Luis says: Let’s you and him infight!
So let’s go back to rubbing in the shortcomings of Republicans. I think we all missed pointing out this Grand Junction Sentinel story saying that former Rep. Scott McInnis of Grand Junction is trying to ease former Rep. Bob Schaffer of Ft. Collins out of the Senate race so that Colorado Republicans can avoid a divisive primary like the one between Bob Beauprez and Marc Holtzman in the governor’s race last year.Trouble is, the Republican primary before that one was the 2004 Senate primary, where Bob Schaffer was the lone candidate before Governor Owens recruited Pete Coors to come into the race. Schaffer supporters, which include the Colorado Springs fundamentalist faction, feel that the governor and state Republican party apparatus unfairly tipped the scales in the primary to Coors. And, the fact that Coors went down to defeat to Ken Salazar only makes the bitterness worse – I’m sure Schaffer’s supporters feel he could have done a better job in the general election than Coors did. (I think they’re wrong, but there’s no way to prove it.)
So I don’t think it’s very likely that Schaffer can be sweet talked into clearing the field for McInnis. And we might have another bitter Republican primary fight between the candidate with the perception of being the anointed favorite versus a darling of the religious right. Pass the popcorn.
I love me some good internal squabbling – when it happens on the GOP side. Of course, you never can tell when a primary is going to be a blessing or a curse. Sometimes, you wind up with a battle-tested, more experienced nominee with greater name rec (example: John Hall). Other times, you wind up with a total train wreck, trailing negative vibes and ugly baggage all over the place (example: Randy Graf).
Luis seems to think we might very well be in for fight night. Here’s hoping he’s right!
At this point we have a clear field for Udall. If they go negative then we can waltz into the seat but if they play positive and ask the voters to vote for them instead of voting against the other guy then we have a figh on our hands.
a Repub Rotwing Primary fight, yeeha, bring it on!
Scott McInnis attempted to adopt the mantle of the heir apparent to the seat to get potential primary foes to step aside but the Scheafer camp is having none of that. So I expect McInnis and Schaeder at a minimum to run, and once Schaefer jumps in, it might set off a chain reaction of would be GOP candidates who have little to lose in taking a shot at a rare prize, an open US Senate seat. They can all deflect party unity criticism by making Schaefer the heavy afterall.
becuase I think that if McInnis were to run in primary with minimum effort, we’d lose the seat due to geography. Udall really can’t win with McInnis, a respected, moderate, former congressman, taking such a large vote share in John Salazar’s district. Not to mention, his moderacy helps in him in the more conservative suburban portions of CO-07 and CO-04. If there was a difficult priamry fight in which he came out on top, I think Udall would narrowly win. If Schaffer came out on top after an expensive, brutal primary where he positioned himself as the wingnut in the race, particularly on social issues, then Udall would be a 52% favorite by sweeping CO-01, CO-02, (his district), and CO-07, (Ed Perlmutter’s district), and holding Schaeffer to a very small margin in CO-04, (Musgrave’s current Democratic trending district, aand Schaeffer’s old district I beleive), and John Salazar’s Democratic trending district, maybe even winning a plurality in the latter.
It would be great having a Senate Democrat other tan Ken Salazar from Colorado. Salazar is such a Republican on economic issues, he’sthe epitomy of the anti-populist Democrat; voted for the Bankruptcy act, the class action lawsuit bill, the extension of some of Bush’s tax cuts, etc. Udall on the other hand, is a reliable,very liberal vote on most issues not just social issues. Even if he is pro-choice, I still like him a lot, and think he’d be a great Senator.
My Dream 2008 Senate Freshman Class:
-MArk Udall D-CO****
-Mark Warner D-Va****
-Richard Moore D-NC***
-Tom Allen D-ME****
-Dan Boren D-OK**
-Mike Fahey D-NE**
-Anyone but jackass ultra-conservative John Sununu D-NH****
-Steve Lourey D-MN***
I’d be living in fantasy land to think we could get all eight, but I’d be estatic if we got just four, the four that have four stars beside them. Id think I’d died and gone to heaven if we got 6 of these in. To be blunt in southern way: WE AIN’t GETTIN AW ATE.
One thing everyone in Colorado knows about McInnis, he is a fighter. One of the hardest campaigners, in the country. Silver-spoon Udall will have a tough time keeping up, even with help from his wife’s shadowy, ultra-liberal 527 organization’s help.
Seems like the party here is really lining up behind McInnis. Schaffer is a smart guy. My bet is that he takes a walk on this one, and looks to a 2010 showdown.