Since when due construction projects come in on budget?
I realize the magnatude of the budgetary mistakes but the plot will only thicken with more purchased properties by the city of aspen and or pitkin county. Start looking into the former BMC West property at the Airport Business Center. Maybe Aspen needs to take a look at the construction cost and amount of time it has taken for Carbondale to build their four lane entrance and bridges. Can we have a socialized building center? Wont be long and construction workers will be driving from Aspen to Basalt to pick up their goods, this is good for the economy! Oh, with the new found attitude of our big box stores, where the shelves are controled by managers not working in the store, you will not be able to get what you nead readily, if things are out of stock than too bad. This has been a common occurance in recent times. So those of us that need hard goods product s are left traveling further down valley hoping we will get what we need there as well. Sorry to ramble on different subjects.

THX1138

Interesting you should see this as liberal versus liberal. I can honestly say I've never seen it that way. (See "accountability" above.) In fact, as with Braudis, it was always about not letting an elected politician getting away with murder.

Is Mick a liberal. Not to me. Gun to head I'd say socialist or Marxist as above.

Best, Michael!

Are you suggesting that the proclivity to be a total a-hole has nothing to do with party affiliation or political philosophy?

And all this time I thought the lyric was "I want a new truck."

Cheers,

Next thing you know, Mick will be out, an "Aspen conservative" will be in, and Con Man will be pining for the good old days.

Some things never change!!

Best,

PETE

For me it's really about accountability. If Mayor Ireland knows who is illegally out to get him, just say so. If he doesn't know, just say so. And if he made a mistake and made the whole thing up, he should just admit he was wrong and "move on" as he would so like the likes of me to do.

When I first started writing about Bob Braudis and Mick Ireland, I jokingly referred to them and their supporters as "The Bath Pary," a play on Sadamm's Baath Party. I wrote a satirical piece in the voice of a Comrade to liken their ways to the Soviet Union.

But now I see unequivocally that this is no joke--that my satire was perilously close to the truth. The Bath Party is both undemocratic and anti-democratic, led by a handful of underachievers who act as if they have the power to turn the clock back to a backward time that probably never existed in the first place.

It so happens they are doing so in a town that is (or at least was) made of money with no end in sight. That makes everything worse. They also have zero business sense, which means they think there is no end to the money. And they are also collectivists, which means they want to eat the golden goose even as they destroy their means of cash production.

No, Jerry, they're not fascists--they're Marxists who need to be seen as totalitarians who have somehow gained control of the purse. How did that happen? People in affordable housing--some have called them the Entitlement Class--are the voters. Second-homers et alia don't vote but they provide the cash flow for affordable housing. Thus has The Bath Party, well-organized in the ways of getting out the vote, managed to gain power.

When Mick had his $5,000 bike stolen ($5,000!!!) I was glad he got it back. But I also admit to a smile when it was stolen because I felt the Mayor needed to know what it's like to be on the butt end of an unwilling transaction where somone unlawfully takes what is rightfully yours. I can't afford a $5,000 bike, just as Mayor Ireland can't afford a Hummer, and I couldn't help but hope the robber was at least a member of a class lower than the Mayor's, which is saying something.

In the world of The Bath Party, why shouldn't a deserving citizen have the right to take Mick Ireland's bike? And what right does Hizzoner have to complain about it?

Best, Con Man!

Mick's anger and vitriol came though quite clearly at the end of the interview. An on-air screaming rampage would have done little to make his bilious state more obvious.

Cheers,

The frustrating thing is that Aspen is supposed to be a liberal town and I believed we elected a liberal Mayor. Ironically, I always thought liberals were supposed to be more "open-minded" than conservatives. However, there doesn't seem to be much room in current-day Aspen for dissenting opinions. It saddens me that Aspen, the home of the Aspen Institute and the embodiment of Walter Paepcke's "mind body and spirit" ideal, has evolved into a fascist one-party town.