April 14, 2009 05:18 PM UTC

Penry Chumps Self

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• by: Colorado Pols

The Denver Post reported today:

Gov. Bill Ritter said Monday that a potential $300 million cut to Colorado colleges is off the table, though he offered no guidance on how to solve the state’s shortfall as the Senate moved forward with a plan that taps money from a workers’ compensation insurer….

Senate Minority Leader Josh Penry, R-Grand Junction, said he would like to know where Ritter stands on those proposals so lawmakers can make decisions that won’t fall under the veto pen when the governor receives the budget later this month.

He and other Republicans ripped Ritter on Monday for staying silent on politically difficult choices. [Pols emphasis]

“He’s the guy who could nip all this in the bud,” Penry said. “But he’s invisible. It’s left a vacuum of uncertainty that other governors would have filled.”

We’re not here to take issue with what Minority Leader Josh Penry said about the Governor yesterday–people have their opinions about Ritter’s management style for good or ill, we’ve said a time or two that we wish Ritter would take a more active role in some of these contentious battles–before the surprise veto pen.

But what the hell was Penry telling the Grand Junction Sentinel last Friday in that case? Kind of looks like more or less the exact opposite thing:

Gov. Bill Ritter is pulling the strings in the legislative debate on the proposed $17.9 billion budget, [Pols emphasis] which is predicated on large cuts to higher education, according to state Sen. Josh Penry, R-Grand Junction…

“Then the governor inserted himself and said to move it along” as proposed by the budget committee, said Penry, the Senate minority leader.

Alrighty then, either the Governor is failing at his job because he’s “staying silent” on the budget, like Penry said yesterday, or he’s “pulling the strings” on the whole business–like he said Friday? Since those would seem to be pretty much, you know, mutually exclusive, it would be nice to have him, like, pick one. We thought this quote from Penry was silly on Friday when we first saw it (folks know better), but to see him 180-degree contradict himself the next business day? Did he think people wouldn’t read both papers or something?

Ah, forget it. Maybe we are the only ones who find it interesting that this guy can’t maintain a consistent argument from one paragraph to the next.