The first week of Donald Trump’s presidency has made one thing clear: Americans must start considering Mr. Trump’s mental health a serious problem.
Category: Elections
Activism, Corruption, Crazy Republicans, Diversity, Elections, Equal rights, Human rights, politics, Women
Massive Anti-Trump March in Grand Junction One Day After Inauguration
by • • 5 Comments
If yesterday’s massive Women’s March to protest Donald Trump in Grand Junction proves anything, it’s that western Colorado is clearly not a politically monolithic area for conservatives any more.
Grand Junction saw the largest crowd ever in its local history turn out today to participate in a march downtown in support of liberal values like women’s rights, equality, diversity and respect for all human beings. Grand Junction’s march was held simultaneously as, and in support of the massive Women’s March in Washington, D.C., as well and similar protests in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles other cities all across the world. The marchers turned out they day after the presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who openly insulted women in many ways during his long campaign for president and in public venues throughout his life and career.
Consumer advocacy, Corruption, Crazy Republicans, Elections, Grand Junction Chamber, Lies, Lobbying, politics, Stupid Republicans, Weird Grand Junction Stuff
Mike Anton is Back, This Time Plugging an Events Center
by • • 0 Comments
Michael P. “I’m Your Worst Nightmare” Anton, author of the Grand Junction’s only negative campaign ad, and cheerleader for the chamber’s lies and political interference
Mike Anton is back, appearing on TV and speaking to groups around town, telling Grand Junction residents they should vote for an extra sales tax to build an events center downtown.
Do you remember Mike Anton?
No?
Well then let’s recap exactly who Mike Anton is, and what he has done over the last few years, so you will remember him:
Anton owns a business in town called EmTech. He sat on the board of directors of the Grand Junction Area Chamber of Commerce in 2013, the year the chamber backed Rick Brainard for city council.
Remember how THAT turned out?
Democracy, Elections, Ethics, Extremism, Trump Insanity
U.S. Congressman Issues Statement on Decision Not to Attend Trump’s Inauguration
by • • 2 Comments
U.S. Congressman Ted Lieu of Los Angeles County
In the wake of the insults President-Elect Donald Trump hurled at civil rights icon Congressman John Lewis today on Twitter, just days before Martin Luther King Day and his own inauguration, Congressman Ted W. Lieu (D – Los Angeles County) issued the following statement explaining his decision to not attend Trump’s inauguration on January 20, 2017.
The flap started when Rep. Lewis said in an interview today with Meet The Press host Chuck Todd that he will not be attending Trump’s inauguration in part because he doesn’t think Trump is a legitimate president due to Russia’s reported interference the U.S. election.
Corruption, Democracy, Elections, Ethics, politics, Trump Insanity
Nationwide Team of Lawyers Submits Last-Ditch Effort to Stop Trump from Taking Office
by • • 0 Comments
Trump: Electorally illegitimate President-Elect?
The New York Times and other news outlets including AlterNet, RawStory, and DailyKos are reporting that a bipartisan nationwide team of attorneys has performed detailed research into each of the 538 members of the electoral college and found that more than 50 members who voted for Donald Trump were ineligible to vote because they violated their state’s laws governing who is eligible to serve as an elector. For example, Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi served as an elector and voted for Trump, but the Florida state Constitution specifies electors cannot hold any other paid government office while serving as an elector. In other cases, electors did not reside in the congressional district they were charged with representing, or were not registered to vote in the districts they were supposed to represent as electors. Each of these situations constitute legal violations of eligibility to serve as electors.
The report states:
“We have reason to believe that there are at least 50 electoral votes that were not regularly given or not lawfully certified (16 Congressional District violations and 34 dual office-holder violations). The number could be over a hundred.”
The group issued an “Electoral Vote Objection Packet” containing this information, as well as the specific language they need to use to object to certification of the vote, to members of Congress and are asking them to stop the certification of the 2016 Electoral College results scheduled for 1:00 p.m. on Friday, January 6.
You can read the entire report here:
The Electoral Vote Objection Packet and spreadsheet detailing the problems the attorneys found with the 50+ electors can be seen here.
Corruption, Crazy Republicans, Elections, Ethics, Fake patriotism, politics, Stupid Republicans
Creepy Republicans are Fortifying their Swamp; Tipton Won’t Say How He Voted
by • • 0 Comments
English writer Lord Acton once said “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”
The House of Representatives proved Lord Acton correct yesterday when, as their first act as the majority in the 115th House of Representatives, Republicans met in secret, at night behind closed doors, and voted to amend House rules to gut the independent Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE).
The OCE is responsible for investigating corruption and misconduct by House members. It was created in 2008 after Randy “Duke” Cunningham, a former Republican representative from California, was sentenced to prison on bribery and other criminal charges he incurred while in office. The OCE perhaps best known for its investigations into the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal, and investigating former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, who in 2010 was convicted on criminal charges of conspiracy to launder corporate money into political donations. In his defense, DeLay argued he was improperly convicted for just “doing what everybody was doing.”
If overall Republicans felt they were serving their constituents honestly and ethically in the best way they knew how, they probably wouldn’t give much thought to the OCE. But instead, they focused on it quickly and early with an eye towards destroying it. So why carry out an attack aimed at constraining the OCE, if not to pave the way for unfettered unethical activities like those we’ve already seen so much of in Congress?
Corruption, Crazy Republicans, Elections, Energy, Environment, Ethics, Extremism, politics, Public health, Stupid Republicans
Mesa County Commissioner John Justman’s Smug Attitude Toward Constituents
by • • 3 Comments
Mesa County Commissioner John Justman’s attitude toward his “subjects,” as demonstrated by Bugs Bunny
Check out this online exchange between Mesa County Commissioner John Justman and one of his constituents:
On December 14, a Mesa County resident posted a link to an online petition titled “Defend the Arctic Refuge from Oil Drilling” on Facebook along with the comment “Tillerman will drill this.”
The person was referring to Donald Trump’s secretary of state nominee Rex Tillerson, the former CEO of Exxon, who has made drilling for oil his life’s work.
Surprisingly, the first person to chime in in the comment section below the post was none other than Mesa County Commissioner John Justman, who wrote “Good Job Tillerman,” signaling his approval for drilling the Earth to death while repeating the misspelling of Tillerson’s name.
In response, the constituent wrote:
“John sometimes I think you say these things to be funny. The truth is this time it is NOT funny. You will be dead before your grandchildren will have to deal with a entire change in the environment you and I have taken for granted. Today the North Pole had a high of over the freezing level and the “heatwave” is suppose to continue. These fragile areas have iconic creatures you and I are familiar, but your grandchildren will watch the last of those animals perish. If you believe that is good, then I question your fitness to serve as a Commissioner. That position takes great analytical and practical thinking about today and the future.”
To this take-down, Justman thundered back:
Corporations, Crazy Republicans, Elections, Ethics, Extremism, International, Safety, Security, Violence
Ten Reasons Why Trump Will be a Terror Magnet
by • • 0 Comments
Trump Tower, Istanbul
The possibility exists for a President Donald Trump to be a powerful draw for terrorist attacks against the U.S.
There are lots of reasons why this could be the case.
1) Trump has shown the world that he is a coarse, boastful, arrogant, xenophobic bully, and exacting revenge against bullies is an age-old storyline. Throughout his campaign, Trump denigrated people of differing ethnicities, from other countries and of different religions, a situation that reflects negatively on the perception of the U.S. abroad and that practically invites a response from those he targeted with his broad, negative brush.
2) The “Trump” name looms large on a lot of towering, glittery, stand-out hotels and residential buildings around the globe, including many in places where terrorism has already been a problem, like Mumbai, India (the 2011 Taj Hotel attack), and the Republic of Georgia, where over 60 bomb threats were recorded in 2013. The U.S. Department of State Overseas Security Advisory Council currently rates the risk of political violence in Georgia as “high.”
Corporations, Corruption, Elections, Ethics
Who are the Electors of the Electoral College?
by • • 2 Comments
On December 19, the electoral college will vote on who the next president of the U.S. will be, and they are not all bound by law to vote for Mr. Trump. Now that it’s been concluded that Clinton won the popular vote by more than 2 million, it would be within the Eletoral College’s purview to change who they vote for.
At the same time, Constitutional experts are arguing that unless Donald Trump divests himself of all of his foreign business holdings, he will be in violation of Article 9, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution as soon as he takes his oath to uphold it.
Consumer advocacy, Crazy Republicans, Diane Schwenke, Elections, Grand Junction Chamber, Grassroots advocacy, Legal marijuana, New marijuana economy, politics
City Processing Marijuana Petitions
by • • 0 Comments
On Thursday, November 17, members of Grand Junction Cannabis Action Now (GJCAN) turned petitions in to the City containing 3,300 signatures to get a proposed ordinance (pdf) on next April’s citywide ballot to bring marijuana commerce back to Grand Junction.
The group needs 2,254 valid signatures for the proposal to advance.
The City has ten days from the day the petitions were turned in to validate the signatures, making November 27 the deadline for the city to declare whether the goal was met. City Clerk Stephanie Tuin says they are working now to validate the signatures, and says they actually validate each signature turned in.
If GJCAN has submitted enough valid signatures to get the measure on the ballot, City Council will get an opportunity at its January meeting to approve the petition’s wording and adopt the ordinance as-is. Council’s other option, if they are still too afraid to address the marijuana issue themselves, is to send it to the April ballot for a vote of City residents. Either way, by its inaction on the marijuana issue, Council has missed it’s opportunity to weigh in on the matter and left it to City residents.
That’s probably just as well, though.
Crazy Republicans, Elections, Equal rights, Ethics, Ethnic/Minority, Extremism
Trump Appoints White Nationalist, Anti-Feminist Steve Bannon as “Chief Strategist”
by • • 0 Comments
Article published by Breitbart News that encourages fat-shaming of women, the way Trump did to the former Miss Universe, Alicia Machado
President Obama is trying to calm the fears of people abroad about a Trump presidency, while here at home Trump is stoking public fears of his presidency by his appointment of Steve Bannon a his “chief strategist.”
Who is Steve Bannon?
You might want to sit down before you read this.
Steve Bannon is the executive chairman of Breitbart News, a far right wing commentary website known for championing views of the “alt-right,” a white supremacist fringe ideology that has raised alarm bells for its chest-pounding, misogynistic, race-baiting, and anti-Muslim positions. Breitbart and the so-called alt-Right oppose multiculturalism, immigration, feminism and have a strong disdain for diversity. Breitbart News has actually carried articles with headlines saying “Birth Control Makes Women Unattractive and Crazy,” “The Solution to Online ‘Harassment’ Is Simple: Women Should Log Off,” “There’s No Hiring Bias Against Women in Tech, They Just Suck at Interviews,” and “Bill Kristol: Republican Spoiler, Renegade Jew.”
Elections, Equal rights, Ethics, Ethnic/Minority, Hate, Human rights, politics, Safety, Security, Stupid Republicans
Grand Junction Business Owner Trying to Make People Feel Safer in Wake of Election
by • • 0 Comments
The T-Shirt Litsheim plans to market to help make people feel safer. To get your “Protector of Peace, Ally to All” shirt, call or text Litsheim at 970-201-8752.
After David Litsheim, owner of Seeds of Revolution at 241 Grand Ave., started reading growing numbers of first-hand accounts on social media of racist assaults and bullying after the election, he wanted to find a way to address the problem. With help from Bryan Wade, Litsheim designed a highly visible T-shirt that will serve as a symbol telling people “If you are being intimidated or fear for your safety, come to this person because they are safe.”
The campaign mimics a similar campaign that sprang up in the United Kingdom after Donald Trump’s election. Brits have started wearing safety pins on their lapels to symbolize anti-bigotry, anti-violence and safety.
Democracy, Economics, Elections, Ethics, Extremism, Grand Junction Chamber, Gun violence, Legal marijuana, Lies, New marijuana economy, politics, Religion, Secularism, Stupid Republicans
Focus on the Bright Spots in the Election
by • • 2 Comments
Half the country woke up this morning despondent, demoralized and in utter dread of what a Trump presidency will mean to this country. We’ve never had a president before who confessed on video to sexually assaulting women and who is endorsed by the Ku Klux Klan. We’re about to find out what that’s like, but everyone — including conservatives — might end up being surprised by what Trump will actually do while he’s in office, since he earned a 76 to a 91% lie rate for everything he said while on the campaign trail. The New York Times even dubbed him “Lord of the Lies.” If it was the right wing’s goal to throw a molotov cocktail into the government of the country they supposedly love so much, then they succeeded.
Economics, Elections, Ethics, politics
What’s Really Going On Inside Mesa County Government? Here’s a Hint: It’s Pretty Bad.
by • • 6 Comments
Rose Pugliese, one of the sitting county commissioners responsible for a high level of discontent among Mesa County employees
The following is a guest column from the August 28, 2016 issue of the Daily Sentinel that many people may have overlooked. The author is the operations manager for the elections division of Mesa County. She describes how the County treats its employees. I am reposting it here because many people probably missed it, and county residents need to know about the poor management of county under our current county commissioners.
Advertising, Democracy, Elections, Ethics, Human rights, Intolerance, politics, Propaganda, Stupid Republicans
Local “Deplorables” Gather for Trump’s Visit
by • • 0 Comments
Former Delta County “Castration school board member” Kathy Svenson (arrow, in kooky hat) was one of the self-described “Deplorables” at Trump’s visit at West Star Aviation in Grand Junction yesterday
A woman who attended Donald Trump’s rally in Grand Junction yesterday appeared in a front page photo in today’s Daily Sentinel and was identified as “Kathy Svenson of Delta.”
Svenson was a highly suitable attendee for Trump’s rally. She is, in fact, a bona fide “Deplorable.”
Svenson is the famous former Delta County School Board member who gained notoriety nationally and internationally for saying transgender students should be castrated before being permitted to use the restrooms in public schools. She became known as “The Castration School Board Member” of Delta County, Colorado.
Svenson made her comments after the Colorado Civil Rights Division ruled that a 6-year-old transgender student could use the girls’ restroom at her school.
Education, Elections, Energy, Environment, Grassroots advocacy, Media, politics, Propaganda, Worker advocacy
Long Ballot? Don’t Worry. Use AnneLandmanBlog Voter Guide!
by • • 3 Comments
The entire November ballot is in today’s Daily Sentinel, and it takes up 6 pages of fine print, like these two.
Ballots were mailed today in Mesa County, and it’s a long one. The Daily Sentinel has published the entire November ballot in today’s paper, and it takes up six full pages of the paper, in fine print.
If you are worried about all the time it’s going to take to figure out how to vote on all this stuff, worry no more. We’ve done the research for you! We’ve looked into where the big money and corporate influence are coming from on all the issues, and how wealthy corporations are using ballot initiatives to try to trick you out of your rights, and weaken your influence and your ability to protect yourself and your families from their activities. We’ve looked at the ins and outs of all the issues, what’s fair and what’s not, and figured out how people can cast votes in their own interest.
Just go to AnneLandmanBlog Voter Guide 2016 to see the recommended votes on the local, state and federal candidates and ballot issues. The rationale for the votes is toward the bottom of the post.
Happy voting, and remember, after this you can mute all those annoying election TV ads!
Elections, Health care, politics
AnneLandmanBlog Voter Guide, 2016
by • • 5 Comments
This guide offers AnneLandmanBlog’s opinion on how to vote on candidates and issues in the November 8, 2016 election.
A discussion of the issues follows the recommendations.
Recommendations:
Federal offices:
President/Vice President: Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine
U.S. Senate: Michael Bennet
Representative to U.S. Congress District 3: Gail Schwartz
Advertising, Elections, politics, Religion, Separation of Church and State
Immaculate Heart of Mary Church Delves Into Politics in Grand Junction: Is it Legal?
by • • 13 Comments
The Immaculate Heart of Mary Church at H and 26 1/2 Roads in Grand Junction is irritating some residents of Paradise Hills with their political signs. Is it illegal?
Paradise Hills residents have been contacting Western Colorado Atheists and Freethinkers expressing their irritation and asking if it is legal for the Immaculate Heart of Mary Church, which dominates their neighborhood, to display political signs opposing Proposition 106, the “Colorado End of Life Options Act,” on their lawns along the streets on two sides of their property.