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October 26, 2010 09:20 PM UTC

Soul-searching has already begun: What if GOP nominee had been Norton?

  • 80 Comments
  • by: Jason Salzman

( – promoted by Colorado Pols)

If you’re a Republican, and you look at Ken Buck’s troubles, you can’t stop your mind from wondering back to the comforting image of….Jane Norton.

Except it’s not so comforting, of course, because you wake up and see Ken Buck trying to talk about rape and incest, and you know Norton would have faired much better than Buck on numerous fronts, like the flip-flop front and the women-front, to name a couple.

This discussion, of whether Norton would have been a better candidate, will undoubtedly emerge in the media after the election.

At least that’s the way it used to be, before the advent of blogs.

Nowadays, the public soul-searching, among respected commentators and partisans, begins before the election.

For example, on the topic of Norton versus Bennet, one conservative, the prolific Rossputin blogger, Ross Kaminsky, has already weighed in.

In an Oct. 18 post that looks a bit like it was written by the Michael Bennet campaign, Kaminsky laments that Norton isn’t the GOP nominee because she’d be doing better:

Kaminsky: But I can’t help remembering the heated online discussions I had with the Buck faithful when I supported Jane Norton, my argument being essentially that “these two are almost identical on policy, but Norton will be much harder for the Democrats to demonize in the general election than Buck will be and therefore, I’ll back the person I think more likely to win the general election.”  Those words still ring true, even prescient, to me.

He went on to deliver some harsh words about Ken Buck. To be fair, Kaminsky wrote that he’s still planning on voting for Buck, and he emphasized this again in a subsequent blog post.

Still, this is some pretty harsh stuff coming from a conservative like Kaminsky, and you wonder if it explains why Norton isn’t campaigning with Buck at all.

Kaminsky: Ken Buck needs to stop putting his foot in his mouth and stop saying ridiculous things which turn him into a caricature of the narrow-minded bible-bound old white guy which Democrats use with great success against the GOP.  Sadly, when Republicans say things like Ken Buck said on Meet the Press, it’s hard to argue that that caricature is far off the mark.

Kaminsky doesn’t labor in obscurity. He shares a radio show with former CO Senate President John Andrews. His blog has a national audience, and he’s a fixture on the most prominent conservative blog in Colorado, the People’s Press Collective. He carried the conservative torch on The Denver Post’s blog for a number of years, outlasting his liberal counterparts who failed to post much toward the end.

Even though Kaminsky writes that he views the GOP as imperfect, seeing it as the only serious vehicle to potentially implement his favored policies, he’s actually a good weather vane for the Republican establishment. For example, during the financial crisis in the fall of 2008, Kaminsky gave reluctant support for the bailout, which was supported by a Republican president, the Republican nominee for president and vice president (yes, Palin supported the bailout), the Republican Treasury Secretary, and by Republican members of Congress. Then, within days of supporting the bailout, Kaminsky reversed himself.  To be fair, Kaminsky was up front that he was changing his position, but it came almost immediately after we were hearing noises in the conservative intelligentsia that Republicans should oppose the bailout and use it for political leverage down the road.

That’s why when I read posts from him critical of Republican candidates, I have to wonder if he’s channeling the thoughts and feelings of Republican power brokers who would never dare air them in public.

So, when Kaminky starts wishing for Jane Norton, it means something.

In the days before blogs, uncomfortable conversations among respected commentators like Kaminsky would have taken place over the kitchen table.

But today, the speculation about what could have been begins now-and in public.

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80 thoughts on “Soul-searching has already begun: What if GOP nominee had been Norton?”

    1. who chose the inexperienced “Smartest Guy in the Room” Josh McDaniels as their coach?

      Wait, they couldn’t be the same person could they??? Nah…

    3. What if Dan Maes still worked for the Liberal, KS police department?  What if Penry hadn’t been pushed out of the Gov’s Race?  What if Ritter had chosen Romanoff instead of Bennet?  

      At the end of the day, the Rs were in perfect position to benefit from the conservative wave.  Instead, they nominated Pinocchio for Governor and a three-legged (ref. TEA Party support)Buck for Senate.  The GOP’s expected minor party status in Colorado seems to be a fitting end to this story.  

    4. Jane Norton is as conservative as Ken Buck on both fiscal and social issues. She did a good job of debating Buck during the primary, but she was a little too scripted. She’s not a lawyer and it showed a bit in the debates where Buck seemed to be better at talking about the issues in detail.

      Norton was much more disciplined than Buck, but she misspoke a few times. And her campaign ran some horrible ads in June that I still don’t get.

      Norton and Penry were up against the social issues folks who control the GOP. While Buck and Norton downplayed social issues, the real reason Buck won the primary is that the mostly men who feel strongly about social issues backed him and got him nominated. The guys just feel better about another guy than about a smart, strong woman.

      Would Norton be doing better than Buck? Well, Buck still has a chance to win, thanks to the anti-Obama wave and Bennet’s voting record. She certainly doesn’t have the record that Buck has as a DA, but she “fixed” Planned Parenthood, and that would have been an issue.

      She’s also married to Mike Norton, and he probably would have been attacked for things he did as U.S. Attorney, etc. Norton would have been forced to run on Bill Owens’ and Bush I’s records. She would have been demonized as a MGMA lobbyist, which she was not.

      Norton’s advantage over Bennet is that she is a Colorado native who attended Colorado public schools and went to college in Colorado. She got where she is by working hard and working her way up in the GOP. I think she would have been backed by Republicans even more enthusiastically than Buck is being supported.

      What ifs don’t work well for me. You can make up anything to fit your narrative, and nobody can deny your dreams nor your nightmares because theirs have no more credibility than yours.

          1. With no reason whatsoever does anyone question that, because there’s absolutely no reason to have any question. But you’re right, I don’t like that because willful ignorance is just a hair above murder in my book.

  2. I know, I know-we still have the secret ballot (although it’s rumored that campaign reform legislation will move the entire political process to Facebook, without privacy settings!), but according to the usual high-placed, intrinsically unreliable sources, Jane’s voting for Michael…

  3. on whether Romanoff would have had a better run than Bennet.  41.7% Republican, 36% Dem is a rather large wave, don’t you think? The polling that has them tied has a 1% differential.  It looks like that might be a little off.

        1. Baghdad Bob is a Dem, Holmes…

          (Reuters) – Republicans enter the final week of a bitter U.S. election campaign as heavy favorites to win control of the House of Representatives and score big Senate gains, dealing a severe blow to President Barack Obama two years after he entered the White House.

          A thirst for change in Washington and worries about the stumbling economy appear likely to break the Democrats’ grip on Congress next Tuesday in a rout that would topple House Speaker Nancy Pelosi from power.

          1. we are going to see a lot of R’s take dem seats.  Orange man, god forbid, may well be speaker.

            except in the case of Buck.  He’s cratering.

            1. All we need is the House.  The Senate would have been nice, but the Dems won’t be getting anything stupid passed in the next two years, and Obama’s going to have his hands full with investigations into every little nook and cranny of his Presidency.

              1. You meekly say “cratering in the margin of error?” not mentioning the lead Buck had previously, and then you go on to essentially say, who cares if he loses anyway, which implies that you think he’s going down the drain. You don’t say, who cares if he loses anyway, about a candidate you think is winning.

              2. Do you want Obama to be impeached? Do you think it’s good government to harass his administration like it was Reagan’s, or are there a lot of scandals (not just one or two) worthy of investigation?

                1. I’d be willing to wager that Holder’s DOJ is in big trouble.  

                  Usually, I’d like to see him impeached, but he was brilliant in acquiring impeachment insurance by choosing a Vice President that makes Dan Quayle look like Einstein.

                  I think it’s great government to stall anything the far-left wing of the Dem party from accomplishing anything, for the good of the country.

                    1. His refusal to prosecute the New Black Panthers, and alleged refusal to pursue race-neutral violations of the voting rights act.

                      Other areas beyond DOJ doing things like this.

                      Plus, I’m sure they’ll find plenty more once they start fishing around.  This is IMO an incompetent group in the White House, and hopefully they’re equally as incompetent in hiding their skeletons.  Just think of some of Obama’s “Czars” getting hauled in front of the House under oath.

                    2. albeit using it to withhold information is disturbing, but when did interpreting the law become illegal ?

                    3. God help the Republican Party and its happy ignorant masses because I’m done trying.  

                    4. Would you have felt as comfortable if this job description:

                      “Use of FOIA/PA exemptions to withhold information from release to the public”

                      were used by a company working at the behest of the last administration, and had donated $25k to the Republicans and none to the Dems?

                      That might be a good wrestling nickname, BTW.

                      Laaaadies and Gentlemen….. The IGNORANT MASS!!!!

                    6. Let me ask you something.  In 2006, were you excited at the prospect of the House being able to stall Bush in his policies you didn’t like, and investigate things like the Iraq war?

                    7. that allow an agency to withhold information under specific circumstances, including, information about ongoing criminal investigations. Advertising for someone who has expertise concerning the exemptions is normal.  

                    8. You don’t know how hard you hit that nail on the head, do you?

                      Should government go on a fishing expedition because you don’t like Obama?

                      It’s been well documented that Bush-era people made the call on the New Black Panthers.

                      Fighting FOIA was everyday business with the Bush administration; bad, but shouldn’t Bush and his people also be investigated if Obama and his are? Yes or no?

                      This stuff you mentioned is all picayune. It’s like negative campaigning; it’s not right that it happens but both sides do it, so what are you going to do?

                      What do you think the longterm consequences of pursuing matters like this are? Here’s a hint: how well has government worked since the Clinton impeachment hearings? (And he at least had perjured himself, although that was all he did worthy of it.)

                      Downthread you ask about investigating Bush. I think, the fact that we went to war over demonstrably false allegations of WMD’s and questionable analysis of the threat Iraq posed with us keeping an eagle eye on them, that that’s a bit more serious than anything you mentioned. What do you think?

                    9. Bushes AG that failed to prosecute?

                      Obama was NOT in power and had yet to appoint any AG’s

              3. to do anything positive for the country.  According to  their leadership, their top and pretty much only priority is to make sure Obama is a one termer.  Making sure the other side fails is their only goal and they would rather have everything they try to put through vetoed than solve any problem or make anything one iota better for anyone. The general welfare is simply not on the GOP list.  

                So things are bound to crater with a GOP House or House and Senate.   Six months in it will be clear that voters should have listened to those who warned how much worse it would be with a return to the failed GOP policies that crashed our economy and grew the gap between the top few hundred families and the rest of us to proportions not seen in modern industrialized  democracies since the 19th century.

                With such a brief interlude, by 2012 people won’t be so ready to forget the lesson. The stage will be set for Dems to come roaring back in 2012 if they just take control of the message and have the confidence to stand by it with no silly, wasted attempts to get Rs, whose only intention is to create pain and failure, to play nice.

                If Rs had any intention of creating more jobs when they take back a majority in one or both houses, they wouldn’t be sticking to policies including complete deregulation and enormous tax breaks for the rich in the face of all the evidence ( starting with Reagan, not once has a shred of evidence supported the blatantly false claims of trickle down) that those policies not only don’t create good jobs for Americans, they kill them and slash real wages in those that remain while America becomes the least egalitarian, most plutocratic society among all the western democracies. Guess that’s the way you like it, LB.

                1. just thought of what we have to look forward to.

                  Can these fuckers spend any time thinking about something other than regaining power ?  You know, like GOVERNING ?

                  Its never, never about the people, or creating jobs (other than during campaign season) or solving problems.  Freaking dysfunctional.

                  1. I mean think about this. The entire country is starving for jobs, worried sick about what the future holds for their kids, their senior parents, whether we’ll ever get out of the messes in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Mitch McConnell comes right out and says, those things aren’t a blip on the screen in terms of the GOP priorities. The top priority is politics, crushing their political opponents. That’s all. They honestly don’t care about any other consideration. They say so right out loud and they’re set to take back the house anyway.  Are Americans a bunch of morons or what? Guess we’ll find out Nov. 2nd.  

    2. False! Romanoff would not have raised the money to run a competitive race. Plus, he had no life outside government, which makes for a tough sell for a Dem in an anti-Washington year.

      Also: I disagree with part of Jason’s premise that there is “soul-searching” among “respected commentators and partisans.” Which of these people have souls?

      Also: Who says Norton was any great shakes? She was more about lobbying than Tom Strickland.

      In an angry year, Buck started this campaign as the best up-yours vote out there. He could win if he’d shut up, but it may be too late now.

      1. but a 40 plus bachelor Jew with a Russian czar last name, winning state wide in a state where the likes of Buck has a great chance and a guy like Tancredo is pulling more than a third with a wacko minor party affiliation? This Jew doesn’t think so.

    1. Look at the quote in my post. He was for Norton.

      And yes, a lot of respected Dems were for Romanoff. But do you see any of them wishing for Romanoff at this point in the race, in public, on their blogs?

          1. My point was that he was a die hard Norton supporter from the get go. A few sour grapes from him are expected now that Buck gets the senate seat instead of Norton.

    3. Doesn’t he know the best way to elect Republicans this year is to pretend to support Democrats, create a fraudulent identity, gin up false outrage at the Democrats over issues you don’t believe, and do it all on the taxpayers’ dime? What was he thinking with his straightforward discussion of the strengths and weaknesses of candidates?

    4. People who are one thing on Facebook but then something totally different someplace else.

      Honestly… have you NO shame? Not even a tiny smidgeon?

    5. you don’t get the hypocrisy. I bet David Chestnut would get it. David knows how cowardly it is to go on Facebook, create a fake account as the opposite of everything you claim to be, and then try to convince the opposition to not vote. That’s a fairy craven move, right?

      Maybe I should ask Mr. Chestnut as you’re lying cheating, hypocritical piece of shit. Do you know when David will be making another appearance?

      1. I’ve been telling him that all week.  I can only figure he stopped listening to anyone around the time his homeschool teacher rebuffed his adolescent crush and advances.

          2. Since you thought it was appropriate to create one to help your chosen candidate just a few days ago, I find this sudden Buckpedal a bit amusing. Just another hypocritical notching in your belt eh David/Beej?

    1. I will also add that she actively supported Ref C&D, which hurts her with the fiscal conservatives. If you want someone with liberal fiscal views, why vote republican?

      For me, she made it no secret that she big-time hates Muslims, so I could have never voted for her.  

  8. and Maes goes under 10% will Dick Wadhams become the Josh McDaniels of politics?  They better be scouring the countryside for more extremists.  How embarrassing would it be for Wadhams to have his state party achieve minority status in a “Republican Wave” year?  The fact that we are even discussing such a possibility would give strong evidence of the Josh McDaniel ego syndrome at work in the state GOP party.  The funny part is they did it to themselves.  They have no one to blame for this predicament except each other.

    Peddle to the metal boys.  Too many hollow boasts and not enough GOTV.  You’re running out of time and the objects in the rear view mirror are closer than they appear and are set to run right over you.  Lie faster.

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