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December 17, 2008 06:08 AM UTC

Dick Wadhams Has Got Nothing

  • 26 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

Obligingly, the Rocky Mountain News reports this evening:

Republican Dick Wadhams is smiling again, which must mean the look on many Democrats’ faces is one of unease.

Sen. Ken Salazar’s decision to join President-elect Barack Obama’s cabinet has opened a variety of possibilities – and potential pitfalls – for Democrats, who know it’ll be tougher to keep Salazar’s U.S. Senate seat than it was just a few days ago.

That prospect has Wadhams, the state’s party chairman, grinning – and salivating of getting the GOP back in the game after a disastrous 2008 election.

“Incumbency is a powerful weapon even for an appointed senator, but an appointed senator is going to be more vulnerable than an elected senator,” Wadhams said Tuesday…

If Ritter taps a member of Congress to take over for Salazar in the case of a vacancy, that would set off other concerns for Democrats. A special election would have to be held in that congressional district and Republicans believe they have a shot in winning in two of those districts.

The situation reminds Wadhams of 2004, when Republicans controlled both U.S. Senate seats and five of seven congressional districts…

Oh yeah, obviously: that’s why Democrats eagerly debate the merits of nearly a dozen Senate candidates while Bob Beauprez and Tom Tancredo slap-box with Marc Holtzman over who’s going to get buried by Colorado’s popular Democratic governor in 2010.

Wadhams’ argument essentially boils down to “they have nowhere to go but down,” and it’s true that the next two years have enough unknowns that you can’t get too cocky about any majority, but 2010 won’t be 2004. Republicans are a still choking on their own low-budget intrigue (thanks in considerable part to Wadhams), and Democrats have a bench deep enough to survive all the major-league callups necessary.

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26 thoughts on “Dick Wadhams Has Got Nothing”

  1. This was essentially my reaction to the state GOP getting all excited about their chances in a special election. Until they have a credible candidate I’m not getting worried.  

    1. Got a robocall tonight with a push-button poll, asking which Dem I favored. Names were DeGette, Perlmutter, Hick, John Salazar, Romanoff and Pena.

      Next each of the above names was matched with a Republican for a 2010 election, first with Owens, then with Tancredo.

      Somebody’s little mice are out there working.

  2. I agree that the old names are just that old and worn out with their bad ideas and no where to turn.

    At a party this past week I overheard that a gentleman that was attending the party might be considering the run for Governor on the GOP side. I’m a democrat and I believe I would vote for him and don’t even know what he stands for. I did hear he was from the south, I think Atlanta. I did see him on the other side of the room and he was getting alot of attention, so I had to go over. I might add that Ritter was there and left after saying a few words and got very little attention even from a heavy populated democratic group. This gentleman was very professional in appearance and manners and I really liked him immediately.He was doing alot of listening and little talking. Seems everyone was sharing their lives with him for some reason. A breath of fresh air and comes from the business world. Not a lawyer and no political experience, I was told , that alone is a plus. I was told he has been in Colorado three years and loves it here and chose to live here when he returned from working overseas. I’m sorry I didn’t get his name as I had one to many with my friends, so memory was short, but will get it from some friends, I hope. I am told he comes from corporate experience and is strong on energy, and health care and one of the most likeable people we might have seen in a while. I was just listening and I knew I liked him immediately. That would be a change a real business person leading our government , how could we handle it.Maybe something would get done. So if anyone was at the Japan Emperors Birthday party and knows of the gentleman please post it.

    We need a new face and this guy would blow all the old names away if he really is running. Maybe I was dreaming… Hope not.

    I love this site and appreciate everyone’s views.

    1. quite a run, actually. But … Bill Owens, Wayne Allard, Wayne Allard, John Thune. He’s not just whistling Dixie (though he is whistling Dixie, when it comes down to it).

      1. Isn’t it obvious why he’s drooling? Beneath his feverish brow, Mr. Wadhams is planning to take his 2008 performance to its rigorously logical conclusion in 2010: simultaneous state party chair, statewide campaign manager, and now…candidate Dick Wadhams (your next US Senator).  

      2. At least he doesn’t SING “Dixie,” like Tom Tancredo did in front of a group of South Carolina secessionists a couple of years ago.

        And THAT’S a front-runner for the GOP. Wow. No wonder the Dems are cocky. Maybe a little too cocky, though.

        1. We’ve hashed this over here before, but since you brought it up…..

          There isn’t a racial word or phrase in the song. It’s only wrong doing is guilt by association, that many people we think of as bad, past and present, have sung it as an anthem.

          We don’t shun sweet potatoes or white corn because those same people ate them, do we?  

          Dixie is a powerful song of place, of mythology, an insight into a long ago culture, and a tune that if you don’t want to sing along, you are dead.

          (And was written by a Yankee, so I doubt if he was a slave owner or believed in such things.)

          1. I guess you can pretend that Dixie didn’t carry any racial connotations by looking very narrowly at just the lyrics. That requires flat out ignoring the entire history surrounding the song though

               On the evening of March 4, 1859, at New York’s Mechanics’ Hall, Dan Emmett, a five string banjo player for the enormously popular blackface Bryant Minstrels, introduced a catchy new “walk-around” song about an adulterous weaver named Willum. A native of central Ohio, Emmett was an accomplished songwriter – credited with, among other compositions, “Turkey in the Straw” and “Ol’ Dan Tucker” – and he was an expert performer in the googly-eyed, part-contemptuous, part-envious blackface style that set young northern workingmen to roaring. Emmett had kept the tune in his suitcase for years, and some writers have speculated that he first picked it up from free black musicians. The song’s hastily written lyrics – with the refrain, “In Dixie Land I’ll took my stamd/To lob and die in Dixie” – were an unexceptional mixture of nonsense and contrived nostalgia typical of the northern minstrel genre. What made the song special, like all of Emmett’s best work, was its rousing melody. Thus, from a corked-up Yankee pretending to be a slave – singing about a “gay deceiver” before a New York audience of “greasy mechanics” – came what was destined to be filched and transformed, to Dan Emmett’s horror, into the best known pro-slavery nationalist anthem.

            Sean Wilentz “the Rise of American Democracy” pages 725-726

            1. “The best known pro-slavery nationalist anthem?”  What the hell does that mean?  How is IT pro slavery?  Again, it’s back to who sang the song, not the song.  There is a difference.

              I stick with the song, not those have sung it, or eaten grits or mashed potatoes or suckled at mother’s breast.  (Which all should be damned and avoided by the same “logic.”)

  4. You must remember that Gov. Bill “I Like Debt” Ritter is in control.  He’ll be incredibely weak in ’10.  He will become the W of the Dems in Colorado and will begin to manifest the same level of toxicity ;).

    1. Gov. Bill “I Hate Balanced Budgets” Ritter

      or

      Gov. Bill “I-25 Sink-hole” Ritter

      or

      Gov. Bill “I believe in anonymous-Sex Bathrooms” Ritter

      or (my personal favorite)

      Gov. Bill “New MAKE BELIEVE Energy Economy” Ritter

    2. I’ve gotta agree with you. A lot can change in a year or two, and it’s uncomfortable hearing how cocky the Dems are.

      Sometimes there really IS “no place to go but down.” And I don’t think the Dems’ electable “bench” is all that deep.

      1. it’s that you can’t count on the GOP staying thin.  Even though the loss in the state house (seats from the majority) is understandable in a lot of ways, it’s still a loss.

        Two years is a long time for Penry to become known, C. Gardner to move up, Witwer to come back into play, leadership to realize Roberts and the like are the next wave, etc.  They’re out there.  Hopefully the GOP still hasn’t learned a thing.  That way statewide is no problem.  Go, Dick, go.

        1. If Wadhams is still chair by 2010 we can count on at least one more cycle of clueless denial on the part of the CO GOP, at least when it comes to the races for Senate and Governor. Definitely shouldn’t get cocky about the state legislature and 5 out of 7 CDs is probably as good as it gets for the near future.

          Noticed that Wadhams says Perlmutter being a favorite with unions would make it hard for him to win statewide in 2010 if he’s appointed because that would be a problem for moderates. Yeah right. How would Wadhams describe Perlmutter’s two thirds Republican and Independent district? Hard left?

    3. Ritter is looking very good for re-election. And whoever gets the Senate seat (except Strikland), same thing – very good chances.

      Look at how much effort it was to replace Musgrave and she was awful by almost any measure.

      1. being an appointed incumbent is that different from being an elected incumbent as long as a complete no-hoper isn’t getting the appointment.  Hickenlooper, Romanoff and Perlmutter all would be strong incumbents in 2010 with no funding problems.  

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