Tag: Conservatives

Conspiracy theories, Dangerous Republicans, Economics, Extremism, Health, Janet Rowland, Pandemic, Public health, Safety, Scams

Mesa County Commissioners working to seize control of Mesa County Board of Public Health

by Anne Landman • May 19, 2023 • 34 Comments

MCPHD Director Jeff Kuhr, Ph.D. won plaudits for helping Mesa County get through the Covid-19 pandemic

Mesa County Public Health Department (MCPHD) Director Dr. Jeff Kuhr has been under attack by the Mesa County Commissioners, who for some reason have been working for months to generate credible reasons to fire him. Commissioner Janet Rowland in particular has targeted Kuhr, accusing him of financial impropriety and grievous errors in MCPHD’s procurement processes. The Commissioners have ordered the Mesa County Board of Public Health to fire Kuhr, but they refused, saying there is no actual evidence that he’s intentionally done anything wrong. Not only that, but the State of Colorado rates MCPHD as having the lowest possible financial risk (pdf) in its compliance with federal and state contracts, making it clear that the state trusts MCPHD, but our right wing commissioners don’t. (This financial risk rating is done every three years, but the state skipped it during the pandemic. The MCPHD is currently undergoing this analysis again.)

As D-51 School Board’s conservative majority rushes to close East Middle School, it fast-tracks the opening of a religiously-affiliated charter school

by Anne Landman • March 13, 2023 • 37 Comments

District 51 School Board President Andrea Haitz

As the conservative District 51 School Board majority headed by Board President Andrea Haitz hurries to shut down East Middle School, it is fast-tracking the opening of yet another charter school, the Ascent Classical Academy, a project of Hillsdale College, a private Christian religious school located in south-central Michigan.

Ascent Classical Academy uses a curriculum advanced by Hillsdale’s Barney Charter School Initiative, “an outreach program of Hillsdale College devoted to the revitalization of public education through the launch and support of classical K-12 charter schools.”

Ascent Classical Academy plans to open in Grand Junction in August, 2023, at 545 31 Road, the building that formerly housed the Rocky Mountain Gun Club, just as the District puts the finishing touches on shutting down East Middle School, a high-performing traditional public school in the heart of downtown Grand Junction.

Teachers union president resigns via email amid flap over school closures & conservative school board members’ rejection of health clinic at GJHS

by Anne Landman • March 11, 2023 • 8 Comments

Timothy Couch, President of the Mesa Valley Education Association (MVEA), resigned via email March 8, on the same day the three-member conservative District 51 School Board majority ignored the pleas of students and voted to reject an offer by Marillac Health to operate a grant-funded, school-based health clinic at Grand Junction High School. The three Board members rejected the clinic at a time when homelessness among D-51 students is rapidly increasing and a Youth Risk Behavior survey by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) (pdf) found poor mental health and suicidal thoughts and behaviors among students are increasing nationwide. According to the CDC, in 2021, almost 60% of female students experienced persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness during the past year and nearly 25% made a suicide plan. Suicide is also a growing problem among Mesa County youth and suicide prevention is a “health priority” for Mesa County Public Health.

Fox Network hosts privately ridiculed Trump’s election fraud lie while continuing to pump the lie out to viewers

by Anne Landman • February 28, 2023 • 10 Comments

Mesa County’s many, many supporters of Donald Trump (pdf) must be super-bummed this week to find out Fox News owner Rupert Murdoch has acknowledged that Fox News anchors Laura Ingraham, Lou Dobbs, Jeanine Pirro, Sean Hannity, Maria Bartiromo and others knowingly lied to them by repeating Donald Trump’s fraudulent statements that the 2020 general election was “rigged” and he actually won.

Murdoch acknowledged under oath in a deposition in the $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit brought by Dominion Voting Systems against Fox Network, that Fox News hosts knowingly lied to viewers by endorsing false election fraud claims while at the same time they were privately ridiculing such claims. Murdoch further admitted he should have ordered Trump allies like Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell, who were lying to the public about the election, off the air, but didn’t.

Tina Peters is back begging people for money, this time on a Christian crowdfunding website

by Anne Landman • February 1, 2023 • 3 Comments

Tina’s new crowdfunding campaign on GiveSendGo, which has become a favorite fundraising site for far-right extremist groups like QAnon, the Proud Boys and anti-vaccine groups, which have been banned from GoFund Me.

Former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters is at it again, begging people to send her money while she awaits trials in March on obstruction charges (for recording in a courtroom and kicking a cop) and on multiple felony charges related to her election tampering.

Now Tina is using a free Christian crowdfunding website called GiveSendGo.com, that was originally created with the idea of helping religious people raise money for missions. GiveSendGo’s website says the “reason we started GiveSendGo” was “to share the Hope of Jesus through crowdfunding with everyone who comes to our platform.”

Mack Post Office closed since Dec. 31, with no re-opening date

by Anne Landman • January 17, 2023 • 2 Comments

Note taped to the front door of the Mack Post Office.

We’ve already heard about the dire labor shortage that is causing major mail back-ups at the Post Office’s Scarlet mail handling facility, and delays in delivery of residential and business mail locally.

Now we just found out the Mack Post Office was closed indefinitely on December 31, 2022, leaving people in the Mack area without any retail postal services. People needing postal services are told to go to the post offices in Loma and Fruita.

Former G.J. Chamber of Commerce CEO Diane Schwenke to run for G.J. City Council

by Anne Landman • January 1, 2023 • 24 Comments

Longtime Grand Junction Area Chamber of Commerce President Diane Schwenke

The former longtime CEO of the Grand Junction Area Chamber of Commerce, Diane Schwenke, has announced she will be running for the at-large seat on Grand Junction City Council in 2023.

Yes, THAT Diane Schwenke.

The one who endorsed convicted felony embezzler Steve King for state Senate in 2012.

The one who endorsed Ray Scott as a replacement for convicted felon Steve King. In 2018, Scott double-billed both his legislative and campaign expense accounts for over $1,000 in Uber rides, effectively doubling his personal reimbursements. He was also sued by the ACLU for blocking constituents from his official social media accounts, costing taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars.

The same Diane Schwenke who endorsed Laura Bradford for Colorado House of Representatives in 2012. Bradford was pulled over by Denver police for driving under the influence of alcohol during her first and only term in the House. She quit after that term.

The same Diane Schwenke who endorsed Rose Pugliese for County Commissioner. Pugliese worked to kill the Riverfront Trail System by gutting all funding for it, circulated a petition to force D-51 teachers to stop teaching kids about climate change, and also stumped for the disastrous Tina Peters to be elected County Clerk.

Audio of 911 calls about Rep. Lauren Boebert’s family harassing neighbors

by Anne Landman • August 15, 2022 • 7 Comments

Five Garfield County Sheriff’s responded to multiple 911 calls on August 4 from neighbors of Lauren and Jayson Boebert about children harassing a residential neighborhood in Silt by driving ATVs up and down a residential street at high speeds of around 50 MPH. Two callers reported the children driving the ATVs were the kids of Jayson and Lauren Boebert. The first told the 911 operator that he stopped one of the children going 50 MPH in a RZR off-road vehicle and asked him to slow down. The child said “fuck off” to the neighbor, went home and got his dad, Jayson. Jayson Boebert then returned in charcoal-gray Ford F150 truck with the child in the passenger seat and started threatening “everybody in the neighborhood,” according the caller. Jayson drove over a caller’s mailbox, destroying it, while the caller was on the phone with the 911 operator. The caller reported Jayson was “dumb as a post,” “looking to fight with everyone in the neighborhood” and was “so irrational.” “When 911 operator asked if there were any weapons, the caller responded that the whole family has guns.

Mesa County GOP Chair says Tina Peters asked him to block other candidates from running so she could win again for Clerk

by Anne Landman • August 12, 2022 • 4 Comments

Tina Peters and her deep-pocket financial benefactor Mike Lindell, the My Pillow CEO

The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel reported August 11 that indicted Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters asked Mesa County Republican Party Chair Kevin McCarney to rig the primary election for her by blocking all other candidates from running against her. McCarney told the Daily Sentinel that Peters asked him to do this before she declared she was running for Clerk again on January 16, 2022. She then dropped out that race in February, 2022 to instead run for secretary of state.

“She was asking me to fix her race to make sure she had a spot because she knew she was going to lose here,” McCarney told the Sentinel.

The revelation about Peters’ request to McCarney to have him rig her primary election comes just before a movie about her titled “Selection Code” is scheduled to premier on August 20, 2022. The movie, funded by election denier My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell, advances former President Donald Trump’s lie that election fraud is rampant in the U.S. and elections are “rigged.”

Tina Peters on the judge in her criminal case: “This is a dirty, dirty player”

by Anne Landman • July 26, 2022 • 2 Comments

NOTE: YouTube removed this video of Tina Peters’ appearance on Steve Bannon’s show because in it, Peters persistently tells a raft of blatant lies about election fraud in Colorado. I am trying to explain to YouTube that the video is being used for purposes of commentary and criticism, and this has worked for YouTube’s removal of other video clips of Tina’s talks, but so far they have not agreed to restore this particular one. Fortunately I transcribed some passages of her talking in this video here:

In the video she made in Pitkin County the night she bonded out of jail in Aspen on 7/22, Republican Tina Peters called Mesa County Court Judge Matthew Barrett, the judge overseeing her criminal case, “partisan” and “malicious,” and claimed “his goal is to incarcerate an innocent woman.” She further accused Judge Barrett of “legislating from the bench,” and urged her followers to “file a lot of ethics complaints” against him.

Just two days later, on 7/25, while appearing on Steve Bannon’s internet talk show “War Room,” in a segment titled “Deep Dive of a Few Bad Men,” Peters continued assailing Judge Barrett:

Boebert votes against bill to protect Americans’ right to contraceptives

by Anne Landman • July 22, 2022 • 1 Comment

House Rep. Lauren Boebert

Republican Colorado House Rep. Lauren Boebert may tell you she stands for freedom, but she is actually working to undermine your freedom.

A recent case in point: on July 21, 2022, Boebert voted against House Bill 8373, the “Right to Contraception Act.”

After the Supreme Court reversed Roe v. Wade in June and Clarence Thomas threatened to reconsider other privacy issues including the right to contraception, Democrat Kathy Manning of North Carolina introduced the Right to Contraception Act, to “protect a person’s ability to access contraceptives and to engage in contraception, and to protect a health care provider’s ability to provide contraceptives, contraception, and information related to contraception.”

Who doesn’t want to be assured they will have the personal freedom to learn about, access and use contraceptives as they see fit?

Lauren Boebert and 194 other House Republicans, that’s who. Only eight House Republicans who voted for the bill.

You can read the full text of the Right to Contraception Act here.

So Boebert had a chance to protect a crucial freedom, and voted against it.

Fortunately, House Democrats advanced the bill to the Senate.

If you love freedom, it’s crucial to vote Democratic up and down the next ballot, since we now have a Christian activist Supreme Court that is taking action to restrict Americans’ rights in accordance with their own personal religious beliefs.

But if you want to be assured removal of more of your personal rights and freedoms, vote Republican.

Bobbie Daniel, Conservatives, Conspiracy theories, Crazy Republicans, Dangerous Republicans, Election deniers, Elections, Embarrassing Republicans, Extremism, Mesa County Republican Party, Sherronna Bishop, Tina Peters

Video shows Republican Mesa County Commissioner candidate Bobbie Daniel endorsing Tina Peters for Clerk in 2018

by Anne Landman • July 21, 2022 • 11 Comments

A 2018 Facebook video shows 2022 Republican Mesa County Commissioner candidate Bobbie Daniel endorsing Tina Peters for Mesa County Clerk, assuring viewers that Tina has a “wealth of knowledge” and “we’re in really good hands if you’re our Clerk and Recorder.”

Daniel appears in the video with far right-wing activist Sherronna Bishop, whose home was searched by the FBI last November in connection with Tina Peters’ election tampering scandal. Bishop has been implicated in the scandal as well. She and her husband recently sold their home in Garfield County, fled to Texas and are keeping their whereabouts a secret.

It turned out electing Tina Peters as County Clerk was the biggest, most expensive and most embarrassing mistake Mesa County voters have ever made.

Hutchinson’s testimony was a blockbuster, but here’s the real “wow” moment from the last hearing of the January 6 Select Committee

by Anne Landman • July 11, 2022 • 15 Comments

On June 28, 2022, former White House Aide Cassidy Hutchinson gave explosive testimony to the January 6 Select Committee: She described how an unhinged President Trump urged a crowd of his supporters — that possessed bear spray, guns, knives and spears — to march to the Capitol. She told how Trump lashed out at his Secret Service agents in the car, how he demanded they take him to the Capitol to be with his supporters, and how he petulantly hurled his lunch plate against a wall. She revealed that her boss, Trump’s Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, had sought a pardon from the President before leaving the White House.

Everyone’s been talking about her testimony since.

Yet the testimony that drew the most audible gasp from the audience at the June 28 hearing Select Committee wasn’t even from Cassidy Hutchinson.

It was from former three-star General Michael Flynn, who had been Defense Intelligence Agency head, and had served as National Security Advisor under the Trump.

That testimony is in the above video clip, which is under 2 minutes and can also be seen here on YouTube.

The next hearing of the January 6 Committee is Tuesday, July 12 at 8:00 a.m. 1:00 p.m. Eastern Time/ 11:00 a.m. Mountain Time and will feature testimony from Trump’s White House attorney Pat Cipollone, who was present with Hutchinson in the White House in the run-up to January 6.

Anti-semitism, Dangerous Republicans, Election deniers, Embarrassing Republicans, Extremism, Fake patriotism, Firearms, Intolerance, Mesa County Republican Party, Racism, Republican lies, Trump Insanity

Like Tina, Mesa County Sheriff Candidate Bob Dalley believes The Big Lie

by Anne Landman • June 4, 2022 • 19 Comments

Dalley is overtly politically partisan, and promotes himself repeatedly as a Christian who loves guns. But more than this, he believes in Trump’s Big Lie, just like Tina Peters does.

The front page of this Saturday’s Daily Sentinel featured an article about the debate held recently between the two candidates running for Mesa County Sheriff in the Republican primary election coming up June 28: Bob Dalley and incumbent Sheriff Todd Rowell.

At the debate, Dalley cited statistics about alarming increases in crime within the county, without giving any sources for his statistics, while Sheriff Rowell cited Colorado Bureau of Investigations data that show Mesa County actually has lower crime rates than the rest of the state as a whole.

That Dalley would quote statistics, as he does on his campaign website as well, without citing even a single source for any of the information, is always a red flag, since he could be making up this information, but the biggest bombshell in the Sentinel article was really near the end, and was presented with little fanfare or attention:

It was this:

“Dalley said he doesn’t believe Joe Biden fairly won his election to president of the United States in 2020.”

Like Enstrom Candies? You might want to re-think that. They’re one of Boebert’s biggest donors.

by Anne Landman • May 15, 2022 • 10 Comments

Enstrom Candies is Lauren Boebert’s 4th biggest donor. Source: OpenSecrets.org

How OpenSecrets.org computes donations from an entity.

GovTrack officially lists Colorado House Representative Lauren Boebert as a participant in the January 6th, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters. She has had zero accomplishments while in office. Instead, to cover that up, she lied to her constituents and took credit for

Enstrom Candies, a favorite coffee shop, ice cream shop and candy factory in downtown Grand Junction, is Boebert’s 4th biggest donor

accomplishments achieved by Democrats. She supports Putin and Russia with her votes. She embarrassed all of Colorado with her shocking outbursts at the 2021 State of the Union address by President Biden, shouting out loud at him while he was talking about his deceased son. She openly insulted a group of Jews who were visiting the U.S. Capitol. She made homophobic comments about Transportation Secretary Pete Butigieg about his taking parental leave to care for his two newborn twins. Boebert made bigoted jokes to intentionally disparage a Democratic colleague. She challenged a wheelchair-bound House colleague to a sprint. She mocked the death of a 42 year old cinematographer who was accidentally killed on the set of a movie by a firearm. Boebert wants government to take orders from the church. She has openly promoted the white supremacist myth of “replacement theory” that is leading to more mass shootings in the U.S. She voted against a bill to help Americans get easier access to baby formula.

Tina Peters claims she was “framed” with the ballots left in the ballot box from the 2019 election

by Anne Landman • March 4, 2022 • 1 Comment

Speaking to members of the Jefferson County Republican Men’s Club on February 21, 2022 (video), Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters claimed that she was “framed” when election workers found “429 ballots” uncollected in a ballot box from the 2019 election.

The ballots were discovered when election workers went to empty the box for the 2020 election, but Peters refused to petition a judge to open and count them and include them in the final vote tally from the 2019 election. In her talk, Peters also got the number of uncounted ballots wrong. 574 ballots were discovered left in the ballot box, not 429.

Peters claimed without evidence that “they stuffed the ballot box with 479 ballots” in order to “take over my office” and said it was part of an effort to “take over the western slope.”

Looks like District 51’s conservative school board majority is getting ready to fire Superintendent, Assistant Superintendent and Director of Equity & Inclusion

by Anne Landman • February 6, 2022 • 19 Comments

Meeting agenda quietly put up on the School Board’s website on short notice announcing a special meeting the next day to discuss employment contracts of the Superintendent, Assistant Superintendent and Director of Equity and Inclusion

The District 51 School Board’s new conservative majority — Andrea Haitz, Angela Lema and Willie Jones — appear to be getting ready to fire School District Superintendent, Diana Sirko, Assistant Superintendent Brian Hill and Tracy Gallegos, the District’s Director of Equity and Inclusion, who was hired into that position in July, 2021.

The three Board members gave short notice about a special meeting to be held on Monday, February 5 at 5:00 p.m. discuss these three employees’ contracts with attorneys they just hired in January to serve as their own representatives: David Price and Tammy Eret of Hoskin, Farina and Kampf.

The Board members produced the agenda on Saturday evening, 2/5/22, and then quietly slipped it onto the School Board’s meeting website (pdf) on Sunday evening, 2/6/21.

CO House Rep. Lauren Boebert challenges wheelchair-bound House colleague to a sprint

by Anne Landman • November 27, 2021 • 0 Comments

In a light-hearted competition among the most extreme right wing Republican members of Congress to see who could glorify killer Kyle Rittenhouse the most after his acquittal this week, Colorado House Rep. Lauren Boebert (Republican-CO) turned down an arm-wrestling challenge and instead challenged her colleague, House Rep. Madison Cawthorn, to a sprint.

Rep. Cawthorn is in a wheelchair due to injuries sustained in a 2014 vehicle accident.

Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC). Photo: Campaign web page

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