This is the time of year when we ring in the new year, wring out the old, and mop up the drippings with a newspaper column. Here goes.<\/p>\n
Aspen Skiing Co. announced this year that it is reining in dogs, since lately the whole town has been raining in dogs. Dogs don’t heed warnings from skiers like “On your left.” Maybe they heed snowboarders better, who just shout “Dude! Outta my way!”<\/p>\n
And dogs do doo-doo on the slopes just like bears do doo-doo in the woods. I’d rather fall on a rock or on bear doo-doo than on doo-doo done by a dog.<\/p>\n
The overgroomed inhabitants of the Aspen Labradoodle Sanctuary, otherwise known as the Red Mountain neighborhood, are barking and woofing about this crackdown. But their dogs couldn’t care less.<\/p>\n
In local politics, the former mayor et cetera of Aspen who spent decades on government payrolls emerged this year from taxpayer-subsidized housing that he got for dimes on the dollar in search of another government job, something like Punxsutawney Phil emerging periodically from his rent-free hole in search of his shadow. This is after a few years underground where he monetized political connections with his “consulting” (his word) business.<\/p>\n
Back when he was mayor, his counter “argument” to one of my political columns was to tell me in a social media post: “Aspen. It’s not for everyone. Maybe you should move on.”<\/p>\n
I wasn’t persuaded.<\/p>\n
This is his second try for elected office after vacating the mayor’s office. In his first try, he suffered a trouncing by a newcomer by nearly a 2-to-1 margin. In this second try, he suffered another trouncing by another newcomer by another nearly a 2-to-1 margin.<\/p>\n
His persuasion skills evidently work no better with the citizens of Aspen than they worked with me. They think by nearly a 2-to-1 margin that Aspen is not for everyone and maybe he should move on.<\/p>\n
The longtime assistant city manager already has. With persuasion skills rivaling those of the former mayor, he asked rival bureaucrats in the county to rubberstamp his proposals by calling them “motherf\u2014ing extortionists.”<\/p>\n
Now he’s out of a job. The conflict reminded me of the Iran-Iraq war about which Henry Kissinger lamented: “It’s a pity both sides can’t lose.”<\/p>\n
In national politics, someone has spent nearly two years and about 100 gazillion taxpayer dollars chasing a president for being mostly a Republican with totally bad orange hair.<\/p>\n
The portion of the evidence that hasn’t been destroyed by this indefatigable Javert shows beyond a reasonable doubt that the president is guilty on both counts as shown by his appointment of sex criminals to the Supreme Court who are known members of the notorious criminal gang called “Republican white males.”<\/p>\n
It’s true that the sex crimes were only alleged, not proven, and happened a third of a century ago if they happened at all, and most of the allegations were withdrawn when the accusers were put under oath. But the evidence that the appointees were Republican white males is compelling.<\/p>\n
Expect the Democrats to vote for impeachment.<\/p>\n
You ask, what about the non-crime that the investigator was paid to investigate \u2014 the non-crime of “collusion” with the Russians?<\/p>\n
Well, the evidence shows that this president has never colluded. Period.<\/p>\n
He has never colluded with the Russians to steal an election, has never colluded with our allies to run the free world, has never colluded with his chief of staff to manage the White House, has never colluded with his secretary of defense on military strategy and has never colluded with his hair stylist for a normal haircut.<\/p>\n
This guy is simply too frowsy to be capable of collusion in any way, shape or form. If he and another person were trapped together in a wet paper bag, they couldn’t collude their way out.<\/p>\n
He’s the anti-colluder. Jeremiah Johnson did more colluding alone in the wilderness.<\/p>\n
He even failed to collude with his lawyer to pay hush money to enterprising women out of campaign funds \u2014 or out of taxpayer dollars, as congressmen routinely do. The lawyer was indicted for instead paying the women out of personal funds.<\/p>\n
If you can figure out how that’s a crime, then you too can be a very special counsel.<\/p>\n
Despite the president’s inability to collude with others, give him credit for tossing some dirty bathwater \u2014 and sometimes some babies along with it \u2014 into the dustbin of history, to use the phrase favored by Leon Trotsky and other Democrats.<\/p>\n
Such as American apology tours, black unemployment, ISIS (remember them?), good manners (remember those?), much of illegal immigration, trade agreements that screw American workers, the ban on saying “Merry Christmas,” a little of our mass-incarceration of racial minorities, perpetual war in Syria, good manners, trade agreements that help American consumers, economic lethargy, grammar, all but approximately two of the genders, good manners, a capital of Israel that is not her ancestral home and good manners.<\/p>\n
And the Clintons.<\/p>\n
As for the new year and the slow motion (I hope) stock market crash, I’ll pass along investment advice from Will Rogers (and if you know who that is, then you’ll soon be with him):<\/p>\n
“Don’t gamble. Take all your savings and buy some good stock\u00a0and hold it till it goes up, then sell it. If it don’t go up, don’t buy it.”<\/p>\n
And trade in the labradoodle for some of that taxpayer-subsidized housing.<\/p>\n
Correspond and subscribe at theAspenbeat@gmail.com<\/a><\/p>\n