Hypocrisy alert! Hypocrisy alert!

Hypocrisy levels dangerously high.  Larimer County has finally, finally implemented a mask mandate.  Sort of.  They needed to pack in one more good weekend of retail sales, so that sales tax isn't impacted and all 30 employees at the Estes Valley Library can keep their part-time jobs. 

I love the "Thank goodness" comment from our Mayor.  For those who don't know the mayor, it comes across as a "thank goodness" of relief, like, finally, someone in Larimer County government has come to their senses.  We are dying up here for no reason, but finally, finally, we have convinced Larimer County to adopt what we have always followed, mandate or not.

Or not.  Let's count the number of folks wearing masks around this Estes Park town hall table back in August.  None, none, none, none.  I'm counting none.  Or are all the participants instead wearing invisa-masks?

The town didn't need to wait on Larimer County to put a mask mandate in place.  Indeed, masks have always been a good idea indoors (especially when the indoor portion extends over an hour with no breaks) during the pandemic, mandate or no.  Back in August (let's see, were Larimer County numbers stable, falling, or climbing back in August?), when Diamond Joe Neguse rode into town, masks certainly could have been worn around a table with less than six feet of distance between participants, especially those coming from other states, or those participants at the meeting who now claim their hands were tied and they were doing everything possible to keep cases under control, like adding a bunch of phantom Estes Park residents to the denominator of the "Cases/100K" fraction to keep Estes Park cases low compare to Dirty Berthoud or Wellington of the Unwashed.   Peer pressure is a terrible thing.  I wonder who was the first to suggest "Hey, what the hell, let's not wear masks, and let's take a picture of us all not wearing masks, to show who's boss."?

I wonder if the "thank goodness" from the Estes Park mayor really means "thank goodness the mouth breathers I deign to (pretend to) govern have to wear masks, because we up here on Mount Olympus are bulletproof - These mandates only apply to lesser mortals."  Because I am happy to trot out other photos of the mayor participating in indoor meetings and events in the past few months, heck, in the past few weeks, and somehow not finding a mask to coordinate with her Bon Marche off-the-rack ensemble.

Sadly, none of those picture are from the monthly "Mayor's Chats", which the current mayor has been unable to find any time in her busy schedule to attend.  Maybe she just can't dig out that darn mask of hers from her deep well of sorrow.