"Colorado Governor Bill Ritter's one claim to fame, as he stands at the midpoint of his term, is his over-hyping of what he calls the "new energy economy" -- and the fact that another rising politico, a guy named Barack Obama, stole the phrase from him.

It's more appropriately called the "New Energy Baloney," in my view, since it's largely based on subsidies, mandates and other government interventions in support of niche energy technologies that aren't ready for prime time -- while regulatory and rhetorical war is waged against an "old" energy economy that actually delivers the goods."

"Tune in at 9 PM local Mountain Time this evening for the eighth edition of Rocky Mountain Alliance Blog Talk Radio, the first of 2009. Tonight’s guest is Tom Lucero - University of Colorado Regent, chairman of the recently successful Amendment 54 campaign, and already a declared Republican candidate for Colorado’s 4th Congressional race in 2010."

"That's right, while everyone else is cutting back in tough economic times, the enviro-crazed Boulder County commissioners have designated $66.6 million toward open space expenditures in the 2009 county budget.

Much of this money is going to service the massive open space bond debt that has accumulated over decades, now some $200 million. Another $12 million is discreetly earmarked to come from the General Fund--as if the millions of dollars the county takes in from three open space sales taxes isn't enough."

"Charter school founder and Senator-elect, Keith King, recently expressed his thoughts on charter school issues that will come before the General Assembly this year:

"In mid-December, news broke that MediaNews Group head Dean Singleton asked unions to open negotiations on new contracts early in the hope of saving a combined $20 million at the Denver Post and the Denver Newspaper Agency. But, as mentioned parenthetically in a December 16 More Messages blog, this information wasn't reported by the Post. Since then, things have changed on that score, albeit in unexpectedly subtle ways. "