Denver Man Gets Alien Greeting Panel on Ballot

Every major US city should have a plan to greet extraterrestrial visitors, and Denver might just get its own come 2010. A local man has scared up enough signatures to have a proposition creating an Extraterrestrial Affairs Commission included on the ballot next year. Given that Jeff Peckman assumes the visitors will be benevolent, the commission would write up a plan for “diplomatic contact” ahead of “mutually respectful and beneficial coexistence.”

Hold on, you say. Is this an expert panel? Sure: Peckman himself saw a UFO—a flying green orb—the day Michael Jackson died, and the panel would have someone versed in “direct personal encounters.” One city councilman who thinks the ballot initiative system is too lax is tickled. What, “do they want to go to a conference on Mars?” Hey, there—Peckman needed just 3,974 signatures, the Los Angeles Times notes—and delivered 10,274. (More Jeff Peckman stories.)