Colorado - What Color Are You?

My poor state of Colorado, shame for shame. Our primary is now in February and we are not part of the western super Tuesday! Now that we are on board with the rest of the election schedule candidates are looking westward and the see a state up for early grabs on both sides for the primary and the general election. In 2004 John Kerry pulled out of the Colorado shortly after the Primary in early September finding stiff competition against the Republican juggernaut.

Traditionally Colorado has been a reliable Republican state. However we now have a democratic state government and besides Kerry's big pullout he did very well here getting 960,666 votes making 47% of the vote with over 2 million votes cast. However after last night's debate and the sparring between Obama and Hillary over diplomacy and John Edwards leading in his home state, I wondered, what does the western part of the country think? So I hit the streets and found out that Colorado was just as confused as ever! As usual the innermost part of the city was pressing for the democrats, the suburbs were more conservative and Boulder, was just Boulder who could go either way, but usually voted Democrat.

One interesting thing I did notice across the board was that this state is against the war in Iraq. A few people were against the way it was run but the overwhelming result was that this state in its major cities was against the war. That does not bode well for the Republicans in this race. Colorado was uncomfortably close for the GOP in 2004 and now they are facing another close election over something they know is a problem. It certainly isn't a reason why. Fort Carson has sustained heavy losses in the War in Iraq losing 212 people to the war. We already knew that the war was going to be a significant factor in the 2008 election especially with the democratic candidates striking out as anti-war and the Republican candidates trying not to be against the war but also trying to get as far away from President Bush as possible.

So, was last night's debate helpful or hurtful for this state? Opinions didn't seem to change too much. Surprisingly however, Senator Obama (D-Illinois) seemed to be a name that Denverites were liking and liking alot. I am fairly conservative and so I had to ask a few people about Tom Tancredo's run for president. While there are not as many accolades a Guiliani, Hillary or Obama, he seemed to be well received especially by a city and state touched a great deal by illegal immigration. Representative Tancredo's message of strong borders and a strong America seems to strike a chord. He does have the home-state advantage and he represents a traditionally conservative district. So the report in Colorado is pretty much that of the nation, we just don't know what to think yet and we don't know what color we are and only time will tell.