Cassie Craven:  The Wild Bunch Is Wyoming

Gov. Mark Gordon let a repeal of gun-free zones become law Thursday without his signature, but not before he got in some side-line jabs.

Gordon vetoed the same bill last year after the Wyoming Democratic Party called on him to do so. What is interesting about his lack of veto this time, is that he’s a lame duck (he has no more terms left and is on his way out).

Why wouldn’t he veto now? Perhaps he’s thinking about higher office?

Although the Liz Cheney gaggle would love to see him sweep in, he’s no Kristi Noem and should have no chance for appointment or higher office.

The governor proclaims that “local control” is being trampled in the name of the legislature supporting our right to bear arms under the U.S. Constitution.

“Elections are impactful, and I recognize the overwhelming majority of this legislature opted to drop a political bomb,” he said.

What he should recognize is the loud mandate that Wyoming voters gave when they kicked out a bunch of dusty old establishment incumbents who talked out of both sides of their mouths.

We had a locked-down state, COVID mandates, property taxes creating poverty and people in power not knowing what biological sex means any more. South Dakota had none of those things.

We lived in an imaginary universe reeking of wokeism, in a place we were always told was “conservative.” Voters woke up. People got organized, and the rest is history.

Gordon’s letter quoted an unnamed neighbor: “This wild bunch doesn’t understand Wyoming.” With all due respect, Mr. Governor, this wild bunch was elected in a near landslide, despite your big-time money and endorsements trying to stack the deck. You lost. They won. Maybe you and your friends are the ones who don’t understand Wyoming.

Perhaps the actions of our legislature wouldn’t be necessary if we had an executive branch with a backbone, as South Dakota did. I do wonder what our state would look like if Harriet Hageman had been our governor.

The governor’s letter calls the “wild ones” – “lackadaisical” and “grabbing power.” Perhaps it is time the power is returned to the people, as our Constitution envisions.

I’m reminded of a scene from the 1994 flick With Honors when Simon Wilder, played by Joe Pesci said, “The genius of the Constitution is that it makes no permanent rule other than its faith in the wisdom of ordinary people to govern themselves.”

When the Harvard yup calls that “crude,” Wilder replies that the Founders knew one thing that all great men should know. “That they didn’t know everything…They wanted a government of citizens not royalty, of listeners, not lecturers.”

Sen. Tara Nethercott, R-Cheyenne, said on the Senate floor this week that she was only voting for a bill to protect girls in their restrooms and locker rooms because of “the fervor associated with this issue (which) in my view is maybe overpowering good sense, so I’m not going to stop it.”

Sen. Bill Landen, R-Casper, also said, “based on my visits with everyone back home, this is a big deal.”

Sen. John Kolb, R-Rock Springs, said, “It’s high time this is addressed. This is a problem.”

Nethercott didn’t like that governmental entities can be sued. But I think it’s time they had some skin in the game and did their job to protect the most vulnerable among us instead of telling us to go to sensitivity training.

The “fervor” by which you are seeing common sense legislation move into law is the result of a loud mandate from the people. An awakening, if you will. A vote against the people now makes them unelectable. Even state leaders know that now.

The weaponization, censorship and brow-beating of the system has come to an end. They have no credibility in the golden age of America. And “the wild bunch” doesn’t kiss the ring of the government and its swampy bureaucracy puppets. If that makes us “wild” then it also makes us free.