The Con Man welcomes the Aspen Valley Ski and Snowboarding Club back to the program, then explains why the conventional wisdom that said Democrats would be damanged by the primaries was so completely wrong.
Click here for the complete "Con Games with Michael Conniff" for Tuesday June 10,2008.
Add comment June 11th, 2008
The Con Man can't help himself: he has to liken the Burlingate affordable housing scandal in Aspen to the neoconservatives who rule(d) Washington. What do they have in common? Both the local liberals and the Beltway conservatives felt they knew better.
Don't miss the call from former Aspen City Councilor Torre in the second half of the show.
Click here for the complete "Con Games with Michael Conniff" for Wednesday June 11, 2008.
Add comment June 11th, 2008
I don’t get to Aspen City Council work sessions that often—who has time for comedy in these days of Food and Wine?—but the first hour or so of the work session on Burlingate and affordable housing was a doozie.
I came in during a Council meltdown Tuesday night and it took me a good twenty minutes to figure out that Mayor Mick Ireland, Jack Johnson, and Steve Skadron were squawking about the necessity of televising the session as bankrolled by Marilyn Marks, a member of the Citizens Budget Task Force, a group formed at the suggestion of Mayor Mick to his eternal regret. Marks, also a member of the affordable housing subcommittee, has done nothing but make their lives miserable, mainly by pointing out the Council and City staff has no clue about where the money goes or is going in affordable housing.
Continue Reading Add comment June 10th, 2008
Higher than average snowpack has emergency management officials in Pitkin County, the city of Aspen and the towns of Snowmass and Basalt gearing up for possible flooding this runoff season.
Continue Reading Add comment May 29th, 2008
The Con Man gets a visit from Lt. Colonel Dick Merrit and Seaman Dan Glidden, two retired veterans who stand for all that's good about those who have served the country. Also: a bit of a rant of flag lapel pins and taking back the lapel flag pin--and the flags--from those who desecrate it with faux patriotism.
Click here for the complete "Con Games with Michael Conniff" for Memorial Day May 28, 2008.
1 comment May 26th, 2008
I read in Friday’s Aspen Times that off-leach dogs may soon be allowed to run free on Smuggler Road. Judging by all of the un-leached dogs you see scampering up and down this popular hiking trail each day, you’d have thought this was already law. I wish I’d known that dogs were required to be leached. I would have strapped a billy club to my belt and made hundreds of citizen arrests by now.
Continue Reading 1 comment May 23rd, 2008
When Mick Ireland and his Merry Pranksters assumed office in Aspen after the last election, I of course assumed there would be some glaring glitches and growing pains.
Not in my wildest imagination did I believe that the current regime would all but run Aspen into the ground financially in just a few short months. No exaggeration, my friends. Under the stewardship of the Bath Party, Aspen has been brought to its knees, fiscally speaking, by a group of poobahs who pooh-pooh the value of the dollar even as they burn money faster than an open fire on the Cooper Avenue Mall.
Continue Reading 5 comments May 21st, 2008
You may take this as a challenge and/or invitation to change the future toward a sustainable civilization! The USA grows by 3.1 million annually on its way to adding 100 million people in 30 years. What drives that population overload? Legal and illegal immigration! Water shortages, energy costs, gridlock, crowding, air pollution and quality of life hang in the balance and can only worsen with added population.
Continue Reading Add comment May 21st, 2008
I am having a difficult time deciding which presidential candidate would receive my vote come November, should I actually remember to vote. I think my problem is that I know very little about the candidates, other than the basics; white man; black man, white woman…Republican, Democrat, Democrat…war hero, dynamic speaker, wife of Bill…old as mummy dust, young and inexperienced, middle aged and somewhat bitchy, etc.
Ideally, I’d dedicate the time to read the most recent book written by each candidate in order to gain a better understanding of who they are as a person, but that would mean I would have to read three books, so, forget it.
Continue Reading Add comment May 17th, 2008
My mom was born in a tent (some accounts I’ve heard say it was a cabin) near Estes Park, Colorado on an August night in 1936. My grandfather was a laborer during what must have been the construction of Trail Ridge Road from the Alpine Visitor Center to Grand Lake. It is one of the cruel realities of surviving your elders that you come up with questions you can never have answered.
When I was a much younger man, in that netherworld between high school and life, I went to work in the coal mines. Yes, back in the day, there were coal mines, and some of them were in Pitkin County. But I digress.
Continue Reading Add comment May 11th, 2008
