Posted on 09/30/2010 7:30:31 AM PDT by beaversmom
The implosion of Colorado gubernatorial candidate Dan Maes is becoming so apparent that it’s likely to leave the Republican nominee finishing in third place on election night.
It’s an embarrassing and disheartening prospect for a party that just months ago believed it had an even shot at taking over the governor’s mansion in the Rocky Mountain State.
A new Pulse Opinion Research survey of the three-way contest released Tuesday showed Maes capturing just 15 percent of the vote, 19 points behind American Constitution candidate Tom Tancredo, who launched a bid after he rendered the Republican unelectable. Democratic Mayor John Hickenlooper leads Tancredo 44 percent to 34 percent, according to the Sept. 25 survey, conducted for Fox News.
The Pulse survey follows two other polls taken earlier this month showing Maes stuck in third place, as Republicans continue to abandon his bid because of questions about his fitness for office.
“I’m not surprised at all. None of his statements are resonating with voters. His debate performances are poor. He’s not catching on with the party, he’s not raising money. It’s not a viable campaign,” said Mike Beasley, a GOP lobbyist and former policy director for Gov. Bill Owens.
Jen Raiffie, a conservative activist and former Tancredo campaign staffer, said the momentum for Tancredo was most recently evident at a Sunday fundraiser featuring Maricopa County, Ariz. Sheriff Joe Arpaio, which drew nearly a thousand people, including many former Maes supporters.
“What is clear is that the Maes zombies are waking up and some, more reluctant than others, are finding themselves being welcomed into Camp Tancredo with loving and open arms. There is a lot of bad blood between some of these activist. The question is: Will they finally unite together in support of Tancredo? The momentum indicates that they will unite overall, in my opinion,” wrote Raiffie in an e-mail.
Maes has been hampered by everything from campaign finance violations to questions about his claim to have been placed undercover by the Kansas Bureau of Investigation when he was a police officer there. On Tuesday, the nominee continued to fight the claims surrounding his dismissal in the mid 1980s from the Liberal, Kan., police department.
“The accusation that I somehow fabricated the story of working with KBI has now been completely debunked, and I would hope that my critics will now apologize with the same zeal they formerly used to attack. I would also encourage any Republicans who withdrew their support based on the inaccurate initial reports to reconsider their decision and once again support the Republican nominee for Governor,” Maes said in a statement.
But observers believe the chance for Maes to repair the damage done to his character has long passed, leaving him destined for a third-place finish.
“The mayor’s going to get 45 to 51 percent. Tancredo will come in second,” said Denver-based pollster Floyd Ciruli.
Seth Masket, a University of Denver political science professor, wrote on his blog that Maes has become so toxic that Tancredo – long pinned as an extremist among the establishment rung of the party – looks like the better bet.
“The list of Tancredo endorsers includes relatively mainstream party folks like Bob Beauprez, the GOP’s nominee for governor in ’06, Josh Penry, who dropped out of the governor’s race last year, and former state Rep. Rob Witwer. Their backing is an indicator to other Republicans that it’s safe to like Tancredo this year,” he wrote.
The saving grace for the Colorado GOP: The governor’s race appears to be an island unto itself. There’s no polling data showing Maes’s problems are becoming a drag on GOP Senate nominee Ken Buck or any of the other congressional candidates vying in competitive races.
But Beasley, who is breaking with his Republican roots to support Hickenlooper, said he is worried about the lasting impact Maes’s failure might have on the party.
“If he really is in the low double-digits, we’re going to have a couple thousand people versus 5,000 or 6,000 picking delegates for the national conventions and nominating statewide candidates,” he said, referring to the formula used to determine delegate representation at party functions. “If he does as dismally as people think, we’re going to have very few people involved.”
“What it does do is give John a chance to reach out to both political parties and those in between to bring Colorado together,” he said.
The Maes campaign did not respond to a request for comment and the state GOP declined to comment.
Seriously.
There are handbooks written about how to do this ~ and I'm actually chortling over this situation.
Amazing what the public will buy into eh?!
Go, Tanc.
HUH, I didn’t know that.
If it really is the way it reads, extraordinary pressue should be put on Maes to drop out.
Yep. It really is the way it reads. Maes MUST go.
Nonsense. There are many Republicans calling for Serpico Maes to drop out. He just won't.
Maes is another of these whiners that should have dropped out. Tancredo is a bit off but with Maes’ voters behind him, the race could be very very close. It still might be if Maes’s voters just realize he is a real loser. Tancredo seems weird to many voters but if he hit the right niche, perhaps Hick might not pull this off.
I think this whole election cycle has been ridiculous. The real problem is the Colorado State GOP, which has been shafting us with terrible candidates for almost ten years now. Remember Pete Coors, the guy who said in his concession speech, “I never really wanted to win, anyway.” Or how about Bill Owens hitting us with the largest tax increase in Colorado’s history (referendum C) and then being surprised when the Republicans can’t win back the Governorship. I’m sure Jane Norton was counting on all of us to have a short memory about that when she ran against Buck. Sorry Jane, but no candidate who ever supported Ref C will get my vote.
I can’t tell you how many central committee meetings I’ve been to where the party elite kept telling us not to vote for the conservatives in the caucus because “they just can’t win.” I’m sick of it.
Maes released documents yesterday that confirm everything he’s said about his time in the Liberal, KS Police Department, including working with the KBI on a gambling ring. If that were his only problem at this point, then he’d be clear and have a shot at the governor’s mansion. But it’s now hopeless because his own party abandoned him, just like they told us to do to every conservative that’s come down the pike in the last ten years.
Where have they gone instead? The party leadership have left the party, jumping ship to Tancredo. Tancredo came in to this thing late, when he easily could have gotten in to the primary early if he really felt that Maes and McGinnis were not viable. On top of that, the primary was made up of nothing but political insiders (party favorites) with barely a conservative bone in the bunch. Yeah, I voted for Maes, but it was as the most conservative individual out of a bunch of RINO’s.
Tancredo could, and should have run in the primary. He didn’t. The GOP could and should have supported its candidate, but it didn’t. They wanted McGinnis, who was a blue-blood country-club republican at best, and a RINO at worst. When they got Maes, they basically pulled all support on the night of the primary. Christine O’Donell was treated better by the party leadership than Maes was.
Tancredo may be more conservative, and had he run in the Primary, he probably would have gotten my vote, but the whole situation since the primary has been a joke.
Tancredo wanted the GOP to ignore the results of the primary, push Maes out, and ANOINT him as their candidate. Must be nice. Don’t run for office, don’t work through the primary, but show up on the day after and then demand to overturn the votes of 380,000 Colorado republicans, not one of whom voted for Tancredo.
So, he went out to run third party. Fine, he has that right. But look at the ads he’s running. He has yet to run one ad against Chicken-Scooper, every one of his ads have been vicious (and now we find out, untruthful) attacks against Dan Maes.
You’d think that Maes had a 70% lead in the polls. But not to worry, Tancredo has now so poisoned the well, there’s no one in the state who’d continue to vote for Maes. Even here on Free Republic, where people are supposed to be informed, Maes is called a con man and a shyster.
Now we’ve got Bob “I used the courts to knock my opponent, the real conservative, off the ballot” Beauprez backing Tancredo, and I’m supposed to be happy? Let’s recap: He LOST to Ritter! Big Time. We’re talking nearly 20%... This is the guy Tancredo wants to endorse him?
Old Both Ways Beauprez, the RINO who couldn’t beat Bill Ritter is supposed to make me feel good about Tancredo? Tancredo’s the guy who dragged an 83 year old woman onto TV to rip into Dan Maes for a contribution he’s already returned and been fined by the election committee for? A crappy move by Maes to take the money? Yeah, but that was 18 months ago, and the guy who talked her into the contribution was fired about 10 months ago. At least Maes didn’t put this woman on television sounding like a bitter old hag. And it’s not like he took her life savings. It was $300. I gave almost that much to Pete Coors — the guy who didn’t really want to win. Talk about swindled...
Frankly, while I used to love Tancredo, his current actions are making me absolutely sick to my stomach.
Is he better than Hicken-choo-choo? Sure, but, then again, so is a rotting monkey corpse. When do I get a chance NOT to vote for the lesser of two evils? Oh yeah, I get to vote for Buck.
Here in Colorado, the GOP is about to lose its major party status, and frankly, with the clowns we’ve been putting up and the clowns running the party...
...it’s about time.
Coulda, woulda shoulda.Are you planing to support the weasel ?
Or vote for a true Conservative ?
Anyone who lies to and cons Freda is a weasel.
> Nonsense. There are many Republicans calling for Serpico
> Maes to drop out.
I’m very glad to learn this!
> He just won’t.
One thing ya gotta hand to the busybody commies and RINOs. They’re tenacious.
That's not true. Tancredo stated many times (I listened to him on Caplis and Silverman several times) that he wanted someone else, not himself, to be the GOP nominee. Once the primary was settled and Maes showed he had no intention of dropping out, Tancredo had to keep true to his word and stick with the Constitution Party. Maes is the spoiler here and you are being silly if you keep going on about poor old mistreated Dan Maes. The future of our state is at stake. If you are conservative, you will support the only viable conservative candidate in the race.
One thing Maes has always had going for him is that he’s not a quitter. He has a long history of hanging in there even when in the face of impossible obsticals.
In this case his tenacity is going to hurt us conservatives in CO.
In an exclusive interview, Maes said that he and his advisers have decided to push ahead toward election day, now less than five weeks away, because his base of conservative grassroots activists wants him to do so.
“When someone I respect comes to me with a concern, I’m going to listen to them,” Maes said. “One person who I really admire and respect, who’s an advisor to me, did sit me down and say, ‘Why don’t you take a look at this and make sure you’re doing the right thing?’
“But there’s no turning around this late in the game now. It’s two weeks before the mail-ins go out, so we’ve got to charge ahead and make this happen.”
http://www.kdvr.com/news/politics/kdvr-maes-losing-support-txt,0,3555574.story
So even his “trusted advisors” are hinting he should leave the race, but he just ignores their advice.
That would be consistant with his life thus far.
For once, he should take some outside advice.
Sorry, you’re wrong. The day before and after the primary, Tancredo was calling for Maes (or McGinnis, whoever won) to drop out and be replaced by either Josh Penry or himself.
In any case, you’re missing the whole point of my rant.
I don’t think Maes is some knight in shining armor. I think he’s a typical, slimy politician, barely conservative, and mostly a party hack. And the time to vote him out was in the caucuses and the primaries. But for the last 10 years that I’ve been a GOP central committee member, the leadership has been begging its membership *NOT* to choose conservatives.
The Colorado GOP has *EARNED* Minor Party status by putting up crap candidates for 10 years, and actively sabotaging the campaign of anyone conservative. This is just the culmination of ten years of ***-clowns running the local party.
Will I vote for Tancredo? At this point it’s probably my only hope to keep Hickenlooper out of the Governor’s mansion. But I will do it holding my nose because of the back-stabbing, low-life, dirty tactics Tancredo is using. The only thing in this election bigger than Hickenlooper’s stupidity is Tom Tancredo’s self-righteous ego.
But as far as I’m concerned, the Colorado GOP is dead. It committed suicide.
Oh no, poor Freda has regrets about her donation. Like I said, where’s my refund for donating to Pete Coors’ campaign? The guy never intended to win. He swindled me out of several $100 donations, because I wanted anyone but Ken Salazar to win. Instead the party nominated a candidate that Dr. Dobson spent $2.5M defeating. Great. We got Salazar instead.
You missed the whole point of my rant. Tancredo is no glowing pillar of Conservatism. The guy is a one-trick pony with Immigration Reform. Great, I’ll hold my nose and vote for him, and I’ll be happy to get an Arizona style law instead of Hickey-fruitster’s Sanctuary State, but that’s not going to fix the rest of the problems. I’ve seen no evidence Tancredo’s the next Ronald Reagan that’s going to turn the state around and lead us to the promised land.
I am so SICK of voting for the lesser of two evils. Someday I want a candidate that I actually can vote FOR.
My complaint is that the GOP has bought itself minority party status through its own actions over the last decade by fronting RINO’s and Blue-Blood Country Clubbers. Don’t blame Maes for it.
A long time ago I heard the political system of America described as “The Evil Party versus the Stupid Party.” We’re going a long way to earn the title of “Stupid Party” in Colorado.
I don’t remember it that way. I’d have to see something in print or hear it. I remember him saying he would step aside if McInnis or Maes agreed to step down and let someone else take their spot before the deadline.
I don’t share your disgust and low opinion of Tancredo obviously. I’m happy he has given me a choice in November. I didn’t have that before.
I do share your disgust and low opinion of the Republican machine in Colorado. I’m not knowledgeable enough of the inner workings, but things have got to change if we are going to remain a competitive party. Even with Maes on the top spot, I think many of the Repub candidates stand a very good chance in November. I hope the grass-roots enthusiasm remains through 2012, but we can’t count on that. We’ll have to have a top notch machine in place and who knows if that is possible. In general, things just don’t change like that on a dime.
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