Nothing wrong with a Congressman speculating on what President Obama might do.

But Rep. Cory Gardner’s speculation Saturday, on a national Voice of America show, that Obama will approve the Keystone pipeline later this year in exchange for a “regulatory action on greenhouse gasses” deserves media scrutiny.

The radio host apparently didn’t have the inclination to ask Gardner about his sources for the intel about Obama (presumably he has at least two such sources, and they’re not talk-radio hosts).

Neither was Gardner asked, more generally, for a ray of light into why he thinks Obama might do these things.

This leaves the door wide open for some journalist to ask Gardner for the substance behind his Keystone assertions.

Here’s more of Gardner’s thoughts on the topic:

GARDNER: You know, I actually think that the president will approve the pipeline. I think that sometime later in the fall of 2013 that the president will approve the pipeline. Now, I think there will be a trade-off, because he does have a significant number of his supporters that oppose the pipeline. So I think there is going to be some kind of a quid pro quo, so to speak, — an action that the president will take to try to say, “Well, all right. I’ve approved the Keystone pipeline. I’m also doing this” to try to appease or satisfy the people who [are] opposed to the approval of the pipeline. What that will be? My guess is it will be some kind of a regulatory action on greenhouse gases that could make it even more difficult to develop energy in this country. But I do think he wil approve it, but it’s going to come with something.

Just a couple days before Cynthia Coffman officially launched her campaign for Colorado state attorney general, State Rep. Mark Waller sounded awfully serious when he told KNUS’ Jimmy Sengenberger that he was considering entering the race as well.

Here’s what Waller told Sengenberger June 10:

Sengenberger: Rumor has it, your name has been tossed about in consideration for Attorney General. Is that a thought process that you are going through, or what can you tell us?

Waller: You know, certainly several people have approached me on that issue. They have asked me to do that. They think given my law enforcement background, my background as an Iraqi war veteran, and my background in the legislature, that that might be a great opportunity for me to serve going forward. So, we are certainly considering that. We haven’t made any final decisions at this moment in time, but I’d be looking for something soon.

Sengenberger was subbing for Steve Kelley, who’s been out recovering from a car crash, and he should bring Waller back on the KNUS morning show to find out if Coffman’s official announcement affected Waller’s thinking on the AG race.

Rep. Cory Gardner (R-CO) is reportedly sympathetic to a move by county leaders in northern Colorado to secede from the state.

It doesn’t appear that he’s been asked directly if he supports slicing a new state out of Colorado, but based on his statement below, it’s a reasonable question to ask.

Two country commissioners in northern Colorado are talking secession (See here) because they think Democrats who control the state Legislature are waging a war on rural Colorado. They point to new gun and renewable-energy laws as prime evidence for this, even though polls show support across Colorado for these measures.

Instead of condemning secession as contrary to the American way of standing together and working out problems in a non-tantrum-like-manner, Gardner, who represents northern Colorado, said this to the Post Independent last week.

The district that U.S. Rep. Cory Gardner, R-Colo. comes from would be split, but Gardner said in a statement on Thursday that he is sympathetic to what commissioners are doing.

“The people of rural Colorado are mad, and they have every right to be,” he said in the statement. “The governor and his Democrat colleagues in the statehouse have assaulted our way of life, and I don’t blame these people one bit for feeling attacked and unrepresented by the leaders in our state.”

Gardner has close ties to Weld County Commissioner Sean Conway, who’s a leader of the secession effort. They worked for Colorado Senator Wayne Allard from 2002 through 2005, when Gardner left to run for the CO statehouse.

Reporters apparently missed Secretary of State Scott Gessler’s first direct response to the Colorado Independent Ethics Commission’s finding that he violated state ethics law and “breeched the public trust for private gain.”

Gessler made his comments on KNUS’ Kelley and Company (710-AM) this morning, and reporters should have tuned in. So I’ll fill in the media gap and provide a transcript of most of his comments below. And I’ll update this post with audio of the interview later today.

Guest host Jimmy Sengenberger, filling in for regular host Steve Kelley, did a decent job interviewing Gessler.

Click Here for Audio

Sengenberger: What’s your side of the story?

Gessler: …The Elections Commission, unfortunately, is a just very partisan-driven organization. I mean, two of the members have actually contributed to Hickenlooper, sort of really staunch partisan Democrats. It was pretty clear seven months ago which direction these guys were going. It took them eight months to figure out how to do it. But it was really sort of an unfair process, and it’s frustrating, because you want to think that these guys are going to be fair and even-handed and you want to think that the IRS is going to be fair and even-handed, and you want to think that, you know, things work. But they really don’t a lot of the time. So we are going to be appealing. I’m pretty confident that we’re going to get it overturned because of the way these guys handled themselves.

Sengenberger: I’m curious as to what the Independent Ethics Commission claimed you violated in terms of a statute, rule, or anything in the Constitution that might be in play?

Gessler: Right now I just don’t know. I don’t know. I really don’t know. I mean they had deliberations and they said learning about elections is not official business, which just sort of seems crazy when everyone else disagrees with them.  And that was one of the most frustrating things. We spent seven months trying to get them to tell us what the legal standards were. And then a month ago they said the legal standards could be one of these two things or they could be something else, and we’ll tell you afterwards. And so we still don’t know. So, I mean, maybe when the draw up the report they’ll sort of tell me at that point. But that’s one of the frustrating areas. They just sort of make up the rules as they go along.

Sengenberger: …What do you make of the argument that, well, that you shouldn’t have done it, used discretionary funds, taxpayer money, for something that had a partisan tilt to it?

Gessler: Well, it didn’t have a partisan tilt. That’s the bottom line….We produced a three-hundred-page binder of all the materials that were discussed. None of it was partisan stuff…. I know it had the word Republican in front of it, that was the sponsoring organization, but it was not a partisan event. It was straight-up education. And all the evidence before the commission said that. But they are not really interested in the evidence before them. It was a very partisan-driven outlook.

Sengenberger: …I’m curious as to why you ended up paying back the twelve-hundred-something that you chose to pay back?

Gessler: $1278. Here’s why. I’m just trying to move on when it comes to what goes on with the people of the state of Colorado. But, the money here has been an absolute waste. The last Republican Secretary of State we had, Mike Coffman, also received a complaint from the same organization in front of the same ethics commission. And that cost probably about probably $100,000 to dispute. So these types of frivolous things have cost the state around a quarter million dollars already. And it is just sort of absurd. And you want to put it behind you. You want to have fair elections. You want to move on to trying to make it easier for people to do business and have jobs in the state of Colorado and things like that. I’m trying to put it behind me. I’m trying to push forward. And of course it’s a very vindictive organization and they’re not interested in that–the ethics commission. So that was the purpose. And I was very clear. Look, I don’t think we’ve done anything wrong. I don’t think we’ve ever done anything wrong. But $1,278 is a pretty big distraction when there’s been hundreds of thousands spent arguing over it. Let’s try to put it behind us. Let’s try to move forward. But, you know, even that’s not acceptable because the Ethics Watch organization—no I’m sorry—Ethics Commission. They all sort of blend together after a while.

Sengenbrenner: Yeah.

Gessler: They’re not really interested in that. They’re interested in progressive [inaudible] because they know there’s an election coming up. So they can use this as a way to generate television ads and what not. I mean, that’s really what it’s about. So it’s very frustrating.

Sengenberger: [The left is saying you should have used funds from the travel budget, not the discretionary budget.]

Gessler: They are really sort of nonsensical. I mean, they’re saying I should have used a different fund rather than this fund to go. But it was ok, but if it wasn’t ok, then I shouldn’t have done it. It’s absolutely nonsensical. What it is is a talking point. A talking point. There’s no sense or coherence. Bottom line. Everybody who’s reviewed this, except of course the Ethics Commission, the Colorado Supreme Court, an outside auditor, the State Comptroller, said this was absolutely appropriate for me to do. That’s the bottom line. The left can jabber all they want, and, of course, the Ethics Commission is part of the left. I mean they are driven by my political adversaries.  I mean those are the people who judged me on this. They can jabber all they want. We now go before a real court, the district court and federal courts here. We’re going before a real court with real-world procedure. And this is just a stop on the way going forward, because, look, if you believe in this. You shouldn’t have a government agency that’s politically driven that chews people up. We’ve seen that at the IRS. We’ve seen that with the Ethics Commission. Look at it from that standpoint. I’m not going to stand for it.

After the Republican election disaster of 2012, there was a lot of talk about how GOP leaders had constructed a giant bubble around themselves, protecting them from facts that could have saved them from the November collapse.

The bubble remains unbroken in many quarters on talk radio, as you’d have known if you tuned to KNUS’ “Backbone Radio,” Sunday, featuring a conversation between former state Senate President John Andrews and host Matt Dunn.

Things got interesting when the two began discussing who’s sufficiently conservative to speak at Andrews’ upcoming Western Conservative Summit, sponsored by the Centennial Institute and Colorado Christian University.

Mike Huckabee, Scott Walker, Alan West, and Jonas Goldberg got big thumbs up. (They will be there.)

But NJ governor Chris Christie got the big thumbs down, and Andrews said Marco Rubio could get booed, if he were a speaker:

Andrews:  I, honestly, haven’t really worked hard to get [Christie] this year.  I don’t regard him as a conservative.  This is a conservative summit.  We took a good run at getting Senator Marco Rubio–

Dunn:  Yeah, I was going to ask.

Andrews:  a gifted young conservative –

Dunn:  How would Rubio be received. We’re down to about 20 seconds, but how would he be received at the Summit right now?

Andrews:  I think with a lot of skepticism.  There might be some boos from the audience because of what he’s trying to do on amnesty, to be honest with you.  A very gifted guy, but he has taken – he has set his foot wrong on this one.

Dunn:  It’s interesting to me that it seems that Ted Cruz is the ascendant.  And Marco Rubio is the opposite right now.  Who would have thought?

I like to picture these two guys sitting in a bubble-enclosed radio studio floating away from the city of Denver and planet Earth.

Why are they shielding themselves from their own allies, like Christie, who isn’t an exact replica of them?

Is it time for Andrews let some fresh air into his definition of “conservative?”

Those are the kind of questions that Dunn should address on his show, but his radio studio is probably too far into outer space by now for him to read this blog post and accept my reasonable advice.

Former state GOP Chairman Dick Wadhams believes Colorado Republicans should find state-wide candidates modeled after Wayne Allard, Bill Armstrong, Bill Owens, and Hank Brown.

“They were candidates that appealed to a broad section of Coloradans,” Wadhams told internet-radio host Art Carlson Saturday. “They didn’t go out of their way to alienate any Colorado voter. And as a result, they won in a state that’s very competitive, like Colorado. And that’s what we need in 2014.”

Nothing unusual there, but the funny part was, Wadhams went on to praise a possible GOP candidate who’s obviously among the most alienating public figures in Colorado.

“I think it’s difficult to start a campaign when you’re dealing with those ethical assaults [resulting form the ethics investigation Gessler faces],” Wadhams told Calrson. “But if Scott can get past them, if he can get beyond those charges against him, he’ll emerge as a strong candidate.”

What about the need to find a person who won’t “alienate any Colorado voter?” I can think of at least a few voters that Gessler might have alienated, maybe Hispanics, minorities, and the entire voting population of Colorado, for example, but unfortunately Carlson let the topic slide by.

Listen to the Wadhams interview here: Dick Wadhams discusses Scott Gessler on Arts Place 6-8-2013

Wadhams called Gessler “a great friend,” who’s “done some great work as Secretary of State.”

“It’s now been 11 years since Republicans won a race United States Senate or for Governor,” Wadhams told the internet audience. “…The common thread among the people who’ve won statewide for governor and senator as Republicans is that they were very disciplined candidates.”

“If the intention is to win an election, I think Republicans have to take this seriously and really make a decision on who can win,” said Wadhams. “And that’s not because they become overnight liberals or something. Wayne Allard and Bill Owens were two of the most conservative legislators when they ran for state-wide office and yet they could articulate their conservative agenda in a very open and welcoming way for all Coloradans to consider. We don’t need Republicans who will alienate large blocs of voters.”

If I were host Carlson, I would have asked Wadhams if substantive changes, even itsy bitsy ones, are required by GOP candidates to avoid the alienation trap.

Or is this all about messaging, like Wadhams implies? What about some specific policy proposals related to abortion? Hispanics? The environment? Poverty? Healthcare? Education? Taxes?

Those issues never came up. Carlson should have dug deep and asked about them.

On Greeley’s KFKA radio June 7, gun activist Laura Carno asked:

Does [Senate President John Morse] stand by the Colorado Senate Democrats’ tweet that sheriffs, including the Democrats, are standing with criminals for challenging these gun control measures in court?

Host Amy Oliver, who doubles as a staffer for the Independence Institute and is promoted by KFKA as “conservative,  intelligent, and sexy,” jumped in (@22:30):

We’ve talked about that.  They tweeted out, “Sheriffs stand for criminals and against law-abiding citizens.”

Oliver neglected to mention that, in reality, CO Senate Democrats tweeted that pro-gun sheriffs stood “with criminals” because a man who shot a gun at his wife was actually standing (physically with both feet planted) on stage with the Sheriffs, when they announced their lawsuit aiming to overturn new laws banning on magazines holding more than 15 rounds and requiring background checks for most gun purchases and transfers.

As reported by ColoradoPols May 17, Clint Webster was standing with the sheriffs at a May 17 news conference at the Independence Institute.

Webster has a criminal record stemming from threatening his wife and shooting at her and another person.

The Post reported in 2010 that Webster, who was running for State House, “threatened to kill his ex-wife and fired two shots from a Colt semi automatic pistol at her and another person as they drove away from his house.”

Webster “pleaded guilty in 1992 to second-degree assault, a felony, two counts of felony menacing and a misdemeanor assault charge,” according to The Post.

Colorado Springs TV station KRDO made the same mistake in May 29 putting the standing-with-criminals comment in context on its website but completely omitting a reference to Webster and his gun crime in its broadcast story.

This is a serious error, because without the reference to Webster, you’d think Democrats were accusing sheriffs of standing with criminals just because the sheriffs oppose gun-safety laws. This was clearly not the intent of Democrats.

Just so you know, here’s the statement issued by Senate Democrats in response to questions about why sheriffs would stand with criminals.

“The statement was pointing out the irony of the sheriffs protesting legislation that prevents criminals from getting guns while standing with a man who shot at his wife and another unnamed person who was with his wife.

In the photo below, there is Larimer County Sheriff Justin Smith (wearing glasses) at the press conference. Next to him is Clint Webster, who was convicted of felony assault and menacing for shooting twice at his wife. So the Sheriffs are quite literally standing with a criminal, and not just any criminal, a domestic violence offender who fired two shots from a Colt semi-automatic handgun at his wife.”

Hard to miss the point, isn’t it?

If you want to hear what the base voters of the Republican Party are thinking, tune to…talk radio!

This is especially true when the radio hosts themselves are former Republican officials and office holders, as is the case with former CU regent Tom Lucero and former Larimer County GOP executive Devon Lentz, who hold forth as co-hosts in the mornings on KFKA radio in Greeley.

Lucero and Lentz were worked up Wednesday morning about immigration, as they’ve been in the past, and their conversation gives us a local window into the reasons the immigration-reform bill seems to have hit a brick fence in the GOP-controlled House of Representatives.

Lucero can’t understand why Sen. Marco Rubio, the Florida Republican who’s been pushing federal immigration reform, would promote a bill that offers a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.

“I think if Rubio were serious about it,” said Lucero on air Wed., “he would have come out with just two bills that dealt with employment, and border security. But he got sucked in, in Washington D.C., and now you’re talking about a pathway to citizenship; you’re talking about people with the opportunity to vote within ‘x’ number of years.”

“We’re rewarding people that are here illegally!” responded Lentz.

“Exactly!” said Lucero

“The rules are in place for a reason!” Lentz added. “Enforce ‘em, and let’s move forward from there!  Not change them!  Because somebody has violated rules for ten years, doesn’t make it acceptable. Let’s make an exception to the rule for them?”

Lucero and Lentz (like Rep. Cory Gardner) clearly aren’t happy with the bipartisan Senate proposal to ramp up border security, with specific milestones, as comprehensive immigration reform moves forward.

“Let’s start with border security,” Lucero told his listeners, who you could almost see nodding out there in conservative radioland. “Keep those out that want to come in, and those that are here, they’re here.  So then we deal with it after the border is secure.  First, first – first step has to be border security.”

Is Rubio dividing the GOP, wondered Lucero and Lentz.

Lucero thinks Rubio has put Republicans in an “awkward position.”

Lucero feels the pressure that Rubio puts on him and Tea-Party Republicans: “If Marco Rubio supports it, why can’t you?  Marco Rubio is quote/unquote one of those Tea Party renegade senators in the U.S. Senate and if a conservative like Rubio can support it, why can’t you?”

“I don’t know that [Rubio is] dividing the Party,” Lucero said on the radio, “but he’s not making it easy for Republicans out there that don’t support comprehensive immigration reform–Republicans who support ‘secure the borders, all borders, all ports of entry,’ and who want an employment verification system. Yeah, Marco Rubio is making it difficult on those of us who believe in that. That’s my conclusion.”

UPDATE 8:15 p.m. with comment from Personhood USA.

——-

As expected, Gov. Hickenlooper signed a bill Wed. making it a crime to cause the death of a fetus due to a reckless act against a woman (like a drunk driver hitting a pregnant woman).

Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains issued a statement praising the bill’s sponsors, Reps. Mike Foote and Claire Levy, and Sen. Pat Steadman, and stating that the new law “empowers district attorneys and other members of law enforcement to hold criminals accountable for crimes against a pregnant woman which result in the loss of her pregnancy.

“The bill was thoughtfully crafted to protect pregnant women without impeding upon a woman’s right to access reproductive health care,” according to Planned Parenthood. “We thank our state lawmakers for focusing their time and energy on a bill that positively supports women.”

Some Republicans, as well as Personhood USA, opposed the bill, which GOP Sen. Scott Renfroe, referred to as the “Let’s-Go-on-Killing-Babies” bill, because it didn’t give legal rights to zygotes (fertilized eggs) or other forms of human development. The law specifically does not “confer the status of ‘person’ on any human embryo, fetus, or unborn child at any state of development prior to live birth.”

Personhood activists, who aim to ban all abortion and some common forms of birth control, are gathering signatures for a ballot initiative that would give legal rights to all “unborn human beings.” The fact that this phrase is not defined in the text of the ballot question makes abortion-rights activists worry that courts could interpret it to mean that all forms of human development, starting with zygotes, should receive legal protection, thus banning all abortion and some common forms of birth control.

Personhood USA spokesperson Jennifer Mason commented via email on the new Violence Against Pregnant Women law:

Mason: Heather Surovik, whose nearly full-term son was killed when she was struck by a drunk driver near her due date, has opposed the Violence Against Pregnant Women act, calling it “possibly the most deceptive bill ever to be signed into law in Colorado.” Like Heather, Personhood USA recognizes that Planned Parenthood and its supporters carefully worded this bill to repeal criminal abortion laws and protect abortion providers even in cases of gross negligence, all under the guise of decrying violence. This bill specifically denies rights and recognition to babies like Brady Surovik, which is why Personhood USA will continue to support Heather Surovik’s petition drive for true justice for pregnant victims, without the hidden agenda of Colorado’s pro-choice political activists.

This afternoon Hick will sign a bill setting a state standard for the amount of electricity rural electricity associations must produce from renewable sources, like wind and solar, according to Fox 31′s Eli Stokols.

Judging from past coverage, Republican opponents of the bill will try to cast it as an attack on rural Colorado.

When Rep. Jared Wright tried to do this back in April, the Grand Junction Sentinel’s Charles Ashby pointed out that the Rural Electricity Association in his area supported the renewable-standard bill (SB 252).

So reporters should check for meat behind accusations of an Democratic attack on the ranchers and others in rural counties, if those accusations start flying again today.

Evidence of meatlessness and manipulation by those claiming “war on rural Colorado” can be found in an article about SB 252 in the news letter of the Rocky Mountain Farmers Union’s May “Legis Letter.” The bill was vehemently opposed by a large electricity association called Tri-State Generation and Transmission. Here’s an excerpt from the May RMFU newsletter:

Tri-State and the rural electric family chose to draw a line in the sand, and now we are stuck with goals that may be a challenge to achieve. By refusing to listen to RMFU and other rural and agricultural groups looking for a reasonable compromise, Tri-State only managed one achievement: driving a new wedge between rural and urban Coloradoans.

In the run up to the vote on SB 252, industry “pundits” were predicting the end of civilization: Unemployment in rural communities will double! Rural utility customers will be bankrupted! Urban Colorado declares war on rural Colorado!

Ag groups were caught in the middle, trying to get both sides to listen rather than shout slogans. On the one hand, we don’t want to see rural communities hurt by utility costs; on the other, the sky was not, in spite of what was being shouted, falling. Urban Colorado is working toward a much higher portfolio standard than rural Colorado. They don’t see why that’s fair, and the answer is more complicated than most people understand. But that’s not warfare; it’s a time to talk over our differences. [BigMedia emphasis]

The newsletter quoted Rocky Mountain Farmers Union President Kent Peppler, who criticized the uncompromising opposition to SB252. RMFU was neutral on the bill, even though its Renewable Energy Chair sits on the Tri-State Board.

Here’s Peppler’s quote in the RMFU newsletter:

“The lesson in this legislative setback,” said RMFU President Kent Peppler, “is that ‘My way or the highway’ only works if you have the votes. The REAs didn’t have the votes, and ignoring their agricultural constituents and potential allies didn’t help that problem. Going down in flames may be noble, but it doesn’t get the job done. Now the real work has to begin. The last thing we should let this do is poison our commitment to renewables. Homegrown power is coming of age for communities, individuals, and facilities. The demand for renewables means new opportunities for rural communities, new jobs for rural communities, and new businesses keeping our rural communities alive.” [BigMedia emphasis]