May 02, 2007 05:46 AM UTC

PART TWO: Please answer some questions about your past, Mr. Lamborn.

• 2 Comments
• by: DemoGirl

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PART TWO commences below “the fold”.

First, however, let’s have a short review of last week’s PART ONE in our multi-part series on Congressman Doug Lamborn. [And, at the very end of this diary, there is a “sneak preview” to next week’s “Part Three”.]

PART ONE [Review] http://www.coloradop…. Last week, as found at the preceding link, we discussed the possibility that Mr. Michael Baller, a Denver retiree, was the source of funds for the hit pieces (a/k/a “Lamborn Lambporn”) purveyed by the Christian Coalition of Colorado in 2006. Three unanswered questions [a fourth was added several days after the diary was published] were posed. As inquiring minds continue contemplating the answers to those four questions, it should also be considered that the CCC’s actions in 2006 were costly to its reputation and that to avoid any further decline, Gosnell and the CCC may try to find a different vehicle for the same kind of Lamborn Lambporn tactics in 2008-a vehicle that is not officially associated with the CCC.  That is to say that by so doing, they may get the same slime for the buck, but avoid any linkage in the public’s mind to “more of the same Lamborn Lambporn from the CCC”.  We shall see.

Now, without further ado, “below the fold” commences “PART TWO”.
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THIS WEEK, in “PART TWO:  Please answer some questions about your past, Mr. Lamborn” there’s one question in particular that I believe was never asked at any 5th CD candidate forum in either the primary or general election.  Personally, I feel it is a relevant question that should be asked at all candidate forums for all who “apply” for any “job” as an elected official in 2008 in any state, regardless of party-and especially for positions such as Congressmen have where the annual salary, excluding benefits, is currently $168,000. 

Here is the question I believe should be universally asked:  HAVE YOU EVER BEEN FIRED FROM A JOB?  Doug Lamborn recently replied to that question as follows, “I CAN’T REMEMBER.  I CAN”T CATEGORICALLY DENY IT BECAUSE I’VE SURE MADE SOME MISTAKES,” as reported by “The Hill” on March 6, 2007 at http://thehill.com/q…

Some of the most stressful events in life-some bringing joy, others angst–and not forgettable, in my opinion, by any person in good health, would be things such as marriage, birth of a child, death of a loved one, and-I submit-getting fired from a job.  To my way of thinking, Mr. Lamborn’s answer to the reporter from “The Hill” is simply not believable.

Accordingly, below are some questions that someone may someday soon ask of Mr. Lamborn, whether coming from a member of the press, or at a candidate forum, or from a constituent at a political function, Lincoln Day Dinner, etc. 

1. Yes or No.  Mr. Lamborn, have you ever been fired from a job.  If “yes”, explain.  “I can’t remember,” is not acceptable.  Nor is the following an acceptable answer: http://charlesandmar….  If you need to do so, please visit here: http://ivescrewedup….

2. Project Vote Smart shows here http://www.vote-smar… that you were an attorney with Kutak, Rock, and Campbell.  From when and to when were you associated with that firm and what were the circumstances of your severing your employment from that firm?  Were you fired from that job?

3. Would you make available for public inspection a copy of the “history of employment” or such similar portions of your application to sit for the Colorado State Bar Examination as you completed for applying for your state’s bar exam?

4. Your biography at your Congressional website: http://lamborn.house… at this writing in late April, 2007, advises as follows:  ” . . . Rep. Lamborn . . . has been an attorney in private general practice in Colorado Springs for 20 years, emphasizing business and real estate.”  Is that true?  Or, is it more accurate to say that you have merely been a licensed attorney for 20 years? Consider this: http://www.coloradop….  And then consider your reply approximately one minute and thirty seconds into this interview: http://www.youtube.c… where you were asked, “What were you doing prior to your election to Congress?

The above questions are not in jest.  It is profoundly important to determine, as I think lawyer Lamborn would agree, whether anything in one’s past employment bears on one’s fitness for office.  If there is nothing to hide, these questions, when and if actually answered by Mr. Lamborn, may simply be much ado about nothing-or, reveal that there’s a great deal we didn’t know but should have.

SNEAK PREVIEW ON PART 3-Three one paragraph news summaries required to be read for your “homework”.
There is an issue about one manner in which some of Lamborn’s supporters have been reported to have attacked his opponents in past elections-a different version of Lamborn Lambporn–, and that goes to obligations of one of his opponents to his dying wife, in one situation,  and most recently, obligations of a father to his young children.  The implications of one’s fitness for office, if judged by the weights that Lamborn’s supporters would put upon his opponents’ shoulders based on family obligations, call into question why Mr. Lamborn’s supporters have never questioned his own fitness.  In whose eye is the log?  Before May 10, please have read all three of the free news summaries found here, and, if opting to purchase a complete article, I suggest the second of the three articles: http://news.google.c….

EDITED 5/8/2007 by DEMOGIRL to add links to all remaining parts of the four part series:

PART ONE: Chuck Gosnell and the CCofC’s Lamborn Lambporn money trail.
http://www.coloradop…
PART THREE: Doug Lamborn’s 1996 and 2006 Dubious Achievement Awards.
http://www.coloradop…
PART FOUR: Doug Lamborn’s 2006 Dubious Achievement Award . . . and . . . adieu from Demogirl.
http://www.coloradop…