The latest Fix is in on the Bob Schaffer/Mark Udall Senate race, and it’s not looking so good for Schaffer, a conservative Republican who has, as was indelicately termed, “lurched from one problem to the next over the past few months.” Meanwhile today, the Rocky’s conservative editorial page editor, Vince Carroll, offered a sharp reprimand to Schaffer for continuing to misrepresent Democrat Udall’s record on the invasion of Iraq. Youch.
Writing today in his blog, The Fix, the Washington Post’s Chris Cillizza released his latest Top-10 predictions of the hot Senate races around the country, specifically which ones are most likely to do the old party switcheroo come November. And holding steady at No. 3 is the Schaffer/Udall race. Here’s what Cillizza has to say:
For months, The Fix insisted that former Rep. Bob Schaffer (R) would be a better candidate than Democrats believed. Or not. Schaffer has lurched from one problem to the next over the last few months while Rep. Mark Udall (D) just continues to stay out of the way. A Quinnipiac/washingtonpost.com/Wall Street Journal poll put Udall ahead 48 percent to 38 percent. That seems about right. (Previous ranking: 3)
For a basic primer on some of those “problems” that Schaffer has encountered in his quest to represent the state of Colorado in the U.S. Senate — which we have termed “cowpies,” check out the Colorado Independent’s overview piece from Monday here.
Meanwhile, in his personal column today, the Rocky’s Carroll spanked Schaffer for misrepresenting his opponent’s position on Iraq.
Republican Bob Schaffer has spent the week suggesting that his opponent in the U.S. Senate race, Democrat Mark Udall, is a hypocrite because he sponsored a resolution in 2002 denouncing Saddam Hussein in the strongest terms, stipulating that he possessed a variety of terrible weapons and describing Iraq as a state sponsor of terrorism.
The resolution was even billed as a "preliminary authorization for the use of force against Iraq."
If you fail to look closely, you could easily conclude that the supposedly anti-war Udall was actually on the same page as the congressional majority that ultimately did authorize war – and that Udall’s vote against their resolution amounted to splitting hairs.
That’s rubbish. Schaffer should cut it out.
Udall has never been part of the "see-no-evil" faction of the Democratic left that downplayed Saddam’s savagery or denied Iraq’s role as a destabilizing force in the Middle East and beyond. He never doubted the tyrant’s intentions regarding weapons of mass destruction, or mocked the U.S. goal of regime change.
But Udall did sincerely oppose the resolution that gave the president the green light to topple Saddam. That’s a fact, and it’s a big deal.
It’s not the first time that Schaffer has pulled this Iraqi “black-is-white” stunt. As Colorado Media Matters noted on April 1, Schaffer made the same bogus claim about Udall in late March, when he appeared on John Andrews’ radio show on KNUS-AM (710).
