The 2d CD Blogging Debate

Our friend (who we have never met) at Liberal and Loving It pulled off a coup. He got the three candidates for the 2d CD seat being vacated by Mark Udall to debate on the internet.

Because there would be 14 separate links, we will only link the blog and let the reader scan down. The last post is dated January 29th.

One of the reasons that we point readers to that debate is that it is a good window into the mind and motivations of Mark Udall, who went unmentioned.

They all want to get rid of the Bush tax cuts to fund their pet projects. None is admitting that they expire in 2010 regardless, and there is no money to be had from them.

Only Jared Polis among them didn't aspire to be a grandparent, and we would guess that their mention of the subject was a gentile subconscious dig by the other two, but perhaps not.

None seemed to know or want to admit that Ted Kennedy was the major author of No Child Left Behind. They all chafed at the impacts of that law.

There is much more. It is a good read, but if you are a conservative, don't expect much there that will make you happy. On the other hand, if you want to sample the environment that brought us Mark Udall, it is there in full liberal flower.

Darth Vader Wants Answers

Ok, we were chuckling as we wrote this title, but we know that many, many public officials and employees look on Jared Polis as the Darth Vader who financed Amendment 41 without bothering to read it first.

He is calling for an investigation of the state school board expense account. He claims to have never made a claim for funds but the records seem to say otherwise. It isn't a big amount, but the story will be interesting to follow because if he really didn't take the money (likely), then who did? Where did it go?

It turns out that Polis did take a $200 gift but his Amendment 41 doesn't seem to apply to him. Others, according to the Rocky Mountain News aren't happy:

But the idea of Polis accepting a gift when other elected officials could not rankled critics of Amendment 41.

"This reflects an arrogance that says the law applies to everyone but me," said Katy Atkinson, who led the unsuccessful campaign to defeat Amendment 41.

Polis did not report the gift on his disclosure forms to the secretary of state.

"The rules never seem to apply to him," said Mary Alice Mandarich, campaign spokeswoman for one of Polis' opponents, former Sen. Joan Fitz-Gerald.

Fitz-Gerald IS Running, It Turns Out

It seems that Joan Fitz-Gerald is actually running for the seat being vacated by Mark Udall. We were wondering as she ducked an opportunity to appear on Jon Caldara's Independent Thinking debate last week.

While she lacked the courage to submit to questions from a libertarian, she jumped at the chance to appear in a debate before the Boulder Press Club.

Polis and Shafroth Will Debate, Fitz-Gerald Too Busy

KBDI's Independent Thinking will host a debate between Jarad Polis and Wil Shafrothto be aired at 8:30 on January 10th.

Former Colorado state senate president Joan Fitz-Gerald also is seeking the democratic nomination but declined an invitation to participate in the debate, citing prior commitments. A request for dates that would accommodate Fitz-Gerald's schedule went unanswered.

"We'll leave an empty chair, in case she has a change of heart or change of schedule," said Caldara who added that he intends to challenge the candidates on a variety of issues such as Iraq, climate change, ethics in government and campaign finance.

We will be watching.

We have no idea why Fitz-Gerald couldn't make time on her schedule. Jon Caldara is such a teddy bear. No kidding!

Charges Flying in 2CD

It looks like Jared Polis took money from five folks who contributed to the Swift Boat political campaign in 2004. Most people wouldn't care, but in Boulder the reaction is "Gaaassp."

Joan Fitz-Gerald is making as much hay as possible, or so reports the Boulder Daily Camera.

"How does Jared even know these people, who traditionally give only to Republicans?" [ Fitz Gerald campaign manager Mary Alice ] Mandarich said of the donors.

Gaaasp!

The Denver Post reports that the Polis campaign has a comeback:

Polis' campaign manager, Wanda James, countered that Fitz-Gerald's campaign looks more and more like "a front for the oil and gas industry."

She said Fitz-Gerald has taken more than $24,000 from Excel employees.

Gaaassp! Gaaassp!

So, Who Will Replace Udall?

Firedoglake is about as far left wing (not counting Kos, HP, and others) as you can find. Mark Udall is leaving a liberal base in Boulder. It is easy to get a sense of how far left Udall is by watching the comments from the left on who will replace him.

Fitz-Gerald is seen as the inside the beltway candidate, which isn't good as Rahm Emanuel sold out the really far left when he helped "reactionary" Democrats win. She has no issues on her site (also bad).

You may recall that last month Establishment insiders held a little training session for favored candidates in Chicago, conducted by Christine Pelosi, who will be visiting with us at FDL later today. Most of the candidates who were invited have no primary opponents and they are busy battling Republicans. A few– one of whom was Joan Fitz-Gerlad– have very serious primaries and this caused some alarm. Was this the dreaded anti-grassroots DCCC interference, the kind of interference that saddled us with a Congress that can’t get much done because of so many reactionaries, some of whom were unscrupulously pushed by Rahm Emanuel last year?

Read only about half of the post. The author wandered away from his original subject and into immigration, which, while interesting, wasn't all that enlightening.

So Be It

Eric Sondermann makes an interesting point today:

While [ Joan ] Fitz-Gerald has proven experience and a fair number of more traditional constituencies in her corner, such as unions and former Democratic politicians, the 2nd Congressional District is less "New Deal Democratic" than other Democratic strongholds, said political analyst Eric Sondermann.

"Labor doesn't hold as much sway. It's more of a 'green,' higher-education, Moveon.org area," said Sondermann, a political analyst who worked on the campaign to pass Amendment 41, which was backed by [ Jared ] Polis.

Perhaps we shouldn't write "Mark Udall, Boulder" or even "Mark Udall, Eldorado Springs." Eric Sondermann suggests it should be "Mark Udall, MoveOn.org." So be it.

Democratic Circular Firing Squad?

The Denver Post has a bit more on Raf Naboa, the blogger who gave us those wonderful quotes about Joan Fitz-Gerald, Will Shafroth, and the brothers Salizar.

A fool and his blog are soon parted.

That's the moral of the short career of Raf Naboa, whose hoped-for 15 minutes of fame ended about 4 seconds after he used his position as "director of outreach" for Jared Polis to reach out and trash leading Colorado Democrats.

Great Quotes

It's hard to watch Mark Udall without watching the Democrat race to take his seat. Here are some useful quotes from a Jared Polis insider:

Shafroth is a nice guy who's been looking to run for office for a long time--he has no deeply held convictions that anyone can see, and if he's elected, he'll be a decent enough Member who will likely go on to lead the Caucus of the Obscure, and not achieve anything remotely worth remembering.

Fitz-Gerald is your traditional main-line establishment politician. She's a state senator from Jefferson County, and she runs the Senate with an iron fist. Essentially, the folks that gave us 12 years of Democratic ineptitude are the folks who are backing her. If you love John and Ken Salazar, and you hunger for the kind of bold, visionary leadership that they provide, you'll simply adore Fitz-Gerald.

Mark Udall has to love the latter quote, given that both John and Ken Salazar are trying to help him appear more moderate. It's a lost cause, but it is fun to watch Democrats try to out liberal each other.

The Money Race in the Second CD

The Denver Post said last year that the winner of the of the Democratic primary in the Second CD would be the most liberal candidate. I have the link, and will post it the first time the Post tries to pawn off the "moderate" label for Boulder Liberal Mark Udall.

Three Democrats are in the race to replace Udall: Jerad Polis, most famous as the multi-millionaire who pawned Amendment 41 off on an unsuspecting Colorado public; Joan Fitz-Gerald, the President of the Colorado Senate, and Will Shafroth whose name recognition is so low we had to look it up.

All have released their money reports for the last quarter. Polis and Shafroth both raised about $300K, with Fitz-Gerald coming in last at $240K.

There is some confusion in Polis' mind as to whether he is putting in his own money. He promised to match web contributions dollar for dollar, which would indicate that he is putting his own money into the race.

At other times, he claims he is not.

Polis said he doesn’t know if he’s going to spend a lot of his own money.

“Right now, we raised more money than our opponents, so there wouldn’t be any reason to spend any more money,” he said. “If there’s a lot of special interest money coming in from the other sides, I will certainly believe in myself enough to invest it.”