July 31, 2009 05:43 PM UTC

Penry, Ritter Echo "Bipartisan Thud," McInnis Hides Behind Penry Supporter

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• by: Colorado Pols

Improving quite a bit on last week’s eyebrow-raisingly shoddy journalism, the Grand Junction Sentinel’s Gary Harmon comes respectably close today to setting the record straight:

The U.S. Energy Department’s proposal to store mercury in Mesa County has united Gov. Bill Ritter and two leading contenders for Ritter’s job.

In a letter he sent to Energy Secretary Steven Chu on Wednesday, Ritter described the proposal to dispose of the federal government’s stores of mercury as “deeply flawed.”

Two Grand Junction Republicans who want to take on Ritter in the November 2010 general election, Scott McInnis and Josh Penry, agreed.

The proposal to store mercury in Mesa County “has been met with a bipartisan thud,” Penry said. “I hope the Obama administration will pull the plug. We’re not interested in their mercury stimulus.”

McInnis, according to his spokesman, Sean Duffy, “looks forward to seeing the specific results that will come from (Ritter’s) letter. An equally aggressive approach to the continuing economic and jobs problems on the Western Slope would certainly be welcome.”

A nice warm fuzzy to cap this little exchange–as much as we love bloodsport controversy it’s refreshing to see some bipartisan unanimity once in awhile. We guess it’s unanimous, anyway–in a related Denver Post story today, reporter Lynn Bartels clears up additional details and talks to both Republican candidates about the issue. Curiously, candidate Scott McInnis seems reluctant to personally go on record. Why is he still hiding behind Steve King?

As for McInnis, he is against shipping mercury to Colorado but is letting local politicians handle it, said Sean Duffy, a McInnis spokesman. Republican state Rep. Steve King, R-Grand Junction, has come out against the proposal.

“We didn’t feel compelled to bang around in it because Steve was on top of it,” Duffy said.

We’re starting to think, like we said a few days ago, that maybe Steve King should be running for Governor instead of McInnis. Bartels also reported that Penry did in fact send his letter of opposition to the Energy Department pretty quickly after the hearing last week, vindicating him on a key question we had about his timing–and with Ritter having taken his own strong position against, that pretty much leaves only McInnis’ lame “Steve King speaks for me” nonresponses, you know, wanting.

One other thing: It’s our understanding that Rep. King actually supports Penry in the GOP gubernatorial primary. Do you think it’s a good idea for McInnis to use him this way? That’s one human shield we could picture morphing into a helpful toss…under the bus.