One of the truisms in journalism, allegedly, is that, if it bleeds, it leads. Bad news, graphic stories and human suffering often seems to get the biggest font size in newspapers or on news websites.

And on this Thursday morning, as I was pondering what I should write about, I admit I was ready to again express my indignity or even outrage at the types of stories dominating the news and the implications of those stories for our society.

Plus, I got my second COVID booster yesterday (huzzah for science!) and as I type these words, I’m running a slight fever and am feeling overall a tad achy and grumpy (Ed: this might be TMI). So, I thought I should be a curmudgeon (which, by the way, I spelled correctly on the first try!), but ultimately decided not to be one…

I had thought I’d try to sneak in a few national items about what a great job Joe Biden is actually doing, given that all you hear about are gas prices and inflation, both beyond his ability to control. I thought I’d mention things like unemployment declining at the fastest rate ever, to 3.6%, that under Biden the economy has added 7.9 million jobs, the greatest ever in one year, that our GDP is growing at 5.7%, double the fastest year in the last fifty, or that wages are up 5.6% and the deficit went down $1.3 trillion under good old Joe. But since that is not really a Colorado story, I’m going to move on (Ed: good!).

One of the reasons you should read Colorado Politics every day (especially on Tuesdays and Fridays, for some reason, in the op-ed section) is because of the quality of reporting across wide areas of interest, in terms of subject and geography. And so, I thought I would draw your attention to a couple of CP stories wherein we see good government functioning well, with good people running the show.

I’ve touted the record of the Democratic-led legislature and our terrific governor before, and a recent CP story gives us yet another example of how we in Colorado are now national leaders in many areas. It seems the governor has just signed into law a bill that will exempt nonprofit daycare centers from property taxes in Colorado. The cost of childcare is just nuts, with the average Colorado couple with two youngsters paying $28,000 per year on childcare, roughly 14% of their entire income. Hopefully, the landlords getting this break will pass the savings along. We’ll have to see how well that is working, but fingers crossed, it will help many thousands of Colorado families. This story didn’t make the evening news, nor did you likely see it on your social media feeds, but both Dems and the GOPers (mostly) got together and agreed on this bill, which is now law.

A second CP story talked about yet another example of Colorado leading the nation. Gov. Jared Polis (who is doing terrific, did I say that already?) just signed a bill that might seem very minor and unimportant to most folks, but will actually have a potentially profound impact on kids who were born via the use of egg and/or sperm donations. Colorado is now the very first state in the US to remove anonymous sperm and egg donation.

Though I’m sure an anonymous donation policy was well intended, the ability to hide the donor’s identities also meant that the kids born from such donations were unable to learn about their own genetic background and other important factors that might impact their medical futures. With anonymous donations, mass donations by relatively few men could (and sometimes did) dominate a local area, and that is not great from a medical point of view. For example, the article notes that back in 2014, more than 50 people learned they were all half-siblings, as a fertility doctor had donated over and over again, dominating the gene pool of that fertility center.  Had two of that number fallen in love and had kids, the genetic dangers to the offspring could have been significant.

With this new law in Colorado, once they turn 18, people who were either half or entirely created from donations will be able to learn their own genetic history, giving them critical information about what medical issues or challenges they might face in the future. As one GOP sponsor of the bill put it, “the era of anonymity is over. Through technology, no one can donate and have 100 offspring or more and somehow hide behind this veil that they will forever be unknown – this will pave the way for other states. They will eventually call this the Colorado model.”

Neither of these new laws is likely to impact you, gentle reader, a great deal, unless you have little kids or have a vested interest in fertility issues, but both are a great example of what can get done when the two parties work together.

Colorado is a leader in many areas of policy, and though sometimes being first means we make a mistake or two, in general I’m very happy that we have a legislature that can and does work together behind the scenes during the legislative session, and I’m very happy we have Polis running things from Denver.

Small steps of actual progress are more important than partisan blather and appealing to the outraged senses of the public. We are fortunate to live in a state with such leadership.

Oh, and keep reading CP for all those stories you might miss if you only listen to the shouting.