Bill Armstrong Endorses Kopp, Buck in 2014 GOP Primaries

Former U.S. Senator Bill Armstrong, now president of politically activist Colorado Christian University and board member of the influential Campus Crusade for Christ, this week saw fit to endorse Republican primary candidates for governor and next year's Senate race–each having crowded fields eager for the support of Christian conservatives. For governor, this icon of the religious right in Colorado endorses former state Sen. Mike Kopp:

When I served in the United States Senate, I saw first-hand the importance of having a real leader in the Executive Office. Ronald Reagan stared down the Soviet Union, and put our economy back on a prosperous track. I was honored to stand next to him as we worked towards the ideals of smaller government and peace through strength.

We are lacking true leadership in the Governor’s office, and I know Mike will fix that – immediately. He understands the need to allow Colorado to opt-out of the ObamaCare disaster. He understands the importance of protecting our Second Amendment rights. He understands the need to get the government out of the way so our economy can prosper.

Not a shabby endorsement, but Armstrong saves the real red meat for Ken Buck's 2014 do-over bid:

2014 is the best political opportunity for our party in a generation. Democrats are in disarray. No wonder their poll numbers are skidding. Just think of the disasters they've caused — Obamacare, the IRS scandal, NSA surveillance, Benghazi, the slowest economic recovery in modern history and fiscal debauchery that has produced a mammoth federal debt of over $17 trillion. [Original emphasis]
With virtually every high-voltage issue breaking our way, we have a great chance to hold the U.S. House of Representatives and regain control of the Senate. We deserve to win and the odds are that we will. But whether we actually fulfill our dream of getting the Senate back or fall short may very well depend on what happens here in Colorado in next year's Senate campaign.
To maximize our chance to win the Colorado seat, and help put the GOP over the top nationally, we must nominate our strongest, most experienced, most electable candidate. That's why I support Ken Buck. He has the fire in the belly and the big league campaign experience it takes to win, especially to unseat an entrenched incumbent. So I am backing Ken to the hilt…

Whether or not you agree that "2014 is the best political opportunity" for Republicans "in a generation," the question of whether 2010 U.S. Senate race loser Buck is the individual best suited to capitalize on said opportunity is by no means settled among Republicans. But that doesn't appear to be stopping Buck from consolidating a great deal of support early on in his primary, and he is way out in front of the pack in early polling.

Likewise, Armstrong's endorsement will be helpful to fellow religious conservative Mike Kopp as he tries to move up in a field of better-known but competitively dubious Republican gubernatorial primary contenders. At the moment, Kopp is deep in the single digits in his primary as Scott Gessler and Tom Tancredo hog the spotlight, so he's got nowhere to go but up.

In both cases, it's a welcome blessing just in time for Christmas.

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Pew Report: Tea Party Still Controls Republican Primaries

A new poll from Pew Research is bad (BAD) news for Republicans in Colorado and around the country:

Move in a more conservative or moderate direction on policy? By 54% to 40%, Republican and Republican-leaning voters want the party’s leaders to move further to the right. Not surprisingly, conservatives and those who agree with the Tea Party overwhelmingly favor moving in a more conservative direction, while moderates and liberals would like to see the party take more centrist positions. Yet the more moderate wing of the party is a minority generally, and makes up an even smaller share of the likely primary electorate. [Pols emphasis]

Everybody in the crazy pool!

That's not good — not if you are a rational Republican, anyway. As we've written time and again in this space, the greatest threat facing the Republican Party continues to be the outsized influence of the Tea Party. When only the most right-wing candidate can win a Primary, the Republican moving on to a General Election is essentially fighting with one hand tied behind his or her back.

Republican Party officials are well aware of this problem, but there's not a whole hell of a lot they can do about it — particularly when the Tea Party is a collection of a bunch of different groups.

Both local and national Republican Party officials recognize the need to moderate their policy positions and try to appeal to voters other than, well, old white guys. They are correct in their read of the situation, but they can't do a damn thing about it when the Tea Party wing of the Party refuses to play along.

Check out the sobering statistics from the Pew study in the box at right. The big news, obviously, is that the Tea Party continues to exert the most influence over the Republican Primary process:

Tea Party Republicans have influence in the GOP partly because of their high level of political engagement. Overall, they make up a minority (37%) of all Republicans and Republican-leaning independents nationally. Yet this group is more likely than other GOP voters to say they always vote in primary elections; as a result they make up about half of the Republican primary electorate (49%).

In Colorado, this could be good news for someone like Sen. Greg Brophy, who wants the GOP nomination to challenge incumbent Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper. Nationally, it means Democrats have a definite advantage in the 2016 race for President as it is likely that the GOP will put forth a right-wing candidate.

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