Colorado voters reject extremism
Lessons from yesterday's elections in Colorado:
- Colorado's citizens prefer pragmatism over zealotry, as they demonstrated by embracing the pragmatic Referendum C and rejecting the ideological extremism of C's opponents.
- By defeating Referendum D, these pragmatic voters demonstrated that they can reject Doug Bruce-style wingnuttery and still support a lean, fiscally responsible government.
- Governor Bill Owens has redeemed himself. Supporting C for the good of his own state cost him the support of influential right-wing ideologues in Washington, many of whom are capable of vetoing a Republican presidential aspirant. Owens deserves respect for his courage.
- John Caldara may be right that his Independence Institute was not required by law to reveal the names of its big out-of-state donors. But his screeching about the importance of preserving their anonymity might have hurt his political cause. At least we can hope so.
UPDATE: Prof. Bainbridge isn't willing to cut Gov. Owens any slack. His post exemplifies the ideological thoughtlessness of people like Grover Norquist who have never had to shoulder the responsibilities of governing.
Bainbridge is one of my favorite conservative bloggers because he's ordinarily willing to look behind simple-minded slogans. This time around he's parroting the slogans himself (as most of his commenters have noted).
Comments
are a2 drivers getting unruly?
u.e.
Posted by: Ulterior Epicure | November 6, 2005 01:01 PM