February 07, 2019 09:18 AM UTC

Rep. Doug Lamborn Scoffs At You Meddling Kids

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• by: Colorado Pols

The Colorado Independent’s Robin Bravender reports on freshly quotable remarks from Colorado’s least inspiring Congressman, Rep. Doug Lamborn of Colorado Springs–who has a thing or two to say about these whipper-snapper first-year Democrats, and their high-falutin’ idears for green energy and other such pies in the sky:

The Democrats’ sweeping plan sounds “too much like a Soviet five-year plan or something like that,” Lamborn told his colleagues Wednesday at a U.S. House hearing about climate change. The 5th District Republican, who represents Colorado Springs, said of the Green New Deal: It’s “simply not going to work.”

…Lamborn, 64, told the Natural Resources Committee he can understand how some of his younger colleagues have bought into the idea.

“You only have to be 25 years old to be a member of Congress, and we have young people that bring a lot of great qualities, but maybe they don’t bring a lot of life experience,” he said. “I guess I can understand if someone has not a lot of life experience and they’re proposing something that’s extremely unrealistic, well, impossible.”

He can’t understand how “adults and grownups, who are more mature,” would also be advocating for the plan, he said. [Pols emphasis]

Ouch, grandpa! Of course, there are plenty of “grownups” well over the age of 25 who argue a swift and determined migration to renewable energy is an urgent priority–and if Lamborn speaks for the rest of the Republican Party in declaring 25-year-old Americans are not “adults and grownups,” well, that’s a big problem for Republicans in…every future election? It’s tough to imagine the 18-25 bloc of voters ever taking that kindly.

It’s not really a surprise to see Rep. Lamborn put off by bold initiatives from the new Democratic majority in the House, with basically no legislative accomplishments of his own to celebrate after over a decade in Congress. When Lamborn does make the press, it’s usually for embarrassing self-injury like referring to President Barack Obama as a “tar baby.” In the Colorado legislature, Lamborn was best known for his quest to swap the names of Colorado’s Mount Democrat and Republican Mountain so that Republicans would have the taller mountain (this is not a joke).

So no, like that special baby boomer in your life who talks about “kids today” with a disapproving sneer, it’s a safe bet that Rep. Lamborn is never going to be a supporter of the Green New Deal. It may unfortunately be necessary for another election to pass before anything like this plan has a realistic chance of becoming law, serving until then as a point of contrast between the two parties for voters.

And though his own seat may be safe, Lamborn is a good contrast for voters everywhere too.

Especially the younger ones.