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November 07, 2008 10:17 PM UTC

An Examination of the DEM Bench; 2010 Gubernatorial

  • 52 Comments
  • by: Haners

We’ll be examing various aspects of the approaching 2010 statewide elections.  Please comment how you would like, but please only vote in the Polls for your Party.

Ok, it’s far fetched.  But that doesn’t mean we can’t have a little fun.

The sitting Governor of Colorado has been toeing an interesting line.  As an pro-life Democrat in a very pro-choice party, Ritter got lucky by avoiding a primary in 2006.  Will he get lucky again?  If not, who could run?

Bill Ritter- He’ll run again, but is he weak from the left?

Andrew Romanoff- The soon to be “fomer Speaker” was touted as a possible candidate in 2006 but declined.  Out of work next year, could Romanoff decide this is the right year and the right job?

John Hickenlooper- The Mayor of Denver would certainly be well positioned to challenge Ritter from the left with the points he scored with the grassroots through his work with the DNC when the convention was in town.  Could he feel lucky?

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52 thoughts on “An Examination of the DEM Bench; 2010 Gubernatorial”

    1. What if there was a fake candidate. A plant. Let a gadfly run who knows they’re going to get throttled to drum up support for Ritter and make him look stronger.

      1. It would have to be the perfect balance of someone who was viable enough to not get written off by the media and be meaningful when they were beaten, but not take away too much from Ritter.

        Sounds like a lot of work to me, but again I love good political theater

  3. A Democratic primary to distract voters from what will surely be a bitter and destructive GOP primary.

    The Guv may be faltering, but he hasn’t fallen off the cliff yet. He would have to do something disastrous for there to be a primary in ’10.

    1. I mean, I think that Ritter is going to be renominated.  But there is obviously a frustration felt by the left over having to put up with what they consider to be moderate Democrats.  That frustration is probably felt more towards Salazar then Ritter, but who knows?

      At the end of the day, I love some good political theater!

        1. Unions are a big left vs. right divide, as are taxes and land use.

          But in any case, it was the worst kept secret in 2006 that Democrats wanted someone more left to run but no one ever materialized.  The question is, will they find someone this time?  Maybe not a Romanoff, but a Mike Miles (that was his name, right?)

          1. its a made up issue by people from outside the state who don’t understand the labor environment in this state.

            As to the fight in 2006–not so much.

            1. Am I missing something?  No challenge materalized in 2006, but what I am saying is that it some Dems didn’t try to hide the fact that they wanted someone else.

              1. try to hide the fact they were elated to take back the governor’s office. You’re dreaming if you think there’s a rift in the party, Haners, sorry.

                1. See Haners, we know where we live.  We know what kind of Dem has been sailing to state-wide victory in Colorado.  And we’re happy to have more and more Dems winning stuff.  

                  If you’re waiting for the wild eyed liberals to screw things up you’re going to be waiting a  while.  Wild eyed liberals  aren’t running the party.  They just complain in blogs.  Or perhaps hold safe liberal seats.

                  We Dems have a pretty good thing going with the moderates who have been beating the crap out of the conservative right here over the past few years.   Sorry but we’ve learned a few things about how NOT to self-destruct.  

                  Nothing lasts forever.  It’s the right that’s self-destructing now.  The GOP will probably learn too but for now, shoe’s on the other foot, Haners.  You ought to be worrying about your own circular firing squads.  

              2. which is admittedly dim – I didn’t pay any attention to the race til around the time that the ‘pubs blew away Holzman – was that the only person people really wanted to run was Hickenlooper, and he’s not exactly hard left. I certainly don’t recall any griping about having to settle for a moderate.

                I don’t think Romer or Lamm were the most liberal of politicians either. And given what seeking liberal purity wrought in 2000, I think only the very leftmost of lefties are given to griping about anyone not being “liberal enough,” with the exception of Ken Salazar. But the reasons for that are fleshed out in another diary…

      2. But the problems are mostly due to the people being unable to decide how to fund the government they want. Everyone wants the roads and schools fixed and no one wants to pay for them.

  4. While that is true, it is also true that Bill has not done anything stupid vis Г  this issue.

    If he let’s sleeping dogs lie, then no one will challenge him on this.

    The Dems want to stay in power and not have a bloody primary for the sake of purity.

    3. that he had no intention of actively pushing a pro-life agenda.  He’s been as good as his word.  We pro-choice Dems just aren’t having a problem with him.  Sorry, Haners.

  5. “No way. No how.  No primary.”

    If the Republicans were in charge of the leg, then he might be put in the uncomfortable position of having to sign or veto an piece of legislation around the issue of choice—but they are not, so he won’t.  

    Ritter will be our candidate in 2010.  We Dems will leave it to Beauprez, McInnis and Tancredo (and Schaffer?) to beat the crap out of each other in a primary for the right to lose to Ritter in the general.

    1. .

      I was confused –

      were they talking about Bill Ritter, the Guv, who’s personally without any guiding moral principles regarding the so-called “Right to Life,”

      (says he’s personally against it, but that asserted position has zero impact on his actions,)

      but will turn whichever way the wind blows in order to win votes ?  

      He’s only “pro-life” in the sense that everyone, even the most strident advocates of expanded access to abortion, are in favor of Life, within “reasonable” limits.  

      There’s no daylight separating “pro-life” Bill Ritter from “pro-life” NARAL or “pro-life” Planned Parenthood.  

      Long-time readers know I make lots of errors.  If I’m wrong on this, I would benefit from further edification.  

      .

      1. I don’t recall either NARAL or Planned Parenthood endorsing Ritter in 2006. If I’m wrong, please provide the link.

        If Ritter’s “pro-life” credentials are just a political front, why haven’t NARAL and Planned Parenthood run a bill that explicitly legalizes abortion in Colorado — instead of just letting the 1967 Lamm statute remain on the books, despite being found unconstitutional? Doesn’t this week’s 75% – 25% thrashing of Amendment 48 show that Colorado is a pro-choice state?

        1. It shows that Coloradans don’t want to make a fertilized egg a person.

          If there was an attempt to outlaw abortion with an exemption for rape, incest or the threat of the mother dying or being critically harmed, it would pass.

            1. I’m not saying it wouldn’t be close, I’m just saying that I think most Coloradans share that view.

              Of course you’re right to be skeptical, because many do not necessarily think that their view should be the law.

              It would put the Governor in a fairly awkward position as well.

            2. Roe‘s core principles are that women have a right to privacy when choosing abortion and that states cannot infringe on that right prior to fetal viability; after fetal viability, states can enact restrictions, so long as those restrictions do not pose an undue burden on women or place a woman’s health or life at risk.

              Pro-choice activists’ opposition to so-called “partial birth abortion” bans derive NOT from the fact that they’re bans on abortion, but from two very basic facts: (1) there’s no medical definition of a “partial birth abortion”; politicians coined this term and have made up different definitions in every single such ban — therefore opening the door for bans on procedures that are used before fetal viability; and (2) the bans omit exceptions for the health or life of the woman.

              John McCain’s air quotes when referring to women’s health when it comes to late abortions further perpetuates the misinformation that women who are 8.5 months pregnant are running around, impulsively deciding to have an abortion, and asking doctors to innocuously jot down “woman’s health” in their medical records to justify a late termination. The reality is that less than 2% of abortions are provided at 21 weeks or later, and these involve very real human tragedies where complex situations force women, doctors and their families to make difficult decisions.

          2. most people do not think that a woman should have to go before a tribunal to plead her case for terminating a pregnancy…which is exactly what such a law would require.

            Women are adults capable of making these decision in consultation with anyone (or no one) of their choosing.

            The law you propose would fail overwhelmingly.

      2. Tell me if I’m wrong:

        Here are what qualifies as pro-life

         1) you love little innocent babies

         2) never is something that happens, the in utero baby’s fault

         3) if someone was irresponsible enough to get pregnant, then they need to take responsibility for their mistakes and at least give the healthy white child up for adoption.

        and sometimes someone is pro-life when they think:

         1) God creates a human being at the moment a sperm wriggles into an ovum.

         2) if you murder someone for murdering someone else, its because it was the right thing to do.

        Thoughts outside of this box are frowned upon. Any examination of the emotional validity of the above points are sad-inducing.  

    5. Ritter was DA for a bit and during that time he saw the now-unconstitutional parental notification law as wrong. He came out against Amendment 48 because he thinks that there should always be an exception for rape/incest and mammy’s health. This is totally sensible. No sane and fully functional human being would ever disagree that that is an appropriate and realistic response.

      The rape/incest and exception is what seals the deal for the pro-choice voters. You cannot make a strict constitutionally sound exception for rape and incest and have abortion inaccessible to women who do not prove rape.

      This bullshit gray area means that there are two sides to this argument, you are either making a superstitious and religious legislative move or you are for accessible and rational health care in appropriate to the 21st Century. All else is completely irrelevant to the third dimension.

      After Tuesday’s mandate, pro-choice voters are safe in this state. As long as Ritter continues to be a thinking human being, pro-choicers will re-elect him.

      Now, how is your family doing? Do you need anything from me? Why don’t you come to my sermon this Sunday? Just put this on your tongue.

      *comment title irrelevant

  7. who has any chance of winning.  we might get a moron trying to unseat him for some nonsense, but our party mechanism is strong/smart enough to make sure no serious candidates run against him.  oh, also, he’s going to be re-elected.

  8. Colorado is still a conservative state. You folks dreaming of people challenging Ritter “from the left,” let alone WINNING the governorship, are crazy.

    Ritter would not have won had he been a typical doctrinaire Democrat. His pro-“life” and strong anti-crime background are what got him elected.

    1. is what did it. They would have run the same campaign had Hickenlooper gotten the nomination, and would have just as easily sailed to victory. Colorado, as every poll has shown year after year, is a pro-abortion state, but politicians who get bogged down in the argument do so at their peril.

      1. Pls provide a link where someone says he or she is pro-abortion.

        It’s one thing to say that politicians and the government have no right to create a mandate requiring women to carry pregnancies to term. It’s another thing entirely to say that if you don’t think it’s any of the government’s business, that means you are pro-abortion. People who are pro-choice don’t necessarily have abortions. They just believe abortion should be safe and legal, provided by trained medical professionals. Making them illegal by government mandate only makes them a dangerous, black-market commodity.

        1. Nobody thinks are abortions are just great.  Pro-choice, pro safe effective and widely available  contraception is not the same as pro-abortion.  In fact when the economy is in good shape and good safe contraception options are widely available the rate of abortion goes down, as it did under Clinton.  

          Also being anti-choice isn’t the same as being pro-life.  If it were all the alleged “pro-lifers” would be against the death penalty and for diplomacy over wars of choice.  

          They’d also be all for funding services for young single mothers to help them raise the children they so badly want them to carry.  

          They’d be just as much against fertility clinics that freeze and toss out fertilized eggs as they are against abortion clinics.

          They really don’t seem to be all that interested in the sanctity of life in general.  They seem more interested in forcing their religious views on others.

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