Greeley
However they voted in the 4th Congressional District race, the folks coming out of the voting center at the downtown Best Western answered one question the same way.
“Do you remember any positive ads from this campaign?” I asked 15 voters.
No, 14 of them answered.
The 15th, Cris Ortiz, thought she might have seen one positive ad from Democratic challenger Angie Paccione, for whom she voted, but not from Republican incumbent Marilyn Musgrave.
The multimillion-dollar mud bath in the 4th left its mark on the voters. It wasn’t the mark the candidates hoped. Virtually everyone I talked to had to figuratively pinch their noses to cast a ballot for a representative in Congress.
And they were very clear about what that said about the process.
“It was so annoying that I didn’t want to vote for that office,” said Trish Rocha, who owns a flea market in Greeley. “I voted for Musgrave because I voted Republican. I can’t give another good reason.”
“It reinforces the stereotypes I have about how bad politics are,” said Danielle Kimbell, a 22-year-old student at the University of Northern Colorado, after she cast her ballot for Paccione. “It didn’t stop me from voting because I still feel like having some kind of input.”
Sleazy attack ads, which, among other things, touted Paccione’s old bankruptcy and Musgrave’s supposed status as one of Congress’ 13 most corrupt members, didn’t stop Juleen Weigle from voting either. But they did change her choice.
“I don’t remember a positive ad,” the 43-year-old Greeley woman said of the Musgrave-Paccione race. “Actually, it determined how I voted. I didn’t vote for either one of them.”
Weigle went for independent candidate Eric Eidsness, who didn’t have a prayer of winning but at least conducted a civil campaign. Weigle didn’t think she wasted her vote backing a sure loser.
“I probably wouldn’t have voted at all if (Musgrave and Paccione) were the only ones,” she said.
Weigle was not alone.
“This is the worst I’ve ever seen, and I didn’t vote for either of them because of it,” said another Eidsness voter, a state employee who didn’t want to be identified.
The ugly truth, though, was that someone would be rewarded with a seat in Congress for indulging in what Colorado State University political-science professor John Straayer called one of the country’s most negative campaigns.
Musgrave barely mentioned her record in Congress the way you’d expect an incumbent to do. The reason, Straayer speculated, is that there was no there there.
“It seems to me that for the duration of her time in Congress, her negatives have been building,” the professor said.
Holding a seat that should be a Republican lock has become a strategic and financial nightmare for the GOP, political pollster and analyst Floyd Ciruli added. The money spent by Musgrave’s campaign and the 527 political groups supporting her will run to many millions in a district that has a 30-year history of conservative Republican leaning.
“She has become consistently vulnerable,” Ciruli said of Musgrave. “So strategically they had no chance to build on or resurrect her reputation.”
Instead, it seemed like all attacks all the time.
To educate herself and her husband, 28-year-old Dana Standridge collected every piece of campaign literature she received and went over it on weekends. After reviewing it all, Standridge said, all she knew “was that Paccione went bankrupt and didn’t pay her student loans and Musgrave wants to cut military benefits.”
“It frustrated me,” the young mother said. But not so much that she couldn’t vote for Musgrave.
And, sadly, that’s where a battle of attrition like the one waged in the 4th Congressional District pays off.
Faced with nothing but fear and loathing, people still choose what they consider the lesser of evils.
“I kind of voted against somebody,” said June Martin, refusing to say whom. “I wanted it to be over. I wanted the good old days where the people running for office say, ‘I’ll do this, and I’ll do that.”‘
Jim Spencer’s column appears Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Reach him at 303-954-1771 or jspencer@denverpost.com.
