January 25, 2010 09:59 PM UTC

Kill Toxic "Mascot Bill" While The Killing's Good

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• by: Colorado Pols

An opportunity self-preservation interested Democrats should take, the Durango Herald reports:

Lt. Gov. Barbara O’Brien worries that her office might be swamped with work from an Aurora senator’s bill to curb the use of American Indian mascots at high schools.

Senate Bill 107, by Sen. Suzanne Williams, D-Aurora, would require about 18 high schools with American Indian mascots to get approval from the Colorado Commission on Indian Affairs to keep using the nicknames.

The commission has one full-time employee who reports to O’Brien, and he already is busy with work on Indian burial laws. The commission must contact up to 50 tribes every time American Indian remains are discovered in Colorado.

“I’m just worried about putting something this potentially sensitive and important on the commission, which is only one person,” O’Brien told legislators and the chairmen of Colorado’s two Ute tribes at a meeting Friday…

Last Friday, we discussed the reasons why introducing this kind of “politically correct” legislation in a contentious election year is a bad idea. It’s not that we’re insensitive to the underlying issue, but a whole slew of far more important priorities await the legislature this year–issues the voters will actually care about like the economy and education, issues that can’t be portrayed as sensitivity nannyism at a time when Democrats can least afford it.

Bottom line: this bill needs to die quickly before it turns into a damaging GOP talking point against the Democratic majority as a whole. It has already gotten far too much press. This is the sort of thing that could help turn off PC-averse moderates and independents in the same way Republicans did with their own pet issues before they were swept from power in 2004. The simple logistical reason offered by Lt. Gov. Barbara O’Brien should be all that’s needed to put this bill down quietly, with, we hope, a lesson learned: save it for an off-year.