Learning to live without a functional Colorado GOP

Freedom Unaffiliated

Learning to live without a functional Colorado GOP

By Jon Caldara

’m trying to come up with the right analogy. I’m sure you can do much better.

I’m thinking of a bunch of little kids playing king of the hill. In their minds, they think the pile of dirt is Mount Everest, when, in fact, it’s the size of a pitching mound.

Or maybe one of those Japanese soldiers who was left on a small, isolated island for decades not knowing World War II had ended and his side lost. He’s still fighting.

Or, perhaps, corporate shareholders fighting for control of a company they think is the size of IBM when in fact it’s a broken hot dog cart.

Or, perhaps, medieval lords battling over territory the size of a postage stamp.

It’s like two lifeguards wrestling over who gets to save someone who has drowned.

Or, perhaps, just toddlers fighting over a toy.

I’m talking about the remarkably entertaining drama that is the battle to control the feckless Colorado GOP.

At this point, it is nothing but comical and you could be forgiven for finding the whole thing just plain entertaining with the plot of a Marx brothers’ movie.

Former state GOP Chairman Dave Williams refuses to accept the vote of the party’s Central Committee to remove him, along with the other officers, and replace him with Eli Bremer and his team.

Does this operation sound familiar to you? Let me see here. So, what we have is somebody who lost an election but doesn’t want to give up power. He’s putting out communications the election was illegitimate and, instead of working to get Republicans elected, is working to destroy the elections of fellow Republicans.

Could there be a better way to pay homage to former President Donald Trump?

My suspicion is Williams is angling for a job in the Trump administration. Maybe this behavior helps, but I can’t see how. In the meantime, Republicans continue to lose offices in Colorado without a functional party to help them.

There are real-world problems because Williams will not give up his throne. Quite literally, Bremer and gang can’t get the keys to the office, can’t check the bank balance, can’t get the passwords to the website or email system.

So, we’ll have to wait until a judge or the Republican National Committee weighs in and see if the warring parties accept the decision.

But for the purpose of the 2024 elections, it just doesn’t matter. The state GOP is basically worthless, no matter who wins this spitting contest. No matter who runs it, the party is broke, broken and discredited.

Even if the new administration was properly installed today, it wouldn’t have the time or money to make any impact as ballots are a month-and-a-half from being dropped.

The problem is bigger than one dysfunctional organization. The conservative moment in Colorado is largely ineffective.

Republicans are the minority party in Colorado. Unaffiliated voters are the majority, and they are growing. Colorado could become the first truly unaffiliated state.

Trump and abortion keep moderates out of the Republican Party, as wokeness and a war on business is chasing them out of the Democratic Party.

The future of Colorado belongs to those who can communicate policy ideas, not personalities, to the unaffiliated. Williams’ call to burn gay pride flags won’t do that. The Democrats indoctrination of pre-pubescent kids into the opposite gender won’t do that.

Conservatives in the state need to accept some harsh realities that go against their strongest held beliefs. And I know this can be hard, but here is reality:

For the foreseeable future, Colorado will not become an anti-abortion state. The reality is for the foreseeable future we will not become an anti-gay, anti-lesbian, anti-bisexual state.

For the foreseeable future, we will not be an anti-cannabis state. We will be a pro-environmental state.

But it doesn’t mean we are a pro-tax, pro-regulation, pro-crime, pro-woke state. There are clear paths to create large victories during the next decade in these policy areas.

But that will only happen if we invest in voter registration, voter outreach, community organizing, local government recruitment, investigative reporting and vote harvesting operations for a decade.

And none of that has anything to do with a political party. Until then, enjoy the show.