2010 U.S. Senate Race

It’s not just unnamed sources suggesting former Colorado House Speaker Andrew Romanoff intends to challenge incumbent U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet in a Democratic primary next year. The Denver Post, which first reported Romanoff’s plans Friday night, quotes Pueblo-based political consultant Wally Stealey confirming that Romanoff is running, in a lengthier story posted on its website [...]

Former House Speaker Andrew Romanoff is readying a primary challenge to incumbent Democratic U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet.

Supporters urged Romanoff to mount a primary challenge to Gov. Bill Ritter, whose surprise appointment of Bennet left some party activists angry, The Denver Post’s Michael Riley and Christopher N. Osher report, but the 44-year-old Denver Democrat has instead decided to take on Bennet.

Putting to rest a recent round of speculation, former U.S. Rep. Bob Beauprez told radio listeners Monday evening he will not seek the Republican nomination for next year’s U.S. Senate election in Colorado. Citing a reluctance to emerge from a comfortable retirement, Beauprez said he and his wife “kinda realized we liked what we’re doing,” [...]

Prominent conservative blogger Ben DeGrow writes Monday afternoon that former U.S. Rep. Bob Beauprez won’t be taking on Democratic U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet next year.
But that doesn’t mean the crowded field of GOP challengers won’t be growing. Former Lt. Gov. Jane Norton has decided to join the race and will announce her plans next month, [...]

Tagging the contenders “an underwhelming field all around,” FiveThirtyEight.com’s Nate Silver lists the Colorado Senate seat held by Democrat Michael Bennet as the seventh-most-likely seat to change hands in the 2010 election . Silver’s August rankings reflect a “fairly major shakeup,” he says, adding that 10 seats — including Bennet’s — are more likely to [...]

Yglesias thinks it’s time to trash the Monday holiday tradition and switch to three-day weekends that start on a Friday. “I think it’s the difference between a weekend that psychologically feels like it has two Saturdays and a weekend that psychologically feels like it has two Sundays,” he writes. Early Bird Special tends to agree.
Nonetheless, [...]

Republican leaders addressing the crowd at Friday night’s second-annual Larimer County GOP shrimp-boil fundraiser and straw poll event in Fort Collins steered clear of social issues like abortion and gay marriage that have featured prominently in Larimer County politics of the past. They focused instead on calls to rein in government spending and pass more pro-business legislation.

That message, peppered throughout with references to Ronald Reagan and aimed chiefly against the Obama administration, suggested the steep challenge these candidates face in winning office in 2010.

With more local politicos using the microblogging service Twitter to surreptitiously feed the rumor mill, rally supporters and bash opponents in 140 characters or less I thought it might be fun to highlight the week’s best, worst or funniest message, known as a “tweet.”

And our inaugural post is a doozy too.

Weld County District Attorney Ken Buck’s landmark hate-crime prosecution of a man accused of murdering a transgender Greeley teen could prove “very much a mixed bag” for the Republican, who emerged Tuesday as a candidate in the 2010 U.S. Senate election, political observers say.

Weld County District Attorney Ken Buck became the first official Republican candidate aiming to unseat U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet, the Democrat appointed to the seat in January after Ken Salazar stepped down to become secretary of Interior. Buck, who has been making noise about running for months, made the announcement on his BuckforColorado.com Web site Tuesday morning.