Copyright © 2006 Henrietta W. Hay
This week's Election
November 3, 2006
Just four days to go and the fat lady will sing. Well, she will sing for half of us and the other half will be crying. The election will be over and we can go back to our favorite TV shows and ads for deodorants instead of candidates.
Some random thoughts about the election:
- I wish it were 2008 and we were voting for a new President. But the current President did come up with a bit of humor. With 47% of Americans in the last New York Times poll saying "bring them home," W put on his somber face and announced that he would quit using the phrase, "stay the course." Instead he assured us that the war is winnable, whatever he means by that. And this turnaround just two weeks before the election. Political? Wonder who thought up the timing.
- Here at home the most obnoxious part of the campaign has been the vicious, cruel negative advertising. The early anti-Beuscher ads though, should get him elected They were so busy dissing Bernie that I didn't know his opponent's name for a couple of weeks. Most of the other candidates have been dragged through the mud too.
- Who is paying for all this vitriol? Big money from Denver and the east is pouring in with very few legal limitations. The Democrats are not too shabby at raising money, but the biggest haul has been by a Denver conservative group called Trailhead, created by Bill Owens, Pete Coors and Bruce Benson. It has raised $4.3 million according to the Denver Post.
- Have you noticed that to get elected a red-blooded western man has to be seen in his shirt sleeves and a cowboy hat, walking toward the camera, or even better, riding a horse?
- An amazing phenomenon is shows up in several newspapers this year. The Denver Post, which is basically Democratic, and the Daily Sentinel which is basically Republican have done some amazing turnarounds. The Post is endorsing several Republicans, and the Sentinel is endorsing several Democrats. That's a good sign. Maybe we are moving toward voting for the person instead of the party now and then.
- I have a number of favorite candidates, but the number one is Bernie Buescher, running for re-election in House District 55. A combination of brains, experience and a willingness to cooperate and even -- horrors -- compromise, to say nothing of the fact that he is a member of the Joint Budget Committee, makes him invaluable to the Western Slope and the entire state.
- One battle on the eastern slope is surprising a lot of people. Marilyn Musgrave, running for re-election in the 4th Congressional District was considered a shoo-in. She is the mother of the Far Right in Congress. But maybe she is too far right. Democrat Angie Paccione is running against her on a rational platform and they are neck and neck.
- Steve Rose of the Johnson County Sun (Kansas), a firmly Republican paper for 56 years bemoans editorially the "fracturing of the Republican party." He wrote an editorial on the new Republican Right and asks, "What does the Right mean?" A few of the reasons are these. "It means anti stem cell research. It means ridiculing global warming. It means putting religion in public schools: not just prayer. It means mocking evolution and claiming it's not science." That's right.
Maybe the fat lady will sing "The Star Spangled Banner" and maybe a miracle will happen and we will become one country again.