Author: Tom Cronin

Tom Cronin and Bob Loevy “Fight blight!” That was the heartfelt slogan of better housing advocates in the late 1950s and 1960s. At that time, big cities in the eastern and midwestern United States were “blighted” with tenements and rowhouses that were packed with people, poorly maintained, and overflowing with social ills. Too many people…

Tom Cronin and Bob Loevy If you live in a freestanding home on a nice-sized lot in Colorado, chances are good that you have single-family zoning. That means only one family lives in your house, and only one family lives in every other house in your single-family zone. If you do have single-family zoning, the…

Tom Cronin One of the reasons we fought the American Revolution was to establish our own representative institutions to allow us to govern ourselves. The invention and design of the U.S. Congress was a historic achievement. Yet our aspirational U.S. Congress has always exceeded the regular workings of our actual Congress. Why do we have…

Tom Cronin and Bob Loevy The Republicans are the minority party in both houses of the Colorado state legislature. In the state Senate, there are 26 Democrats to nine Republicans. In the State House of Representatives, the count is 46 Democrats to 19 Republicans. Despite their minority status, Republican legislators have important roles to play.…

Tom Cronin and Bob Loevy Gerrymandering is the political crafting of safe election districts for one’s own political party and crafting less safe, or competitive, election districts for your partisan opponents. It is among the oldest dirty tricks in American politics, and perhaps the only legalized form of vote stealing left in the United States.…

Tom Cronin and Bob Loevy The top leadership in the Colorado state House of Representatives is a matriarchy. The top three positions – speaker, majority leader and assistant majority leader – are all held by women. The situation is reversed in the Colorado state Senate. There it is a patriarchy. The top three positions – president of the…

Tom Cronin and Bob Loevy The November 2022 state legislative elections in Colorado were swept by the Democrats. The lower house of the state legislature – the state House of Representatives – is now in session at the state capitol in Denver. There are 46 Democrats and 19 Republicans. The Colorado state legislature is organized on a…

Tom Cronin and Bob Loevy One of the blessings, as well as the curses, of constitutional democracy is we keep on having to hold campaigns and elections. The 2022 midterm elections are over. City elections in many communities will take place this April. And, ready or not, the 2024 presidential election is soon to enter…

Tom Cronin and Bob Loevy Critics have faulted the early Iowa presidential caucuses and the New Hampshire presidential primary as unrepresentative of our diverse nation. It so happens that President Joe Biden regularly came in fourth or fifth in those states when he ran for the Democratic nomination for U.S. president. Biden and his Democratic…

Tom Cronin and Bob Loevy Special gratitude: To all the teachers and nurses for their indispensable nurturing and caring for all of us of all ages. To all the military service members stationed throughout Colorado who stand ready to defend our nation. To all those who ran for public office this past year, whether they…