Breath of fresh air compared to the pseudo-intellectual msm drumbeating about how a recall is not the “correct” way to address these issues: Democracy in Colorado Springs | National Review Online.
I am the first person from the national press that Knight has spoken to directly. “This is not about us,” he explains. “The new gun laws were just the catalyst. A lot of people are very upset about being ignored, so finding vocal moral support hasn’t really been a hard sell. There’s a lesbian couple that’s been very happy in helping us.” I raised my eyebrows at this. “I start there,” he adds, “because people say to me, ‘Well, they couldn’t possibly be interested in helping you.’ Well, sure they can! They care about protecting themselves, too.”
Luke Wagner, one of Knight’s five brothers-in-arms at the Basic Freedom Defense Foundation, set up to fight back against the new gun-control measures passed earlier in the year, explains the wide appeal of the movement to the people of this area. “John Morse couldn’t have given us a better gift than to have thrown something in everybody’s face,” Wagner tells me. “He decided that rural Coloradans aren’t as important as urban Coloradans. He doesn’t like gun owners. He wants to take money from outside of Denver and bring it into Denver for schools. There’s something for everyone!”
“We’ve had a lot of signatures here from people who voted for John Morse,” Knight adds. “He’s made everyone mad. Whether it’s the issue of not listening, or the energy issue [the state has set energy requirements that rural areas say are impossible for them to meet], or the police department coming out against the new gun laws. Even the marijuana people have come out against him for trying to suspend legalization until he could tax and regulate it.” Indeed. The advocacy group the Marijuana Policy Project is so angry with Morse that it has named him the “Nation’s Worst Pot Politician.” In response, many legal-pot advocates have got behind the recall effort at the last minute.
Money, what about the special interest money?
The recall has certainly become a national story, although contrary to the insinuations of the press, the anti-recall side has benefited significantly more from the influx of out-of-state cash and attention than have its champions. The NRA has sunk $361,700 into its own efforts in the state, and Americans for Prosperity is spending here too. This is not an insignificant sum, certainly. But it pales in comparison to progressive efforts. Michael Bloomberg has written a $350,000 check to an anti-recall group, Taxpayers for Responsible Democracy; the entreptreneur Eli Broad has contributed $250,000; and, in total, more than $2 million has been collected to defend the lawmakers fighting the recall. Meanwhile, former Obama staffers are flooding into the state to help with the ground game.
By my tally, the pro-recall coalition is being outspent by a little under 8 to 1, adding to a structural disadvantage that is rendered worse by the establishment’s evident wariness of the recallers’ tactics. “This was an interesting sword that was given to the people of Colorado — the recall sword — and nobody wants to go near those of us who are drawing it,” Knight says. “The gun groups are fractured” and “the Republicans don’t want anything to do with us because they think, ‘Next they’ll recall us.’”
