There was only one Democratic contest in tonight’s congressional primaries in Colorado: The struggle between appointed, weakly progressive incumbentMichael Bennet and challenger Andrew Romanoff. At this moment, with 80 percent of precincts reporting, Bennet leads Romanoff by just over 8 percent. Ken Buck is leading Jane Norton by over 9 percent for the GOP nomination.
In the 1st congressional district, there was no choice for either Republican voters or Democratic voters. Incumbent Democrat Diana DeGette will be challenged by Republican Mike Fallon and Green Party candidate Gary Swing.
In the 2nd district, 70 percent of precincts are reporting. Democratic incumbent Jared Polis will run in the general election against Republican Stephen Bailey. In bad news for Bailey today, his primary opponent Bob Brancato currently has over 30 percent of the vote, even though he withdrew from the race before today’s election.
Democratic U.S. Representative John Salazar will struggle against either Bob McConnell or Scott Tipton. With 86 percent of precincts reporting, Tipton is currently ahead of McConnell by over 11 percent in the fight for the Republican nomination.
There were no contests in Colorado’s 4th congressional district today, and not much hope for progressives. Right wing Blue Dog Democrat Betsy Markey will be competing against right wing Republican Cory Gardner.
In the 5th district, incumbent Republican Doug Lamborn will be fending off Democrat Kevin Bradley. No contest in this district either.
Voters were yawning in the 6th district as well, where neither the Democrats nor the Republicans gave them any choice but to vote to rubber stamp a single candidate. Mike Coffman, the incumbent Republican, will vie against Democratic challenger John Flerlage.
In the 7th congressional district, the GOP did have a contest. With 66.6 percent of precincts reporting in this district so far, Ryan Frazier is leading by nearly 30 points over Lang Sias for the Republican nomination. It seems almost certain that it will be Frazier who will challenge the sitting Representative, Democrat Ed Perlmutter.
So, with this little snapshot, we see how “the system” is set up to coddle incumbents and that nothing changes in any momentous way on any regular basis – it’s status quo (continually sinking middle class becoming working poor) or worse, but not a shot at getting any better.