Remember this Denver Post headline, after the June 24 Republican primary: "In Bob Beauprez, Colorado GOP goes with mainstream contender."
I rolled my eyes at the time because, I'd been following Beauprez, who's now running to unseat Gov. John Hickenlooper, for years and knew him to be far outside the mainstream, as seen in his support of replacing income tax with a "consumption" or sales tax, just to name one Tea Party favorite.
Maybe whoever wrote The Post's June 24 headline knows better now than to characterize Beauprez as a "mainstream contender," as his Tea Party leanings have oozed out in the news over the past few months. (See his comments about Obama pushing America close to "civil war" and about 47 percent of Americans being "perfectly happy" to let someone else pay the bill.
If not, Beauprez's statement yesterday, in response to a question from KLZ 560-AM guest host Jimmy Sengenberger, should seal the deal:
"I have said for years, Jimmy, that this [the Tea Party] is the healthiest civic movement I have seen in my lifetime, and I'm almost 66 now. I don't think I've ever witnessed a time where people have stood up and said, I want to save this Republic. I want my government back, and focused primarily on constitutional originality and fiscal discipline. It can't get any better than that. The time is absolutely. Are there disagreements among various groups and various individuals. Sure. Or is it always a perfect, clear smooth path. No, of course not. It wasn't in our nation's founding either. But if this nation is going to survive. If we are going to be that greatest nation on god's green Earth, it isn't up to government. It is up to the people. And this uprising that we broadly call the Tea Party movement in my opinion, again, is the healthiest thing we have seen in very long time in America." [BigMedia emphasis]
What kind of mainstream candidate could possibly say this? None. Ask Ted Cruz or Sarah Palin.
And during a separate radio interview yesterday, reported by The Denver Post's Joey Bunch, Beauprez proved the point.
As you know if you've followed the death of bipartisan immigration-reform legislation in congress, the Tea-Party has distinguished itself as taking the most obstructionist, uncaring, and uncompromising positions on immigration-reform. And the Tea-Party approach is embodied in KNUS talk-radio host Peter Boyles.
Beauprez aligned himself with Boyles yesterday when he said he'd send Colorado National Guard troops to the Mexican border to deal with undocumented immigrants, as Texas Gov. Rick Perry has already done.
"If Rick Perry or another governor requested it, I would certainly step up and do my part," Beauprez told Boyles.
Beauprez later added in the interview that he would stop issuing driver's licences to undocumented immigrants, and he wouldn't house young migrants in Colorado while they await court dates. Tens of thousands of desperate children have been crossing the border from Central American countries, and, in Tea Party fashion, Beauprez writes off having anything to do with them.
A Beauprez spokesman later told The Post that Beauprez would send the Colorado Guard to the border for humanitarian work, as law would prohibit military activity.
Bottom line, I'm betting The Denver Post won't be writing any more headlines calling Bob Beauprez "mainstream." Unless, of course, the headline writer describes Beauprez as "mainstream Tea Party."
That's more like it.