Alabama vs Colorado

 

From an excellent column about Alabama "winning" the battle for Space Command HQ by Brian Lyman:

 

"We won’t know how many employees will make the trip until the move is complete. But it’s clear that a big problem with moving Space Command to Alabama is, well, Alabama. The leaders of the command think many of their employees — highly trained, highly educated and not easy to replace — would quit before moving to our state.

And honestly, I get it. Colorado has its own charms, of course. But how exactly are you going to persuade people to come here?

Education? Colorado is in the bottom half of per pupil public school spending in the country. But it still invests more in its children than Alabama does.

Public safety? Colorado’s homicide rate is less than half of Alabama’s. And despite having almost 1 million more people than Alabama, Colorado had 273 fewer firearm deaths in 2023.

Health care? Yeah, no. Colorado expanded Medicaid over 10 years ago, helping to slash its uninsured rate. Alabama’s hospitals and health care professionals have all but begged our state leaders to follow suit, citing the dire condition of rural hospitals and the economic benefits of expansion.

Instead, Alabama leaders sulked about former President Barack Obama and whined about the cost, while eagerly directing federal money into the construction of a megaprison in Elmore County and smiling as the price tag for the facility flew into the stratosphere.

And at least until Trump got involved, Colorado was pretty welcoming to transgender youth and didn’t blithely take their health care away from them. Nor do I see Colorado leaders panicking at the idea of a child reading a book with an LGBTQ character in it.

Oh, and Colorado treats women like adults. Where Alabama forces sexual assault victims to bear their attackers’ children and sees no problem with an abortion ban that makes the treatment of pregnancy complications far more difficult than it should be, Colorado voters last year voted to put abortion protections in their state constitution."

FULL COLUMN HERE. 

And I suppose we should be thanking all of the Alabama politicians who created those negatives?