October 30, 2010 06:57 PM UTC

GOP and the "Bad 3," A Star-Crossed Love Story

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• by: Colorado Pols

As it turns out, the “Bad 3” ballot initiatives–Amendments 60, 61 and Proposition 101, haven’t turned into the litmus test issue for conservatives they were once portended to be. Actually, that’s not really fair, they have served a valuable purpose, along with the birth control and abortion ban Amendment 62, in dividing practical conservatives from their less responsible colleagues.

Then there’s spokesman Gregory Golyansky, about whom you could say much the same thing.

Of the handful of elected officials still formally standing behind these initiatives, Sen. Kevin Lundberg is probably the most prominent. Lundberg has been the subject of profile-raising attacks by Democrats on the wide variety of issues he proudly takes the fringe position on–both in support of his opponent, and to stink up the Republican brand in general. As a spokesman for the “Bad 3,” he’s only marginally better than Golyansky himself. To be fair, he did stand by Dan Maes longer than most–oh, wait, never mind. That actually doesn’t help him, does it?

It appears that Rep. Kent Lambert, another proud member of the “Schultheis wing” of the GOP minority, is quietly signaling to his supporters that he will support the “Bad 3” as well. Dave Schultheis himself, of course, has weighed in loudly and often (and amusingly) in support of these initiatives, but proponents are smart enough to keep him out of public view.

But beyond these few hardcores, there’s a whole other category of Republicans who have stayed “neutral” on the “Bad 3,” or endorsed some but not all, or are just plain all over the map.

To be honest, we were surprised that GOP Senate candidate Tim Leonard (SD-16) didn’t formally throw down for these initiatives. As a co-founder of the American Constitutional Party, these initiatives are actually kind of mild compared to what he’s said he wants to do. To be clear, the ACP’s party platform would eliminate all federal funding for education, along with a long list of other prescriptions that made the “Bad 3” look, well, progressive?

Short version: we don’t buy Leonard’s “neutrality” any father than we can throw it.

And then there’s Leonard’s ACP fellow traveler Tom Tancredo, who as a gubernatorial candidate has pretty much been all over the place on the “Bad 3,” alternately supporting one, or two out of three, or maybe none of these initiatives. Anybody know what he’s said most recently? It doesn’t really matter, because people don’t tune in Tancredo to hear about policy.

Of course, no discussion of convenient “Bad 3” neutrality is complete without Ken Buck. Buck went neutral on these measures at the same time he announced he was no longer taking positions on any state ballot initiatives–which was itself his attempt to “Buckpedal” his prior support for Amendment 62, the abortion ban. Turn on your television and see how well that worked out.

Given that the “Bad 3” are failing by a wide margin, wouldn’t Buck have done himself a favor by coming out against these initiatives at some point? Given that the Amendment 62 flip-flopping appears to have gained him absolutely nothing, wouldn’t publicly opposing these initiatives have given Buck back a little badly-needed moderate credibility?

It’s too late now to matter, but we think this would have been a smart move for Buck. Unfortunately, his attempts to extricate himself from Amendment 62 boxed him out of doing so.

As for Lambert, his appointment to the Joint Budget Committee last year was a joke, proof positive of the unseriousness of his colleagues on solving the state’s budget problems. We said so at the time, and we always try to note when we’re proven right.

Bottom line: if it was ever the goal of conservatives to move back to the center for the general election, and reassure independents that they were responsible players on fiscal matters, the “Bad 3” initiatives were the place to do it–and some have. But in a few key races where triangulating off these initiatives would have really helped them, they failed to capitalize on a great opportunity.