Author: Hal Bidlack

Hal Bidlack Back in 1904, when my grandmother was six years old – so not that long ago – a fairly liberal fellow named Robert LaFollette was governor of Wisconsin. He was tired of the back-room deals that selected candidates for office, the famous “smoke-filled rooms” that dominated a long period of our political history. LaFollette…

Hal Bidlack Back in 2008, when I made my own run for Congress, I ran in Congressional District 5, because that is where I live, in Colorado Springs. The district was a different shape back then, as it was redrawn after 2020 (as happens after every census) to include basically only El Paso County, whereas…

Hal Bidlack A very thought-provoking Colorado Politics story notes with our national congressional embarrassment (do I really need to say her name? OK, fine: Lauren Boebert) carpetbagging off to CD4, she leaves CD3 as now more likely to elect a Republican than it was before. According to the Cook Report, the district goes from toss-up…

Hal Bidlack As I type these words, the temperature outside my Colorado Springs home is -7 degrees Fahrenheit, but the political temperature inside the Colorado Republican party appears to be really heating up. There is so much to discuss! I’m tempted to write about Eric Sondermann’s very insightful look at the three GOP seats in…

Hal Bidlack As any semi-regular reader of my column already knows, because I’m constantly talking about it, I ran for the U.S. House of Representatives back in 2008. I’ve mentioned how remarkable those roughly nine months or so was in my life, as well as how I actually won that election against Doug Lamborn – in…

Hal Bidlack Last Friday was an eventful day in Colorado politics, as reported in Colorado Politics. It seems the current member of the U.S. House for Colorado District 5, Doug Lamborn, has decided that 18 years in the House is enough, and he has announced he will not seek reelection this autumn. As my regular…

Hal Bidlack As I sit down to write my column, I’m overwhelmed, yet again, by the news of a school shooting, this time in the tiny town of Perry, Iowa. I know that town a little bit, in that when I was a kid, I spent my summers on my grandparent’s farm outside the western…

Hal Bidlack Well, as I’m sure you have been talking about, Colorado’s national embarrassment, U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert, has decided she can’t win in her own district anymore. So she is going to pull up stakes in Colorado’s Third Congressional District, and will, at some point this year, move to CD-4, effectively abandoning the people…

Hal Bidlack Well, here it is, the day after Christmas and I’m guessing in your house there is still that trash bag full of wadded up wrapping paper no one took to the garbage can yet. And there’s the remains of a turkey or ham or other main course in the fridge, where it will…

Hal Bidlack My regular reader (Hi, Jeff!) and others will recall from earlier columns I am an amateur astronomer, with a couple of nice telescopes and a deep love of the night sky. Heck, I even had an astronomy show on my local NPR station for five years. And so it is not a surprise…