Hickenlooper is wildly back-peddling on what he now says what just a joke about how relieved he would be if Denver lost out on Amazon’s $5 billion investment and 50,000 jobs, because then he wouldn’t have to work hard.
Of course he’s committed to Colorado’s bid, Hick said, “but it’s a ton of work.”
“I was making a joke at the beginning of that, talking about how you work so hard on these things and sometimes once you win, the real work begins. If you don’t win, for a lot of people, it’s like, ‘Whew, we don’t have to work quite so hard.’ That doesn’t mean we aren’t going after it 100 percent.”
Interesting, because when we work hard to get a job and don’t get it, our reaction is not “Whew, we don’t have to work quite so hard.” It’s more like, “How can we not starve, lose our house, and everything we’ve worked so hard to achieve?”
Hickenlooper is far better at losing than we are.
Hick insists he did work hard on the standard “we offer this to everyone” bid, which he took time out during his busy schedule on a junket to India to proofread.
“I was up until 1 o’clock in the morning going over every word of that proposal. I can show you the jewels of mine in it from my sleep-deprived brain.”
Hick’s explanation is not the least bit reassuring, and we fear he’s just making matters worse.
When asked if he was worried Amazon might not get his joke and take his comments at face value, Hick ducked the question and rambled on about growth.
Hick’s insistence now that Colorado is not afraid to work hard to get jobs and go to work might fall on deaf ears.
Instead, he was working overtime to become the face of failure if Denver loses this golden opportunity.