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Ken Buck and Dan Maes

by | 9:00 am, September 4, 2010 | 2 Comments

I wrote the following as a comment on Ken Buck’s Facebook page in response to some who were criticizing Buck’s withdrawal of support from Dan Maes…

As many of you know, I was a supporter of Jane Norton (though not because I thought badly of Ken.)  As the campaign went on, however, I came to like Ken’s style and policy views more and more, and I’m gladly supporting him now and have contributed to his campaign. 

I called for Maes and McInnis both to get out of the governor’s race, while knowing they probably wouldn’t.  While I like Tom Tancredo personally, my preference was for a different candidate entirely, with quite a few names that would have satisfied me.

[I offer all that information as context to show that I am not an “anything Ken says” person, nor a supporter of any of the current candidates for governor, and therefore relatively neutral among politically active Republicans on these issues.]

I am very pleased with Ken’s decision to withdraw support from Dan Maes.  I’m sure it wasn’t an easy decision, but it was the right one.

Dan Maes, while probably not a bad person, is a horrendous candidate, hopelessly unqualified for the job of governor.  Every week brings a new story of a gaffe or lie.  And he hasn’t hired a campaign manager which says something about his fund-raising or his giant ego or both.

At this point, my focus is keeping conservative and libertarian voters motivated to support the good candidates who can win, including particularly Ken Buck but also Cory Gardner, Ryan Frazier, and Scott Tipton as well as the many solid Republican candidates for the state legislature.  Indeed, the state legislature could be the most important races for the state with redistricting coming up and the Maes candidacy likely to give the governorship to Hickenlooper.

Finally, I will add that although I have been leaning toward voting libertarian in the governor’s race, I am reconsidering.  If I can be convinced sometime soon that Tom Tancredo really could win this thing, I will encourage voters to support Tancredo even though I am not on the same page as he is regarding his signature issue of immigration.  (In particular, while I want to enforce our borders, I want to increase the level of legal immigration into the country.)  The governor is not someone who has much impact on federal immigration policy, and I would support a move to eliminate “sanctuary city” policies.  Tom is smart and principled, though of course he is still a politician.  Unlike most politicians, however, you can almost always guess what his position will be on an issue because he’s not shy about telling the truth, whether he thinks you want to hear it or not.  I’d rather have him than Dan Maes or John Hickenlooper.  (I’m not even sure I can honestly say I’d rather have Maes than Hickenlooper, speaking as someone who thinks we need to live through a bad government from time to time to remind people what bad government means.)

Anyway, I repeat that I am pleased with Ken Buck’s decision to withdraw support from Dan Maes.  Just because some group supported both candidates, i.e. a particular Tea Party group, that doesn’t mean the two candidates need to be joined at the hip.  Republicans need to get away from Maes as quickly as possible and move on to candidates who can win.

Link to Original post at Rossputin.com.

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Category: Colorado Politics, Syndicated
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Comments

  1.   GAS
      September 4th, 2010 @ 11:39 am

    Let me see if I understand this. Maes is getting kicked like a dog because he embellished his resume? Let’s get a honest show of hands of those who have embellished their resume. That’s what I thought.

    I understand their is sometimes competing desires between principle and pragmatism. What principles will I give up to achieve some partial success and which principles will I not give up even if it means not achieving success.

    I’ve NOT been a supporter of Dan Maes but my most underlying principle (Which is my understanding of the principle of the Tea Party movement) is a rejection of the despotism of the ruling elites in the Party structures.

    The events of the last week again prove that the ruling elites show no regard for the democratic process in which a candidate who was duly elected is attacked by the ruling elites through their influence with the media and influential donors all for the purpose of maintaining their power structure.

    So it appears that now I must support Dan Maes because he has become the object of the very problem that must be corrected and the principle that I refuse give up to achieve some pragmatic ends.

  2.   Whitney
      September 4th, 2010 @ 10:17 pm

    Well, said, GAS…..

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