July 30, 2009 04:37 PM UTC

"Face the State" Makes the News!

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• by: Colorado Pols

Literally, as the Longmont Times-Call reports:

Contrary to a report on a conservative Web site, the Boulder District Attorney’s Office will not investigate Longmont City Councilwoman Karen Benker.

And the freelance reporter who wrote the article saying Benker could be investigated is the same person who made the original complaint to Boulder District Attorney Stan Garnett.

Greg Burt wrote an article that appeared Wednesday on Face the State, a Republican-oriented online publication. In it, Burt wrote that “Longmont city council member Karen Benker worked to influence the awarding of a $10,000 contract to a nonprofit of which she was board member.”

Burt also wrote that the Boulder County District Attorney’s Office was going to look into whether Benker violated state law that prohibits elected officials from trying to influence a public decision involving a personal interest.

Burt made the complaint, Garnett said Wednesday, and the information Burt provided to the district attorney’s office was not enough to warrant an investigation.

His office will send a letter to both Burt and Benker today saying as much, “since this has now become public,” Garnett said in a statement he released Wednesday afternoon.

Makes sense, doesn’t it? If you really want to take somebody down a peg, file the “complaint” yourself and then post what you did as a “news” story on your own “news” website! Just brilliant, cuts out that pesky fourth-estate middleman with their meddling concerns about “the facts.” Come to think of it, that’s why we have the vaunted Face the State to begin with, isn’t it?

Of course you want to be slick when you pull this kind of stuff, since if the real media catches on to what you’re doing it tends to sting a little credibility-wise (see above). A good place to start would be to find someone else to file your self-fulfilling “complaints.” Seriously, amateurs.