If state Attorney General Cynthia Coffman wants to waste Colorado taxpayers’ money on a premature legal battle with Boulder County, we encourage the county to give her one. We think she’s wrong on the legal merits, and that she basically admits it in her correspondence with the county. She “suspects” that the county will violate a recent Colorado Supreme Court decision by extending its current short-term moratorium on oil and gas development, but it hasn’t done so yet.

This leaves only two explanations for picking a pointless fight. The first is using the threat of legal action to prevent county commissioners from extending the current five-month moratorium when it expires May 1. If that’s the plan, she should threaten to sue if and when they enact such an extension, not by establishing an arbitrary deadline in February that has no apparent basis.

The second explanation is that this is a political publicity stunt designed to prove her loyalty to the oil and gas industry. A gubernatorial campaign can be expensive. Generally speaking, when a politician sends a letter and issues a news release simultaneously, publicity is her actual goal.

Read more at The Boulder Daily Camera.