April 05, 2009 05:03 PM UTC

Nobody Ever Said Penry Was Stupid

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• by: Colorado Pols

We’ve had a few adjectives to apply to Senate Minority Leader Josh Penry over the last few months, but “stupid” has never been one of them. And we’re not above pointing out when possible gubernatorial candidate Penry actually says something quite smart, and reflective of strategic thinking–as the AP reported earlier this week:

A bill allowing illegal immigrants to pay in-state college tuition survived a narrow committee vote in the Colorado Senate on Wednesday, with Republicans accusing majority Democrats of using bare-knuckle “Tom DeLay tactics” to keep the measure alive.

Democrats scheduled the vote during the absence of a Republican senator whose vote likely would have stalled the bill.

That prompted Senate Minority Leader Josh Penry of Grand Junction to compare the Democrats to DeLay, the Texas Republican whose strong-arm tactics as speaker of the U.S. House earned him the nickname “The Hammer.”

Democrats denied manipulating the schedule…

The bill had originally been scheduled for a vote Friday, when [Sen. Ted] Harvey is due to return, but it was rescheduled for Wednesday.

Penry said Democrats didn’t give Republicans enough time to ask for another Republican to temporarily take Harvey’s place on the committee. He accused Democrats of moving up the vote to take advantage of Harvey’s absence.

“It’s either that or an amazing coincidence. It’s reminiscent of what the Republicans did in Washington. These are Tom DeLay tactics,” Penry said.

Just makes you want to explode–the hypocrisy, right? Not so fast–Penry may have an (R) after his name but one thing you can’t claim is that he’s in any way associated with the Tom DeLay clique of ruthless Republican congressmen from the 1990s. The fact that he can credibly say he’s not a part of that corrupt culture is, when you get right down to it, one of Penry’s greatest assets going into an election for higher office.

Unlike, and you’d be a fool to think this wasn’t in the back of Penry’s mind, that guy (above photo). Scott “McLobbyist” McInnis (left) knows a thing or two about Tom DeLay (right)…doesn’t he? Well, doesn’t he? “How the hell did this just become about me?” Scooter will ask when this quote gets pulled out in a primary debate…

Like we said, Penry can be accused of plenty of things, but lack of basic political cleverness isn’t one of them. We think he knew very well what he was saying, subtext not just included but key–and it was a very smart thing to say.