The tax man recently came knocking at state treasurer Mike Coffman’s door after the Republican businessman failed to pay the quarterly withholding taxes for his company, Colorado Property Management Group Inc. Embarrassed by the snafu, Coffman says he hadn’t been keeping abreast of the day-to-day business — which he used…
Storme Aerison walks to the front of the courtroom and selects an aisle seat. Gone is the heavy mascara, the lipstick and the thick layers of blush. Gone are the poses, the pouts and the sultry glances of Aerison’s Internet persona — Shannon Ireland, cover girl. On this afternoon, Aerison…
African-Americans account for just a 5.1 percent slice of the Denver radio audience, according to figures used by the Arbitron ratings service — and while this demographic is far from the only group whose members listen to hip-hop or rhythm and blues, its traditional loyalty to the music suggests that…
Itching for a fight? Put a pipefitter from the Bronx and a cabbie from San Francisco on adjacent bar stools and ask which team will win the World Series. Or get a couple of lifelong Broncos fans going about where the worm must turn this season — in Brian’s brain,…
Redneck Letter Day Out of left field: Just read Michael Roberts’s August 17 column on David Barsamian, “Leftoverture.” In honor of Jeff Foxworthy, I have compiled twenty-something reasons you might be a left-wing redneck: 1) You have a poster of Noam Chomsky above your bed. 2) You pay attention to…
Cody Wille stands flat-footed outside the back door of Clark’s Market in Aspen. He fumbles with his mask, trying to get the eyeholes right with one hand while clutching a BB gun in the other. The gun is a surprise. His friend Moses Greengrass handed it to him moments before…
When Gilpin County resident Laura Kriho was called for jury duty back in May 1996, she didn’t want to go. She planned to call the courthouse to get out of it, until she spotted a notice on the back of the jury summons warning that a failure to appear could…
Justin Erik DeBusk, wearing tan prison garb and handcuffs behind his back, was sentenced to eighteen months in a federal prison on July 10 for his involvement with one of the country’s most elusive drug dealers, Robert Golding (“Vanishing Point,” July 6). As DeBusk, who is 26, was escorted into…
They could be separated at birth (and by a few decades) — self-made men who share a hatred of the media and a love of guitars, animals (one shoots them with cameras, one with guns), the military, their fathers, America, Charlton Heston, and writing about themselves in endless detail. In…
You’d think any radio show capable of attracting fans from avant-garde musical acts such as the Olivia Tremor Control, Built to Spill, Friends of Dean Martinez, Negativland and Pere Ubu would have to be mighty hip, right? And yet Alternative Radio, the Boulder-based program intended to profit from Keep Left,…
In the nine and a half decades since Teddy Roosevelt was president and the Ford Model T was introduced, only two American men — both of whom, as it happens, live in Boulder — have won gold medals in international marathon competition. Most people, non-runners included, could peg the first…
The Hating Game Time marches on: How timely that you printed Julie Jargon’s “P.S.: I Hate You” in the August 10 issue, at the same time that Senator Joseph Lieberman was chosen by Al Gore and/or his “strategists.” Salzman’s plight sounds exhausting and quite burdensome, but I credit her courage…
Westword’s What United Did to My Summer Vacation contest has been a resounding success. Well, not for United Airlines customers, of course. No, things just keep getting worse for them. A recent example? Nearly 200 United flights out of Denver International Airport were canceled between this past Friday and Sunday,…
The July issue of Arvada’s municipal newsletter makes the city sound like the biggest supporter of open space in the metro area. “Open Space Preservation Continues: Mountain Backdrop, Trail Corridors Top Priority,” says the headline on the cover of The Arvada Report. Inside, an article enthuses about Arvada’s commitment to…
Mendel and Mindle Glouberman were born and raised in the tiny Polish town of Stolin. There was never any question that after they married they would settle there, and they expected the same from their five children and their children’s children. When some of their children decided to leave, during…
Anyone who knows Rita Montero and Joseph C’de Baca knows they’re persistent. Some might describe them in less diplomatic terms: arrogant, in-your-face, sharp-tongued, downright troublesome. Whatever their adversaries’ adjective of choice, it would be hard to argue that Montero and C’de Baca are driven by anything but a passion for…
“Books on subjects related to the professional hit man are hard to find. But there are a few publishers out there who have the backbone to provide those of us who take life seriously with the necessary educational materials.” — from Hit Man: A Technical Manual for Independent Contractors. Paladin…
Paul Fox hits the brakes, and his pickup swerves onto the shoulder of 62nd Avenue, in the industrial fringe of Adams County. A dump truck roars by, shaking the ground as it passes, but Fox doesn’t notice. He’s pointing out the window toward a huge mound of dirt, weeds and…
When new Nuggets owner Stan Kroenke held Dan Issel’s big feet to the fire last week, any casual observer of Denver’s beleaguered NBA franchise had to wonder: What is Issel to do? Wave a wand and transform his motley collection of slew-footed children and graying journeymen into the Los Angeles…
Chile Today, Hot Tomorrow Greener pastures: Mmm…I can taste a special “with” and feel the sweat prickling on my forehead after just a few bites. Thank you for getting Chubbys “right” in “The Heat Is On,” Harrison Fletcher’s August 3 column. I’ve been going there for over twenty years, and…
The sun isn’t up yet, and already Ernie Cordova is sweating. He’s hunched over the grill at the Chubby Burger Drive-In, getting ready for the morning rush. A mound of hamburger sizzles to his left. A mound of scrambled eggs and chorizo sizzles to his right. Bubbling in an aluminum…
In the computer-generated photographs of Rocky Flats in the year 2006, the squat, proletarian buildings where plutonium was once shaped into deadly pits have been airbrushed away. The artist was wise to get rid of them: Those vast, concrete edifices were an anachronism, a Cold War artifact from a loony,…
