While The Denver Post‘s Bruce Finley played journalist with environmental activists and the Governor’s staff, Republican state Sen. Greg Brophy was schooling the Air Quality Control Commission and the fractivists at the hearing with some pretty bad-ass testimony.  Here’s an excerpt, per Lynn Bartels at The Denver Post:

That’s right, our skies are cleaner today with many more people living here than they were years ago. Glad that Colorado’s skies are cleaner than ever? Hug a fracker. The natural gas they produce is one of the reasons why.

Last week, John Kerry called those who deny climate change flat earthers.

Please.

The true flat earthers in the American energy debate are the extreme environmental groups who make wildly exaggerated claims about the climate impacts of greenhouse gases, while at the very same time doing everything in their power to stop natural gas development — the energy source that is actually reducing all emission types, including carbon.

Flat earthers, thy name is the Sierra Club.

In that sense, I hope this Commission won’t be swayed by the flat earthers here today arguing for a one size fits all air standard. This attempt to punish rural Colorado for the traffic congestion and smog in Denver and Boulder is part and parcel of a wider war that’s being waged against rural Colorado.

If there’s anything we can say about Sen. Brophy, he brings an uncommon level of common sense with a dash of hilarity to mind-numbing state business.  But, more importantly, he’s more knowledgeable on some of these issues than the fractivists are.  They could learn a few things from him in terms of content and delivery.