CO-04 (Special Election)
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(R) Greg Lopez
(R) Trisha Calvarese
90%
10%
President (To Win Colorado)
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(D) Joe Biden*
(R) Donald Trump
80%
20%↓
CO-01 (Denver)
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(D) Diana DeGette*
90%
CO-02 (Boulder-ish)
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(D) Joe Neguse*
90%
CO-03 (West & Southern CO)
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(D) Adam Frisch
(R) Jeff Hurd
(R) Ron Hanks
40%
30%
20%
CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado)
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(R) Lauren Boebert
(R) Deborah Flora
(R) J. Sonnenberg
30%↑
15%↑
10%↓
CO-05 (Colorado Springs)
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(R) Dave Williams
(R) Jeff Crank
50%↓
50%↑
CO-06 (Aurora)
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(D) Jason Crow*
90%
CO-07 (Jefferson County)
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(D) Brittany Pettersen
85%↑
CO-08 (Northern Colo.)
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(D) Yadira Caraveo
(R) Gabe Evans
(R) Janak Joshi
60%↑
35%↓
30%↑
State Senate Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
80%
20%
State House Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
95%
5%
August 04, 2010 06:05 PM UTC
55 Comments
Verbose much?
Some of us care about all ten amendments in the Bill of Rights, not just a few.
Bad combo.
don’t dispute the merits of the cited and linked information, so they complain
that the diary is too long.
how weak is that?
The title is wrong. Why read more.
I vote for INTEGRITY. That’s why I voted Bennet.
Period.
This diary starts with a point: Bennet has been inconsistent on gun-control votes. From there it devolves into a rambling string of poorly worded insults.
Here’s a hint, Ben (and Wade): If you’re trying to change somebody’s mind, it’s a bad idea to insult them.
The title turned me off.
You want my attention? Don’t insult me.
that linking to your own diaries constitutes ‘cited information.’ But over here the sky looks blue.
I am still absolutely amazed by the fact that Wade thinks the DSSC has two piles of money: 1 PAC pile and 1 non PAC pile. This concept of giving only non PAC money from a group that takes PAC money is so nuts it really makes me question anything Wade would ever say.
But there’s a lot of Bennet myth-making to cover. I should have done a Part I & II.
…to the zombies here, Ben. Great post.
Must. Have. More. Brains.
And nutritious.
That has to be one of the most hyperbolic, hypocritical couple of sentences written in this race. And that’s saying a lot. Zombie, meet zombie.
As far as “playing politics” I’m just wondering how these votes that you say are doing just that are somehow worse than the votes and the legislation that Andrew Romanoff introduced in the special session on illegal immigration in 2006. Countless times I’ve seen people point to that special session as a bright spot in Andrew’s career, and a reason why he would be a good leader.
You can’t have it both ways. Pragmatic leadership doesn’t just apply when Andrew Romanoff does it. Nice try, though.
Buck’s toast after that statement on rape and incest.
That’s why they’re trying to bring him down. Libertad, in his basement, is the most fearful of all.
Is not Libertad
about the various Romanoff incarnations?
Different writing style.
And no boldface.
Because we’ve really heard just about enough of that. If Andrew wants to keep reinventing himself — this is America!
registered in 11/09, before Romanoff began reinventing himself.
Though I was talking about your crack, not Libertad 2.0’s.
I was just noting the different screen name, not making a crack. Wade seemed to be responding as if the post was from the original Libby.
He sees “2.0” and he flies into a rage.
that will make me change my mind
belong to Zombies for Bennet?
if the shoe fits….
Zombies don’t wear shoes.
I know I won’t convince the hardcore Bennet Groupthink Spin PAC. I’m talking to the people who are on the fence.
to lounge on and smart politically savy people. The other side – Romanoff, crabgrass and crybabies.
Nobody denies Bennet has a big pile of money.
Romanoff has a lot of nerve, not realizing this Senate seat belongs to the guy who has never been elected to anything.
Are all politically savvy people such as yourself also bad spellers? It is savvy to support Bennet if you mean, politically safe.
I’m sure that’s why Colorado’s Democratic delegation supports Bennet. It’s politically safe. You can’t risk pissing off a Senator. It’s why many people have lined up behind Bennet.
The people who’ve lined up behind Romanoff are courageous. I’m more impressed with courageous people. Savvy people embrace the status quo. It’s much easier. Courageous people change the world.
changes his opinions on a daily basis then you support the right guy. If it’s courageous to support a career politician who needs gimmicks to get elected ( I may or may not take pac money – better ask my campaign manager ), then you support the right guy.
If it’s courageous to support a career politician running on ego and entitlement, thenyou support the right guy.
None of those are the qualities I want in my senator and the state of Colorado deserves better than that.
Why are no pregressive groups supporting Romanoff? With all his statewide connections and single handidly according to his supporters, having turned the state blue, why does he never poll above 50% statewide?
and short sentences.
Did any of those votes have unintended consequences? Were any of them more than just their titles? Were the amendments written poorly?
I feel like we’ve been over this a number of times. It says a lot about you and your candidate that you expect your Senator to vote on a bill according to cursory examinations.
Not that it’ll do any good, but what the hell. I think it needs to be said. In the middle of the screed, OBK writes:
What’s illegitimate about it? State law says that the Governor is entitled to appoint a Senator to fill a vacancy. The only requirements are the Constitutional ones: namely, that you be 30 years of age, been an American citizen for 9 years, and an inhabitant of the state you’re representing. The Governor can appoint whomever he wants.
Wait…I know why it’s illegitimate – because Andrew Romanoff didn’t get the appointment!
No, sorry. Bennet is the legitimate incumbent. If you have a beef with the laws as they’re currently enacted, that’s fine. I’m personally in favor of special elections, and I think unrestricted gubernatorial appointments are bunk. But my thinking they’re bunk doesn’t make them illegitimate. It means I change the law.
But if people have been saying that the Romanoff supporters reek of entitlement, they can look right at the statement that you wrote, and I quoted.
I’m sure that if Romanoff instead of Bennet had gotten the nod, you’d have been totally copacetic with that, and you’d have totally thought that the process was legitimate.
I’m sorry, but you can’t have it both ways – much as you’ll try.
incumbent, illegitimate though he is, Secretary of State Bernie Buescher sign something involving this appointment? This just keeps getting more suspicious.
[runs to grab three-corner hat, breeches, buckled shoe & musket]
I’m arguing that his incumbency is illegitimate because he has never been elected. By illegitimate I mean it should not be viewed by voters in the same way normal incumbency is viewed. I feel there are many voters out there who like Romanoff but lean Bennet only because he was appointed.
I would have felt the same way no matter who was appointed but to a lesser degree if it was someone who had a constituency, as I tried to explain in Ritter’s Gamble.
We all know incumbency is a tremendous advantage, right? But at least most incumbents have to be elected at least once before they become incumbents. That adds an extra level of injustice to this election. I don’t think anyone believes Bennet could beat Romanoff on an even playing field, do they?
75% of Bennet’s work was done for him the second Ritter appointed him — and his campaign is still a mess. If Bennet was as great as all the Bennet zombies think he is, he would have put Romanoff away a long time ago.
I agree with you on this:
That’s right, just like Bernie Buescher’s incumbency is illegitimate. Wasn’t that the other vacancy Romanoff applied for but didn’t get? It’ a good thing he didn’t, because then you’d be railing about the extra level of injustice if he ran for election, right?
We’ll find out in a few days.
Special elections can be interesting. But they are expensive and time consuming.
If Bennet wins- will you get on board,or are you going to sit it out and make up some other reason to not support Bennet?
His primary election victory will be illegitimate too. Because of Obama and OFA and BennetPols and all those mean, mean — I mean so boring I can hardly watch them — ads he’s run.
The question of whether an arbitrary percentage of the work was done is different. Considering that only 59% of appointed incumbents win election on their own right, it’s certainly a stretch to think that Bennet was a lock for election.
Moreover, I don’t see the injustice that you see. If Romanoff is as well known and possessed of a constituency as you claim, then I’d argue that the burden lies on Bennet’s side, having gone from being Superintendent of Schools to U.S. Senator in one fell swoop.
Regardless, it’s a moot point. Both candidates, in this interminable election (and it certainly feels that way), have had plenty of opportunities to make their case to the voters. I just don’t see that Romanoff has been hampered in any way, beyond the normal obstacles and barriers that any challenger faces.
The way you’ve framed the question really does indicate to me that you’d regard any result other than a Romanoff victory as an inherent injustice. Which, OK, you’re entitled to that consideration, but it’s not the massive violation of democracy that you contend it is.
One other thing: it’s a heated election, we all have our preferences, &c. But for all your references to “Bennet zombies”, I could make the same equivalences to Romanoff zombies 🙂
Either guy would be a credit to this state. I happen to think that we shouldn’t change horses in midstream.
calm.
We want passionate invective, even if you gotta MSU. dammit!
Romanoff hasn’t. Bennet’s incumbency has given him many subtle advantages, such as the prestige of the office. But also not so subtle advantages, like in fundraising. People and PACs donate to incumbents because it’s smart business.
Bennet has also had the Denver Post in his pocket for this entire campaign. The Post does not cover or dismisses stories critical of Bennet or twists them into anti-Romanoff stories. But it pursues Romanoff stories to the hilt, such as the website header or the PAC issue. Remarkably, it even molded the White House job dangle story into an anti-Romanoff narrative.
But Bennet’s biggest and most insidious incumbent advantage is what I’ve been talking about, this deference he is getting with voters. He is the incumbent because of one vote, Bill Ritter’s. But he gets the deference accorded true incumbents — people who have actually been elected by votes of the people.
Can you admit that if Bennet was not appointed he would not even be in this race? That’s how much he needs the advantages of incumbency.
If Bennet wins this primary, your resentment and frustration will destroy our chance to keep the seat D.
My guy got all the negative press….
Your guy got deference…..
The media screwed my guy and loved your guy …..
and
boo hoo hooo
to suit your argument. Illegitimate means illegal, unlawful, irregular, unsanctioned. You said what you meant, you just wish you hadn’t and now won’t admit it.
You act as tho Ritter did something wrong, and Bennet is a criminal for having accepted the position that Ritter offered him and the Pres. recommended him for. Of course, many others have pointed out that you and your fellow ARzombies would have been happy as clams if Ritter appointed AR.
And according to you all, Bennet was a one-dimensional, corrupt, lying bastard from day one. Yet, you’ll never say that Ritter then had to be either stupid, or corrupt himself to make that appointment.
Just more hypocrisy, spinning, and outright lying because you had to have an enemy to be against, to prop up your White Knight fantasies about Andrew Romanoff.
he meant illegitimate claim at incumbency, which I think he meant as “elected to the position.” The definition of incumbency, or at least the one that I found, just means “current office holder.” I think there is a common misconception that incumbent must mean elected. I think Bens points are all valid, but that word does not mean what he thinks it means.
But as for OBK’s other points, I don’t know how valid they are. I’ll address them, in turn.
I could say the same thing about Romanoff supporters not seeing any inconsistency with Romanoff’s record as a politician. The fact that many folks are willing to give him a pass merely on him saying that he’s reading from the right page in the prayer book is just as uncritical.
I’ve supported and worked for candidates like Mike Miles, Ned Lamont, and Paul Wellstone; it takes more than a deathbed conversion for me to grant you absolution, so to speak. Many of the things that Romanoff takes credit for now were initiatives advanced by other legislators, where he either came to the table late or not at all.
While I welcome his conversion to progressive politics, and, frankly, respect that he’s come this far waging the kind of culturally progressive campaign that we, all too often, pay lip service to, I can’t help but continue to wonder where this progressive champion was for eight years in the Colorado legislature; where this progressive champion of, for example, comprehensive immigration reform was when he rammed through legislation that could be rightfully considered the spiritual and philosophical father of Arizona’s SB 1070; and where this progressive champion will be if he is elected to the Senate.
These are all questions that, frankly, have been asked over and over and over again, for the last year, and the only answer we’ve gotten is that he’s seen the light now that it’s convenient for him to do. So you’ll have to color me skeptical on that.
Again, I could just as easily say the same thing about Romanoff supporters. Earlier in the piece, OBK referred to Bennet as an “illegitimate” incumbent. And while, when I challenged him on this, he quickly backtracked, one can’t help but think that had Romanoff received the appointment, very, very, very few people would have considered Romanoff “illegitimate”.
Without getting into the specifics again, suffice it to say that we are engaged in a great contest to ratify the choice that Governor Ritter made. This is as it should be. Both Romanoff and Bennet have had a year to make their cases before the Democrats of this state; in six days, we will render the verdict.
This is the process writ in law. We’re a nation of laws, not men. If people have a problem with the law, and not merely with the man, then there should be a parallel movement to reform the laws so that this doesn’t happen again. Sadly, I suspect that that won’t happen.
A number of things here. First, the idea that Bennet’s experience in politics is equivalent to Romanoff’s experience in politics is just simply laughable. Romanoff served on the Democratic National Committee, then spent eight years as an elected official, the last four as Speaker of the House. He’s the very definition of a career politician. To suddenly act as if he’s just a simple, down-home, just-folks kind of guy is insulting.
Moreover, it becomes even more insulting when Romanoff supporters turn around and use the very same record they just got done insisting wasn’t a mark of a career politician as proof that Romanoff would be more effective than Bennet in the U.S. Senate. Newsflash: you can’t have it both ways. Either he’s a man of the people, virginally unsullied by the mark of the special interest beast, or he’s a smooth operator who’ll excel in the halls of the Senate – but he can’t be both. Pick one.
As for the political machine known as Organizing for America: yes, it’s part of the DNC. It’s also composed of regular people who volunteer because they want to make this a better country. Furthermore, the claim that OFA is a political machine is an attack straight out of the Republican playbook. The claim is that Obama and his minions are engaging in dirty Chicago-style machine politics, as opposed to the clean politics that “real Americans” engage in.
What’s next – that ACORN and SEIU silently whispered to Bill Ritter that he should appoint Michael Bennet? One begins to wonder whether the Trilateral Commission will pop up, or maybe the fearsome Gnomes of Zurich.
For what it’s worth, having participated in Democratic Party politics for half of my young life, I can tell you that many of the Romanoff supporters that OBK sings paeans to as simple, good-hearted folk engage in dirty machine politics every bit as foul as those found in a Chicago alderman’s office.
The attack becomes especially rich when you consider that Romanoff will be the first person asking when the DSCC, OFA and other “political machines” will come to his rescue, should he win the primary. And, again, had he been appointed, no one would’ve been decrying his support by OFA. No one.
Let’s be blunt. When it comes to this primary, we’re looking at about 15 shades of grey. This idea that one guy is sainted, and the other is Satan, is absolutely ludicrous. Michael Bennet and Andrew Romanoff are, in this sense, just like the rest of us: highly gifted in some areas, highly flawed in others. More on this shortly, but I’ll segue to the last bone of contention here.
Bennet’s a freshman Senator. To be honest, all Senate freshmen have a certain puppy-like attitude about them. They follow people around, they ask a lot of questions – it’s what they do. The Senate, and more to the point, its procedures, are well-nigh impenetrable.
To be brutally honest, the idea that Romanoff is somehow going to waltz into the Senate and start on an orgy of legislating and policy-making is simply ludicrous. It’s also the corollary to the “career politician” point; that despite him being a simple guy who’s just interested in politics, he’s also a skilled legislative savant who’ll dazzle the world with his political legerdemain.
Yeah, not so much. If Romanoff gets elected to the Senate, particularly a Senate with a diminished Democratic majority, he’s going to do what Dick Durbin and Chuck Schumer tell him to do, in exchange for which they’ll let him make floor speeches that have the policy substance of a jelly donut. If the Republicans are in charge, you can forget about even that.
That’s not Romanoff’s fault, incidentally; that’s how the system is constructed. In Senate tradition, freshmen are little seen or heard. And while Romanoff has the potential, if elected, to be a great Senator, the idea that he’s somehow a world-historical figure who’ll be the exception to the rule in the Senate feeds into my last point.
And here’s the problem, in a nutshell. No, not the zombie.
When you talk about belief, when you talk about conversion, you’re talking about something deeply personal. You’re also talking about something that anchors you down, and keeps you from going further. As Chris Rock said, you can always change an idea; it’s a lot harder to change a belief.
The other thing about conversion and beliefs is that they don’t really mix well with the free exchanges of a democracy (cue the “it’s not a democracy, it’s a REPUBLIC!” guys. Yeah, yeah. Listen, Patrick Henry called and wants his breeches, three-corner hat and musket back in 1774, ok? Thanks.)
We’ve gotten, lately, into a really bad habit of believing that the political leaders we support are imbued with all manner of good virtues and that the ones we don’t are Hell’s own spawn. You saw it with Barack Obama, and now you’re seeing it with Michael Bennet and Andrew Romanoff.
The problem with doing that is that it forces us to concentrate on the other guy’s flaws, and makes us ignore our guy’s own deep shortcomings. Furthermore, when another person attacks our guy, we feel deep down inside as if we’re the ones being attacked, so we go nuclear on the other guy and his supporters.
But that’s not the the worst thing. The worst thing is, when our guy fails to live up to the inhuman expectations that we place on her or him, we immediately call down the thunder on our guy and scream betrayal to the heavens.
Our guy didn’t betray us; we betrayed ourselves. We betrayed ourselves because we surrendered our power in a democracy to our guy. He didn’t take it; we gave it away, with a pretty little bow on top.
The only way we keep the power is by thinking critically and acting critically. There’s no way to do that if we’re talking about conversion and belief. And frankly, in this primary, we’ve done that to ourselves and each other far, far too many times.
We have to do better than that.
You said:
I didn’t backtrack. I told you what I meant. And yes, fewer people would have found a Romanoff incumbency illegitimate for the reasons I laid out in Ritter’s Gamble. Bennet is a complete unknown and every effort has been made by the Preident and the Democratic Party to give Bennet a free ride to the general election. That is undemocratic.
Yes, we are a nation of laws and one of those laws is that the people elect Senators. So it’s upsetting to me when the President — even a President I still support — tries to appoint a Senator, which is what is happening here.
You seem unwilling to admit there is an uneven playing field in this primary. I don’t know how you can say that with a straight face.
I didn’t say Organizing for America is a corrupt political machine, I just said it is a political machine, which it is. And it should be out fighting for progressive causes, not involving itself in a primary using money donated by Romanoff supporters against Romanoff.
I don’t believe Romanoff will walk into the Senate, wave a magic wand, and cure cancer. But I do know he will FIGHT for the causes I believe in. Bennet may be a nice guy and a hard worker but he has no political common sense and, much worse, he is not a fighter or a leader.
better also correct your own – I believe the word is president not predient.
and my response is there. 🙂
Technically you are right about the word “incumbent” — my point is that it’s a deceptive word. And people are giving great respect and deference to Bennet’s incumbency (as they do other incumbents) when his incumbency deserves zero deference and respect.
That is the point I was trying to make, I should have been clearer. You were saying it in the way people understand it, not the actual definition. It is deceptive.