Craig Barnes has worked as an infantry officer, a hodcarrier, a trial lawyer, a lobbyist for industry, and run for Congress in Denver. He initiated the Sunshine and Sunset concepts in Colorado legislation, was co-counsel on the Denver school integration case and the nation's first comparable worth case for women. He has been a newspaper columnist for the Rocky Mountain News and a regular commentator on public radio.

In the 1980s he negotiated nuclear issues with leaders in the Academy of Sciences in the Kremlin; in the 1990s he facilitated talks between opposing sides in the ethnic cleansing war between Armenia and Azerbaijan and thereafter led successful talks to fashion the first transboundary water agreements between the new republics of Kazakhstan, Uzbeckistan, Tajickistan, and Kyrghzstan.

His stage plays include the 16th century trilogy, Queen Elizabeth I, King’s Yellow and The Last Tudor, all of which were performed in Santa Fe. His play A Nation Deceived featured Ed Asner in the lead role as the prosecutor of Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld for lies and war crimes, is on DVD, and was performed in Santa Fe and Los Angeles.

His historical study In Search of the Lost Feminine explores archeology and patriarchal myths and was winner of the USA Best Books award in Cultural Anthropology in 2006. He received the New Mexico AP Award for best radio commentary in 2004. His childhood memoir, Growing Up True featured life in Arapahoe County in the 1940s and won the Colorado Book Award in 2001.
His upcoming book Democracy At The Crossroads is a study of the centuries-long conflict between democracy and feudalism and will be in bookstores in November, 2009.

He has four grown children, eleven grandchildren and has been married to his wife Mikaela for 51 years. For more information go to www.CraigBarnes.com


Blog Entries by Craig Barnes

Good and Evil in a Troubled World

Posted December 21, 2009 | 05:02 PM (EST)


Nobody seems happy. Not the democrats who want to get out of Afghanistan; not the Republicans who want to bomb devils and wipe out evil. Not the prophets of non-violence and not the advocates of strength. Obama's autumn strategy is a collage of contradictions. On the one hand, he is...

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The Reality of PTSD

8 Comments | Posted December 16, 2009 | 06:50 PM (EST)


Many years ago when I served in the infantry, my closest friend was a young West Pointer named Burt. He was a first rate soldier. When we rotated out, I came home and Burt went on to Vietnam. He led troops in combat and won a Silver Star for heroism....

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The Corporate Danger: Plutonomy

2 Comments | Posted October 30, 2009 | 07:07 PM (EST)


All over Washington, from the Congress to the White House, the smart money is betting that this autumn the Supreme Court will give corporations the same right to spend in federal elections as has any person. Free spending, five justices will say, is the same as free speech and to...

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A Second American Revolution

Posted November 24, 2008 | 05:09 AM (EST)


Two weeks ago, I stepped outside into the smell of pinôn pines under a bright blue-sky morning. Aspen leaves lay golden across our steps and scattered out into the grasses around the house. The Gramma grass had gone black and at this time of year the long, tall Little Blue...

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Voting for Obama

Posted October 27, 2008 | 01:40 PM (EST)


In 1952, when I was 16, my father was stationed in the Air Force in London. I was dating a general's daughter. I can still remember her kisses. They were luscious and the best experience to that point of my young life. Then one night in early September, just after...

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Palin at the G8

Posted October 13, 2008 | 02:11 PM (EST)



Are the American people going to put Sarah Palin in a position from which she might have to be the one to lead a cabinet of economic and financial advisors to navigate us out of this cascading global crisis?

Chinese, Saudi Arabian and Russian interests...

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