More Poorly Thought Out Udall Legislation

The Denver Post is reporting that Mark Udall dropped more bills in the hopper just before the end of the session:

"You can never start soon enough," said Alan Salazar, chief of staff to Rep. Mark Udall, D-Eldorado Springs. With the presidential election next year, he said, passing bills could become difficult.

"So the sooner you get things done, the easier it is," Salazar said...

Udall also offered one to match a bill from Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash. That one would require Interior Department agencies and the Forest Service to give Congress an annual report on firefighter safety practices, training programs and actions to prevent fires, including prescribed burnings.

On the one hand, Mark Udall champions all of the Sierra Club policies (no road building, no thinning, no firebreaks) which promote huge, hot forest fires and make it hard to do any forest management. Now, he wants a firefighter safety report!

Udall's comprehensive forest fire fighting philosophy makes as much sense as choosing to arm a battalion of soldiers with pistols and then requiring the battalion commander to report how many of his men were killed by rifle fire.

More on the Green Party Demonstration

The Denver Post has a writeup this morning that sheds more light on the demonstration that Mark Udall's staff ducked yesterday.

The Post indicates that they conducted a three week long sit in there and finally exhausted Udall's patience so someone called the cops.

The woman facing jail time has a long demonstration rap sheet. Others involved are only facing $100 fines.

"Following a three-week-long occupation of our district office in March, I also met with them for a two-hour meeting in which I listened to their views on Iraq," [ Alan ] Salazar [Udall's Chief of Staff ] said. "No one has a deeper respect for the right of free speech and civil dissent than my boss. He doesn't agree with this group's views on the best way to end the Iraq war, but he will always stand up for the rights of people to speak out."

Closing the office yesterday was an error in judgement. Except for that, this appears to have been handled rationally by Udall and his staff, and by the prosecutor.