Here are some significant articles from past reports:
January 2022
The Truth about “The Big Lie”
The big story in the legislature this week was not dealing with any bills. It was two virtually identical resolutions (HR22-1004 and SM22-001) in the House and Senate concerning election integrity (or the lack thereof).
I titled this as the truth about “The Big Lie,” because there is a big lie out there, a really big lie, but it is not what is being reported by virtually every media outlet, every Democrat leader and too many Republicans as well. We are all too familiar with this story. I have been reporting on it for now well over a year. To pick up many of the details review the reports I have published in my weekly newsletter, found at KevinLundberg.com
Suffice it here to say that there is an overwhelming bank of evidence that the 2020 election was filled with fraud, particularly in the presidential swing states. Part of the really big lie is that Colorado’s voting system is called the “gold standard.” Colorado has been a leader in establishing a voting system that is ripe for fraud and abuse, with automatic voter registration, same day voter registration, all mail ballots, a totally opaque electronic voting system and bloated voter registration roles that in some cases exceed the number of possible voters that exist in each county.
Calling this absurd and dangerous voting system the “gold standard” is the Orwellian part of this really big lie. It is obvious that the really big lie is actually being promulgated by those who coined the terms “gold standard” and “The Big Lie.” Of course, they insist that anyone who questions the integrity of this flimsy system is buying into “The Big Lie.”
Here is a way to test the veracity of these competing claims: Who is calling for audits, transparency of all the facts and verification of the claims? Who wants all of this to be given a fair hearing in the courts? Who wants the election equipment vendors to open up their boxes and their computer codes? Who is trying to get this all out in the open and who is insisting that we just cover it up and move along?
Too much has already come out to think this will ever go away before it is completely settled. The time has come to verify the facts on both sides of the argument. We must have election integrity, with verified, repeatable, and robust accuracy of the real, live, legitimate voting citizens. Anyone who refuses to get this sorted out is promoting the real, really big lie.
Getting back to the resolutions, they were not just denying the evident fraud of the 2020 election, or only claiming that Colorado has the “gold standard.” The resolutions were urging the U.S. Congress to pass Federal legislation which would force these systems on all 50 states. Fortunately that fell apart in Washington, and in Colorado we now know who supports this charade in the Colorado legislature.
Essentially the votes for the resolutions fell on party lines (the only exception was a senator who is not much more than Republican in name only). Several amendments were also proposed, where the votes tell much when looking at who voted for and against the amendments. If you want to study those details I invite you to look up the resolutions and check out the amendments and individual votes on the amendments.
I wrap this up with the observation that a large majority of Republicans, many unaffiliated and even a big chunk of Democrats know that our election systems are broken. The opportunity for fraud is obvious to anyone who fairly assesses the shallow security measures and the evidence of fraud is over whelming, for those who actually take the time to look at the evidence.
There is a really big lie out there and I think of it every time I hear someone claim there is no evidence that the 2020 presidential election was stolen. Look at all the facts and judge carefully. Our nation’s future depends upon it.
Supreme Legal, Moral and Cultural Chaos
Doublespeak.
5/2/20
One week ago the Colorado governor issued executive order #44 for the pandemic. He calls it “Safer at Home,” as opposed to his previous “Stay at Home” order. When he discussed it a few days earlier at a press conference it was supposed to be the first step in opening up the state. However, in close examination this order is more like doubling down on the orders to keep Colorado closed, keeping everyone in something that looks a lot like house arrest and overall keeping a tight control on all we do in Colorado for the next 30 days… at least.
George Orwell had a word for this kind of rhetoric. He called it “doublespeak.” This is when the government says one thing, and in fact does the opposite. Another literary example of this manipulation of the public through shrewdly constructed press statements can be found in C.S. Lewis’ book “That Hideous Strength.” In it the protagonist is hired to deceive the public with newspaper articles which made completely repulsive public policies sound reasonable and even desirable.
In “Safer at Home” the governor is actually consolidating his power by ordering the state health department and local health districts to also issue orders that reinforce his orders. He continues to make every order at least 30 days long, even though the law only allows him to declare an emergency for no more than 30 days at a time, and then issue orders within that limited time frame. Counties are required to go through a complex system of approvals if they want to modify the strict standards of his statewide orders. And for those of us older than 65? We are still under the more strict Stay at Home order.
Some businesses are allowed to operate in a very limited fashion, but in all cases we are being treated like subjects rather than free citizens. At this point of controlling the effects of this epidemic and properly managing a collapsing economy the decision making authority should be returned to the citizens. Instead we see a governor who is gathering all of the power to himself and his centralized government system.
This “new normal” cannot be allowed to continue.
IT WILL NOT MAKE THE VIRUS GO AWAY but it will undermine our inalienable, Constitutionally guaranteed rights
I am just giving a brief overview of his six page executive order, which was followed by a 34 page order from the state health department. For a more detailed and much longer description of the governor’s orders I highly recommend Rob Natelson’s article in Complete Colorado. https://pagetwo.completecolorado.com/…/natelson-latest-cov…/
If you read Mr. Natelson’s article be prepared to be frustrated and confused. Not by his writing, for he is clear and concise, but by the complex, controlling and oblique commands the governor has created.
Can Weld County Open Weld County?
4/25/20
The Weld County Board of Commissioners have said that more businesses can open than the governor has decreed. As Commissioner Scott James is quoted in the Coloradoan ” “free people in a free country” can decide if they want to open their businesses or do business with companies that may or may not reopen…”
Can they do that? The better question is can the governor stop them? The answer is, the governor probably has the power to stop them, but does he have the legal authority?
If you really want to dig into this first read the April 15 commentary published in the Washington Times. In this commentary Andrew Napolitano clearly lays out the principle that governors are always (including times of emergency) subject to the laws of their state, and the Federal government, including all Constitutional rights of the citizens.
So far Governor Polis has issued 43 executive orders concerning the epidemic. His authority to issue any of these orders comes from CRS 24-33.5, Part 7, concerning emergency management. This gives the governor extraordinary powers during the period of a declared emergency.
The provision allowing this to be an emergency is in CRS24-33.5-703(4), where “emergency epidemic” includes “highly fatal infectious agents or biological toxins.” COVID-19 was originally considered much more fatal than influenza. However, now that is being seriously challenged by recent scientific studies.
But lets assume this qualifies as an emergency epidemic. The governor can then issue quarantine orders. For this epidemic we have seen a new use of the word quarantine, for the governor’s orders are quarantining everyone, sick and healthy alike. Stay-at-home, safe-at-home and restrictions on “non-essential” businesses (which terms are not found in this Colorado law) are a form of quarantine.
But lets assume its okay to quarantine everyone. in CRS24-33.5-704(4) is states that “…no state of disaster emergency may continue for longer than thirty days unless renewed by the governor.” What we see in the governor’s 43 executive orders is what I call rolling 30 day orders, meaning he declares a state of emergency and then each succeeding order is 30 days from the date of that particular order. So a disaster was declared on March 11, but the governor violated his original order with each succeeding order by going beyond the original deadline of the emergency declaration of April 9. He did renew that original order on April 8, which will therefore expire on May 7, but again the new deadline is totally ignored by succeeding orders that declare deadlines beyond that 30 day limit.
Colorado law, which the governor is bound to follow, limits his extraordinary emergency powers to no more than 30 days at a time. At the end of the 30 days he may chose to renew the emergency, but the law does not contemplate a constant state of emergency powers for the governor of Colorado. It is reckless and illegal for the governor to issue these orders that extend beyond his statutory limit of 30 days.
So, can the Weld County Board of Commissioners open Weld County? Yes, for they are stating the obvious. We are a free people in a free country. The governor is acting beyond the scope of his authority and the Weld County Board of Commissioners are calling him out on it.
It is Time to Re-Open Colorado
4/18/20
Some are saying that we need to give the shutdown another few weeks, essentially taking us through May before everyone can get back to work. They contend that all of the trillions of dollars of Federal government subsidies will protect our economy and we need this additional time to hold the virus back.
I strongly disagree for two fundamental reasons.
First, concerning the epidemic:
Back in February we were told there would be exponentially accelerating cases that would overwhelm the medical system. Either because of faulty models, effective social distancing, or a combination of both, the worst case scenarios in this country never happened. What we are seeing in Colorado is new hospital admissions have been diminishing for the last two weeks. Hospitals and emergency rooms have been more empty than overwhelmed. The “curve” that has been so much discussed has been flattened and effective treatments to help many recover are being found. And we as individual citizens are social distancing and will continue to be careful, with or without the governor’s orders to shut down the state.
However, the only actual cure we really have on the immediate horizon is immunity from the virus, which inevitably means more people will get this highly contagious disease, regardless of the shutdown orders. The best numbers we have show it is a dangerous virus, but within the range of a serious influenza. If we continue the shut down for several more weeks, it will not make the virus go away, it will only extend the time until there is sufficient immunity to stop the epidemic.
Preliminary results released Friday from a Stanford study of Santa Clara, California confirms the mortality rate is in fact about that of a bad flu bug. It is highly contagious and the study showed that the actual number of persons who had already contracted COVID-19 was 50-85 times the “official” known, tested infection rate. Factoring in this data yields a mortality rate in the range of one tenth of one percent.
Second, concerning the impact this is having on the rest of our culture:
We are dismantling our economic systems. It is more than just high unemployment (which is a big problem). If this shutdown continues through May I expect something more like a depression.
A depression is where people die for lack of basic things like adequate food, proper housing, shortages of just about everything, lack of basic medical supplies, etc.. What we are toying with is not just inconvenience, we could be sacrificing our culture and our people for years to come.
Another few weeks will geometrically escalate what is already developing into the deepest recession in our lifetime. It takes more than money to keep an economy afloat. It takes production and that has largely been removed from the economy for the last several weeks. Supply chains are currently stressed. Try ordering stuff from Amazon, it is taking several weeks for delivery.
A few more weeks and we risk production and supply chains breaking. Businesses are stressed. A few more weeks and many will be out of business. That will take years to rebuild. At the beginning of the shutdown panic buying kicked in for toilet paper, sanitizers and some food staples. Due to the diversity and resiliency of our supply systems that smoothed out, but continue the shutdown for a few more weeks and as the tens of thousands of products that are still available start to dwindle, panic buying may take over in earnest.
But we will have squandered our robust economic capacity and recovery will be that much further out of our reach. The longer we wait the worse it will get.
The alternative that I am seeking is letting individuals decide what works best for themselves. The vast majority will chose to continue to social distance and protect those most at risk. But at the same time businesses can start to rebuild. Churches can assemble (as each sees appropriate), people can begin to be productive again and life can start to return to a somewhat more normal pace.
Public Health
4/11/20
About a month ago I commented to a doctor friend of mine that one outcome of this epidemic is that public health officials will probably lose a great deal of credibility. I based this on my experience as a legislator who had much experience in dealing with public health.
Recent reports have been questioning the accuracy of the numbers we are getting from public health and many citizens are also starting to question the authoritarian power we see coming from public health. We are hearing reports of doctors being told to list the cause of death as COVID-19 if it is present, or even suspected, even though some of these individuals had other medical problems that may have actually been the cause of their death. This exaggerated death count is then used as the reason for unprecedented orders that have shut down our economy and daily lives.
Additionally, as I have reported before, the big number they are always using is the total number of identified cases. This would certainly be meaningful if it had anything to do with how many actually have the disease, but instead this is only a metric of how many tests they have been able to perform, which is a very small fraction of the population. Additionally, I have not seen any serious attempt to give true meaning to that number with any scientific sampling of the general population, which could give us a reasonably accurate picture of the current spread of the disease.
What I see is just a lot of numbers being thrown about that do not give policy makers enough meaningful data with which they could balance the risk of the disease with the risk of the extreme orders being put in place.
The Colorado health department’s website is a good example of what I am talking about. It contains a lot of colorful graphics, but much of it is inscrutable. For example, the graph listing COVID-19 deaths says it is by the reported date of the illness, or it can be listed as the date of the onset of the illness. Really? How about the date of the death, which would be a specific, identifiable and meaningful data point? Or is the graph just mislabeled? I have studied this everyday for the last couple of weeks and I still cannot make sense of it.
Public health officials are smart people. They could do a much better job of keeping the public and the policy makers aware of the actual facts concerning this virus epidemic. Instead we are all left to swim in an ocean of numbers that look scary, but are not very meaningful.
As a member of a legislative health committee for 14 years (and having served on a Colorado health commission before that) I learned to not trust public health numbers because too often they have proven to be more propaganda than hard facts. I wish it were not so, but public health has become something more than “hard science.” They have developed the skills of social engineers who know how to manipulate the presentation of the facts to get to their objectives. I do think that they are trying to ultimately do good, that is, reduce disease, but their methods of operation are highly suspect. Unfortunately these methods often frustrate the good they are intending.
This goes way beyond information and orders during an epidemic. Public health drives the policies on emissions standards, the imminent ban on oil based paints and dozens of other petroleum based products, immunization laws, asbestos abatement, the regulations for doctors, hospitals, clinics, and food preparation, etc..
As we move beyond the immediate impacts of this epidemic I hope our policy makers will put some guardrails around public health systems. First, public health needs to reassess their methods and motives. They need to be scrupulously accurate and authentic. They must stop trying to “spin” the facts.
Second, elected policy makers need more immediate oversight of public health authorities, particularly in times of emergencies. County commissions should have the power to directly and immediately veto any county public health directive. The legislature should retain that same direct and immediate authority over state health edicts and the governor’s executive orders. I do not expect this would create chaos in times of crisis. Instead, it should promote more measured responses and give our elected officials more say in critical times.
Finally, the legislative branch of our state government needs to take back their responsibility of making the decisions concerning the rules and regulations that governs our everyday lives. Public health has accumulated way too much power in setting the rules, fees and policies that the elected representatives of the people should be doing.
We are a nation and a state where the laws are supposed to govern the rulers, we are not, and should never be, a nation where the rulers become the law. Our government is designed to be controlled by the checks and balances of the many levels and branches of government. This principle should not be lost, especially in times of emergencies.
Our laws give extraordinary powers to the governor and public health authorities, but it should always be tempered with a sharing of that power with other, duly elected officials.
There is much we can learn from this pandemic. I trust one big lesson is that in a free society the rule of law must always govern the rulers.
Two Pandemics
3/14/20
We all know more about COVID-19 than we ever wanted to know, but there is another Pandemic taking over our world that is far more contagious. Its incubation period can be instantaneous, its symptoms amount to just about anything, and it can destroy just about everything.
I am talking about fear.
It is smart to get ahead of the challenges of COVID-19, but the biggest enemy I see on the horizon is fear and overreaction. Please don’t get caught up in it. During these trying times of cancellations, sickness, economic chaos and political turmoil it is easy to be ruled by fear.
Without fear driving our actions, we can take rational steps to protect ourselves and our family, and do what we can to help those in need.
During the first few difficult months of the Civil War, when addressing Congress President Lincoln said:
““Having thus chosen our course…without guile and with pure purpose, let us
renew our trust in God, and go forward without fear…”
Governments around the world are struggling to find solutions to the pandemic of COVID-19, but this was not a surprise for the Supreme Ruler of the universe. As with every major crisis, our ultimate hope is not in our own strength or knowledge, it is in the mercy and grace of our loving heavenly Father.
“…let us renew our trust in God, and go forward without fear…”
Marriage is Not to be Found in the Sex Ed Bill
3/3/19
Over the past few weeks I have given several descriptions of the sex ed bill, HB-1032. However, it is such a complicated bill it is hard to capture all that is within this legislation.
In some ways just as significant as the particulars in the bill are what has been left out of this radical legislation.
The most glaring omission is anything relating to heterosexual marriage. The bill bends over backwards to require the instruction of other human relationships, including the entire LGBT+ spectrum and even singles out a requirement that “immigrant communities” be represented in the discussions. However, nowhere is there anything that would indicate that “comprehensive human sexuality education” includes instruction on sexuality within the context of a heterosexual marriage.
A quick search of the reengrossed version of the bill yields not one use of the words “marriage,” “baby,” “child,” “wife,” “husband,” “man,” “woman” or “love.” The word “children” is only found in an amendment Republican House members included in a part of the bill that will not become a part of the statutory law and that was adopted after a very long and contentious debate in second reading.
In 1032 human sexuality is discussed as an activity that occurs between humans, but only in the context of individuals. Nowhere is it portrayed as an essential component of a healthy family, structured within the exclusive domain of marriage.
No, instead “gender stereotypes” are prohibited and “stigmatizing language,” is banned, which, considering the context of this legislation most assuredly includes the concept of teaching the merits of a one man one woman marriage.
Remember, this is supposed to be comprehensive, meaning the entire spectrum of what should be taught about the subject.
It is crystal clear. HB-1032 is intended to force feed all public school students in Colorado (charter schools included) a new morality that excludes the principle that marriage is the proper domain of sexual activity. Marriage has been an essential foundation for our American cultural mores for centuries, but in HB-1032 it is not even worth a mention. Instead it has been replaced with a new set of values that rejects traditional marriage and in its place puts up an “anything and everything else” set of values.
National Popular Vote Debate
On March 1, as a part of Centennial Institute’s program for CPAC, I was a part of a debate on the National Popular Vote, which the Colorado legislature just passed. Here is a link to the debate and the written comments I prepared for the debate:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=quKYu2wlVEk&t=1751s
For the sake of brevity I will call the National Popular Vote Compact the NPV.
Senator Gardner and I both oppose this bill. He considered the bill this year and I had the opportunity to hear this very same issue in 2007 in the House State Affairs Committee. That year it was called Senate Bill 46, which had passed the Senate. However, in the House committee, with seven Democrats and four Republicans we defeated the measure with a vote of 1-10. In 2007 this bill was killed with a strong bi-partisan vote. I wish I could say the same for this year.
The NPV will radically overturn the system we have for electing the President and it has the potential of doing much more damage to our civil government.
It severely upsets the balance of power between the states and the Federal government. It will deny all states not in the compact any meaningful role in selecting the President.
The compact violates several parts of the Constitution and, if it is implemented it may lead to a significant constitutional crisis.
I submit that the NPV could become a grave threat to the union of our republic.
In the current system the states elect the President, with the NPV individual state authority and influence will be severely diminished. Consequently the NPV will concentrate more power into the Federal government.
The NPV also violates several parts of the Constitution: Article I, Section 10, Article II, Section 1, Article V, and the Twelfth Amendment.
The proponents argue that in Article I each state is given the authority to determine how their electors are selected and all the NPV does is direct that state to ignore the will of their own citizens and follow the national vote totals. But, they are using this clause to completely destroy the reason the Electoral College system was created, which is to empower the states to elect the President.
The NPV is designed to become effective if a bare minimum of 270 electoral votes are controlled by the states participating in the compact. This would force at least 20-30 additional states who never adopted the compact to live under this new rule.
Additionally, the NPV does not require the approval of Congress, even though this is a constitutional mandate for all state compacts that affect the balance of powers between the states and the Federal government.
I conclude my opening remarks with bad news and good news.
First the bad: If the NPV is implemented, here is how it will play out. It will be challenged by some states not a part of the compact. I find it hard to believe the court will uphold the compact, but in either case the decision will cast a long, dark shadow of distrust on all succeeding presidential elections. We will have two separate, mutually exclusive mechanisms for electing the President, each endorsed by a large number of individual states. This will further divide the union into two distinct camps. In these times of razor sharp political conflict we cannot afford to fan these flames of disagreement and distrust.
Now the good news: There is a better way. If the proponents of the NPV are so convinced that the President should not be selected by the states, don’t try to work around the Constitution, amend it, as it is established in Article V. Go through Congress or go through the states directly, Article V provides both possibilities. Our Founders wisely knew that such dramatic changes needed to be a high bar, requiring a super majority of agreement.
The NPV Compact is an illegal end run around the principles and the process of our government. Please abandon this foolish and dangerous path. I welcome an honest and healthy debate on refining our civil government, but don’t tear down the authority of our Constitution. Work within that brilliant foundation which has guided our nation for nearly two and a half centuries.
