Dear Mexican: My beloved niece married a boy of Mexican extraction. I am very fond of him, but he and his family hold us at arm’s length. It’s very difficult to get close and has made me back off. My niece has told me that his mother “doesn’t like white…
In January, Frank Ruybalid, the embattled top prosecutor for Colorado’s Third Judicial District, resolved a long-running state ethics investigation by pleading guilty to thirteen violations of professional conduct rules for attorneys, essentially admitting that he’d mishandled the prosecution of several criminal cases that ended up being dismissed. Ruybalid was put…
When Dennis Gallagher steps down as city auditor in nine weeks, at the end of his third and final term, his departure will mark the end of one of the most impressive — and long-lived — careers in elected office in state history. Gallagher was an obscure thirty-year-old speech professor…
Air hostess Léopoldine Doualla-Bell Smith had endured her share of discourteous treatment from passengers while flying the not-always-friendly skies of the late ‘50s and ‘60s, but everyone has a breaking point. She reached hers one day in the early ‘60s. While she was helping a passenger settle in at his seat, the man decided…
Bill Cadman is mad as shmuck. The state senate leader is mighty steamed. Not because the legislative session that ended with a thud this week was one of the most impotent and gridlocked in recent memory, or because a host of bills dealing with pressing issues such as affordable housing,…
Dear Mexican: I work with mostly young, progressive, educated white folks at an institution of higher education in Southern California. The other day, I mentioned buying a shirt that reads “Illegal immigration started in 1492.” We had a good laugh, and my co-worker, whom I like a lot, said that…
During this past legislative session, legislators found themselves in all kinds of contorted positions as they considered a proposal to deregulate yoga instructors — a proposal that would impact bhavan-collective, the yoga studio that Tonia Crosby had opened in the Cole neighborhood last July. The Division of Private Occupational Schools…
Ye Denver Mayor: Denver auditor: Denver clerk and recorder: Denver City councilmembers at large: Denver City Council, District 1: Denver City Council, District 2: Denver City Council, District 3: Denver City Council, District 4: Denver City Council, District 5: Denver City Council, District 6: Denver City Council, District 7: Denver…
As promised, Colorado Senate President Bill Cadman has introduced a bill inspired by the womb-cutting attack on Michelle Wilkins in Longmont and the decision not to file a murder charge against Dynel Lane, her alleged attacker, even though Wilkins’s child, who she named Aurora, didn’t survive. Senate Bill 15-268 has…
Dear Mexican: Why do Mexicans make up such obvious lies? Like this galán who had his sister call me and say it was him with a cold. Or my friend who pretends to be traveling the world but is really sending e-mails from his mother’s computer. Or the random person…
If Colorado schools won’t to retain offensive Native American mascots, it could cost them $25,000 per month under a new bill passed last night by the Colorado House of Representatives’ education committee. House Bill 15-11165 is sponsored by Representative Joe Salazar, a Thornton Democrat. We’ve included the entire document below,…
Dear Mexican: Why do Mexican men have thicker hair than Caucasian men? Is it because it runs in the genes? (I am only asking about hair on the head, not body hair.) Frankie Dear Gabacho: It’s always about the genes for Mexicans, whether it’s our love for tortillas and tamales…
In the wake of controversial comments by Representative Gordon Klingenschmitt that appeared to politicize the womb-cutting attack on Michelle Wilkins in Longmont, at least one group, ProgressNow Colorado, called for him to resign. The organization is getting something close to its wish in one way, but definitely not when it…
Dear Mexican: Do Mexicans know that if one of their grandparents was born in Spain, they can immigrate immediately not just to Spain, but also to any other country in the European Union? I know this is not an option for a lot of Mexicans, but it certainly seems like…
Scouts for Equality, a national nonprofit dedicated to overturning decades-long prohibitions against homosexuals in the Boy Scouts of America, will hold its national spring gathering in Estes Park this coming week, when members will discuss their agenda for continuing the fight in 2015 and beyond. The BSA lifted its ban…
In December 2013, Araphaoe High School student Claire Davis died days after she was shot by another student, Karl Pierson. Davis’s name isn’t mentioned in Senate Bill 15-213, a measure expected to be heard by a Colorado state Senate committee today. However, she was the inspiration behind the legislation, which would…
Dear Mexican: I’m a 23-year-old Latina attending a Texas university. I’m taking a class centered around Latino culture and history. I’m a first-generation Tex-Mex kid, and lately all of the coursework has been making me feel angry/sad/confused, for lack of better phrasing. I don’t know how to handle these feelings,…
On the same day that President Barack Obama issued a public statement calling for an end to gay conversion therapy — the widely debunked approach to psychologically stripping people of their homosexual tendencies — a bill to ban the practice in Colorado for those under age eighteen died in a state Senate…
Homeless advocates across Colorado hope to combat local laws banning individuals from sitting on sidewalks and sleeping on the street with a proposal scheduled to be heard in the House Veterans and Military Affairs Committee on April 15. If approved by legislators and signed by the governor, they say, the…
Last week, we posted a Denver human waste map that’s being used as part of a push to fund more public restrooms in central Denver. And while such facilities wouldn’t only be used by members of the homeless community, members of Denver Homeless Out Loud contends that such facilities would be greatly beneficial…
This week, Mayor Michael Hancock prohibited the use of city funds for “non-essential” travel to Indiana, citing the recent religious-objections law passed in that state. Not only did that announcement raise the question of why, exactly, city officials would ever think of using Denver funds for “non-essential travel” anywhere, but…
Lakewood baker Jack Phillips is appealing a May 2014 ruling that he cannot discriminate against same-sex couples seeking wedding cakes. The Colorado Civil Rights Commission ruled that Phillips, who owns Masterpiece Cakeshop, had violated Colorado’s anti-discrimination law when he declined to make a cake for same-sex couple Charlie Craig and…
