The conventional wisdom is that Chris Romer is toastwhich, politically speaking, is never a good thing to be.
Romer won the battle in the first round of the mayoral race, but now there’s the war. And Michael Hancock looks like the candidate in surge mode as we head toward the June 7 run-off.
Here’s why Romer looks so vulnerable right now: When you’re the perceived front-runner, when you have the most money and the most name recognition, when Denver mayoral history suggests the likelihood of a Dylan-style ending (the first one now will later be last), you need to win big going into the runoff.
Romer won . . . barely.
He didn’t pull away from Hancock. He didn’t pull away from James Mejia. He didn’t even get 30 percent of the vote.
It turned out to be a three-way race, as the polls were predicting. That’s fine unless you’re the clear favorite. It’s Romer whose father was a popular governor. It’s Romer who was, let us say, an attention-savvy state senator. It’s Romer who was endorsed by The Post.
He had everything going for him, except for the 28-27-26, Romer-Hancock-Mejia finish.
He wins. He loses?
Maybe. But there’s one thing that Romer does have going for him. Everything that has happened up until now in the mayor’s race might as well never have happened at all.
You know about the tree that falls in the forest and no one hears. This is the mayor’s race that never rose above a whisper.
It wasn’t simply a snooze-fest. People were actively avoiding thinking about this election. I don’t know how anyone did any polling. Instead of “I don’t know,” there should have been an “I don’t care.” As I’ve said, we’ve been in the throes of serious election fatigue. No one wanted another election cycle. And certainly no one wanted this election cycle.
As we head into the running, there are no lingering issues, nothing that really defines the race. You’ve got Romer, who wants a Wal-Mart on every corner and a cupcake truck riding down every street. And you’ve got Hancock, who thinks the city should be turned into one large aerotropolis (presumably without the see-you-naked body scans), except in the places where he’s going after the agrarian vote by making Denver the would-be greenhouse-farm capital of the West.
So, what we have — what Romer has — is a chance for a complete do-over.
Romer has already made it clear how he’s going to run his campaign. He’s saying that Hancock is Mr. Nice Guy but that this is not the time for nice guys. This is the time for serious guys who have been investment bankers and know how to make tough economic choices. Yeah, that’s who we’re pulling for these days — investment bankers.
It’s as if Romer has heard that people don’t necessarily warm up to him — and so he’s trying to turn that into a plus. Think of New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie as the model.
And Romer won’t mind if you think of Hancock as the nice guy — everyone does like him — who was once the Broncos’ mascot Huddles. I’m serious. I looked up a Post story from 1987 on Hancock, whose role as mascot was as “a white horse who walks around his hind legs and . . . dances near the end zone every time there is a touchdown and then runs to the sidelines to shake hoofs with the fans.”
No wonder John Elway contributed money to Hancock. Considering that Hancock went to the 1987 Super Bowl — when Giants quarterback Phil Simms went 22 for 25 — it might have been hush money. When Hancock made the run-off, did Elway give him a hoof-five?
I’d also like to know more about Hancock’s non-answer answer to a debate question about whether he believes in evolution — a debate held at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, no less. He said, “I believe in God.” I know it’s not a big issue, but I like a mayor who also believes in science.
More to the point, Hancock has been a little vague — OK, really vague — on his plans to deal with the structural budget problems facing the city. But it’s not as if there’s a wide gap between the candidates. They’re both for education reform. They’re both for more jobs, not that a mayor has much to do with job creation, except around the margins.
I’m waiting for an issue to emerge, something that defines the candidates. John Hickenlooper — whose shadow you can’t avoid, particularly since he works right down the street — made his first race about parking meters.
But, strangely, the parking meters actually told us something about him, about his quirkiness and about his willingness to look for different ways to run a city.
And this race? The clock on the scoreboard is starting over. But can Romer and Hancock get anyone excited enough to notice?
E-mail Mike Littwin at mlittwin@denverpost.com.
