Boy is the corporate welfare machine rolling in Aurora these days. Gaylord Entertainment is benefiting from a massive amount of subsidies and tax breaks from the city of Aurora for the honor of locating their hotel and conference center there. If Gaylord were not granted the $300 million in generous “support,” the theory goes, they would not have located their project in Aurora. Of course whether they put roots down in Aurora or somewhere else is besides the point. What matters is the massive wealth transfer from taxpayers in Aurora to a private corporation.

One way for a city to oil up their corporate welfare machine is to “blight” some land, which allows local governments, schools and special districts to “rebate to developers what they pay in property taxes for 25 years.” The word “blight” is to developers as the word “candy” is to children. Except that children have to work a little sometimes to get their candy. However, blighting some land only requires some fancy English language tricks and a stroke of the corporate welfare pen. Here’s what Sen. Morgan Carroll had to say in the Denver Post about this scheme,

It does not pass the straight-face test for the blighted designation… It’s a financing game to get public subsidies for a project that might be wonderful if it were privately financed.

Sen. Carroll hits it out of the park with, “if it were privately financed.” You know, I remember a time when companies would raise money the old-fashioned way – through bank loans. And, now I know I’m showing my age with this one, through private investors. Crazy right? Corporations used to raise capital through means that do not take taxpayers hostage. Not anymore. Now when a project isn’t profitable enough to catch the attention of folks who want to make investments with their own money (to earn a little profit), corporations go to city councils and pitch unprofitable ideas to be financed off the backs of the residents. If banks say no, governments say yes.

Beware of the terms, “incentives,” “grants,” “urban-renewal,” “blight,” “public-private partnership,” and “public investment.” They are all euphemisms for the taxpayer funded corporate welfare gravy train.

Here’s what senior fellow Randal O’Toole has to say about this Gaylord project in the Denver Post earlier this month: Taxpayers Should Reject TIF.

It’s a double whammy of Devil’s Advocate this Friday night. Same half-hour of public affairs television excellence, but in two segments. First, I am joined by Rob O’Dea, editor of BoCo360.com and Lindsey Sterling Krank of the Prairie Dog Coalition for a debate over what to do with Boulder’s burgeoning prairie dog population. Then I am joined by new State Republican Party Chairman Ryan Call for a discussion about the role of the state party and the Colorado GOP’s chances in 2012. That’s Friday, April 22 at 8:30 PM on Colorado Public Television 12. Re-broadcast the following Monday at 1:30PM.

I wanted to update my readers on the continued love affair between Xcel and our General Assembly. Yesterday, unsurprising to anyone following this close relationship, Xcel was able to get it’s way again under the gold dome as HB 1291 – legislation that approves the Air Quality Control Commission’s Regional Haze State Implementation Plan – passed out of Senate committee on a 3-2, party line vote. This was despite emotionally charged testimony from Pueblo union members describing the ill effects of high energy prices on families, workers, business, and the steel industry. It passed also in the face of compelling testimony from Environmental Policy writer William Yeatman, who flew all the way from Washington, DC to testify against this monstrosity. The fact remains: once Xcel makes its mind up about something, it almost assuredly gets what it wants.

So what does this mean? Well, it still has to clear a few more hurdles before it reaches the governor’s desk. But we all know the biggest mountain has been climbed already. It also means Xcel secures another source of big time revenue. “Seeing green” means something entirely different to the fat cats at Xcel. The bottom line is this: when Xcel wins, consumers lose. They are using their cozy relationship with lawmakers to hike energy prices and garner sweet deals – at our expense. Which is all the more upsetting when they secure fat deals that are, in all likelihood, ILLEGAL on their face. We despise all forms of corporate welfare here at Independence. But perhaps the worst kind is of the state-sanctioned monopoly variety. In this case, consumers really have nowhere to go.

The Associate Press reports today that Senate Bill 200, which would create a health benefit exchange in Colorado, cleared a procedural hurdle and is headed to to floor of the Colorado Senate. According to the article, “A health insurance exchange allows private consumers and small businesses to pool buying power to get lower premiums.” Really AP? You sure that’s what a health insurance exchange does?

For a fuller explanation, check out Independence Institute Health Care Policy Center Director Linda Gorman’s recent Issue Backgrounder concerning SB-200. Or get the shorter version in her recent op-ed on the issue, a version of which was originally published in the print edition of the Colorado Springs Gazette, and re-printed here in its entirety:

ObamaCare is unpopular, unwieldy, expensive, arguably unconstitutional, and a prime target for repeal. It requires the states to do much of the federal government’s dirty work. Right now, the federal government is paying states $1 million to plan health insurance exchanges designed limit the kinds of health insurance policies available to state residents.

A lot of misinformation has been circulating about exchanges. Small businesses have been told that they will lower insurance premiums. In reality, the exchanges are insurance brokers. They sell approved plans offered by insurers and will support themselves by adding fees to the costs of plans sold through them.

Last November, Colorado elected Republicans to a slim majority in the state’s House of Representatives. Relying on claims that states could steer exchanges in a pro-market direction, House majority leader Amy Stephens co-sponsored HB11-200 to establish a Colorado Health Benefits Exchange. ObamaCare supporters hailed this as evidence of bipartisan support for ObamaCare ideas.

As more information became available, Representative Stephens requested that her bill not be enacted without inserting language specifying that it is not to be implemented unless the federal government grants Colorado a full waiver from all of the provisions of ObamaCare, and from the regulations flowing from it. She has since retreated from that position.

The Utah Health Exchange is often given as an example of an exchange that expands health insurance choices. In theory, it can aggregate tax-free defined contributions from different employers. If, for example, a husband’s employer contributes $300 per month to the exchange for health insurance and his wife’s employer does the same, the exchange would combine the amounts so that the husband and wife have $600 that they can use to buy either of the employers’ coverage plans.

Unfortunately, the Utah aggregator has not really been tested. It is less than a year old. It has enrolled 69 businesses covering about 2,000 people. This is a trivial number in a state with almost two hundred thousand non-farm establishments employing almost two million privately insured workers.

Massachusetts’ health insurance exchange, the only one of any size in operation, cost about $30 million to operate in 2009. Its budget ate up 3.5 percent of all payments that insurers and people buying insurance made for insurance coverage. The addition of an exchange fee to already bloated premiums explains why governors in Florida, Louisiana, and Georgia have said no thanks to state exchanges.

Even if Utah has figured out a way to expand health insurance choice, it is unlikely that it will survive the ObamaCare take-over intact. ObamaCare imposes complex requirements on both health insurance and state insurance exchanges. As no regulations have yet been issued, no one knows what kinds of exchanges will be allowed. However, the law gives President Obama and Kathleen Sebelius, U.S. Secretary of Health & Human Services, all the tools they need to prohibit local attempts to provide local choice in health insurance.

Existing evidence suggests that those regulatory tools are already being used to full advantage. In a likely attempt to disguise the true cost of ObamaCare until after the 2012 election, Secretary Sebelius has given over a thousand waivers to politically connected groups. Those waivers exempt Obama administration cronies from Obamacare’s burdensome regulations for one year.

Exchange supporters are fond of asserting that by working together “we” can use exchanges to get health insurance that “we” can afford. In fact, Stanford University’s John F. Cogan estimated that insurance premiums in Massachusetts were 6 percent higher than they would have without the reform that created the exchange. Massachusetts exchange policies are more limited than the policies available in other states. They offer limited choice and do not cover non-emergency care outside of Massachusetts.

Colorado’s exchange board would likely adopt similar rules. For example, while SB11-200 prohibits private insurers like Humana from having representatives on the exchange board, it does not apply similar prohibitions to representatives from health plans like Denver Health or Kaiser-Permanente.

ObamaCare is President Obama’s problem. Establishing an exchange would make it Colorado’s problem by imposing Obamacare’s impossible regulations on Coloradans’ health choices.

Tune into the Independence Institute’s pubic affairs television show Devil’s Advocate tonight as host Jon Caldara is joined by Durango Herald statehouse reporter Joe Hanel and Complete Colorado’s Todd Shepherd for a check up on the Colorado legislative session. If you are a Colorado politics junkie, get your fix at 8:30 PM on Colorado Public Television 12. Re-broadcast Monday at 1:30 PM.

In the aftermath of Arizona Representative Gabrielle Giffords shooting came the predictable attacks on political speech. Many were contending that it was “violent” political discourse that was a root cause of inciting actual political violence. Now this may be true (though I doubt it), but it also served a political interest to attack emotionally charged political discourse. You see, the Arizona Representative that was shot was a Democrat, making her largely opposed by the tea party movement. Thankfully she has since come around and seems to be making a full recovery. At the time however, her recovery was in doubt. What you heard on blogs, radio and TV stations, newspapers, and from talking heads across the country was that “right-wing rhetoric” probably killed Rep. Giffords. As grotesque as it might have been, using the Giffords shooting was the platform the Left needed to attack the tea party and conservative ideology. For weeks they raged against violent euphemisms and analogies in politics. (Don’t use words like “war” “bombs” “taking shelter” “battle” or “fallout” as political metaphors). They demanded civility in political discourse. And who could blame them? Don’t we all want to disagree with each other civilly?

And just as predictable as the outrage over “violent” political speech was following the Giffords shooting, so is the deafening silence following violent death threats made against our sister think tank in Michigan, the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. The difference here being that the death and bomb threats made against Mackinac can in no way be construed as “speech.” There is no violent euphemism or analogy here. There are no signs depicting Hitler nor rallies with off-color chanting. What we have in the Mackinac case is pure, unadulterated threats on people’s lives. For example,

In one of the calls to the Mackinac Center, the caller said, “Scotty Walker is dead. So are you. We know where you live.” She then recited the center’s address and said, “We are coming to destroy you.” In another call, the caller said, “You are the first place to be bombed.”

What would cause someone to make such threats against a public policy think tank? Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. Yes, you read that right – asking public officials for public information. So I’m left to wonder… where is the Left now? Where are the groups blasting violent speech and exalting civility in politics? It’s difficult to imagine they haven’t heard about this story yet. Someone ought to have gotten the word out by now right? Isn’t there some giant red button the Left presses when people are acting uncivilly? We’d love to hear someone, anyone condemn these threats. Although we’re not holding our breath. Why? Because the tea party seems to be uninvolved at this point.

The inside the beltway political magazine Campaigns and Elections decided to honor the top Colorado Influencers in their recent issue. And what do you know, they chose both our successful investigative journalist Todd Shepherd and yours truly. Unfortunately, I cannot get my hands on an electronic copy of the issue, but I do have the physical copy sitting right here in front of me. (Scratch that. I was given the PDF link from a friend on Facebook. Check out the article here).

About Todd Shepherd, they said, “Award-winning reporter who moved to the Independence Institute, where he ferrets out government fraud and waste. Has created Complete Colorado, a state-level version of the Drudge Report that has become a daily must-read for anyone interested in politics.” I agree completely. I use Complete Colorado as show prep for my nightly radio show on 850 KOA.

About me they said, “Runs libertarian think tank, the Independence Institute. The state’s best Republican message-maker hands down, hosting his own talk-radio program and television show. Often rubs establishment Republicans the wrong way as they chafe at his honest assessment of the political scene. Case in point, his favorite political axiom is: “If Republicans can f— things up, they will.” Again, I have to agree. They nailed it.

Using the Constitution’s system of a “convention to propose amendments” is likely the only way we’ll ever get a balanced budget amendment, a federal single-subject rule, or other reforms Congress won’t pass. Opponents of the process, however, try to convince people that a convention to propose amendments is a “constitutional convention” (which it is not) and that it could “run away” (which it almost certainly can’t).

Recently I traveled to Indianapolis to testify before the Indiana legislature. While there, I learned that opponents of an amendments convention are circulating questions about a convention, apparently designed to “stump” proponents.

Frankly, when I read what are supposed to be tough questions, I laughed out loud. All the questions are answered easily if you know the history and law applicable to such a convention.

The author of the questions obviously didn’t. He introduced them with this statement: “No convention has been held since 1787, and after two hundred years that experience has little relevance.”

The statement is ridiculous. Americans have held hundreds, perhaps thousands, of conventions since 1787. They also have amended the Constitution 27 times, and state legislatures have submitted hundreds of applications for an Article V conventions. This and related experience is a valuable source of precedent. And the legal disputes that arose out of this activity comprise a valuable source of decided case law.

But if what the author meant is that no interstate convention has been held since 1787, then the statement is still ridiculous because the Founding Generation’s copious experience with both interstate and intrastate conventions has tremendous constitutional and practical relevance. This is because the language and powers bestowed by Article V carry meanings and incidental powers fixed by Founding-Era custom and law, particularly the law of agency.

[By the way, that is not the sheet's only inaccuracy---another is the old myth that the 1787 convention was a runaway.]

Anyway, here are the 11 questions the author poses, with answers to each. For further information, see my writings, linked on this website. You can supplement them with the leading book on Article V conventions, Russell Caplan’s Constitutional Brinkmanship (Oxford University Press, 1988). Some of the book’s conclusions and language have been superseded, but it remains a valuable antidote to claimed uncertainty.

1. How is the validity of applications from the states to be determined?
A. Initially by Congress, although congressional decisions are subject to judicial review.

2. How specific must the state legislatures be in asking for amendment?
A. The legislatures may apply either for an unrestricted convention or one devoted to particular subject matter. There is no rule as to specificity, other than that the legislatures may not dictate specific wording to the convention.

3. Must all the applications be in identical language?
A. No. It is enough if they identify the same problem(s) or subject-matter(s). However, prudence suggests that state legislatures coordinate with one another.

4. Within what time period must the required number of applications be received?
A. Since adoption of the 27th amendment, it is clear that there is no time period. Because, however, some are still claiming that applications can go “stale,” prudence suggests that a campaign be completed within a decade or so. (The application campaign for direct election of senators took 14 years.

5. Can Congress refuse to call a convention on demand of two-thirds of the states, and if it does, can it be compelled to act by the courts?
A. No, Congress may not refuse, and the courts can compel it to act.

6. Who are the delegates, and how are they to be chosen?
A. Delegates are representatives of their respective state legislatures, and are chosen as state law directs.

7. Can the convention act by a simple majority vote, or would a two-thirds majority be required, as in Congress, for proposing an amendment?
A. The convention acts by a simple majority of the represented states. The convention may, by a simple majority of the represented states, alter that voting rule.

8. How is a convention to be financed, and where does it meet?
A. A convention for proposing amendments is a conclave of state delegates. It therefore is financed by the states. Congress, in the convention call, specifies the initial meeting place. The convention may alter that meeting place.

9. May the convention propose more than one amendment?
A. Yes—but only if they are all within the agenda of the convention, as prescribed by the applying states.

10. Is there a time limit on the proceedings, or can the convention act as a continuing body?
A. There is no fixed time limit—the convention can meet until it decides whether to propose amendments and which ones to propose. But a convention is, by definition, not a continuing body. It has no authority beyond proposing amendments within the subject matter prescribed in the applications, and once that is performed, it must adjourn. Additionally, states may recall and/or replace their delegates at any time.

11. Can controversies between Congress and the convention over its powers be decided by the courts?
A. Controversies over the scope of the convention’s powers may be decided by the courts. However, the states, not Congress, fix the scope of such powers. The most likely area of controversy between Congress and the convention would be if the convention suggests an amendment that Congress believes is outside the convention’s agenda as fixed in the state applications. If (as is proper) Congress then refused to prescribe a “Mode of Ratification” for the suggested amendment, the courts could resolve the dispute.

Colorado Public Radio this morning aired a story on craft distilleries popping up around Colorado.  What really stands out is the astonishing number of bureaucratic hoops these risk-taking entrepreneurs have to jump through.  As CPR’s Megan Verlee reports, owners of a craft vodka distillery in Greeley, Colorado “spent two years filing applications before they ever tasted their first batch of vodka.”

Two years worth of appeasing government bureaucracy to launch a small start-up?  It gets worse, as Verlee continues:

Distilling without a federal permit is a felony.  Remember moonshine?  They’ve been keeping count of all the various federal, state and local agencies they’ve had to register with; to date, thirteen.

Give a listen here.  An interesting and inspiring story of the American entrepreneurial spirit mixed with a maddening example of the contemporary over-regulated, free-market stifling American nanny-state.

A story in today’s Denver Post illustrates the waste in many, if not most, of government’s so-called “economic development” handouts.

In 2008, the City of Aurora, Colorado gave a theater company a $250,000, fully-forgivable urban-renewal loan. The company promised to bring 12,000 people a year into what the city, in its planning wisdom, had decreed would be an arts district. The company further promised to offer public performances at least 40 weekends a year for seven years. Naturally, the theater company also rented space – probably too much space or at least at too much rent, because the tab was $7500 a month in the East Colfax Avenue district.

Fast forward to now: The company hasn’t paid its rent since April, 2009. The landlord cut the rent in half, but the company didn’t pay that either. It also hasn’t paid the actors or the royalties for the plays it has produced – not that it has produced so many: The Post tells us that this year the company put on fewer than half of the plays promised.

The tragedy here is not merely that the company is folding. There is much more to it than that. Because people tend to be more careful with their own money than with other people’s money, if the $250,000 had been left with its real owners in the private sector, chances are it would have been used in more productive ways. Instead, the true owners of the money have lost $250,000 and the opportunities it would have brought. The actors, landlord, and others have largely wasted their time and funds on a failed enterprise, when they might otherwise have won more success for themselves and those they serve. And there has been a very human, non-financial toll as well – as readers of the story can see.

And what about all those politicians who show up for “economic development” ribbon-cutting ceremonies? They almost always are curiously absent when the subsidized enterprises go belly-up.