their government. With that may come a more peaceful and stable Middle East removing the existential danger of nuclear weapons in the hands of religious fanatics who have plagued the region for the last 47 years.

In 1979, a revolution deposed an oppressive unpopular monarch, the Shah of Iran who, at least, was a pro-western modernist. It brought Ayatollah Khomeini to absolute power as Iran’s Supreme Leader. Protected by...

Years ago, I interviewed a Canadian health-care broker whose job was helping his countrymen escape their own failing system.

When their “free” health care turned into “free to wait until you die,” he’d save his clients by routing them to doctors in the U.S. who’d accept cash and rescue their lives.

I asked him what advice he had for Americans. His answer terrified me.

“I hope the U.S. won’t do what we’ve done with health care,” he said. I thought his reasoning was that he didn’t want to see Americans...

I’ve lived in Colorado since 1970. And you know what Colorado had back in 1970? High winds blowing down the Front Range.

I moved to Boulder in 1984 and have been there ever since. And you know what Boulder has had all that time? A freakin’ lot of high winds.

I remember as a college kid walking around the CU campus after windstorms, stepping around uprooted trees and massive broken branches that made the sidewalks impassable.

I’ve seen rooftop shingles go flying off Boulder buildings, signs ripped down, and semi-trucks overturned.

All of whi...

The governor and progressive Democrats that dominate the state legislature and every statewide office in Colorado have been masterful ― if not ethical and honest ― in devising devious schemes to circumvent the TABOR amendment in the Colorado Constitution. That’s the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights, passed by a 1992 voter-initiated ballot measure that bypassed the legislature. It limited government spending and barred the legislature from increasing taxes or imposing new ones without the consent of the voters. Democrats have always despised TABOR.

Their favorite ploys have included misrepresenting taxes as “fees” and funding spending programs through tax credits. Because thos...

At this point, if you hear beeping downtown, it’s not a construction crew. It’s a company backing out.

And look, I get it. Businesses relocate for all sorts of reasons: taxes, regulations, labor costs, office space, crime, commute times, the haunting feeling your chief executive is one city council meeting away from being declared a single-use plastic.

But Colorado’s political class has been turning “headquarters” into an endangered species.

Take TIAA, the financial services giant whose name has for decades been glowing atop a downtown Denver skyscraper like a Bat-Signal for retire...

This part will disappoint angry people on Twitter:

Relax. Put the pitchforks down. I am not relitigating the 2020 election or mail ballots or even Tina Peters.

But I am saying people don’t trust elections like they used to. And here in Colorado we can do a rather simple thing to reverse that. And progressives should want it most.

Saving democracy is all the rage now, and as far as political slogans go, it’s a pretty damn good one.

But saving democracy isn’t just about protecting Colorado from President Donald...

It’s worrisome enough that we have to live with the ever-present threat of nuclear war hanging over our head, the fiery extermination of humanity from global warming, a worldwide depression triggered by the U.S. defaulting on its $39 trillion national debt on its way to $50 trillion, to say nothing of an uptick in falls from Denver rent-a-scooters. On top of all that, yet another crisis has descended upon the American public: Donald Trump has ended the minting of our one-cent coin, affectionately known as the penny. Good grief!

Don’t panic, 240 billion of them are still in c...

Something strange is happening in Colorado — strange enough that the political class should notice.

People are leaving Colorado.

After years of being one of the fastest-growing states in the nation, net in-migration has stopped and may be reversing.

According to Federal Reserve Bank data, the last time Colorado’s population took a dip was 1945. Congrats to our policy makers, who finally achieved something historic no one asked for. The Broncos haven’t won a championship in a decade, but what you’re achieving hasn’t happened in 80 years.

For the first time in 16...

A tautology is a needless repetition of an idea using different wording. For example: “Sooner or later the inevitable is bound to happen.” In this case, Bari Weiss is under fire from the stable of leftist, so-called journalists at CBS’s “60 Minutes” program. The rebellion is over a story (in fact, a hit piece), recently scheduled to run, about the Trump administration’s deportation of illegal immigrants to El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement CECOT prison. The story was “spiked” (in journalist lingo: killed or withheld) by Weiss in her capacity as their boss, the new editor-in-chief of CBS News.

Weiss, a self...

Bicycle lanes in Denver are much more than just a nuisance for motorists, they’re a small but glaring symptom of the radical progressive mentality of Democrats that have grossly mismanaged Denver government in recent years. This is a sad reflection on Denver voters, who have brought this on themselves.

Worse than useless and ridiculously underused, they obstruct traffic and pose a safety hazard for bicyclists and pedestrians. The lanes on Broadway north of Speer Blvd. are positively laughable, repositioning cars that were parked at the curb now out into a former traffic lane and inserting the bi...

I suggest we get used to saying the words, “Governor Weiser.”

The election for Colorado’s next governor does not take place in November. It’s in fewer than five months, on June 30. That’s the state’s primary election. Whoever wins the Democratic primary is the next governor (with all apologies to the seeming 328 Republicans running for the seat). So, out of a state of 6 million people, we must choose between an affable socialist and a tired Washington, DC liberal. Aren’t we the lucky ones.

Yes, yes, Michael Bennet has all the name recognition an...

Should police wear masks? Denver’s city council thinks no — and is even trying to outlaw it for federal agents operating in the city (because if there’s one thing municipal governments do well, it’s bossing around Washington, DC).

Like so many issues where people quickly polarize to one extreme or the other, this issue is nuanced. “Nuanced” in today’s vocabulary means “background noise” — something not worth listening to. Like anyone listens to me anyway.

To state the ridiculously obvious, Denver’s policy makers can put restrictions against masking on their own law enforcement (although...

The border skirmishes are increasing, and we could be looking at full-blown combat. The simmering civil unrest inside Colorado’s Democratic ranks is heating up, and during this legislative session it might boil over into all-out civil war.

If it does, Colorado news media might actually have to interrupt their regularly scheduled Republican-bashing to report on it.

Airing dirty laundry

Inner-party squabbles are the price of admission into politics; they’re unavoidable. However, a well-disciplined party keeps its dirty laundry from being aired publicly.

Take the open secret among Washington Democrats and...

In Colorado, TDS doesn’t stand for “Trump Derangement Syndrome.” It stands for “TABOR Derangement Syndrome.”

You can spot its sufferers easily. They break into hives at the mere mention of the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. In fact, they can’t even utter its full name, Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights, only “TABOR,” as if it’s a slur.

They blame it for everything from potholes to pimples. And they insist — with religious certainty — TABOR is shrinking government in Colorado, and thus people are suffering.

That’s not just wrong. It is so demonstrably wrong it’s d...

Historian Will Durant observed that peace is an unstable equilibrium which can be preserved only by acknowledged supremacy or equal power. War is a constant of human history and human nature and always will be. That’s not cynicism or defeatism, it’s practicality. If you believe otherwise you needn’t read any further, we have an irreconcilable premise.

Operation Absolute Resolve, a masterful, tactically precise strike swiftly and flawlessly executed by Delta Force commandoes coordinating intelligence, land, sea, and air elements to arrest and extract Venezuela dictator Nicolas Maduro was a prime example of the superior capabi...

Hang onto your wallet, it’s a Colorado legislative session. And the loneliest person under the Gold Dome is Jared Polis, a governor without a nation.

This will be the last regular session of his limited two terms, and he has managed to become disliked by just about everyone.

Of course, no matter how often he claims to be libertarian or business friendly, those on his right are just plain pissed at what he’s done to the state during his seven years. The sad fact is Colorado has never seen a more business-wrecking governor in h...

Remember during COVID, when the people screaming the loudest for government-mandated jabs were the very same people chanting “my body, my choice” when it came to abortion — I mean, “women’s health care”?

They’re also the folks who insist a 12-year-old is far too young to get a tattoo, but perfectly mature enough to make irreversible “gender-affirming” medical decisions.

The technical term for this is cognitive dissonance. In Colorado, we just call it public policy.

Fighting tyranny be ending elections

Now, as the new year dawns and another legislative session lurches to life, p...

“Minnesota and its two largest cities sued the Trump administration on Monday to try to stop an immigration enforcement surge that has led to the fatal shooting of a Minnesota woman by a federal officer and evoked outrage and protests across the country.” That was the first paragraph in a recent Associated Press article which paved the way for yet another biased editorial masquerading as a balanced news story from the notoriously left-wing AP.

An alternative narrative could read, “Unruly protests in Minnesota by open-border activists attempting to impede federal officers in Minnesota from doing their duty arrest...

Hopefully by the time you're listening to this, the strike of a Telluride ski resort is over, ski patrollers are again joyfully sliding down mountains and getting paid for it, and tourists are once again being overcharged for, well, everything.

But there are some lessons buried in this story of ski bums going all Norma Ray on big skis backside. Forget big pharma, big ski runs mountains. And that's real power. I mean, how much power do you wield when you can run a friggin mountain?

Colorado has arguably the finest skiing...

If you’re a fan of limited government, Tuesday’s election results were a downer.

By Jon Caldara

If you’re a fan of limited government, personal liberty, or educational choice, Tuesday night’s election results were a downer, just another one in a long line of depressing elections that has made Colorado more California than California.

However, if you prefer a controlling elite deciding your fate, debt, class envy and teacher unions, it was just another victory in a decade’s long win streak.

I’m curious how multi-billionaire nannyist Michael Bloo...

The Generation Z guide to gainful employment

By Mike Rosen

Although people that fall within the age boundaries of a generation may have many characteristics and beliefs in common, a sweeping generalization that stereotypes all of them is presumptuous, ignoring the individuality of many others. Since I was born during World War II, I’m two years short of being technically a Baby Boomer. However, I’m close enough to fit some of the stereotypes of that generation like a strong work ethic, personal responsibility, loyalty, and patriotism.

Gen Z-ers were born between 1997 and 20...

New insider report shows Democrats detached from reality

By Jon Caldara

Outside of Colorado, Democrats are still panicked about President Donald Trump’s victory, trying to figure out how Americans can be so stupid as to reject their elitist-driven, woke socialism.

But inside Colorado, Democrats see no need to worry. Unchecked power tends to do that.

A new report from a centrist Democrat group called Welcome confirms what most Coloradans already know but won’t say out loud for fear of getting canceled: the Democratic Party has drifted into a progressive fog, u...

The worst of the questions voters face on Colorado’s ballot

By Mike Rosen

On the Colorado ballot are two statewide measures that are interwoven: Propositions LL and MM. Both are legacies of Proposition FF, referred to voters by the Democrat-controlled state legislature and passed in 2022, creating the Healthy School Meals for All Program (HSMA). Prior to HSMA, the state covered the cost of school lunches only for “at-need” (a euphemism for “poor”) students. HSMA expanded that coverage to include all students regardless of household income, including the children of rich parents. This was just one of countle...

Colorado’s policy laboratory now staffed by mad scientists

By Jon Caldara

For decades, Colorado has served as the nation’s favorite guinea pig — a testing ground for policies so bold, so idealistic and so occasionally boneheaded other states quietly thanked us for jumping in the pool first.

What Silicon Valley is for apps, Colorado is for policy experiments. Sadly, when our “beta test” crashes, there’s no “uninstall” button — just another special session.

Colorado was one of the first states to repeal the counterproductive progressive income tax and replace it with a fair, flat...

Jimmy Kimmel can’t hide behind freedom of speech

By Mike Rosen

Jimmy Kimmel’s recent “firing” (actually, a mere one-week suspension) as host of ABC’s “Jimmy Kimmel Live” for his false, tasteless, and asinine remarks about Charlie Kirk’s assassination kicked off a firestorm of political controversy between the left and right about freedom of speech. Let’s set the record straight.

The Declaration of Independence and our Constitution were profoundly inspired by our founders’ experience living under the tyranny of the British Empire and King George III over the American colonies. In creating...

Colorado’s increasing EV subsidies belie ‘budget crisis’ claims

By Jon Caldara

Colorado’s governor just made this statement “The market has made it clear, EVs (electric vehicles) are here to stay.”

I agree with him. Electric cars, unlike 8-track tapes and rotary-dial phones, will continue to be available to consumers for a long, long time. Cool. But why he made the statement puzzles me. He did so while touting his decision that the state will increase one of its subsidies to buy a new EV from $6,000 to $9,000.

Wait a second. Which one is...

Class warfare on the Colorado ballot in November

By Jon Caldara

Everyone knows there’s no such thing as a free lunch. All the same Colorado voters will again be tested this November to see if they know that.

Expectations are that modern, middle-class Coloradans will deny the “no such thing as a free lunch” truism. They will likely double-down on buying their kids “free school lunch,” with other people’s money, without acknowledging what depraved values they are modeling for their children in the process.

Statewide referred measures LL and MM allow the...

Rebellion brews against nanny state in deep blue Denver

By Jon Caldara

Of all places to find a growing citizens’ rebellion against the nanny state, who’d guess it’s happening in woke Denver?

Take note — if Denverites can claw back a little freedom from their elite, it can happen in your city too.

In this city of 70 breweries, 2,000 liquor establishments, some 300 cannabis dispensaries and now mushroom clinics, it was pure poetry when the city council and Mayor Mike Johnston passed a ban on adults buying flavored tobacco and nicotine products, you know...

‘Trust but verify’ on privately financed Broncos stadium

By Jon Caldara

Only about a month and a half ago I predicted the Denver Broncos will use the subtle threat of leaving Colorado to get taxpayers to build them a new stadium.

In other words, I predicted history will repeat itself. Football stadiums are on a rotating 25-year life cycle with taxpayers buying these playpens so the ultra-wealthy can let their boys concuss one another.

Apparently, Denver Broncos ownership wishes to make me look foolish, (not a high bar; watch me dance).

S...

Teacher unions driving the bus on public school failure

By Mike Rosen

In a recent Colorado Politics column, Eric Sonderman described the chronically underperforming American public education system as “nothing short of a national scandal,’’ deserving of the disparaging moniker “Edugate.” Quite an indictment coming from an erstwhile Democrat. As a conservative Republican, I heartily agree with that appraisal.

I agree with many of Eric’s reforms like variable pay for teachers based on their individual skill and their students’ performance rather than seniority and college credits; paying exceptional teachers the most, rewarding above average one...

The case for armed, trained staff in Colorado schools

By Jon Caldara

Enough. Damn it, enough!

Enough virtue signaling instead of preventing school shootings. Enough of elected school boards denying reality.

It is time for all of Colorado’s 178 school districts to join the 50 that currently have volunteer, trained, concealed armed staff to stop a shooter the moment he begins — because when seconds count, the police are only minutes away

The difference is wanting to feel safe versus wanting to be safe.

By constantly making it harder and...

Zohran Mamdani and the ‘democratic socialist’ grift

By Mike Rosen

Zohran Mamdani, the 33-year-old who won the Democrat primary (endorsed by fellow socialists Bernie Sanders and AOC) is now the party’s wholly unqualified candidate for mayor of New York City. He’s a Muslim antisemite and Israel hater. In college, he co-founded the school’s chapter of the pro-Hamas “Students for Justice in Palestine,” and graduated with a degree in Africana Studies. His thin resume includes a job as a foreclosure-prevention housing counselor, hip-hop musician, political campaign worker, and all of four years as a New York state...

Threats to transgender gun rights unjustly discriminate

By Jon Caldara

The 23-year-old shooter of Annunciation Catholic School in Minneapolis was born male. He identified as a woman and legally changed his name before he killed two and injured 18.

The shooter of the Nashville Covenant School in March 2023 was born female. She identified as a man and killed six. So was the shooter at a Rite Aid in Maryland, female identifying as male. She killed three and injured three.

And in our backyard, the 22-year-old who killed five and injured 19 at Club...

Short skirt, high boots expose Dem hypocrisy under gold dome

By Jon Caldara

Fashion sense? Oh, I got it. After all, 98% of my wardrobe was proudly purchased at Costco. And the ladies dig a man who’s dripping in Kirkland-labeled couture. They sense the money, the power.

Another man who knows fashion is former state Rep. Ryan Armagost. On a private Signal chat, this Republican fashionista took a picture of Democratic state Rep. Yara Zokaie and sophomorically commented on her clothing choice. Other Republicans joined in.

Classy? Obviously not. But it ma...

Flock cameras help cops, Denver Dems prefer criminals

By Mike Rosen

A criminal repeat-offender steals a car in Englewood, which is later identified by police at the Castle Rock Outlets using drone technology. Three police officers drive through the parking lot and blockade the perpetrator as he gets into the driver’s seat of the stolen car. The perp then rams through the three police vehicles and at least one parked car “treating the shopping center like a racetrack,” according to a 23rd Judicial District deputy prosecutor.

The high-speed chase lasts for a few more...

Consolidation of radio a cautionary tale for local TV news

By Jon Caldara

Colorado conservatives have dreamt of the day they could kick 9News anchor, and the Imelda Marcos of sport coats, Kyle Clark to the curb. Their day may be coming.

And I must admit, there’s a certain satisfaction imagining Kyle selling his wardrobe at a garage sale. But conservatives will find a national conglomerate owning half the local TV news outlets is worse. We should remember what happened to radio.

Colorado’s channel 9 and their affiliate Channel 20 are bein...

Gov. Jared Polis loves artificial intelligence to death

By Jon Caldara

Disclosure: Gov. Jared Polis wrote much of this column.

The epitaph on Jared Polis’ gubernatorial gravestone will simply read, “He knew better, but would not stand up to his own party.”

For seven years, our hyperprogressive legislature has sent him one industry-killing bill after another. And he kept signing them, even when he knows they are bad policy, economically devastating, and even if they go against his strongest-held convictions.

One such strongly held conviction is his faith in techno...

Colorado driving pedal to the metal toward an energy cliff

By Jon Caldara

You know when Wile E. Coyote runs off that cliff and he hangs in the air, magically suspended for a while until he realizes what’s about to occur? Only then does he plummet. Well, Colorado energy regulators are the coyote just before he sees there’s nothing below him.

When Colorado’s energy system falters, and your bills skyrocket even higher than your already ridiculously high rates, you need to remember this: Our lawmakers and regulators made it happen. They k...