Thanks to the Denver Post's investigative reporting, we've learned that in the three months since the October 1, 2008 imposition of a state hiring freeze, "(Colorado Governor Bill) Ritter's office approved 326 new hires and promotions — out of 371 requests — that could cost the state more than $12 million."

In other words, Ritter approved 7/8 of requests for "exemptions" from the hiring freeze, increasing the size and cost of government just as all the rest of us were having to cut back...if we were lucky enough not to lose our jobs.

Furthermore, "Between Sept. 25, when the freeze was announced, and Oct. 1, when it took effect, the state hired an additional 121 employees, more than double the 56 hired the previous week."

I think it's just one more step toward Bill Ritter being a one-term governor. He ran as a "pro-business Democrat." In fact, what he really is is a "pro-business-as-usual Democrat," something rational people knew we couldn't afford before and someone whom I hope the rest of the voters are coming to realize is clueless, ineffective, and reckless with their money.

The state legislature's budget staff is predicting a $600 million budget deficit this fiscal year (which ends June 30). Anyone want to bet whether it will be that low? Amazingly, the governor's office is suggesting the shortfall might only be 40% of that number. Yeah, right. And the Dow Jones will be over 12,000 in the next few months. And Hamas will recognize Israel's right to exist.

Just as ridiculous as the governor's self-deception about this year's budget trouble is that the prediction for next fiscal year's deficit is only $385 billion. The size and cost of government will almost certainly not decrease despite claims by Ritter that he's asking departments to make 10% budget cuts. That will happen just in the same way that hiring was "frozen". I predict that the next deficit will be even larger than the current one.

At least this fiscal year had some period of a decent economy, whereas I believe the next 18 months will be an economic disaster. Consumer spending will not rebound for at least 18 months and housing prices will not go up in any substantial way for at least three years, but probably more like 5 years. The bailout is doing as much harm as good in the short- and medium-term and will be viewed in the long-term as one of the worst-conceived economic plans in our nation's history. Probably even worse than the New Deal because we're repeating the New Deal's damaging history rather than learning its lessons.

Not only will this bailout saddle future generations with a massive tax liability, but it is also eroding the very foundation of the free market economy which has been responsible for our nation's prosperity. Those of you who want to argue that free markets are responsible for our current turmoil should do some reading about the government's involvement in the housing bubble. We're not suffering from a lack of regulation. We're suffering from the unintended effects of typical do-gooder, vote-buying Democratic social engineering.

Much like the story in Atlas Shrugged, which today's events dangerous parallel, the nation will probably not learn until its economic blood is in the streets that you can't tax or borrow or appropriate or redistribute your way to prosperity.

Too many people, including apparently Bill Ritter believe that if only the government could just hire people then everything would be OK. He, and many average citizens, seem to forget that the salaries for those government workers come from taxing the more productive private sector. There's no such thing as a free lunch. When you see more government workers effectively on your payroll, your response shouldn't be "I'm glad that at least those people have jobs." It should be "Who the hell is Bill Ritter to buy votes with my money...especially after he specifically promised he wouldn't?"

If there is any good news here, it is that the Democrats are giving voters the rope to hang them (the Democrats, not the voters) with. Colorado Republican legislators seem somewhat better than Republicans in Congress in terms of caring about fiscal responsibility. (This is especially true with the departure...hallelujah...of State Senator Steve Johnson who represented everything that could be wrong with the Republican Party.)

If, and this is a big if, the Republicans can round up a decent candidate for governor in 2010, Governor Ritter will lose re-election by a substantial margin. For that reason, I believe it's 50/50 at this point that he won't even run. And although it won't be easy, I believe the GOP will have an opportunity to take back at least one chamber of the state legislature. The question is will they do anything to proactively show voters that they deserve to be elected for reasons other than just not being Democrats. 2008 was relatively rare in that on a national scale, just not being a Republican was quite a big plus, even if you didn't have a lot of positives of your own as a candidate. That sort of anti-GOP sentiment won't last forever, and especially when Democrats control everything.

With his obvious breaking of the hiring freeze pledge, Bill Ritter has just given the GOP one more piece of high-caliber ammunition to fire at him in the next gubernatorial campaign, and it's easy to expect some collateral damage to the rest of the Democratic Party. As I said, it won't be easy to wrest control from the Dems, but during these dark economic times it's nice to have something pleasant to look forward to.