Rep Marilyn Musgrave won an amendment to a Justice Department appropriations bill that would prevent any money from being spent to enforce a mandate that gun dealers sell trigger locks with the guns that they sell. The article in the Rocky Mountain News is less than flattering for Musgrave. There are several things about this issue that amuse/frustrate me.

1. Why is Musgrave taking the heat for this? Sure, she sponsored it, but the amendment passed 230-191. Why don’t we write articles about the other 230 that voted for it, including Democrat Ken Salazar?
2. How do laws like this get passed without any appropriations attached? Let’s pass a law that we can’t pass laws unless we have a way to enforce/pay for them.
3. Why do we listen to guys like Peter Hamm who only come up with half the facts?

Hamm said that

last year, 2,849 children or teen-agers died from gunfire in the United States, and he believes trigger locks are key to reducing the fatalities.

Lets have some real analysis on these facts Mr. Hamm. How many were gang killings? How many involved newly purchased handguns? How many involved handguns at all? Why are trigger locks ‘key to reducing the fatalities’ other than because you say so?

Personally I’m glad this ridiculous law won’t get enforced (would have saved a lot of time and money if it had never been passed to start with). The liberals in this country know they can’t get the 2nd amendment repealed, so they just keep making it harder and harder for ‘licensed gun dealers’ to stay in business. If they have their way guns will still be legal, but the only way to buy them will be on the black market.

Of cource, Paccione supporters seem to be using this as a rallying issue. Funny, I haven’t read a Paccione press release yet with a strong stance on gun control…

Ault citizens have started circulating a petition to recall Mayor James Fladung. Fladung was arrested April 30 on charges of assault, domestic violence and child abuse, which he subsequently plead guilty to. There have also been additional allegations of excessive alcohol consumption, some conflicting with civic activities. Fladung refused the Ault City Council’s request that he resign.

City Council has put this item off. Discussion will continue at the Aug. 8 work session and a final reading will be done at the Aug. 15 council meeting - after the July 18th hearing to designate the Cranford neighborhood as a historic district. The reasoning for this was

…the council will have a better understanding of the process, which can help them make a better-informed decision about the ordinance.

Seems a little suspect to me - the Cranford decision is the issue that caused this proposed ordinance…

Tonight’s City Council meeting will discuss the controversial historic district ordinance.

A public hearing and final reading of the ordinance that will change the city code regarding historic preservation will be held at tonight’s council meeting.

As part of the report yesterday on City Council expenditures, the Greeley Tribune article noted that

Councilman Ed Phillipsen does not use e-mail and has no charges for the Internet.

It’s interesting that the City’s website lists an email address for him. I wonder who reads the email sent to that address? I also wonder how someone that doesn’t use email ended up on our city council.

In response to a request from City Councilman Ed Phillipsen the City of Greely presented a Forty-six page summary of Greeley City Council expenses since 2002. The report wasn’t particularly detailed since that would have taken 20 hours of city worker’s time to produce.

Mayor Selders was satisfied with the results, stating

No unusual spending appears in the available information

The real question here should be why does it take 20 hours of city time to create this type of report? Why is this information not published annually? As citizens of Greeley we have a right to know how our money is being spent, and with the availability of the Internet the City should have no problem making the information both complete and accessible via their website and a reasonable cost.

Fox News has an interesting story about someone stuffing dog poop through a mail slot at Marilyn Musgrave’s Greeley office. A spokesmen for Musgrave, of course, demanded an apology from Angela Paccione

The best part is, the assailant used an envelope from her own house with her nine digit Zip code on it. This allowed police to narrow the search down to 4 or 5 houses and find the house that had a dog. Sounds like an episode of CSI to me.

Just a note to anyone out there that thinks all of us western hicks are crazy. This is NOT represntative of the Greeley population. The rest of us would have known you are supposed to set the dog poop on fire…