October 14, 2009 08:43 PM UTC

Cheesy Budget Games Continue

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• by: Colorado Pols

The AP reports the latest silliness:

Republican state lawmakers say they’re frustrated after Gov. Bill Ritter refused to sit down with them and discuss budget cuts he plans to announce later this month.

Last week, Ritter’s chief legal counsel, Trey Rogers, rejected a formal request from Republican leaders for a list of budget cuts recommended by the governor’s staff. A copy of the letter was obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press.

In the letter, the Democratic governor said he is withholding the list because it’s a ”work product” that he used in making decisions, and releasing it would ”chill the flow” of information from his staff…

Republicans contend that Ritter may have a good legal argument for withholding the documents but argue that he has a responsibility to involve lawmakers in the process.

After the last round of very bad press for Senate Republicans and Minority Leader/gubernatorial candidate Josh Penry, who were shown to be totally misrepresenting the state payroll to attack Ritter on the budget–who in their right mind would give these guys a draft copy of the next round of cuts? It’s not a good faith request: these are the same Republicans who already voted to give Ritter the power to make these cuts through the beginning of the next legislative session. Republicans admit the legal reason for refusing this open-records request was legitimate. And they agree that there shouldn’t be a special session before next year, so what’s the point of their “frustration?”

Based on their behavior up to now, we’d say the answer is obvious (see title).