December 31, 2009 10:05 PM UTC

Romanoff Goes Negative

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• by: redstateblues

(Let the festivities begin! – promoted by ClubTwitty)

Fresh from the Romanoff camp to your e-mail inbox (emphases mine):

The people of Colorado won’t get to elect a U.S. Senator until next year, but some outside interest groups have already voted.

Click here to cast your vote before midnight tonight.

The nation’s biggest insurance companies, drug manufacturers, and investment banks are pouring hundreds of thousands of dollars into our state, funding my opponents.  Why?  What do these special-interest groups expect to get in return for their money?  And what have they already gotten?

Those are questions each candidate will have to answer.  But here’s what we do know: the same interest groups that are bankrolling the other candidates in this race are blocking the reform we need in Washington.

Tell the special interests to back off.

Corporate gangs spent millions to kill the public option, shield pharmaceutical profits, and water down Wall Street regulation.  But the big players know that the best way to advance their agenda is not simply to lobby lawmakers–it’s to pick them.

For many of these industries, subsidizing the Senate is simply a cost of doing business.  Companies shell out a certain amount each month for salaries, for benefits, and for Congress.

The sight of so many senators sacrificing their constituents for the sake of their contributors isn’t just unpleasant; it’s obscene.  It’s no wonder the U.S. Senate has become the place where “good ideas go to die.”

Clean up the system.

I’m taking a different approach.  My campaign does not accept contributions from corporate interest groups.  More than 95 percent of our donors live right here in Colorado.

That matters.  When we win this election, we will send a seismic shock to the U.S. Senate–which needs one. The message: people come first.

Now it’s your turn.

The insurance industry has picked a candidate.  The drug industry has picked a candidate.  Wall Street has picked a candidate.

Have you?

Sincerely,

Andrew Romanoff

It’s certainly a message, though I don’t know if that message is “people come first”. More like “Bennet is bad”. Pretty much what we’ve been getting from the Cult of Bennet Hatred on Pols and elsewhere. My response to this e-mail is to ask the Romanoff campaign a simple question: had Andrew Romanoff been appointed instead of Michael Bennet, would he be turning down the very contributions he harangues about now? Something tells me he would be raising from these same types of sources–especially since he had no problem taking their money when he was Mr. Bipartisanship as Speaker of the House

The question that Democrats should be asking themselves is will this be effective? Will it increase a $250,000 campaign into what probably needs to be a $10 Million campaign? And what if Romanoff wins–will he reverse this campaign policy and start taking the money he’ll need to win the US Senate race?

Or will the campaign direct their ire where it needs to go? Namely at the Republican front-runner Jane Norton, and only her. Time will tell, but I don’t think this e-mail is a harbinger of party unity. What a way to ring in 2010…