November 26, 2013 11:18 AM UTC

So You Like Recalls, Do You? Get Ready For More

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• by: Colorado Pols

More to this easily-missed comment on the Recall Hudak Too campaign's Facebook page than meets the eye:

This year has already witnessed the first two recalls of sitting Colorado legislators in our state's history, and an attempt on a third state senator is presently underway. Victory in the two recalls held this past summer has put Colorado Republicans within a single seat of taking control of the Colorado Senate. With the balloting process thrown into disarray by a court ruling that prevented the normal delivery of mail ballots in recall elections, Republicans have found a way of overcoming growing Democratic dominance in general elections, picking off individual legislators in contests tilted to their advantage.

Well folks, it does appear that two can play at this game. The fact is, freshman Sen. Vicki Marble has had some of the worst embarrassments we've ever seen in such a short legislative career, from her rant against equal pay for women to her disastrous comments about race and diet that made national news. Marble is also a hand-picked Rocky Mountain Gun Owners candidate, which makes her an appealing target for Democratic retaliation against Dudley Brown's heavy involvement in this year's recalls.

To be perfectly honest, we've been waiting for the other shoe to drop.

It's folly to think that Democrats can't succeed in getting a recall election on the ballot against Marble or other Republican legislators. Marble's crazy comments and unappealing votes as part of the Republican caucus can certainly be vilified by petition gatherers, as much as anything Democrats have said and done this year. There's no reason to think that a similar investment of energy and capital to what Republicans have carried out against vulnerable Democrats can't succeed against vulnerable Republicans like Marble. In both cases, it's the aggressors who have the momentum.

We've warned repeatedly this year that successful recall elections had a strong likelihood of leading to more such recalls, and that in the end a vicious retaliatory cycle of recalls substituting for a functional democratic process was a very real possibility. At this point, Democrats have little choice but to fight back in kind, and turn the advantages Republicans have taken in the recalls so far against them.

Like it or not, the genie is out of the bottle.