Elizabeth Schools Is Fighting For Kids
And protecting a process that works for the community when it comes to books
ELIZABETH SCHOOLS WANTS TO KEEP SOME BOOKS OUT OF LIBRARIES And we’re not talking ALL libraries, we’re talking school libraries. After creating a process that involved pretty much anyone who wanted to be involved, they removed books with content they deemed to be inappropriate for kids. Of course the ACLU sued them. Why did they remove the books? The content was too mature and contains content such as racism, discrimination, LGBTQ+ content, sexual themes, profanity, graphic violence, and self-harm.
The removed titles included:
The Bluest Eye and Beloved by Toni Morrison
The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
You Should See Me in a Crown by Leah Johnson
#Pride: Championing LGBTQ Rights by Rebecca Felix
Melissa (formerly George) by Alex Gino
Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher
It’s Your World—If You Don’t Like It, Change It by Mikki Halpin
The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
Looking for Alaska by John Green
Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult
Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson
Crank, Glass, Fallout, Identical, Burned, and Smoke by Ellen Hopkins
We’ll find out from Superintendent Dan Snowberger where the case stands now and if you want to help, we’ve got a way to donate. He joins me at 1 to talk about it.
IT’S AN ASK ME ANYTHING KIND OF DAY And I’m counting on you guys to bring your Q game.
NO, DEAN SINGLETON DID NOT ENDORSE TRICKY VIC Dean Singleton is a lion in Colorado politics and media. The former owner of the Denver Post, he has long been the guy you want on your side if you’re running for office. As evidenced by this post by Tricky Vic. In this Facebook video, which I can’t embed here, he implies that Dean has endorsed him. Dean has most certainly NOT endorsed him and is spitting mad at this. You can hear Dean Singleton on with Peter Boyles tomorrow morning on his KNUS show at 9:30. Tricky Vic is a liar. Again.
A TALE OF TWO DATA CENTER POLICIES WILL UNFOLD Much like our different approaches in the metro on homelessness will allow us to see in real time whose policies are the best (Aurora, fyi), we now get to compare data center policies in real time. Denver just passed a one year moratorium, while Colorado Springs already has one in the pipeline. Read this:
It turns out the center, slated to open in a decades-old, former Intel chip plant, will use at most half the electricity the site originally was rated to draw. It also will pay a large-load tariff to Colorado Springs Utilities, a separate assessment ensuring other ratepayers won’t be affected. Its use of water, needed to cool extensive IT infrastructure, is limited by a closed-loop system that stops evaporation. Fill it once, and it’s done, and it’s the industry trend. Noise? Only 49dBA. As far as transparency, the project’s developers have convened concerned citizens in community meetings to sound out sentiments and answer questions.
I said yesterday that data centers have become the new bogeyman for people scared AI is going to take their jobs, or use all the water or drive up their power bills. I’m telling you, all those things can be mitigated pretty well, as evidenced above. Though I can’t say any rules and regulations will do away with the fear that AI will take your job.
JARED POLIS MADE ME LAUGH TODAY And I mean that in the good way. At a press conference promoting his Healthy Colorado initiative he was asked about commuting Tina Peters sentence and this ensued.
He seems unbothered to me. It just made me laugh. He also brushed off the censure by saying it freed up his schedule for other things he’d like to do.
BUT HE’S WRONG ABOUT COLORADO’S BUSINESS CLIMATE And I believe he’s smart enough to know he’s wrong here. At a recent business meeting leaders told him that Colorado is losing its edge and that it’s hard to do business here. Polis said uh-huh. Mmkay.
IF TRUMP DOES THIS, HE’S THE BEST PRESIDENT EVER Okay, I will still take issue with the stuff I find horrible, but this would be amazing. Will Congress do its job? Probably not.
You guys know how I feel about the time change.
TRUMP IRS DEAL IS “AN UNPRECEDENTED REMEDY” And I believe completely corrupt. Not only did they wipe away an investigation into whether he abused the tax code by shifting ownership of a building to new owners to take more depreciation to shave $100 million off his tax bill, the new slush fund for people who were wrongly targeted by the Biden DOJ could have very unintended consequences. Do you want to see James Comey get a big payout if the ongoing persecution of him by the DOJ fails? I don’t. This fund should have been set up by Congress, with rules about who gets it, if we’re going to have it at all. This is the kind of stuff that will haunt the Trump Presidency long after he’s gone and show the GOP has ZERO long term thinking on this issue. A bipartisan bill in the House has already been introduced to slap some guardrails around the slush fund. Good. Senator Thom Tillis called the fund “stupid on stilts” so expect there to be significant pushback from Congress on this one.
MY REALLY DUMB CHOICES DON’T COST $50 MILLION BUCKS But that’s what the purchase and remodel of Casa Bonita cost the creators of South Park, Colorado natives Trey Stone and Matt Parker. What has your biggest dumb choice cost you?
THE ACLU LOSES AGAINST BOULDER’S CAMPING BAN And I fully expect any of these cases that are left will fail as well. The Supreme Court’s ruling that a city can ban camping without providing an alternative (upending an appeals court ruling that unleashed the homeless in cities before now) will shut them all down. Good. Read more here.
COOL STUFF IN COLORADO I haven’t been to many of these but now I have a list.
DID YOU GET ENGAGED IN FRONT OF THE TAFFY SHOP IN ESTES PARK? The shop caught your engagement on video and they need to know more about you! Read the whole story here and let’s track these lovebirds down.
CORI KENNEDY HAS BEEN ALL OVER TRICKY VIC And I have the utmost respect for Cori because of her ability to look at her own actions with a dispassionate eye as she continues to seek the truth. She writes here about Vic’s “interview” with Candace Owens and you should read it. Cori has publicly asked for media to NOT platform Corby Hall, the man who says Vic tried to buy guns to traffic into Haiti, because she had a personal experience with Corby where he said he had planned how he was going to kill Vic. She is a good person who just wants the truth to out. She dissected his time with Candace in great detail here.
BEEF PRICES ARE INSANE RIGHT NOW And it’s a combination of drought, high feed prices and other pressures that have beef cattle stock at very low levels. That’s driving prices up dramatically. Read more here.
NASCAR STAR KYLE BUSCH IS DEAD AT 41 After a mystery illness that took him to the hospital where he died shortly thereafter. He has a wife and two little kids. Never take your life for granted, people.
THE RICH PAY MORE THAN THEIR FAIR SHARE IN COLORADO As progressives who hate success are busy trying to get another ballot initiative to jack up income tax rates on successful people, we have a look at how much they already pay. It’s a LOT. Like a WHOLE BUNCH.
People earning an adjusted gross income of between $20,000 and $100,000 a year account for about 50% of tax returns, but only about 20% of all tax revenues. On the upper end, those earning $400,000 per year and up account for about 3% of all tax returns, but contribute a startling 34% of tax revenue.
That seems to me that they are paying quite enough.
SHOULD YOU SHOWER? A FLOW CHART
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AI ISN’T READY FOR PRIME TIME ALL THE TIME YET A community college in Arizona decided to use AI to read the names at Graduation and it just SKIPPED a whole bunch of names who didn’t get their names read at graduation because of it. This is how that went.
I’m sure it’s no big deal for the graduates. They get to do this all the time, amiright?
CLASSROOM PHONE BAN HAS WILD EFFECT ON STUDENTS After New York Governor Hochul issues bell-to-bell phone ban in New York schools, something wild is happening this year. From the NYPost:
“Kids actually talk to each other in school. They sit in the hallway, they engage, they laugh, they study. They play games,” she said.
“I actually saw a card game in the hall recently, which was jaw dropping. I’ve been working in schools now for 12 years, and I have never seen that.”
But I’m sure we don’t need this in Colorado because making parents feel safe is more important than letting kids be kids. I’m sure.
WHY TRUSTING THE EXPERTS IS A DUMB IDEA Because they often get stuff spectacularly wrong. My friend David Strom writes about it here.
THIS ROBOT ISN’T QUITE READY TO STAR IN MJ
CHARLIE BLACKMON IS IN THE HALL OF PRETTY GOOD And I had no idea such a hall existed but he surely deserves it.
LITERALLY ANYONE CAN PLAY PICKLEBALL
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ARE BOOZE AND TACO BELL A GOOD IDEA BEFORE A FLIGHT? Maybe for you, but definitely not for your neighbors.
AROD SAW THE MANDALORIAN AND GROGU
THE COLLEGE KIDS DON’T LOVE AI And they keep booing speakers who talk about it.
GUYS, YOU CAN PACK YOUR OWN LUNCH The notion that this is something kids today have to deal with uniquely is just dumb. Lunch out was expensive compared to wages when I was young too. I packed my lunch. It’s not hard.
Joel Berry from the Babylon Bee shared this a few days ago and it goes hand in hand. Too many young people want to LOOK rich instead of actually BE rich.
The South Park boys got over their skis on Casa Bonita, with that huge Comedy Central contract they got last year, they'll be ok I'm suure