Conservative Blog Scores Exclusive Ken Buck “Interview!”

We don't often find content worth noting within our local Colorado conservative blogosphere these days, with some of our favorite classic sites like Face the State and the People's Press Collective long since having gone dark. But we'll direct you to the Colorado Observer's delightfully fawning "exclusive" interview out today with Republican once-and-future U.S. Senate candidate Ken Buck. After Buck's string of media debacles undid what might have been a winning campaign in 2010, kicking off his latest run with a string of nice, steady softballs makes sense:

TCO: The Denver Post and many pundits said you committed verbal gaffes and miscues in the 2010 campaign. Have you changed as a candidate in three years?

Buck: Well, the Denver Post has a short memory. They didn’t take to task some of the things (Sen.) Bennet said. I’m going to force them to discuss the issues most relevant to Americans – the $17 trillion debt, the hundred trillions of dollars in unfunded liabilities, the more than $1 trillion annual debt Congress keeps passing, and the effects of Obamacare…

TCO: What discretionary and non-discretionary spending programs would you cut?

Buck: I think that’s a discussion that we can have when I get elected to the Senate in November 2014. I’m not going to sit here and talk about (cutting) these spending programs when I have not been elected. [Pols emphasis]

TCO: Sen. Bennet attacked your position on abortion in the campaign. Has your stand on abortion changed?

Buck: You know, what I believe is Congress has voted to ban late-term abortions, and I’m one who opposes late-term abortions, and voted to ban federal funding for abortion, and I’m one who opposes federal funding of abortion. I’m tired of people talking about issues that are not relevant to the public… [Pols emphasis].

Now folks, we really don't know what Sen. Michael Bennet has said that can top…well, half a dozen of Buck's greatest "gaffes" and "miscues," from "I don't wear high heels" to comparing being gay to alcoholism–or the rape victim Buck accused of "buyer's remorse." And Buck certainly used to have specific ideas about what in the federal government he would cut, as in a big chunk of it.

Also, Buck's well-known views on reproductive choice, as our readers know very well, go considerably beyond merely banning late-term abortion: Buck supports banning all abortions, pointedly (meaning he used to say it proudly) including in cases of rape and incest. But is he saying here that the public doesn't care about abortion? Buck obviously knows that he needs to avoid the abortion issue in a General Election, but Republican primary voters aren't going to be happy to hear this.

With all of that baggage, we'd be doing lots of softball-only "exclusives" too…

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