< PREVIOUS ] [ 2006 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >
Granted, Colorado's divorce rate is somewhat higher than
the national average, but is that a sufficient cause to
subject us to a We must protect the sanctity of
marriage
campaign this year?
But like it or not, we're likely to get one. Last week, the Colorado Coalition for Marriage appeared, and it plans to support an amendment to our state constitution to define marriage as a union between one man and one woman. Since state law already does that, it's hard to see how a constitutional provision would make any difference.
That, however, is not the point. Nor are they really interested in protecting us from whatever might happen if a married gay couple moved in across the street.
The point is that the right-thinkers want their
Republican puppets to regain control of our General
Assembly. They need to get their people to the polls. And
there's nothing like a protect marriage
measure on
the ballot to summon the faithful to the ballot box.
They're going to need all the turn-out they can get if Marc Holtzman wins the Republican nomination for governor. All this time, I had thought he was a conservative, but now it turns out that he's a revolutionary. That's what his campaign manager, Dick Leggitt, said last week.
We're in the process of starting a revolution, and we
understand that some people are going to get off the train
as it goes down the tracks.
It would be revolutionary if the state government started supporting passenger rail transportation in Colorado, but Leggitt was speaking metaphorically.
Leggitt's comments came after Holtzman tore into Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper, who is not a candidate for governor, but might be. In military terms, Holtzman made a pre-emptive strike at Hickenlooper.
Asked on a radio call-in show whether he'd jump out of
an airplane during his campaign, as Hickenlooper did in a
commercial supporting Referendum C last year, Holtzman said
If elected governor, I would be a work horse, not a show
horse.
That's an old line that didn't work in 1978, the first
time I heard it. Republican Ted Strickland was running
against incumbent Democrat Dick Lamm for governor, and that
fall we were treated to televised pictures of horses and
the announcement that Colorado needs a work horse, not a
show horse.
Lamm easily won re-election, though.
Politicians ought to be careful when using equine imagery, because there are many of us who, when seeing a candidate and a horse, immediately think of one end of a horse, and it's not the head. Besides, the slogan makes no sense now when work horses are show horses. Those Clydesdales pulling a beer wagon are for show, not for supplying the local tavern.
Indeed, it's been 30 years since I've seen work horses
actually working. Some ranchers around Kremmling did their
winter feeding with teams hitched to big sleds. It seemed
archaic even then, but I did inquire. The rancher told me
The horses start every morning, which you can't say for
a tractor when it's 40 below. And with a tractor, you've
got to have two guys out there, one to drive it and the
other to stand on the sled and toss hay to the cows. With
horses, one guy can stand in the sled and do it
all.
I suspect, though, that we will never see Holtzman
harnessed to a hay sleigh in yard-deep snow on a gelid
morning, no matter how much of a work horse he promises to
be. Holtzman's horse comments were part of other criticisms
of Hicklenlooper, whom he accused of promoting an overly
secularist agenda.
The last time I checked, the
mayoralty of Denver was a secular office. A bishop is
supposed to have a religious agenda, but not a mayor.
Then Holtzman went on to describe Denver as that
rogue city,
which inspired former Denver City
Councilman Ed Thomas to quit the campaign. I spent nine
years of my professional life developing parts of what you
describe as a 'rogue city,
' Thomas wrote in a letter to
Holtzman. The gratuitous insults directed at John
Hickenlooper and his administration were unfortunate and
unnecessary.
No apology was forthcoming. Marc calls them as he
sees them,
campaign manager Leggitt said. I'm all for
candor. I just wonder what Holtzman sees. Maybe he's
wearing blinders, like many work horses in harness.
< PREVIOUS ] [ 2006 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >