October 6, 2026 • 31 mins
Colorado's recent ranking as the fifth most dangerous state in the U.S. for personal safety and residential safety might have you wondering what's going on in the Centennial State. But today's episode is about something else entirely - Amendment 87, a proposed tax measure that's got everyone talking. The speaker dives into the details of this amendment, highlighting some surprising facts and figures that might just change your mind about what's at stake.
This episode is a deep dive into the numbers and the potential consequences of Amendment 87. The speaker examines the Common Sense Institute's report, which estimates that the amendment could bring in $154 billion in new taxes over the next 24 years. But where does this money come from, and what does it mean for Colorado's economy? The speaker breaks down the numbers and explores the potential impact on small businesses, individuals, and the state's overall competitiveness.
One of the key points of contention is the proposed tax on married couples, which could lead to a significant increase in taxes for many Coloradans. The speaker also discusses the potential effects on small businesses, including the tax on business profits that owners never actually receive. And what about the claim that people will leave Colorado if the top tax rate is increased? The speaker examines the data and the arguments on both sides of the issue.
If you're interested in understanding the intricacies of Amendment 87 and its potential impact on Colorado, this episode is a must-listen. The speaker provides a clear and concise breakdown of the numbers and the arguments, helping you make an informed decision about this critical issue. So grab a cup of coffee, sit back, and get ready to learn more about Amendment 87 and what it means for Colorado's future.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Wallet have just rigged Colorado, the fifth most dangerous state
in the U.S., for personal safety and residential safety. Way
to go, Dems. We're number five? We're in the top ten. Yeah,
but we're not number one. I know. Just give us time, Dragon.
Give us time. We'll get there.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
So the Common Sense Institute looked at these amendments.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
Here's how they built it.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
They took the Colorado Department of Revenue's own tax return data.
They aged it forward year by year out to 2050.
And then they taxed every return twice. Once under today's
flat tax. Then once under Amendment 87, exactly as written.
(00:49):
The difference between those two tax returns is the answer.
And they also tell you right up front... That this
model assumes that nobody moves, nobody changes how they file,
nobody restructures a business. They call their totals an upper bound,
and I appreciate that, because most advocacy shops will bury
(01:10):
that sentence. They put it in bold type. Now, their
headline is $ 154 billion in new taxes through 2050. $ 154
billion in new taxes through 2050. Now, I'll set the
number aside. It's 24 years of dollars stacked on top
of each other, and it's big because 24 years is
(01:33):
a long time. But the finding that matters the most
is where the money comes from. Now, according to CSI,
three features of how this measure was drafted eat. Each
of the three features raises billions on their own apart
(01:55):
from the higher rates themselves. Brackets that get frozen with
no adjustment for inflation, that gets you up to $ 36
billion additional dollars. A marriage penalty, about $ 27 billion. Tax
on business profits that the owner never actually received, $ 13 billion. Now,
(02:17):
they're careful to say that those overlap, and you should
not add them up, so I'm not going to add
them up either. But the bottom line is this. Much
of the money that Amendment 87 raises over the next
generation comes out of the fine print. And the fine
print is not what the ballot describes. So let's do
(02:37):
the really hard part, and let's go through the fine print.
The wedding. Start with married. The federal income tax doubles
the brackets for married couples filing jointly. Now, Congress did
that on purpose so two people don't pay more just
because they got married. Amendment 87 does not do that.
(03:00):
One schedule, single or married, the line is the same, $ 500, 000.
The Tax Foundation, a nonpartisan tax research group in D.C.,
they lean toward lower rates.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
They ran the math, too. Two people each making $ 25, 000.
You get married. You file jointly.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
They pay $ 125 more than they would as two single people. Now,
two people each making $ 500, 000. Married, they pay $ 16, 575 more.
$ 16, 575 more than they would if they were single. And
if you say find those folks can afford it, Then
(03:46):
look at the couple in the middle. Two professionals, each
earning $ 280, 000. Let's say a nurse, a anesthetist, and an engineer.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
Single.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
Each one of them gets the $ 325 tax cut. Married,
their joint return shows $ 560, 000. The last $ 60, 000 lands in
the 7.4 bracket.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
And now, compared to today.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
They pay $ 1, 475 more. Same two people, same two paychecks.
The marriage license just turned a tax cut into a
tax increase. That's the marriage. What about the shop, the
small business, the business owner? When you hear people making
(04:39):
over $ 500, 000, you picture the hedge fund guy down on
17th Street. Go look at who actually files those returns
in Colorado. According to IRS data that the Tax Foundation pulled,
Colorado had 53,640 filers with adjusted gross income over $ 500, 000.
More than 30,000 of the 53,640 of them report income
(05:12):
from a partnership.
Speaker 1 (05:14):
Or an S corporation. That's more than half.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
That's the owner of the HVAC company. That's the family
that runs three hardware stores. Those are two partners in
a dental practice. In this state, the Tax Foundation says
households over 500,000 earn more from business than they do
from wages, about 27% more. You raise the top rate
(05:39):
on them, And you're raising the rate on small business.
That's who they are. Not that hedge fund guy sitting
down on 17th Street. And there's a nasty little wrinkle
in there, too, and it's federal law. Stick with me
on this one. If you own part of an S
corporation or you're in a partnership, you're taxed on your
(06:00):
share of the profit regardless of whether you ever see
a dime of it. The business keeps the money to
buy a truck, make payroll in January, pay down the
line of credit. You still owe the tax. Colorado starts
with your federal number, so Colorado tax is due too.
If you're a minority owner, you can't make the company
(06:20):
cut you a check to cover the bill. Now, that's
true today too. The difference is that today it's taxed
at 4.4%.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
Under Amendment 87, it's taxed At up to 8.4%. Got it? Yeah.
They're going to double everything.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
Now, CSI estimates the extra tax on that kind of income,
money that stayed inside the business, about $ 211 million in
the first year alone. Tax on money you never got. Now,
think about the town that we used to be. Step
(07:04):
back and let's look at the state. The Tax Foundation
ranks every state's tax system on how competitive it is.
In 2020, we were 22nd. In 2026, we're 33rd. And
that's before Amendment 87. An 8.4% top rate would be
(07:27):
higher than every one of Colorado's seven neighbors. Now, Wyoming
has no income tax at all. Cheyenne is just under
an hour from Fort Collins. Now, let me be very specific,
because I'm about to say our economy is slipping, and
somebody's going to text me the unemployment rate.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
So here it is.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Colorado's unemployment rate in July was 3.9%, a.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
Touch, a touch below the national rate. That's fine. But remember,
we've talked about this before.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
The University of Colorado's lead school of business called last
year's job growth anemic. They had expected Colorado to add
37,000 jobs in 2025. This year-end estimate was about 12,500.
After years near the top of the country for job growth,
we're now in the middle of the pack.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
The most recent ranking I've seen puts us 24th.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
Labor force participation in this state hit its lowest point
since 2020 this summer. And the Politburo spent last spring
closing a budget hole of about a billion and a
half dollars. I call it a cooling. A state that
used to lead, now sitting in the middle. And this
is the moment we picked a nearly double the top rate?
We're some kind of stupid. But you knew that already. Now,
(08:52):
who leaves? The other side leaves. Oh, they've got an
answer for everything I've just said. The Bell Policy Center
and the Colorado Fiscal Institute are the brains behind Amendment 87.
They say the people will leave argument is overblown. They
cite a University of Chicago study that says every one
point increase in the top rate drives off about 14
(09:14):
hundredths of 1% of the state's millionaires. Four points, they say,
means about half of 1% leave, 99.5% stay. They point
to Taxachusetts, which passed a millionaire's tax in 2022. They
say revenue came in 50% higher than expected, and the
number of millionaires went up. And on corporations, they'll tell
(09:36):
you the tax follows where a company sells.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
Not where it's headquartered.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
91% of Colorado's corporate income tax, they say, is paid
by national companies. So nobody's moving their headquarters over this.
Let's take that seriously. Because it sounds good, right? It
sounds good in the sense you say, not nearly as
bad as I expected. So let's do the head count.
(10:02):
I'll stipulate the head count is small. And the model
that CSI puts out agrees. It shows Colorado losing a
net of something like 78 filers a year in the
top bracket. 78. But gang, the question is not how
many The question is, who? Now, the Common Sense Institute
(10:26):
estimates those households take more than $ 229 million a year
in earnings with them. $ 229 million a year gone.
Speaker 1 (10:40):
And look at the state's own numbers.
Speaker 2 (10:42):
In the Blue Books table, the entire increase on individual taxpayers,
about $ 1. 2 billion dollars, lands on roughly 46,000 households, reporting
more than a million dollars. Every income group below them,
on average, gets a cut. Now, when you build the
budget for schools and Medicaid on 46,000 households, you've got
(11:06):
to keep every one of them. You don't need very
many of them to leave before you start going. California
found that out. Voters there raised the top rates in 2012.
The Tax Foundation, citing a peer-reviewed study, estimates that people
moving out and people changing how they report income ate
(11:27):
up about 61% of the revenue the state expected to collect.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
61%.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
Now, back to Massachusetts. Their revenue did come in strong.
My read, and I'm telling you it's my read, is
that a millionaire's tax collected in a booming stock market
is going to look terrific.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Ask me how it looks in a bad year.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
Massachusetts has not had one yet with this tax on
the books.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
And the corporate argument? Take them at their word.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
Say the corporation doesn't move. Say the tax follows the sale.
And here's what the Tax Foundation says that means. It
works like a tax on sales into Colorado, and it
shows up in the price.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
So the company stays put.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
Tax goes on the price tag on the shelf and
some of that 325 dollars goes right back at the
register now the backers this is the stable funding portion
the backers sell amendment 87 as a stable reliable money
(12:34):
for schools and health care and child care reliable hmm Now,
California's own nonpartisan legislative analysts found that its personal income
tax savings about five times as hard as personal income itself,
and that about 40% of that swing comes from the
progressive rate structure. High incomes are lumpy because it's bonuses,
(12:59):
stock sales, a business that has a great year and
then a terrible year. Today, under our flat tax... Common
Sense estimates the top three income groups would pay about 28%
of Colorado's income tax in 2027. Under Amendment 87, 38%
(13:20):
on day one. By 2050, as the brackets creep, 65%.
So the money for the teachers' raise rides on the
stock market. So CSI ran a scenario, a recession scenario.
In the first year alone, Amendment 87 adds more than
half a billion dollars to the hole that a downturn
(13:43):
would blow into the state budget.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
So when they say reliable, that's what they mean. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (13:51):
Oh, it's reliable until it's not. And I love the
final part of this. We'll fix it later. Let's talk
about the frozen brackets. The Blue Book says it. I
won't say in cowboy English, but I'll say the blue
book says it in plain English. Unlike the federal income tax,
(14:11):
these brackets are not adjusted for inflation. So more of
your income falls into the higher brackets over time. Here's
what that does to the tax cut. That $ 325 maximum,
it'll never grow. By 2050, after inflation, it'll be worth
about $ 184 in today's money. But what does that do
(14:34):
to the tax hike? Let's go to common sense's example.
A couple are in their 30s, each earning $ 225, 000, together $ 450, 000.
In 2027, they get $ 325 tax cut. Now give them
raises that only keep up with inflation. They're not $ 1
richer in real terms because by 2050, they're.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
Paying $ 8, 718 more than than they would under today's flat tax.
I ran that one myself.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
It checks out. $ 8, 718 more than they would under the
current system. So a young couple, both 29, each making, say,
$ 85, 000 with ordinary raises over a career. The Common Sense
Institute says they crossed the $ 500, 000 line in about 2046
(15:30):
at 49 years of age. The other side says, oh,
just relax about it. Somebody making $ 100, 000 today won't hit
a new bracket for more than 50 years.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
I checked that one. It's true, too.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
But nobody is worried about the guy at $ 100, 000. We're
worried about the couple at $ 250, 000. And common sense puts
them across the line around 2042. Both statements are true.
Ask yourself which family you are. And the backers say this. Well,
if the creep becomes a problem... The Politburo can index
(16:05):
the brackets anytime they want. No vote of the people
are needed for that. Tabor lets them cut taxes on
their own.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
Well, they're right. They can. And it can.
Speaker 2 (16:16):
Now ask what that costs. By CSI's estimate, indexing these
brackets means giving up as much as $ 36.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
Billion through 2050.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Money that by then is already paying teachers and Medicaid
providers and child care centers. So name me a Politburo
that's going to walk into a room full of teachers
and announce, oh, you know what we're going to do?
We're going to give that money back to the taxpayers.
Have you not seen that movie in Colorado before? When
(16:49):
the free school lunch program ran short, the legislature didn't
move the $ 300, 000 line. It went back to the same
families at the same frozen line, and they just squeezed harder.
And a stupid voter said yes. That's what later looks like.
Now let's go back out east to that kitchen table.
As he signs, he slides the folder across to the
(17:11):
woman from the title company. She tells him the money
will wire on Thursday.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
What happens?
Speaker 2 (17:21):
Morning, Brownie.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
Actually, after morning, ding dong.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
I got a question concerning the botched execution of that.
Speaker 1 (17:31):
Gal in Tennessee.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
Why don't somebody just unplug her? I'd really like an answer.
I know that's a hard question, but if somebody could
answer it, thanks. Let me finish this and then I'll
do that. So I want you to go back to
that kitchen table out in Lyman. Hold on to your
(17:55):
thought about.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
What's her name?
Speaker 2 (17:59):
So he signs the paperwork and the title company says,
you know, the money's going to be there by Thursday.
He never once thought of himself as being rich. He
thought of himself as a guy who's been lucky with
the weather about half the time. And here's the uncomfortable part.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
It's about us.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
We like this kind of tax. We keep voting for
this kind of tax. Free lunch paid for by somebody
who's got a bigger house. More money for lunch, kids.
You know, for lunch money paid for by somebody else.
It always sounds like it's somebody else's bill. Then one year,
like out in Lyman, suddenly it's him. You sell the
(18:47):
rental that your parents left you. You sell your You
sell your business. You cash out the stock options after
20 years. You take a big IRA withdrawal because you've
got to pay for your mom's assisted living. For that
one year, on one piece of paper, the state of
(19:08):
Colorado is going to look at you and see a millionaire.
And by the way, that list I just gave you,
that's Common Sense's own list itself.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
All of those. I didn't make them up.
Speaker 2 (19:18):
So when your ballot shows up, You better read the
fine print on Amendment 87, and I want you to
do a search for the word inflation. Look for the
word married. You're not going to find either one of those.
Have you ever looked or felt like that? You were
that rich on paper? You sold a house, a business,
(19:39):
a practice, a piece of land? Tell me what that
year really was, absent that one thing that's going to
make the state of Colorado look at you and say, oh,
you're rich. Rich for one day, and they're going to
take most of it. Don't let them do this to us.
Speaker 1 (19:58):
It's insanity.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
Well, I was going to say something stupid. We're insane
if we do. But I have a gut feeling that
most people in Colorado are fed up budget hold of
1.5 billion dollars free this free that you look at
how the crime rate look at our business rankings everything
(20:21):
else this may or may not be the tipping point
but it certainly does add up to a tipping point
no the answer is just no don't let them backdoor
Tabor or anything else don't let them get rid of
the flat tax at all just Say no. Now, back
(20:44):
to the woman in Tennessee. They're screwed up. By the way,
I've since learned, since I did that story on her,
she informed the prison. that she had a very difficult vein.
Some of you may have the same problem. I go
(21:05):
in with Dr.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
Grossman. I go in every.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
90 days to have my blood work checked and see
how I'm doing and look at all my markers and
everything else. And they're really good, and I donate blood.
I donate blood as often as you can do it,
whatever that is, six weeks or something. Only one time
have I had a difficult time when I was hospitalized
for the pancreatitis. The vein collapsed. They had to send
(21:31):
in some ER team from downstairs to try to get
the IV started again. It was one of the worst
experiences of my life. And so I've been very conscientious
about when someone's going to draw blood of, look at
both arms. You decide. I'm not the expert, but you decide.
Where's a vein you can pop? She told them in advance. Hey, listen,
(21:56):
you ought to start looking for a vein now. Start
an IV of some sort. You know, just do a
drip of saline until you put the other juice in
me to get rid of me. She was that self-aware
of what was going on. They failed to do so.
And then she complained. She sat up and said, hey,
my arm hurts. Feels like it's going to blow up.
Speaker 1 (22:17):
That means they didn't hit the vein.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
They were pushing the poison into her body, not into
her veins. So it didn't have the effect it was
supposed to have. And I don't know whether she's brain
dead or not, but she's sitting there. But let's say
she's not brain dead. What do you do with her now?
Because you've now created a maybe double jeopardy. She was
(22:42):
sentenced to death.
Speaker 1 (22:43):
You tried. You failed.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
There's no precedent for saying you're going to try again.
And now you've got the Eighth Amendment. Cruel and unusual punishment. Yes,
I personally believe that the right thing to do is
to pull the plug and let her die peacefully. It's
insane to think that when we entrust The government to
(23:11):
do the one thing that if anybody else did would
be murder or manslaughter, and you F it up, you've
F'd it up. Now what do you do? You're trying
to kill her. Now you're doing everything you can to
keep her alive? This is the argument that people will
make for eliminating the death penalty. I don't think it's that.
(23:34):
I think it's for an elimination of the protocols by
which we administer the death penalty. I still go back
to a firing squad. Or, when it gets gross, a guillotine.
Speaker 1 (23:46):
Or hanging. Something. But why do we have to do that?
I've never had a dog. I'll take that back.
Speaker 2 (23:59):
I've probably had one dog where it took more of
the medication than my last St.
Speaker 1 (24:05):
Bernard. Slightly worse.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
Underestimated how much juice it would take to put that
poor old dog down.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Had Addison's disease. The dog was in pain. I wanted
the dog to stop suffering.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
And the vet started the IV, got everything going, started
the injection. Heart kept beating. So we just kept injecting
the medicine until the heart stopped. We need a backup protocol.
And there ought to be a way to do that
without putting ourselves in the position that we're in today.
Speaker 1 (24:41):
But there's one more thing.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
In fact, I've got a story on it, but I've
been not wanting to do it, and I'm still not
going to do it. The mother of the victim, think
about what she's going through. She drove, I think it
was from Florida to Tennessee to be one of the
witnesses to the execution. No one's apologized to her. No
(25:04):
one's called her. No one's said a word. Her daughter's
still dead. Skull's still been smashed. The woman that's laying
in that hospital room being kept alive is the one
that took a piece of the skull and kept it
as a souvenir.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Yes. You put all of it into perspective. Pull the plug.
A friend of mine's sister, I guess, just started working
for the Marx campaign. I don't even know how to
tell her, what to tell her. Uh... I don't know.
She's just stepping into a whole pile of poop. I
feel bad for her. Anyways, bye. Yeah, sorry to hear that.
(25:46):
Really sorry to hear that. 381,000 feet.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
That's how much a climbing 29-year-old from Golden just did
on foot in 141 days. You stack Mount Everest on
top of itself 13 times and you're just about there.
He never left Colorado. He walked a route that he
drew himself. Donovan Rice is this guy's name. Trail name, Iceman.
On May 13th, he dropped off the rim at Black
(26:13):
Canyon of the Gunnison, down a draw toward the Gunnison River,
and he started walking.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
Earlier this month, he.
Speaker 2 (26:19):
Walked right back into the same park and closed the
loop of roughly 2,000 miles. He called it the Great
Colorado Route. The idea hit him on an earlier hike.
He was walking the Continental Divide Trail. When he reached
the Colorado-Wyoming line, he looked south at the ridge lines
running down into Colorado, and he told Teton Gravity Research
he really wished there was a full-length trail that was,
(26:41):
in his words, more or less nonstop Colorado.
Speaker 1 (26:46):
There wasn't one. So he built one.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
Wow. He spent most of last year sitting with digital maps,
plotting places he loved, stitching them all together. He tried
to stay on public land, keep the road walking to
a minimum, and his words again... Take the more adventurous
route when possible. By the time this guy was done,
he had about 230 separate map tracks, 32 main sections,
(27:10):
something like 200 alternates and backups.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
What's on this route? 13 14ers.
Speaker 2 (27:16):
47 13ers, Rocky Mountain National Park, the Great Sand Dunes,
the Black Canyon, all 11 national forests in this state,
29 wilderness areas, the Maroon Bells, Pikes Peak, Longs Peak,
the Sangre de Cristos, Desert to Alpine, back down again.
And every single morning went on an Instagram with the
same greeting.
Speaker 1 (27:35):
Good morning, Colorado.
Speaker 2 (27:39):
Now, when he set out, the route was supposed to
be about 1,700 miles. By mid-September, he had blown past that.
He came in somewhere around 2,000. Now, that's kind of
like doing a home remodel. It's like remodeling a bathroom,
isn't it, Dragon? It's like you start out, you think
it's going to be just this far, and then it's this, this, this,
(28:00):
and this.
Speaker 1 (28:02):
Now, as I said, he's done the.
Speaker 2 (28:03):
Pacific Crest Trail, 2,650 miles. The Continental Divide Trail, about
3,000 miles. Something called the Eastern Continental Trail, 5,718 miles.
And he stood on top of all 58 of Colorado's
14ers at least one time. And he went out.
Speaker 1 (28:21):
He knew it was a slow snow year.
Speaker 2 (28:23):
And water was the thing he was worried about the most.
His approach to the miles is one that I think
more of us could use. He calls it slowing down,
speed up. Take a day off every week and let
the body and the head catch up and then go again.
Not all of that was a stroll. If Rocky Mountain
National Park, his line runs across ridges with names like
(28:46):
the Cleaver and the Fiffner's Traverse. He described part of
his class five, which I'm not a climber, but I
understand that's rope and nerve climbing, said the worst spots
could allegedly be bypassed.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
Allegedly?
Speaker 2 (29:02):
Spoken like a true lawyer, in my opinion. Here's what
I like about this one. Donovan Rice built this for
the view. He told 5280 Magazine when they interviewed him,
I wanted it to be a beauty-driven route. So he
was chasing whatever was the prettiest over the next ridge.
Speaker 1 (29:22):
And he made it usable.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
Those 32 sections run anywhere from 20 miles to 104 miles.
So a regular person with a long weekend and some
decent hiking boots can at least go walk a piece
of it. Now, Colorado Trail, fine trail. But here's one
guy's show you the whole state and handing you the
map in bite-sized pieces. His story talks about running into
(29:48):
nine black bears. They didn't give him any trouble. I'm
not surprised by that. Tiger salamanders, wild mustangs. At one place,
at a place called Mirror Lake, He says the single
most beautiful day of the whole trip thus far. Now,
he paid for it the way a lot of dreamers
do in this state. He works seasonal hospitality jobs. He
(30:11):
raised about $ 6, 000 from people online. A handful of Colorado
companies kicked in some freeze-dried meals, shoes, sleeping gear, a
few nights indoors. As far as the reporting shows, that
was the entire budget. Now, full disclosure, I ain't walking
2,000 miles. I got a show to do.
Speaker 1 (30:31):
My back is.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
Retained legal counsel. But I can walk 20. So can you.
Most of the ground on that route, the national forest,
the wilderness, the parks, it all belongs to us.
Speaker 1 (30:43):
All of us.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
We just don't go look at it nearly often enough.
We spend a lot of time on this program arguing
about who controls Colorado's lands.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
Who manages? Who gets to drill and graze on it?
Speaker 2 (30:56):
Well, Donovan Rice spent four and a half months just
walking it and reporting back every morning on what he saw.
Rice says the main thing he felt out there was awe.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
That's his word.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
He said good morning to all of us on Instagram
141 times. Then he just walked out of the Black
Canyon of the Gunnison, handed the rest of us the map.
Speaker 1 (31:23):
Maybe we ought to pick it up and go hike
part of it.
Wallet have just rigged Colorado, the fifth most dangerous state
in the U.S., for personal safety and residential safety. Way
to go, Dems. We're number five? We're in the top ten. Yeah,
but we're not number one. I know. Just give us time, Dragon.
Give us time. We'll get there.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
So the Common Sense Institute looked at these amendments.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
Here's how they built it.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
They took the Colorado Department of Revenue's own tax return data.
They aged it forward year by year out to 2050.
And then they taxed every return twice. Once under today's
flat tax. Then once under Amendment 87, exactly as written.
(00:49):
The difference between those two tax returns is the answer.
And they also tell you right up front... That this
model assumes that nobody moves, nobody changes how they file,
nobody restructures a business. They call their totals an upper bound,
and I appreciate that, because most advocacy shops will bury
(01:10):
that sentence. They put it in bold type. Now, their
headline is $ 154 billion in new taxes through 2050. $ 154
billion in new taxes through 2050. Now, I'll set the
number aside. It's 24 years of dollars stacked on top
of each other, and it's big because 24 years is
(01:33):
a long time. But the finding that matters the most
is where the money comes from. Now, according to CSI,
three features of how this measure was drafted eat. Each
of the three features raises billions on their own apart
(01:55):
from the higher rates themselves. Brackets that get frozen with
no adjustment for inflation, that gets you up to $ 36
billion additional dollars. A marriage penalty, about $ 27 billion. Tax
on business profits that the owner never actually received, $ 13 billion. Now,
(02:17):
they're careful to say that those overlap, and you should
not add them up, so I'm not going to add
them up either. But the bottom line is this. Much
of the money that Amendment 87 raises over the next
generation comes out of the fine print. And the fine
print is not what the ballot describes. So let's do
(02:37):
the really hard part, and let's go through the fine print.
The wedding. Start with married. The federal income tax doubles
the brackets for married couples filing jointly. Now, Congress did
that on purpose so two people don't pay more just
because they got married. Amendment 87 does not do that.
(03:00):
One schedule, single or married, the line is the same, $ 500, 000.
The Tax Foundation, a nonpartisan tax research group in D.C.,
they lean toward lower rates.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
They ran the math, too. Two people each making $ 25, 000.
You get married. You file jointly.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
They pay $ 125 more than they would as two single people. Now,
two people each making $ 500, 000. Married, they pay $ 16, 575 more.
$ 16, 575 more than they would if they were single. And
if you say find those folks can afford it, Then
(03:46):
look at the couple in the middle. Two professionals, each
earning $ 280, 000. Let's say a nurse, a anesthetist, and an engineer.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
Single.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
Each one of them gets the $ 325 tax cut. Married,
their joint return shows $ 560, 000. The last $ 60, 000 lands in
the 7.4 bracket.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
And now, compared to today.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
They pay $ 1, 475 more. Same two people, same two paychecks.
The marriage license just turned a tax cut into a
tax increase. That's the marriage. What about the shop, the
small business, the business owner? When you hear people making
(04:39):
over $ 500, 000, you picture the hedge fund guy down on
17th Street. Go look at who actually files those returns
in Colorado. According to IRS data that the Tax Foundation pulled,
Colorado had 53,640 filers with adjusted gross income over $ 500, 000.
More than 30,000 of the 53,640 of them report income
(05:12):
from a partnership.
Speaker 1 (05:14):
Or an S corporation. That's more than half.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
That's the owner of the HVAC company. That's the family
that runs three hardware stores. Those are two partners in
a dental practice. In this state, the Tax Foundation says
households over 500,000 earn more from business than they do
from wages, about 27% more. You raise the top rate
(05:39):
on them, And you're raising the rate on small business.
That's who they are. Not that hedge fund guy sitting
down on 17th Street. And there's a nasty little wrinkle
in there, too, and it's federal law. Stick with me
on this one. If you own part of an S
corporation or you're in a partnership, you're taxed on your
(06:00):
share of the profit regardless of whether you ever see
a dime of it. The business keeps the money to
buy a truck, make payroll in January, pay down the
line of credit. You still owe the tax. Colorado starts
with your federal number, so Colorado tax is due too.
If you're a minority owner, you can't make the company
(06:20):
cut you a check to cover the bill. Now, that's
true today too. The difference is that today it's taxed
at 4.4%.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
Under Amendment 87, it's taxed At up to 8.4%. Got it? Yeah.
They're going to double everything.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
Now, CSI estimates the extra tax on that kind of income,
money that stayed inside the business, about $ 211 million in
the first year alone. Tax on money you never got. Now,
think about the town that we used to be. Step
(07:04):
back and let's look at the state. The Tax Foundation
ranks every state's tax system on how competitive it is.
In 2020, we were 22nd. In 2026, we're 33rd. And
that's before Amendment 87. An 8.4% top rate would be
(07:27):
higher than every one of Colorado's seven neighbors. Now, Wyoming
has no income tax at all. Cheyenne is just under
an hour from Fort Collins. Now, let me be very specific,
because I'm about to say our economy is slipping, and
somebody's going to text me the unemployment rate.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
So here it is.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Colorado's unemployment rate in July was 3.9%, a.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
Touch, a touch below the national rate. That's fine. But remember,
we've talked about this before.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
The University of Colorado's lead school of business called last
year's job growth anemic. They had expected Colorado to add
37,000 jobs in 2025. This year-end estimate was about 12,500.
After years near the top of the country for job growth,
we're now in the middle of the pack.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
The most recent ranking I've seen puts us 24th.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
Labor force participation in this state hit its lowest point
since 2020 this summer. And the Politburo spent last spring
closing a budget hole of about a billion and a
half dollars. I call it a cooling. A state that
used to lead, now sitting in the middle. And this
is the moment we picked a nearly double the top rate?
We're some kind of stupid. But you knew that already. Now,
(08:52):
who leaves? The other side leaves. Oh, they've got an
answer for everything I've just said. The Bell Policy Center
and the Colorado Fiscal Institute are the brains behind Amendment 87.
They say the people will leave argument is overblown. They
cite a University of Chicago study that says every one
point increase in the top rate drives off about 14
(09:14):
hundredths of 1% of the state's millionaires. Four points, they say,
means about half of 1% leave, 99.5% stay. They point
to Taxachusetts, which passed a millionaire's tax in 2022. They
say revenue came in 50% higher than expected, and the
number of millionaires went up. And on corporations, they'll tell
(09:36):
you the tax follows where a company sells.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
Not where it's headquartered.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
91% of Colorado's corporate income tax, they say, is paid
by national companies. So nobody's moving their headquarters over this.
Let's take that seriously. Because it sounds good, right? It
sounds good in the sense you say, not nearly as
bad as I expected. So let's do the head count.
(10:02):
I'll stipulate the head count is small. And the model
that CSI puts out agrees. It shows Colorado losing a
net of something like 78 filers a year in the
top bracket. 78. But gang, the question is not how
many The question is, who? Now, the Common Sense Institute
(10:26):
estimates those households take more than $ 229 million a year
in earnings with them. $ 229 million a year gone.
Speaker 1 (10:40):
And look at the state's own numbers.
Speaker 2 (10:42):
In the Blue Books table, the entire increase on individual taxpayers,
about $ 1. 2 billion dollars, lands on roughly 46,000 households, reporting
more than a million dollars. Every income group below them,
on average, gets a cut. Now, when you build the
budget for schools and Medicaid on 46,000 households, you've got
(11:06):
to keep every one of them. You don't need very
many of them to leave before you start going. California
found that out. Voters there raised the top rates in 2012.
The Tax Foundation, citing a peer-reviewed study, estimates that people
moving out and people changing how they report income ate
(11:27):
up about 61% of the revenue the state expected to collect.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
61%.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
Now, back to Massachusetts. Their revenue did come in strong.
My read, and I'm telling you it's my read, is
that a millionaire's tax collected in a booming stock market
is going to look terrific.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Ask me how it looks in a bad year.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
Massachusetts has not had one yet with this tax on
the books.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
And the corporate argument? Take them at their word.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
Say the corporation doesn't move. Say the tax follows the sale.
And here's what the Tax Foundation says that means. It
works like a tax on sales into Colorado, and it
shows up in the price.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
So the company stays put.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
Tax goes on the price tag on the shelf and
some of that 325 dollars goes right back at the
register now the backers this is the stable funding portion
the backers sell amendment 87 as a stable reliable money
(12:34):
for schools and health care and child care reliable hmm Now,
California's own nonpartisan legislative analysts found that its personal income
tax savings about five times as hard as personal income itself,
and that about 40% of that swing comes from the
progressive rate structure. High incomes are lumpy because it's bonuses,
(12:59):
stock sales, a business that has a great year and
then a terrible year. Today, under our flat tax... Common
Sense estimates the top three income groups would pay about 28%
of Colorado's income tax in 2027. Under Amendment 87, 38%
(13:20):
on day one. By 2050, as the brackets creep, 65%.
So the money for the teachers' raise rides on the
stock market. So CSI ran a scenario, a recession scenario.
In the first year alone, Amendment 87 adds more than
half a billion dollars to the hole that a downturn
(13:43):
would blow into the state budget.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
So when they say reliable, that's what they mean. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (13:51):
Oh, it's reliable until it's not. And I love the
final part of this. We'll fix it later. Let's talk
about the frozen brackets. The Blue Book says it. I
won't say in cowboy English, but I'll say the blue
book says it in plain English. Unlike the federal income tax,
(14:11):
these brackets are not adjusted for inflation. So more of
your income falls into the higher brackets over time. Here's
what that does to the tax cut. That $ 325 maximum,
it'll never grow. By 2050, after inflation, it'll be worth
about $ 184 in today's money. But what does that do
(14:34):
to the tax hike? Let's go to common sense's example.
A couple are in their 30s, each earning $ 225, 000, together $ 450, 000.
In 2027, they get $ 325 tax cut. Now give them
raises that only keep up with inflation. They're not $ 1
richer in real terms because by 2050, they're.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
Paying $ 8, 718 more than than they would under today's flat tax.
I ran that one myself.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
It checks out. $ 8, 718 more than they would under the
current system. So a young couple, both 29, each making, say,
$ 85, 000 with ordinary raises over a career. The Common Sense
Institute says they crossed the $ 500, 000 line in about 2046
(15:30):
at 49 years of age. The other side says, oh,
just relax about it. Somebody making $ 100, 000 today won't hit
a new bracket for more than 50 years.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
I checked that one. It's true, too.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
But nobody is worried about the guy at $ 100, 000. We're
worried about the couple at $ 250, 000. And common sense puts
them across the line around 2042. Both statements are true.
Ask yourself which family you are. And the backers say this. Well,
if the creep becomes a problem... The Politburo can index
(16:05):
the brackets anytime they want. No vote of the people
are needed for that. Tabor lets them cut taxes on
their own.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
Well, they're right. They can. And it can.
Speaker 2 (16:16):
Now ask what that costs. By CSI's estimate, indexing these
brackets means giving up as much as $ 36.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
Billion through 2050.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Money that by then is already paying teachers and Medicaid
providers and child care centers. So name me a Politburo
that's going to walk into a room full of teachers
and announce, oh, you know what we're going to do?
We're going to give that money back to the taxpayers.
Have you not seen that movie in Colorado before? When
(16:49):
the free school lunch program ran short, the legislature didn't
move the $ 300, 000 line. It went back to the same
families at the same frozen line, and they just squeezed harder.
And a stupid voter said yes. That's what later looks like.
Now let's go back out east to that kitchen table.
As he signs, he slides the folder across to the
(17:11):
woman from the title company. She tells him the money
will wire on Thursday.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
What happens?
Speaker 2 (17:21):
Morning, Brownie.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
Actually, after morning, ding dong.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
I got a question concerning the botched execution of that.
Speaker 1 (17:31):
Gal in Tennessee.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
Why don't somebody just unplug her? I'd really like an answer.
I know that's a hard question, but if somebody could
answer it, thanks. Let me finish this and then I'll
do that. So I want you to go back to
that kitchen table out in Lyman. Hold on to your
(17:55):
thought about.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
What's her name?
Speaker 2 (17:59):
So he signs the paperwork and the title company says,
you know, the money's going to be there by Thursday.
He never once thought of himself as being rich. He
thought of himself as a guy who's been lucky with
the weather about half the time. And here's the uncomfortable part.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
It's about us.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
We like this kind of tax. We keep voting for
this kind of tax. Free lunch paid for by somebody
who's got a bigger house. More money for lunch, kids.
You know, for lunch money paid for by somebody else.
It always sounds like it's somebody else's bill. Then one year,
like out in Lyman, suddenly it's him. You sell the
(18:47):
rental that your parents left you. You sell your You
sell your business. You cash out the stock options after
20 years. You take a big IRA withdrawal because you've
got to pay for your mom's assisted living. For that
one year, on one piece of paper, the state of
(19:08):
Colorado is going to look at you and see a millionaire.
And by the way, that list I just gave you,
that's Common Sense's own list itself.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
All of those. I didn't make them up.
Speaker 2 (19:18):
So when your ballot shows up, You better read the
fine print on Amendment 87, and I want you to
do a search for the word inflation. Look for the
word married. You're not going to find either one of those.
Have you ever looked or felt like that? You were
that rich on paper? You sold a house, a business,
(19:39):
a practice, a piece of land? Tell me what that
year really was, absent that one thing that's going to
make the state of Colorado look at you and say, oh,
you're rich. Rich for one day, and they're going to
take most of it. Don't let them do this to us.
Speaker 1 (19:58):
It's insanity.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
Well, I was going to say something stupid. We're insane
if we do. But I have a gut feeling that
most people in Colorado are fed up budget hold of
1.5 billion dollars free this free that you look at
how the crime rate look at our business rankings everything
(20:21):
else this may or may not be the tipping point
but it certainly does add up to a tipping point
no the answer is just no don't let them backdoor
Tabor or anything else don't let them get rid of
the flat tax at all just Say no. Now, back
(20:44):
to the woman in Tennessee. They're screwed up. By the way,
I've since learned, since I did that story on her,
she informed the prison. that she had a very difficult vein.
Some of you may have the same problem. I go
(21:05):
in with Dr.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
Grossman. I go in every.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
90 days to have my blood work checked and see
how I'm doing and look at all my markers and
everything else. And they're really good, and I donate blood.
I donate blood as often as you can do it,
whatever that is, six weeks or something. Only one time
have I had a difficult time when I was hospitalized
for the pancreatitis. The vein collapsed. They had to send
(21:31):
in some ER team from downstairs to try to get
the IV started again. It was one of the worst
experiences of my life. And so I've been very conscientious
about when someone's going to draw blood of, look at
both arms. You decide. I'm not the expert, but you decide.
Where's a vein you can pop? She told them in advance. Hey, listen,
(21:56):
you ought to start looking for a vein now. Start
an IV of some sort. You know, just do a
drip of saline until you put the other juice in
me to get rid of me. She was that self-aware
of what was going on. They failed to do so.
And then she complained. She sat up and said, hey,
my arm hurts. Feels like it's going to blow up.
Speaker 1 (22:17):
That means they didn't hit the vein.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
They were pushing the poison into her body, not into
her veins. So it didn't have the effect it was
supposed to have. And I don't know whether she's brain
dead or not, but she's sitting there. But let's say
she's not brain dead. What do you do with her now?
Because you've now created a maybe double jeopardy. She was
(22:42):
sentenced to death.
Speaker 1 (22:43):
You tried. You failed.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
There's no precedent for saying you're going to try again.
And now you've got the Eighth Amendment. Cruel and unusual punishment. Yes,
I personally believe that the right thing to do is
to pull the plug and let her die peacefully. It's
insane to think that when we entrust The government to
(23:11):
do the one thing that if anybody else did would
be murder or manslaughter, and you F it up, you've
F'd it up. Now what do you do? You're trying
to kill her. Now you're doing everything you can to
keep her alive? This is the argument that people will
make for eliminating the death penalty. I don't think it's that.
(23:34):
I think it's for an elimination of the protocols by
which we administer the death penalty. I still go back
to a firing squad. Or, when it gets gross, a guillotine.
Speaker 1 (23:46):
Or hanging. Something. But why do we have to do that?
I've never had a dog. I'll take that back.
Speaker 2 (23:59):
I've probably had one dog where it took more of
the medication than my last St.
Speaker 1 (24:05):
Bernard. Slightly worse.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
Underestimated how much juice it would take to put that
poor old dog down.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Had Addison's disease. The dog was in pain. I wanted
the dog to stop suffering.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
And the vet started the IV, got everything going, started
the injection. Heart kept beating. So we just kept injecting
the medicine until the heart stopped. We need a backup protocol.
And there ought to be a way to do that
without putting ourselves in the position that we're in today.
Speaker 1 (24:41):
But there's one more thing.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
In fact, I've got a story on it, but I've
been not wanting to do it, and I'm still not
going to do it. The mother of the victim, think
about what she's going through. She drove, I think it
was from Florida to Tennessee to be one of the
witnesses to the execution. No one's apologized to her. No
(25:04):
one's called her. No one's said a word. Her daughter's
still dead. Skull's still been smashed. The woman that's laying
in that hospital room being kept alive is the one
that took a piece of the skull and kept it
as a souvenir.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Yes. You put all of it into perspective. Pull the plug.
A friend of mine's sister, I guess, just started working
for the Marx campaign. I don't even know how to
tell her, what to tell her. Uh... I don't know.
She's just stepping into a whole pile of poop. I
feel bad for her. Anyways, bye. Yeah, sorry to hear that.
(25:46):
Really sorry to hear that. 381,000 feet.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
That's how much a climbing 29-year-old from Golden just did
on foot in 141 days. You stack Mount Everest on
top of itself 13 times and you're just about there.
He never left Colorado. He walked a route that he
drew himself. Donovan Rice is this guy's name. Trail name, Iceman.
On May 13th, he dropped off the rim at Black
(26:13):
Canyon of the Gunnison, down a draw toward the Gunnison River,
and he started walking.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
Earlier this month, he.
Speaker 2 (26:19):
Walked right back into the same park and closed the
loop of roughly 2,000 miles. He called it the Great
Colorado Route. The idea hit him on an earlier hike.
He was walking the Continental Divide Trail. When he reached
the Colorado-Wyoming line, he looked south at the ridge lines
running down into Colorado, and he told Teton Gravity Research
he really wished there was a full-length trail that was,
(26:41):
in his words, more or less nonstop Colorado.
Speaker 1 (26:46):
There wasn't one. So he built one.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
Wow. He spent most of last year sitting with digital maps,
plotting places he loved, stitching them all together. He tried
to stay on public land, keep the road walking to
a minimum, and his words again... Take the more adventurous
route when possible. By the time this guy was done,
he had about 230 separate map tracks, 32 main sections,
(27:10):
something like 200 alternates and backups.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
What's on this route? 13 14ers.
Speaker 2 (27:16):
47 13ers, Rocky Mountain National Park, the Great Sand Dunes,
the Black Canyon, all 11 national forests in this state,
29 wilderness areas, the Maroon Bells, Pikes Peak, Longs Peak,
the Sangre de Cristos, Desert to Alpine, back down again.
And every single morning went on an Instagram with the
same greeting.
Speaker 1 (27:35):
Good morning, Colorado.
Speaker 2 (27:39):
Now, when he set out, the route was supposed to
be about 1,700 miles. By mid-September, he had blown past that.
He came in somewhere around 2,000. Now, that's kind of
like doing a home remodel. It's like remodeling a bathroom,
isn't it, Dragon? It's like you start out, you think
it's going to be just this far, and then it's this, this, this,
(28:00):
and this.
Speaker 1 (28:02):
Now, as I said, he's done the.
Speaker 2 (28:03):
Pacific Crest Trail, 2,650 miles. The Continental Divide Trail, about
3,000 miles. Something called the Eastern Continental Trail, 5,718 miles.
And he stood on top of all 58 of Colorado's
14ers at least one time. And he went out.
Speaker 1 (28:21):
He knew it was a slow snow year.
Speaker 2 (28:23):
And water was the thing he was worried about the most.
His approach to the miles is one that I think
more of us could use. He calls it slowing down,
speed up. Take a day off every week and let
the body and the head catch up and then go again.
Not all of that was a stroll. If Rocky Mountain
National Park, his line runs across ridges with names like
(28:46):
the Cleaver and the Fiffner's Traverse. He described part of
his class five, which I'm not a climber, but I
understand that's rope and nerve climbing, said the worst spots
could allegedly be bypassed.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
Allegedly?
Speaker 2 (29:02):
Spoken like a true lawyer, in my opinion. Here's what
I like about this one. Donovan Rice built this for
the view. He told 5280 Magazine when they interviewed him,
I wanted it to be a beauty-driven route. So he
was chasing whatever was the prettiest over the next ridge.
Speaker 1 (29:22):
And he made it usable.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
Those 32 sections run anywhere from 20 miles to 104 miles.
So a regular person with a long weekend and some
decent hiking boots can at least go walk a piece
of it. Now, Colorado Trail, fine trail. But here's one
guy's show you the whole state and handing you the
map in bite-sized pieces. His story talks about running into
(29:48):
nine black bears. They didn't give him any trouble. I'm
not surprised by that. Tiger salamanders, wild mustangs. At one place,
at a place called Mirror Lake, He says the single
most beautiful day of the whole trip thus far. Now,
he paid for it the way a lot of dreamers
do in this state. He works seasonal hospitality jobs. He
(30:11):
raised about $ 6, 000 from people online. A handful of Colorado
companies kicked in some freeze-dried meals, shoes, sleeping gear, a
few nights indoors. As far as the reporting shows, that
was the entire budget. Now, full disclosure, I ain't walking
2,000 miles. I got a show to do.
Speaker 1 (30:31):
My back is.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
Retained legal counsel. But I can walk 20. So can you.
Most of the ground on that route, the national forest,
the wilderness, the parks, it all belongs to us.
Speaker 1 (30:43):
All of us.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
We just don't go look at it nearly often enough.
We spend a lot of time on this program arguing
about who controls Colorado's lands.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
Who manages? Who gets to drill and graze on it?
Speaker 2 (30:56):
Well, Donovan Rice spent four and a half months just
walking it and reporting back every morning on what he saw.
Rice says the main thing he felt out there was awe.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
That's his word.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
He said good morning to all of us on Instagram
141 times. Then he just walked out of the Black
Canyon of the Gunnison, handed the rest of us the map.
Speaker 1 (31:23):
Maybe we ought to pick it up and go hike
part of it.
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