As Colorado Springs voters head into a municipal election, the Colorado Springs Gazette’s reliably pro-free market, pro-liberty editorial page editor Wayne Laugesen reminds us all that “politicians can’t give you a life.”

We’re taught that elections choose leaders, which isn’t true at all. Elections choose public servants, who should have nominal roles in our lives — even in this age of big, intrusive government. The mayor and council should lack the power to enhance or diminish your life. Mostly, they should oversee a reasonable level of public safety, the efficient maintenance of streets, the sale of water and the sale of utilities. We should not ask for much more, nor should we expect it.

Something for us Denver voters to keep in mind as our own municipal election gets near.

Whole thing here.

Attention future mayor of Denver. Take this story from Miami as a wake up call. We voters, tax payers, citizens will not take kindly to tax increases, spending increases, regulatory increases, special interest favors, and broken promises. Remember Gray Davis? Now you can add Carlos Alvarez’s name to that recall list.

You’ve been warned. Don’t mess with our wallets.

I recently criticized Denver mayoral candidate James Mejia for writing that he wants to “reduce the bureaucracy” in Denver government as part of his “vision for economic development,” without offering any actual examples of existing bureaucracy he thinks needs reducing. I called this “seductive at a superficial level.” Well, it looks like Denver mayoral candidate Chris Romer is also unafraid to engage in seductive, but unsubstantial “pro-business” rhetoric.

Writing at the Huffington Post, Romer points to a “maze of rules and regulations” that recently kept a cupcake truck business sidelined by Denver city bureaucracy. According to candidate Romer:

If we want to put people back to work, our city government needs to work with businesses, not against them. It is critical that we change the attitude at City Hall about attracting business to Denver. We need to expect more of city government — by cutting red tape and streamlining regulations so that we keep businesses here and bring in new ones.

Sounds great, except that “cutting red tape and streamlining regulations” should actually be seen as expecting less from government rather than more. Less bureaucratic stifling of the entrepreneurial spirit means more private sector wealth and job creation. More to the point, claiming to want to cut red tape and streamline regulation (not quite the same thing as less regulation) without citing a single specific existing bit of red tape that should be cut, or a single existing regulation that needs to be streamlined, makes it hard for this Denver voter to take seriously candidate Romer’s stated desire to “change the attitude at City Hall about attracting business to Denver.”

As the Denver mayor’s race heats up, jobs and the economy are emerging as a major campaign theme. This means that to make an informed decision, Denver voters like myself are going to need to wade through the looming avalanche of “pro-business” and “job creation” rhetoric by candidates to separate empty promises and magical thinking from the rational reality of the mayor’s role in private sector job and wealth creation.

For example, over at the Huffington Post, Denver mayoral candidate James Mejia lays out his “vision for economic development,” writing, among several other things, that:

When I am mayor, Denver will be Open for Business. I will ensure that employers stay and new businesses are brought to Denver. During my administration, I will reduce the bureaucracy that slows the pace of business growth and discourages relocation.

Sounds pretty seductive at a superficial level. But seductive is not the same as substantive. An example is when presidential candidate Barack Obama told us all that, if elected, he was going to “go through the federal budget, line by line, eliminating programs that no longer work and making the ones we do need work better and cost less…” At the time, Mr. Obama had already been in the U.S. Senate for several years, presumably then having a strong enough grasp of the federal budget to have actually cited a few examples of programs in need of elimination. Instead, that superficially seductive line is now an example of an empty campaign promise.

Mr Mejia has already been involved in various bureaucracies in Denver city government stretching back to the Wellington Webb administration (1991-2003), and thus presumably has at least a working grasp of Denver’s “bureaucracy.”

So a couple questions for Mr. Mejia:

1. Could you please amend your “vision for economic development” to actually cite some specific examples of existing bureaucracy within the City and County of Denver that stifles growth and keeps away new business, bureaucracy that you are both willing and able to “reduce” if elected mayor? This would help voters like myself to determine if you are indeed serious about Denver being “open for business” under a Mejia administration.

2. A willingness to “reduce the bureaucracy” certainly seems to also imply a willingness to reduce the number of bureaucrats who work within the bureaucracy (unless you are shooting for less bureaucracy, but the same level of bureaucrats, which frankly would seem to defeat the whole purpose). So along with the examples of bureaucracy you would work to reduce as mayor, could you also give an idea of how many fewer bureaucrats would be around under your administration.