Back in May, U.S. Senate candidate Ken Buck had this exchange with Jim Pfaff, the social-conservative flag-bearer at 560 KLZ radio.

Pfaff: “These social issues, like marriage, these are critical issues. It has been one of the great weaknesses of the Republican Party not to deal with these critical issues.”

Buck: “I agree with you that I think it has been a weakness of the Republican Party in the United States Senate, and I think it’s time that we look at the people we are sending back to Washington DC and making sure those people are sticking by the values they espouse on the campaign trail.”

Then, on Thursday, The Denver Post quoted Buck as saying:

“I am not going to Washington, D.C., with a social agenda, and to create that misperception is wrong,” he said.

But for Thursday’s story, The Post failed to ask social conservatives in Denver what they thought of Buck’s “buckpedal” on social issues, as Colorado Pols has termed Buck’s abandonment of stated positions he held during the primary. So I’ll so it here, to fill the journalistic gap.

I mean no one would argue that Buck didn’t go the extra mile, especially for specific audiences, to make it clear that he was going to Washington with a social agenda, as the exchange above illustrates.

His positions on social issues included, among other positions:

• Opposition to abortion even in the case of rape and incest
• Opposition to giving a 14-year-old girl raped by her 13-year-old brother the option to use the “morning after pill”
• Belief in the idea that the “stage of development” when humans become “persons” is the “single cell,” which would ban fertilization procedures
• Support of Personhood Amendment giving citizenship rights to fertilized eggs
• Opposition to common forms of birth control
• Pledge to oppose “pro-abortion” judicial nominees or any person applying for any government position.
• Pledge to introduce an amendment to the U.S. Constitution banning abortion
• Support of an Amendment to the U.S. Constitution ensuring states that outlaw gay marriage do not have to recognize gay marriages conducted in states that permit them.
• Opposition to gay marriage
• Support of public posting of the 10 Commandments
• Support of a vague “coexistence between government and religion”
• Opposition to funding Planned Parenthood health clinics
• In favor of overturning Roe v. Wade.

So do social conservatives feel betrayed that Buck is now saying he’s “not going to Washington, D.C., with a social agenda?”

In response to this question, the normally conversant former GOP Senate President John Andrews emailed me:

“I’ll pass on this one.”

State Sen. Dave Schultheis told me he still supports Ken Buck but he thinks the tactic will hurt his election campaign.

“It’s unfortunate that he appears to be minimizing the social agenda. He should go to Washington with both a fiscal and social agenda.

I think that being totally honest with the people helps a candidate. Let the people decide, which is the way we should all be acting.”

Denver Post columnist Vincent Carroll emailed me:

“Do you really think Buck – a social conservative, no doubt – gave social issues a high priority in the primary?  That’s not my impression. Not compared to fiscal issues, anyway.”

Talk-radio host Pfaff said:

“I’m confident that Ken Buck will stand on these important social issues very well. If a vote comes up, he’s going to vote the right way. In reality, though, the emphasis has to be on getting this fiscal house in order. I’ve said many times, I have no desire to live in a pro-life socialist state. And so, it does have to be both/and proposition and not an either or proposition. The question is emphasis.”

I interviewed those guys last week. Then over the weekend Buck dropped a nuclear bomb on social conservatives.

Buck told The Denver Post he changed his view and would now vote against Personhood Amendment, which would give legal rights to fertilized eggs. He said he didn’t “understand” that the measure would ban common forms of birth control, even though until the weekend his campaign had been defending Buck’s opposition to common forms of birth control, telling 9News Buck opposed forms of the Pill and IUDs, for example.

For Sunday’s piece, The Post got a response from a key social conservative.  The Post interviewed Cleta Jasper, a board member of the Pikes Peak Citizens for Life, who sent Buck a survey in response to which he promised, among other things, not to vote for pro-choice judicial nominees.

The Post asked if she was upset at Buck:

“Not enough to kick him in the shins,” she said.

The Denver Post over the weekend ran an editorial stating that a Michael Bennet ad was unfair.

Now Buck is using the editorial in a commercial.

You have to wonder if The Post, since it has yet to endorse in this race, will put the new Buck ad under the editorial microscope, too.

After all, you expect the editorial page, prior to making an endorsement, to be relatively fair to candidates, maybe not like the news department, but still.

Here are two items from the Buck ad that The Post might scrutinize:

• Buck calls Bennet a “rubber stamp for his friends in Washington.”
• Buck says Bennet is “legislating unemployment.”

The Post wants a “fair and vigorous discussion on the issues that matter to Coloradans,” and it didn’t think the Bennet ad made the cut.

So, what do you think of the Buck ad? Does it meet your standards? Does is come close?

You owe it to readers, and simple fairness, to let us know.

The Denver Post yesterday references an exchange between U.S. Senate candidates Ken Buck and Michael Bennet over a Bennet TV ad showing Buck making a series of statements. The Post reports:

The candidates had a sharp exchange over that ad during their first head-to-head debate Saturday. Buck said media examinations had found its assertions to be untrue, while Bennet stood by the claims.

Assuming Buck is referring to the fact checkers CBS4, 7News, and 9News (and I don’t know other news outlets that have checked the ad), this statement is false.

Those fact checkers found numerous portions of the ad to be true.

For exmaple, CBS4 and 9News deemed it true that, according to the ad, “Buck wants to privatize Social Security.” As a Post report recently put it, Buck’s Social Security plan would “offer private Wall Street investments.” And Buck is quoted on The Fix as saying Wall Street historically gets a higher rate of return than Social Security.

9News found it true, as the ad stated, that “Buck even questioned whether social security should exist at all.” On its website, 9News stated: “Buck has said numerous times, including at the Constitutionalist Today forum in March, that the …the idea the federal government should be running health care or retirement or any of those programs is fundamentally against what I believe and that is that the private sector runs programs like that far better.’ (Source: Constitutionalist Today Forum, March 9)”

7News and 9News found it true, as asserted in the ad, that Buck opposes abortion, even in the case of rape and incest. 7News on its website quoted this Buck radio interview:  “If you believe that life begins at conception, which I do, then the exception of rape or incest, you’re taking a life as a result of the crime of the father, and even though I recognize that it’s a terrible misery that that life was conceived under, it is still taking a life in my view, and it’s wrong.”

7News and 9News (on the video version) also found the ad’s statement, “Buck even wants to ban common forms of birth control,” to be true. 9News website states: “Buck believes life …begins at conception,’ so birth control methods that don’t impact that (i.e. condoms, some forms of the pill) are fine with him. Others that would keep a fertilized egg from implanting like hormone-based birth control methods, some other forms of the pill, IUDs, RU-486 and what’s known as the morning-after pill, are not supported by him. (Source: E-mail from Buck spokesman Owen Loftus to 9NEWS, Aug. 26)  As you can see from my blog post on this topic, featuring an interview with the Chair of the Obstetrics Department at the University of Colorado Medical School, all forms of the pill could potentially prevent a fertilized egg from implanting.

As the TV fact checkers might say, here’s the bottom line: Aspects of the ad were found to be true, others out of context or misleading, and just a couple points were deemed false or opinion.

The fact checkers did not say the Bennet ad was untrue, and reporters should correct Buck if he tells them so.

The 9-11 tragedy had nothing to do with religion, and everything to do with criminal mass murderers.

But today, on the anniversary of 9-11, you wonder how many of us understand that, as anti-Islamic hatred connected to 9-11 appears to be growing and polls show outright bigotry toward Muslims rising.

Against this backdrop, you want reporters to cover the story about a pastor threatening to burn a Quran. I know it becomes a spectacle when you see the small-time religious figure hopping from one national media appearance to another, but I’d rather see stories like that overplayed than ignored.

Denver’s media should take extra steps to air out signs of bigotry toward Muslims in our own community. The stories are out there, I’m sure. They just have to be told.

Here’s the kind of story I mean.

In an Aug. 2 column in the Huffington Post, Republican Ali Hasan asked his “fellow conservatives” to “quit lying,”

“If you are against the mosque,” he wrote, “then call yourself a bigot and give us the gift of an honest dialogue, the kind we carry on so proudly here in America.”

As you might imagine, this wasn’t received very well in GOP circles, and the anger reverberated on talk radio, blogs, and, of course, Facebook.

Writing on her friend Nikki Mata’s Facebook page the day Hasan’s column appeared, prominent 912 activist Virginia Young expressed her view.

Young is the founder of the IN GOD WE TRUST 912 PROJECT and the Broomfield 912 Project , which is apparently one of the most influential 912 groups in Colorado. Tea Party groups like hers had a major impact on the Republican Party this election cycle, producing GOP candidates like Ken Buck and Dan Maes.

“I am bigot,” she wrote. “Latisha I am still waiting after 9 years for American Muslims to take to the streets and denounce the events of 9/11. Why hasn’t that happened? Taqiyya perhaps?”

Latisha’s post, to which Young was responding, stated, “I am a Republican and I do not have a big issue with the mosque being built near Ground Zero. It is simply place of prayer. I DO NOT agree with calling people bigots just because they don’t agree with you…”

Young had a different view, and as a 912 leader in Denver, her opinion means something. Was she serious? Is she a bigot? What did she mean?

I emailed her to find out. I asked to interview her about the mosque issue.

Salzman [Sept 1]: I have a copy of something you apparently wrote on Nikki’s Facebook page. I spoke with Nikki about her comments. I’d like to discuss yours with you.

Young [minutes later]: Please forward a copy to me.

Salzman: [an hour later}: You wrote-“I am a bigot,” and a few other comments. I don’t want to report this without hearing what you have to say about it.

Young [minutes later]: Oh yes, I said I guess I am a bigot then, if that is what Ali Hasan defines us as, if I oppose the Mosque at Ground Zero. What are your thoughts on the Ground Zero Mosque?

Salzman [minutes later]: Where does ground zero mean to you? Do you think mosques should be built anywhere in America?

Young: No response

Salzman [next day]: Did you get this? Thanks.

Young: [no response]

Salzman [a few days later]: Before I publish your “bigot” comment, I hope you’ll give me a more detailed response than you’ve provided below. I want to be fair to you. I also hope you’ll explain the rest of your facebook comment, “Latisha I am still waiting after 9 years for American Muslims to take to the streets and denounce the events of 9/11. Why hasn’t that happened? Taqiyya perhaps?”

If you’d like to talk on the phone, just let me know.

In any case, I hope you’ll have time to drop me a quick explanatory note.

So that was about a week ago, and I haven’t heard back from Young. So I don’t think she wants to converse about it anymore, do you?

But Young’s Facebook friend, Mata, who also wrote in the Facebook conversation that she was a bigot, but with less severe overtones, readily explained herself to me in a phone interview.

“I was being facetious,” she said immediately, explaining that she’s against the mosque personally but doesn’t believe the government should stop it.

“The backers of the mosque say they want to do outreach,” she told me. “If you want to do outreach, that indicates that you want to foster good feelings, but if depending the poll if 60-70 percent are opposed to what you’re doing, how does that foster positive feelings?”

“If it puts people in such an uproar, aren’t you undermining what you are trying to accomplish?” she said, adding that she does not oppose the construction of mosques elsewhere in America.

But plenty of other Americans do. Even if you don’t follow this issue very closely, you probably remember last month’s Economist poll with these shocking results:

• 14 percent of Americans believe no mosques should be built.
• 45 percent of Democrats and 80 percent of Republicans have an unfavorable view of Islam.
• 48 percent agree that “there are some places in the United States where it is not appropriate to build mosques, though it would be appropriate for other religions to build houses of worship.”

Commenting on the poll last month, The Denver Post’s Mike Litwin wrote:

There’s bigotry at work …- bigotry that needs to be called out …- but it’s not exactly old-line religious bigotry. We were attacked by radical Islamists. There are many radical Islamists who say they want to see America destroyed. We have been fighting for nearly a decade against Islamic terrorists but also fighting on the same side as Muslims.

It’s confusing. Obviously, the overwhelming majority of Muslims are not terrorists. Just as obviously, Islam is not a monolith. As far as anyone knows, there are no terrorists involved in the Lower Manhattan mosque/community center/swimming pool. In any case, the hard part of freedom of religion comes when the religion is not popular.

In this blog post, I’m calling out Tea Party leader Virginia Young for being a bigot, until she directly states otherwise. I take Niki Mata at her word that she’s not. I believe her.

Littwin is right that bigotry should be called out. We owe to Muslims and of course we owe it to ourselves and to this country.

It’s also why I called Phil Wolf, who owns the Wheat Ridge car dealership that erected a billboard last year showing President Obama dressed in a turban and stating, “President or Jihad.” His billboard got a lot of attention, as it should have. I had been wanting to call him for a long time to find out if he was a bigot.

I asked Wolf if he supports the construction of mosques in Denver.

“We got to identify who the enemy is,” he said.  “If the activity of the enemy is building mosques, they shouldn’t be allowed.”

I asked him if he thinks Islam is the enemy.

“That’s what’s out there,” he said. “That’s the public perception. As far as the public knowledge is concerned, they are. And if they are, there should be zero tolerance. We should go back to what happened during World War II. Look what happened to the Japanese.  And guess what? There’s a lot of wonderful Muslim and Japanese people. But we didn’t tolerate the enemy. We just don’t call anybody the enemy anymore.”

Wolf is planning to unveil a new billboard at his dealership along I70 in the next few months. Its theme will reflect what he told me above in my interview. And he had a lot more to say in a similar vein.

I hope 912 activist Virginia Young and other Tea Party leaders will join me in protesting Wolf’s offensive views, and his new billboard.

And I hope Wolf’s story, and other signs of bigotry in America, get the media attention they deserve, along with the protests of those who disagree.

You’re excused for missing it, but there’s some disagreement among local TV reporters about whether Ken Buck’s anti-abortion stance means he’d oppose common birth-control methods.

Three local TV news stations fact checked the segment of a Michael Bennet ad stating that Ken Buck “wants to ban common forms for birth control,” and each station came up with a different conclusion.

7News called it a fact, lumping it together with Buck’s position against abortion, even in the case of rape and incest, and stating that “this is Buck’s position on abortion.” (No citations are provided.)

News4 called it opinion, using this logic: “Buck’s position is, life begins at conception. By far, the most common forms of birth control, condoms and the pill, work before conception. And Buck is not opposed to those.” (News4 provided no citations.)

9News got uncharacteristically squishy on us and couldn’t decide if the statement was true or false. 9News told viewers that the veracity of Bennet’s ad “likely depends on what you consider common forms of birth control.” (As with all of its Truth Tests, 9News did provide detailed citations, one of which cited an email from Buck’s campaign stating that Buck opposes birth control methods that “would keep a fertilized egg from implanting, like hormone-based birth control methods, some other forms of the pill, IUDs, RU-486 and what’s known as the morning-after pill.” )

To get the facts on the table about the impact of birth-control measures on fertilized human eggs, I emailed Nanette Santoro, MD, chair of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, at the University of Colorado.

She agreed to provide information, as long as I emphasized that she does not advocate any political position but instead provides current scientific thinking on the topic.

I asked her which human birth control methods don’t damage a fertilized egg.

She emailed me this list of barrier methods: Condom, diaphragm, Essure method of blocking the fallopian tubes. She also included vasectomy and tubal ligation.

I asked which methods cause damage to fertilized eggs.

Her reply:

“Combination birth control pills [made with hormones progestin and estrogen], vaginal rings, or patches interrupt ovulation and do not harm fertilized eggs. Eggs are not released in these cases.

Progestin-only pills, or implants, had been long thought to cause a hostile environment to the fertilized egg. The lining of the uterus is rendered unreceptive in this line of reasoning, and that is why women do not conceive. This conceptualization has led to the belief that these methods interrupt a fertilized egg. Therefore, a person who believes that life begins at conception would understandably be averse to such a method. However, newer research indicates that progestin-only methods make it harder for the sperm to get to the egg by affecting cervical mucus permeability to sperm, and may also interfere with the motility of the fallopian tubes, making it hard for sperm to get up there or for the eggs to get down. Therefore, the accumulated data now weighs more in favor of these methods not interfering with fertilized eggs. This is an important change in thinking.

Methods like the progestin IUD, Mirena, may also act this way and may not inhibit the fertilized egg but may prevent fertilization from occurring. The copper IUD is more likely to interfere with fertilization.”

I asked her: When you say the data “weighs more in favor” of progestin-only pills “not interfering” with fertilized eggs, do you mean that they could potentially interfere but probably won’t? This would be important to those who believe life begins at conception.

She replied:

“I think it’s unlikely but there is never any definitive evidence in that regard. So if I were a sort of ‘agnostic’ on this question of when life begins, I would feel comfort at the fact that my progestin-only method was unlikely to be interfering with a fertilized egg, and would sleep well at night.  However, if I were a very black-and-white thinker, and could not tolerate the possibility that a fertilized egg might be interfered with by my birth control method–no matter how small the possibility–it would be best for me to choose another method.”

I did a bit more research and then asked her this question: Even if taken properly, the combination pill that stops ovulation has a failure rate, meaning that sometimes ovulation occurs and an egg is fertilized accidentally. Very rare, I know. But if ovulation occurs, is implantation affected? In other words, is the accidental fertilized egg less likely to be able to implant in the uterus of a woman who’s been taking anti-ovulation pills?

Santoro replied:

“It’s not known with certainty what happens when a woman who uses birth control pills regularly ovulates.  Usually there is an error or an interaction with another medication that lowers the pill’s potency.  Because the pill contains both estrogen and progesterone, the lining is likely to be receptive to the fertilized egg.  But in some women, the lining is actually stimulated by too much progesterone.  In these cases, it gets relatively thin and might be inhospitable to a pregnancy.  It is hard to know whether this is even a credible mechanism, though, because the pill also inhibits sperm entry into the uterus and alters tubal motility.”

I asked her one last question: What kind of birth control pill is the most common, combination or progestin-only? Or are they about the same in popularity?

Her reply: I think they are all about the same in popularity.

So you can interpret Santoro’s facts for yourself, since Santoro is not taking a political position here. She’s just offering information.

But as I interpret it, if you believe that killing a fertilized egg is murder, as Ken Buck does, then you wouldn’t tolerate even the most remote chance that your birth-control pill could cause murder by potentially stopping implantation, in rare cases, of a fertilized egg that otherwise could have implanted in the uterus.  

So based on Buck’s campaign statement to 9News that he opposes birth control methods that “would keep a fertilized egg from implanting,” then he would logically oppose all types of birth-control pills, which are the most common type of birth control in America, because all of them could potentially do this.

In an excellent paper released Aug. 31, Ari Armstrong and Diana Hseih arrive at the same conclusion stating:

“While most often the pill acts to prevent fertilization, sometimes it can prevent a zygote from implanting in the uterus,” they write, adding that the birth-control-pill manufacturers, Ortho Tri-Cyden and Trinessa, state that their pills alter the lining of the uterus.”

So as you can see below, only the fact checkers at 7News appear to have properly evaluated the segment of Bennet’s ad addressing birth control.

7News reported categorically that it’s true that Ken Buck wants to ban common forms of birth control, properly combining his abortion position with his birth-control stance. That’s correct.

9News was half right, pointing out that Buck opposes birth control methods but failing to dig deeply enough into the matter to understand that all birth-control pills would be opposed by Buck, based on his own criteria for protecting fertilized eggs.

And News4 got it wrong by claiming Buck doesn’t oppose the pill when, in fact, he has said he opposes some types of birth-control pills as well as any birth-control method that makes implantation less likely, which could include all pills, at least in rare instances.

Now reporters should ask Buck himself what he has to say to women who are using forms of birth control that he opposes. About 17 million women in America who use the pill, plus millions of others who use forms of the IUD and other methods, and would like to know.

PARTIAL TRANSCRIPTS OF LOCAL TV NEWS STORIES ON BENNET’S TV AD

News4 Reality Check: Bennet Jumps in with Attack on Buck

News4: The final claim in the ad is aimed at Buck’s pro-life stance.

AD: Ken Buck even wants to ban common forms of birth control.

News4: That’s opinion. Buck’s position is, life begins at conception. By far, the most common forms of birth control, condoms and the pill, work before conception. And Buck is not opposed to those.

7News Investigators: “Fact or Fiction: Is Ken Buck too Extreme?”

AD:

Narrator: “Ken Buck wants to ban common forms of birth control. And his view on abortion?”

Buck: “I am pro-life and I’ll answer the next question, I don’t believe in the exceptions of rape or incest.”

FACT:

This is Buck’s stance on abortion. He has said that the only exception is when the life of the mother is at risk. During an interview with Craig Silverman on KHOW radio, Buck reinforced his position on abortion.

“If you believe that life begins at conception, which I do, then the exception of rape or incest, you’re taking a life as a result of the crime of the father, and even though I recognize that it’s a terrible misery that that life was conceived under, it is still taking a life in my view, and it’s wrong,” said Buck.

9News “Truth Test: More Context for Buck’s comments.”

QUOTE: Does Ken Buck speak for you? Buck supports banning common forms of birth control.

TRUTH: This likely depends on what you consider common forms of birth control.

Buck believes life “begins at conception,” so birth control methods that don’t impact that (i.e. condoms, some forms of the pill) are fine with him. Others that would keep a fertilized egg from implanting like hormone-based birth control methods, some other forms of the pill, IUDs, RU-486 and what’s known as the morning-after pill, are not supported by him. (Source: E-mail from Buck spokesman Owen Loftus to 9NEWS, Aug. 26)

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the latter category included at least 5.2 million women in America between 2006 and 2008 (Source: CDC website: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nsfg/abc_list_e.htm#emergency)

You may recall that last week’s BigMedia question of the week for reporters was, “Does Ken Buck support a ban on the use of morning-after pill, even for a woman who is raped by a family member?

The answer turns out to be yes, as reported by 9News in a story fact checking a Michael Bennet ad. Buck opposes the use of the morning after pill, because it could harm a fertilized egg, according the Buck spokesman Owen Loftus, who was cited by 9News. (More on this topic later this week.)

This week’s BigMedia question of the week for reporters is: If Ken Buck had been a member of the U.S. Supreme Court at the time, how would he have voted on Brown V. Board of Education?

The question arises after ColoradoPols posted a video of Buck last week, in which  he is quoted as saying:

“In the 1950s, we had the best schools in the world. And the United States government decided to get more involved in federal education. Where are we now, after all those years of federal involvement, are we better or are we worse?”

The video got a bit of play nationally, but surprisingly the Colorado media has essentially ignored it.

The truth is, you really can’t conclude anything about Buck’s view on the topic from the video. But the fact that he specifically cites the 1950s does raise legitimate questions about his views on Brown V. Board of Education, especially in light of his general opposition to federal involvement in education.

So reporters should ask him about it. It’s definitely in the public interest to clarify what Buck thinks about one of the most significant Supreme Court cases in American history.

I was rushing out of town last week, and unfortunately I just missed a phone call from Joe Cole, News Director and weekday anchor at Fox 21 in Colorado Springs.

I had called Cole for a comment on a one-sided piece I posted,  alleging that Fox 21 had erred in reporting that U.S. Senate candidate Ken Buck held a “U.S. Senate unity rally” in the Springs Aug. 23.

It seemed strange that Buck would stage a “unity rally” without Buck’s GOP primary opponent, Jane Norton, and no unity rally has been held between Buck and Norton to date.

It seemed strange that Buck would stage a “unity rally” without Buck’s GOP primary opponent, Jane Norton, and no unity rally has been held between Buck and Norton to date.

It seemed strange that Buck would stage a “unity rally” without Buck’s GOP primary opponent, Jane Norton, and no unity rally has been held between Buck and Norton to date.

It seemed strange that Buck would stage a “unity rally” without Buck’s GOP primary opponent, Jane Norton, and no unity rally has been held between Buck and Norton to date.

Buck spokesperson Owen Loftus told me Norton supporters were present, but it was not a unity rally, which his campaign would have made a “big deal” of. He said Fox 21 had made a mistake.

I’m grateful that Fox 21’s Cole gave me his side of the story yesterday, and I shouldn’t have published my blog post of last week until I had given Cole a bit more time to respond.

In any case, Cole said that Andy Merritt, the GOP Chair for El Paso County, had sent him an email describing the Aug. 23 Buck event as a “‘U.S. Senate unity rally.'”

“Buck’s people are saying it’s not a unity rally but the people hosting it are saying it is,” Cole told me. “We certainly don’t want to report an error or call it something it’s not, but if your folks there are calling it a unity rally, that’s what we’re going to go with.”

“Buck’s people are throwing us under the bus here,” he said.

Cole also told me he reviewed segments of video that were not used in the station’s story about the Buck event. Buck said he was there “to connect with Jane Norton’s people,” Cole said.

He added that usually Colorado Republicans are “all on the same page” in dealing with his station.

Asked to comment on the unity-rally issue, Loftus told me it was a non-issue.

“It was a Republican event,” he said. “We were happy with the turnout. We had a great turnout. Ken did meet with a lot of Norton supporters, so we were happy with it either way.”

9News’ excellent “Truth-Test” series, which checks the facts of political ads, confirmed today that U.S. Senate candidate Ken Buck supports a ban on the morning-after pill, even for a woman who is raped by a family member.

The Colorado Independent, the Free Colorado blog, and others have pointed out that this is consistent with Buck’s endorsement of the Personhood amendment.

In fact checking an advertisement by Buck’s opponent Michael Bennet, 9News reported today:

Buck believes life “begins at conception,” so birth control methods that don’t impact that (i.e. condoms, some forms of the pill) are fine with him. Others that would keep a fertilized egg from implanting like hormone-based birth control methods, some other forms of the pill, IUDs, RU-486 and what’s known as the morning-after pill, are not supported by him. (Source: E-mail from Buck spokesman Owen Loftus to 9NEWS, Aug. 26)

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the latter category included at least 5.2 million women in America between 2006-2008. (Source: CDC website: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nsfg/abc_list_e.htm#emergency)

I’m trying to determine if there are indeed forms of the pill that do no harm to zygotes, otherwise known as an egg and a sperm that have formed a union. Most if not all forms of the pill apparently do pose a serious threat to zygotes, so Buck is apparently against most if not all forms of the pill. But I’ll research this more and report back.

The Denver Post on Sunday became the first major news outlet in Colorado, with the exception of the Associated Press, to report that Ken Buck opposes abortion even in the case of rape and incest.

This leads to a second question, which will be the first in my regular series, “Question of the week.” The question-of-the-week will be my suggested query for reporters to ask a specific policymaker, activist, elected official, or candidate. It will not always focus on Ken Buck, like this week’s question.

It appears that Ken Buck not only opposes a women’s right to choose abortion if she’s a victim of rape and incest, but he also supports a ban on the use of the morning-after pill or possibly other types of birth control, even in the case of rape and incest.

On KHOW’s Caplis and Silverman show Aug. 4, Buck suggests that he’s opposed the use of the morning-after pill, even in the case of rape and incest. Here’s the transcript:

Craig: -Let’s say, god forbid, that a 13-year-old boy impregnates his 14-year-old sister and does it by forced rape. You’re saying that the 14-year-old and anybody involved in the abortion should be prosecuted, if they choose to terminate the pregnancy, either through surgical abortion or a morning after pill?

Buck: I think it is wrong, Craig. I think it is morally wrong. And you are taking a very small group of cases and making a point about abortion. We have hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of abortions in this country every year. And the example that you give is a very poignant one but an extremely rare occurrence.

Craig: Incest happens. I’m sure your office prosecutes it. And we know rape and sexual assault happen all the time, and your office prosecutes it. So it’s not completely rare. I agree that most abortions have nothing to do with that. I don’t know if I’d go with rare.

Furthermore, Buck’s support of the Personhood amendment, which grants zygotes citizenship rights, would presumably include complete opposition to the use of some birth control measures, including the morning-after pill, even in the case of rape and incest. The Colorado Independent has been on this here.

So, the question for reporters to ask Buck:

Do you support a ban on the use of the morning-after pill even for a woman who is raped by a family member?

Fox 21 reported Monday that Ken Buck held a “U.S. Senate unity rally” Monday night in Colorado Springs.

But Buck spokesman Owen Loftus told me today that Buck’s stop in Colorado Springs was a normal campaign rally, not a GOP U.S. Senate unity rally.

“That was just a mistake on Fox 21’s part,” he said, adding that “if we were to have a unity rally, we would make a big deal of that.”

“There were Norton supporters there,” he added. “They are coalescing around Ken now.”

He pointed out that Allison Sherry of The Denver Post covered the Colorado Springs event, and she did not describe it as a U.S. Senate unity rally.

Sherry reported that Buck encouraged his supporters at the Colorado Springs rally to support gubernatorial candidate Dan Maes as well as incumbent Attorney General John Suthers.

Fox 31’s weekday anchor and Vice President of News Operations Joe Cole reported:

Republican nominee Ken Buck was in town for a U.S. Senate unity rally. He’s trying to gain support from Jane Norton’s supporters whom he beat in the Republican primary. He is also turning his focus to incumbent Democrat, Senator Michael Bennet.

In its report on the rally, Fox 21 pictured Buck with the tag “unity rally” at the bottom of the screen.

It appears that the Fox 21 reporter may have thought Buck’s statement of support for Maes and Suthers was a U.S. Senate unity rally when in fact it was just Buck getting behind the GOP candidates for governor and Attorney General.

Cole did not immediately return a call for comment.