Every State. Every race. Right here.
This is number 30 in a planned series of 50 entries between now and November, looking at each of the 50 states in terms of every race on that state's ticket--Presidential, Gubernatorial, Senate, House, State legislatures--the whole Mile High Club! Special attention paid to identifying and promoting the most important contests per state.
Today, we celebrate reaching the 3/5 milestone by highlighting the Democratic Convention host state—COLORADO!
http://www.nationalatlas.com/...
Colorado is a diverse state, with areas ranging from the deep blue (Boulder) to the nasty, nasty red (Colorado Springs), with wealthy ski resort areas, thinly populated mountain regions, latino concentrations, and farmland in the middle, and the Denver metro area looming over it all.
Democrats have come a long way here, beginning the new millenium shut out of the state government completely and having two Representatives and no Senators in the nine member delegation. Today we have both houses of the legislature by comfortable margins, the Governor and Lt. Governor, one Senator and four Representatives, with another Senator and a shot at another Representative on the way. And oh yes, we’re gonna carry the state Presidentially for the first time since 1992.
BLOGS: Look to Square State for all things Colorado. Are these guys excited about their front row at the convention or what?
http://www.squarestate.net/
PRESIDENT: THE BIG ONE for this state in 2008. Yes, there’s other important things downticket, but this one is part of Obama’s firewall. Win here and Ohio and Florida can disappoint us again and we’ll still go to the White House. (I’m calling Colorado, Ohio, Missouri, Virginia and Nevada the firewall states in which Obama would be wise to compete as if he MUST win them all, even though he could lose some and still get elected. IN, FL, NC, MT, ND, AK and any other red states are in front of the firewall playing offense duty, while the 21 states carried by Kerry and/or Gore are behind it). Fortunately, of the firewall states, Obama has consistently polled ahead in Colorado more than any other.
SENATE: Mark Udall, our hero for Colorado, is key in our quest for 9 new seats and a filibuster-proof majority. He’s not as safe as his cousin Tom in New Mexico, but he’s led in every poll taken to date, and it’s a good bet we’ll see him as a better legislative partner to Ken Salazar, the other Senator from here, come January.
http://www.markudall.com/
GOVERNOR AND OTHER STATEWIDE: None up in 2008. Democrat Bill Ritter is the governor. Democrats also control the office of Lieutenant Governor and Treasurer (indicating a wise dissatisfaction with the party of Economic Idiocy). Republicans control Secretary of State (so watch for hijinks in counting the votes in Colorado) and Attorney General (ensuring that no Republican voter fraud will be prosecuted). The best advice is to CATCH THEM AT IT.
STATE LEGISLATURE:
House of Representatives: 40D, 25R. Majority 15.
Senate: 20D, 15R. Majority 5. We need to pay some attention to protecting and expanding our majority here. A turnover of 3 seats would give the chamber to the Repukes and deny us a chance to run the table on redistricting.
CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICTS:
District 1—Diana DeGette (Inc. D). A safe Dem seat from central Denver. Watch for her to get some face time at the Convention, being the Representative from the Convention Center and all.
District 2—Jared Polis (D) v. Scott Starin (R). This deep blue district, which includes Boulder, is Udall’s district, and now open, as Udall moves up to the Senate. Polis, a former chairman of the state board of education, is heavily favored. Starin is an engineer with no political background. Polis will be the third openly gay member of Congress, joining Barney Frank (D-MA) and Tammy Baldwin (D-Madison, WI). His primary win was considered something of a surprise, but I don’t mind a bit. I also won’t mind if the safe-blue CO-02 and Boulder become known in Colorado as one of those base districts from which Democrats launch careers.
http://www.polisforcongress.com/
District 3— John Salazar (Inc. D). West and South rural Colorado, including Pueblo, Durango, Aspen, Vail and a whole lot of mountains. Salazar is, I believe Senator Salazar’s brother. Safe Dem.
http://www.salazar2008.com/...
District 4— Betsy Markey (D) v. Marilyn Muskrat (Inc. R). North and East rural Colorado, including Greeley, Fort Collins and a lot of farmland. Still a tough nut to crack but getting better with each election. Musgrave has been a top target in 2004 and 2006 and is easily the next most likely GOP incumbent to fall in Colorado. She’s famous for ranting about "the homosexual agenda", acting like it’s a bigger threat than even terrorism, recession, or vegetarians.
Markey is an experienced Congressional aide and businesswoman (and like so many of our farm-region Democrats, very easy on the eyes) who has been shown narrowly behind in the polls, but within striking distance. With a good ground game and long Obama coattails, the seat can be ours. As always, here’s the link to where you can show Markey some love.
http://www.markeyforcongress.com/
District 5—Hal Bidlack (D) v. Douglas Lamborn (Inc R). Colorado Springs. Probably the most solidly GOP Congressional district in the Rockies outside of Utah. Also, like Utah, an island that has more in common with the Red South, in that most of the traditionally conservative west is libertarian and independent, and therefore turning away from the GOP in disgust the more beholden it becomes to the Religious Right—but Co. Springs instead embraces the fucktards. CO Springs is the home base to a famous Christian Leader who got caught snorting cocaine with hookers (being Christians, they naturally forgave the sins of a Christian). Lamborn survived a bruising and divisive primary fight in 2006 against the previous incumbent’s handpicked successor, was not endorsed by the man he defeated, and had the PERFECT Democrat (Jay Fawcett) in the general—and still managed to win. He’s every bit the nutcase you’d expect, a soulmate to his fellow fucktards Adrian Smith, Michelle Bachmann, Tom Cole, Bill Sali and Jean Schmidt. But the people of Colorado Springs are entitled to representation in their own image if they want it.
Bidlack is a military veteran like Fawcett. Curent;y, he’s not on anyone’s radar, as even the windmill tilters are turning to the nearby 6th as an easier shot.
http://bidlack2008.com/
District 6—Hank Eng (D) v. Mike Coffman (R). Suburban Denver, including Littleton. OK, the windmill-tilters are looking at this one because it is open and not nearly as fringe red as the 5th. But they’re still tilting at windmills. Coffman is a former secretary of state and Eng is an engineer whose most promising experience is as a city councillor in Wisconsin. But at least we have candidates.
The good news is that the incumbent, rabid single issue "build a moat of fire with fireproof crocodiles from Brownsville to San Diego" nutcase Tom Tancredo is going at last the fuck away. On the other hand, having him around was one of the better tools for recruiting latinos to the Democratic party. Democrats Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and Arizona will be thanking him for their new majorities for some time to come. And yes, there will be more like him. The GOP can't help it. They're a bunch of Pavlovian, stimulus-response louts who can't help projecting their subhumanity on the Scary Brown People.
http://www.hankeng.com/
District 7—Ed Perlmutter (Inc D). Adams County, NE of Denver. This potentially swing district was hotly contested in 2006 when it opened. Perlmutter won big, and this year the Goopers have only token opposition to him. Safe Dem.
REDISTRICTING COLORADO: I had an invitation on a previous entry from a Colorado native offering to help redistrict. If he’s still around, here’s the place to do it. I have a hard time seeing us doing any better than a 5-2 House delegation, and if Markey pulls it off, we’re already there.
If Markey does not pull it off, I envision putting Pueblo in the 4th and Ft. Collins in the 3rd to make the 4th bluer.
It also MIGHT be possible to fiddle with the 1st, 7th and 6th (possibly putting Arapahoe County in the 1st and more of Urban west Denver in the 6th), which would make all three districts swing districts and vulnerable to GOP takeover in a wave year. I think I’d rather concentrate the fucktards into the current 5th and 6th, and have five comfortable blue districts, than to have to watch our backs all over the map just for one competitive district. Maybe another decade we’ll be able to do better, but not in just two years.
What do YOU think?
Previous diaries in this series:
Delaware: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Arkansas: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Illinois: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Texas, Part One: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Texas, Part Two: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Utah: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Massachusetts: http://www.dailykos.com/...
North Carolina: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Hawaii: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Mississippi: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Oregon: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Ohio: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Maryland: http://www.dailykos.com/...
North Dakota: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Alabama: http://www.dailykos.com/...
California, Part one: http://www.dailykos.com/...
California, Part two: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Vermont: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Iowa: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Virginia: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Wyoming: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Pennsylvania: http://www.dailykos.com/...
New Mexico: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Kentucky: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Nebraska: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Friggin’ IDAHO: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Maine: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Wisconsin: http://www.dailykos.com/...
New Jersey: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Oklahoma: http://www.dailykos.com/...
South Dakota: http://www.dailykos.com/...