January 04, 2012 08:48 PM UTC

Temptation and Bitterness

• 6 Comments
• by: Konola

It is a temptation to write about the results of the Iowa Caucus, since that is what all the talking heads are doing this morning. But I won’t.

Just as Representative Ray Scott wrote an opinion piece in Friday’s Grand Junction Sentinel, Senator Steve King wrote one.  Full disclosure: Senator King blew me out of the water when I ran against him. I’ll try to avoid any residual bitterness in analyzing his performance, but I am constantly mindful of the E-mail he sent me early last year which essentially told me to stop sending him information about the Affordable Care Act because he would be guided by ALEC on that issue. Actually he said that Colorado would be guided by ALEC. He didn’t extend his comment to other issues, but I’m working under the assumption that ALEC writes all legislation he sponsors.

It is no surprise that King’s proudest achievement was the passage of SB11-173, a bill that required schools and law enforcement to have communication systems that worked together.  King works in law enforcement in his day-job, so his bills usually have some relation to law enforcement.

He is also quite proud of sponsoring the bill that changed the name of Mesa State College to Colorado Mesa University, no doubt because he is a graduate of that “university” and even has their mascot’s name as part of his personal E-mail address. Slipping into bitterness, that reminds me of Bruce Springsteen’s song, Glory Days.

The remainder of King’s piece whines about how the bills he sponsored were killed by Democrats in committee, before ever reaching the floor.  Speaking of bitterness:

“The partisan maneuvers made by a handful of Democrats and Senate President Brandon Shaffer to filibuster their own party’s reapportionment bill, thus ensuring that it went to an unelected judge – rather than being decided by the General Assembly as stipulated in the Colorado Constitution – turned the process into a dark Democratic power grab. After all the talk early in the session about bipartisanship and cooperation, this was especially disappointing. Even Gov. Hickenlooper leveled criticism at the Democrats saying: “The truth is, I was disappointed” that things worked out “with so much bitterness.”

When I ran against King, he never seemed able to differentiate between Colorado issues and national issues. His article continues the trend.

“If the federal government could limit itself to the job it is supposed to be doing, it wouldn’t need to take up so much of the tax base away from the states. The federal government has taken on more and more of the states’ business, using up most of the tax base to help pay for entitlements, leaving the states with very little. The states are put in a position of having to rely even more on Washington, D.C., and the mandates that go with our dependency.

Now, when the federal government has spent itself to the tipping point of insolvency, it is the states that are left to give more, receive less and feel the pain of compounding debt. In the end, Colorado citizens and our children, and their children and their children’s children will pay for the inability of D.C. to live within its means and balance its books – something that we have done every year since joining the Union.

This leaves us with another budget battle looming. I, like my Republican colleagues in both chambers, will refuse to kill the modest economic recovery that has started in our state by taxing our way to “government prosperity.” We realize this would only prolong this difficult situation. For Colorado to be successful, its citizens must have the freedom to be successful. That will ONLY be possible if we keep government out of the way, and reduce the burden of regulation, mandates and overhead on the businesses that will provide that growth.”

Finally, just as Ray Scott is in the pocket of the oil and gas industry, King is making nice with coal, promising to sponsor a bill that will delay implementation of clean air standards in Colorado. Looks like I’ll be blogging a lot about his efforts this year. Such temptation!