April 21, 2014 10:36 PM UTC

Those Wacky GOP Candidates - Where Are They Now?

• 5 Comments
• by: kwtree

(Promoted by Colorado Pols)

Colorado's Republican party has put up some rather entertaining candidates for the state legislature this year, and I just had to post some updates on them.

Nate Marshall posted an official withdrawal from the HD23 race on April 9, after being exposed as an active white supremacist. However, his campaign committee is still active. Is he hoping the outrage will die down? Marshall's latest post on his Facebook page links to an article positing that liberals are "purging Christians". Huh?

Right now, it appears that  Max Tyler won't have an opponent in HD23, as the committee of the other GOP candidate, Christopher Hadsall, is inactive.

Maria Weese,  one-time candidate for  HD35, and author of some racially stereotyped Facebook posts, has yet to form a candidate committee. Adams county Republicans still show the HD35 candidate slot as "TBD". The AC central committee are having a special meeting May 17.  Faith Winter  is running as a Democratic candidate for the HD35 seat.

Gordon Klingenschmitt's (HD15) website still says that he was honorably discharged (he wasn't *) and that to show his "courage under fire", he "prayed in Jesus' name".  (Actually, Klingenschmitt defied his CO's  orders, wore his Navy Chaplain's uniform to a right wing political event, was court-martialed and found to be insubordinate, and forced to retire from the Navy. ) Klingenschmitt also likes to "exorcise gay demons" (no word yet on a possible Richard Simmons demon exorcise video deal). Photo, below, from Justin Smith's article "Disgraced Chaplain lies, and prays that Rev. Barry Lynn dies" on Patheos.

Also running for the GOP nomination in HD15, Dave Williams,  just wrote on his facebook page that he "made the ballot".  This means that he has enough verified signatures to be on the June 24 primary ballot.  

So voters in HD15 will be able to choose between the guy who claims to exorcise gay demons, or Dave Williams, (left, from Facebook photo), the guy who is lenient towards sex offenders, but when asked if he would apologize to a gay veteran he booed off the stage, replied that he was only "sorry he hadn't bought an AR-15 sooner".  Williams is running for a government office, but on his campaign website, the first quote is Reagan's "Government is the problem".

And there is one reasonable candidate for HD15, retired teacher Lois Fornander, running a low-key campaign on the Democratic side.

Memo to GOP candidate vetting committee: You need to get a new barrel – the scrapings from this one are just weird. And here's a tip: read all prospective candidate's Facebook pages before putting them on the ballot.

*FOIA request for Klingenschmitt's court-martial papers was made – waiting.