In serious need of follow-up questioning, State Senator suggests possibility that wildfires were started by terrorists
State Sen. Greg Brophy said yesterday on conservative radio that recent wildfires may have been started by terrorists and that “the Governor and Democrats” have left Colorado vulnerable to terrorist attacks due to their failure to spend millions of dollars on air tankers to fight forest fires.
Brophy said on Fort Morgan’s KFTM that “the governor and the Democrats would spend three-hundred-and-some-odd-million dollars to implement Obamacare but we couldn’t find $17.8 million to buy airplanes for safety and security here in Colorado.”
“What most people don’t realize,” Brophy told host John Waters, “is that both of these fires weren’t naturally caused. These were human-set fires. The fire at Waldo Canyon last year, no one knows who set even to this day, John.
And then, if you remember, when Osama Bin Laden’s hideout was overrun in Pakistan by our Seals, and they captured his computer, one of the acts of terrorism that they were looking at getting involved in was setting wildfires in the western United States. I mean, we really need to address this, and the Legislature failed us last session.” [BigMedia emphasis]
All Waters could muster for a response was a lovable, “That’s very sad.” (Is there a medical term for co-dependency between a conservative radio host and a conservative guest? If so, this is it.)
I was hoping for a question like, “Are you troubled by the complete absence of evidence of terrorism in these two fires?”
Or how about this deep follow-up, “Do you think there’s an element of fear-mongering and politicization in your terrorist theory?”
Or, “Do you think Democrats are adequately protecting the water supply and Bronco games?”
The specter of wildfire terrorism was raised before by state Republicans but Brophy has raised it to a new level in terms of timing and specificity.
“[The Legislature] didn’t get it done,” said Brophy. “They failed us. Everybody knows that those planes wouldn’t have been available for this fire, but don’t we learn the lessons from this fire, and from the one a year ago?”
Brophy favored legislation authorizing the purchase of four air tankers capable of dropping water and retardant on fires. The bill, which was criticized by The Denver Post as unneeded, passed, but the $17 million wasn’t allocated.