Colorado has spoken: First Amendment wins!

Colorado HB1060 has failed! 

Thanks to your resounding efforts and support after I posted about this incredibly heinous bill, it has been taken off the table, possibly forever. Thank you so much to those who testified to stop the bill:

NHFC/NHFA (National Health Freedom)
Sunshine Health Freedom Foundation
Nutrition Therapy Institute
Colorado Coalition for Natural Health

United in Health for raising awareness that this is happening all over the country and that many others will soon need our assistance.

And especially to Vitamin Cottage whose activism in its stores helped alert many of us to the plight of Coloradans.

Thank you so very very much to the hundreds of you who wrote to me, and who wrote to Colorado State Representatives to let them know how this bill would affect your right to choose your information. Many of you wrote from all over the world to people who didn’t represent you to support what we do here. Thank you to those of you who selflessly offered to host my site to get it out of Colorado should the need arise. Thank you to those of you who offered support in so many ways. I have been touched. (No, not in a pervy way. In my heart.)

And thank you to the Representatives of this State for standing up against the big interest life-sucking bullies and doing the right thing. This is truly a win for all of us.

Those who stood for freedom (voted to table indefinitely):
Randy Baumgardner
Paul J. Brown
Don Coram
Marsha Looper
Wes McKinley
Ray Scott
Edward Vigil

Those who stood against freedom (voted against tabling):
Fischer
Jones
Ryden
This doesn’t mean the fight is over, but we have won for now. For today, Your Lighter Side and others like me will continue to deliver sass, chow and bacon.

The people have spoken and they’ve said, “Go ahead. Make my lunch.” That I shall. I might even put on a bra.

And, more good news follows:  A blogging friend of mine, Steve Cooksey, has been the target of dietitians in the state of North Carolina for publishing information not supported by the powers that be. As a result, he has been threatened with jail time by the state for using his site to dispense contrarian (low carb) nutritional support and information without a license. (His is a state that was not able to, unfortunately, shut down a House Bill that would have prevented this abrogation of his First Amendment rights.)

In a fantastic turn of events, Steve writes: “One of the law firm’s Board of Directors approved to take my case… Pro Bono! Still not 100% official… but it’s good to know for three reasons: 1) They are enthusiastic about the possible precedent of the case; 2) They think the risk/reward of taking the case is good; and 3) If I had to pay for attorney fees ‘out of my pocket’ it wasn’t happening. I am SO STOKED! I am moving forward! :)” [edits mine]

We are stoked, too. Little by little we are taking back our health.

When I was in the throes of serious frustration at the situations swirling around us, my best friend Robin said to me the other day, “I miss when this was America.” Maybe, just maybe, it still is. But only when good people stand up and make their voices heard.

And you did. And for this I thank you. We all thank you.

You have come together from all over the country. From all across the world. From Germany and from Australian. From Canada and from Texas. From Asia and from South America. From sea to shining, bacon loving sea. And this made me realize something. Maybe this was never a Colorado issue. Or a North Carolina issue. Maybe this is simply a human issue.  An issue without borders, without race, without religion or orientation. It’s the right to be healthy. To be free. To be heard, even if your voice is the lone one. The right to be wrong. That’s what it means to be human.

And maybe, just maybe, as this fight moves from state to state, and from continent to continent, we’ll become stronger. We’ll become healthier. We’ll be a world that has fought the diseases of civilization. And we will win. We will win.