It must be a bad time to be a Colorado Republican. Barack Obama is in good shape to carry the state’s electoral votes, Mark Udall is looking more and more likely to pick up the vacant Senate seat, and now, everyone is becoming bearish about Marilynne Musgave’s chances of re-election.
The bad news comes from two sources. First, the website Coloradopols.com that Republicans at the recently held State Convention have already given up on her.
Congresswoman Marilyn Musgrave was a dead woman walking on Saturday. Supporters of Weld County District Attorney Ken Buck, as well as Rep. Cory Gardner, were telling delegates that should Musgrave lose to Democrat Betsy Markey this November, they will both immediately announce their candidacies. Both were privately telling delegates that Musgrave is a lost cause.
Secondly come details of why the Cook Political Report has shifted their classification from “Lean Republican” to “Tossup”, as reported by PolitickerCO.
House editor David Wasserman explained in the Cook Political Report that Democratic candidate Betsy Markey “has finally gotten her campaign operation into shape” against incumbent U.S. Rep. Marilyn Musgrave (R-Fort Morgan).
Democratic strategists, Wasserman added, “also say she carries less baggage than 2006 nominee Angie Paccione, who came within three points of defeating Musgrave.”
Another factor, Wasserman noted, is that presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama stands to do very well among CO-4 voters.
Meanwhile, private polls show Musgrave is “badly struggling,” Wasserman said in his explanation.
It’s worth noting that Musgove’s campaign would not return any calls. Short of Obama getting elected, nothing would please me more than knocking Musgrove off. Go, Betsy, go.
People keep on invoking Obama and all that kind of magical factors.
I’m willing to bet Musgrove is having the same problem that Jean Schmidt is seeing in polling- half or more of “her” electorate feeling unmotivated enough to call themselves Undecided.
Seems to be something of an epidemic for Republicans who aren’t that good at constituent services and are basically just megaphones for paleocon social issue stances.
The more I look at it, the country had its big ‘debate’ about gay rights and gay marriage in mid 2004-mid 2005. And what may be a last go at abortion rights for about a year, from mid-2005 (the O’Connor intent to resign letter) to mid-2006. Then about Latinos and illegal immigration from mid-2006 to mid-2007. For the length of the past year, it’s been about acceptability of women first, and then black men, in the top ranks and office of the society.
I’m guessing that gun rights/gun control will be the game of the next year, beginning when the Supreme Court verdict in District of Columbia v Heller comes out. Which could be within weeks.
Assuming the majority verdict comes out in favor of expanding gun rights pretty extensively, the efforts to exploit it and to stymy it will be immediate. Backlash and fallout (there will surely be all kinds of militant legislation proposals, mostly state level) could be quite impressive.
1. Was nominated by her district assembly, Republicans in three CDs voted on May 30 and just got around to posting the winners today.
2. Her million dollar bankroll is pretty good but not as good as it looks . The average GOP House incumbent running for re-election in an R+6 through D+7 district has $819 K in the bank. That’s for 55 GOP House members (including Fossella).