One of the most interesting themes of the Referenda C & D battle was the conclusion by many political experts that Governor Bill Owens took great risk and made tremendous sacrifices by supporting the Referenda and joining a coalition consisting of almost all Democrats and centrist Republicans. As often is the case, the pundits and analysts not only are wrong but completely missed the fact Owens alleged “sacrifice” actually strengthened his position politically.

Political strategist Eric Sondermann, who first appeared on talk television on my show, wrote “Bill Owens laid it on the line and delivered a stand-up performance. There were many key players in this campaign, but the Governor was the indispensable one. This would not and could not have been won without his active support and engagement. That role was made more impressive by the simple fact that he was one of the few people who actually paid a political price. And his price was a steep one.” Sondermann, however, fails explain the “steep price” Owens paid. The reason was because he didn’t pay one.

Fred Brown, the august long-time political editor, reporter, and columnist for The Denver Post, and political commentator for KUSA-TV Channel 9, similarly wrote, “An unapologetic conservative, he's risking a lot to go against the right wing of his party.” The truth was and is Owens risked nothing.

Even the normally bright Mike Littwin, the premier columnist of the Rocky Mountain News, wrote “Owens is a politician who took a huge gamble, with no obvious motive” and “Owens had little to gain by the passage of Ref C.” Little did Littwin know.

Perhaps the best argument was made by Grover Norquist, president of Americans For Tax Reform in Washington, D.C., when talking about Owens’ decision to support C & D. Norquist said to The Denver Post, “Every other Republican governor is going to look at that and say, 'That is a really bad career move.” Norquist could not have been more wrong.

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Owens’ Top-Notch Republican Cover And “Saving TABOR”
PART 2 OF 3

Despite all the claims of how his support for Referenda C & D hurt Governor Bill Owens, it actually did the opposite. Owens could have been damaged had he been the only Republican supporting the measures but the reality was this was a proposal which split both the Republican rank-and-file voters as well as their leadership. Two out of every four Republican legislators – including some of the most prominent ones – supported C & D. This provided political “cover” for Owens.

Top Republican leaders such as former U.S. Senator Hank Brown and former GOP State Party chairman and one-time gubernatorial nominee Bruce Benson were prominent in their support of the Referenda. They added significantly to the political cover for Owens. Even two out of five Republican voters supported C & D – demonstrating the Referenda had significant support within the very party most likely to support their defeat. The Referenda clearly offered a debate about which Republicans recognized they could disagree. In fact, this is exactly why it will take little time for Republicans to regroup and unify.

Even more in that vein, prior to the November 1, 2005 General Election, Benson and Owens already have joined forces with beer magnate and former Republican U.S. Senate nominee Pete Coors to form a fundraising entity for the 2006 election cycle – i.e., the Headwaters group – as part of a plan to top the Democrats’ 2004 effort, in which a group of multimillionaire Democrats formed a primary funding core for the Democrats’ success in taking over the State House, the State Senate, the 3rd Congressional District, and the U.S. Senate seat (the race Coors, himself, lost). This move, alone, keeps Owens back into the conservative Republican game big time.

To top it off, Owens surprised everyone on both sides of this year’s C & D debate by convincingly arguing he was “saving” the Taxpayers’ Bill of Rights. His thesis was that, if Referenda C & D failed, the State Budget would implode and the political fallout would be so severe the very existence of TABOR would be threatened. He surmised the extraordinary budget-cutting which would occur in 2006 and 2007 could lead to a movement to repeal TABOR in its entirety in 2008, if not sooner. The “No pain, no gain” theory would go into effect and the pain would be so overwhelming, TABOR would be seen as threatening the lifeblood of the State of Colorado. By acting responsibly now and by agreeing to a reasonable compromise, Owens believed he was staving off the eventual self-destruction of TABOR itself. Hence, to Bill Owens, supporting C & D meant saving TABOR.

An interesting aside to this is the possibility that, if the Democratic-led coalition had not sought a solution in 2005, those who were opposed to TABOR might have been able to repeal it altogether in just two or three years. That is, by passing C & D, any efforts to repeal TABOR were all but eliminated and it was Bill Owens who rescued TABOR from this possibility. So, did Bill Owens save TABOR from itself?

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Bill Owens’ Bright Future
PART 3 OF 3

Rather than risk his future or lose political capital, Governor Bill Owens decision to lead the fight for Referenda C & D all but shattered any Democratic hopes of pinning an “extremist, Right-wing” label on him. Owens, who always touted himself as a conservative Republican -- and who still does so today -- found himself aligned not just with moderate Republicans such as Denver’s Senator Norma Anderson and Fort Collins Senator Steve Johnson but with a broad array of Democrats and a statewide coalition of 1,000 organizations, with the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce one of the most prominent.

Owens’s argument that he was addressing basic needs of the State while actually defending the very existence of the Taxpayers Bill of Rights made his C & D opponents look like unreasonable extremists. What the pundits and experts have missed is that Bill Owens had nothing to lose by supporting C & D whether voters supported it or not.

By supporting C & D, Owens became the kind of centrist Republican, in the image of Hank Brown or Ben Campbell, who is undefeatable in Colorado elections. Owens obviously already had won statewide elections but his stock seemed to be in decline in the past two years. By supporting C & D, Owens reestablished himself as the State’s preeminent Republican in many respects, including leadership and visibility.

From a personal perspective, by supporting C & D, Owens also made himself the top candidate to succeed U.S. Senator Wayne Allard, should Allard decide to not run for a third term in 2008. There is no Republican who could come close to Owens in a primary election. The field of Republican Congressman, while interesting, contains no one who likely would defeat Owens in such a race. And all the constitutional executive statewide officeholders who normally would be considered automatically for any statewide office – i.e., the Attorney General, the Lieutenant Governor, the Secretary of State, and the Treasurer -- all were appointed by Owens and would be loathe to run against him.

If Owens ran for the U.S. Senate, he undoubtedly would get the backing of a vast majority of Republican donors. Many big-money Republican donors supported C & D and most likely would support an Owens’ candidacy in the future -- and would do so over any other Republican candidate. And by leading the campaign for C & D, Owens enamored himself to many other businesses, including those led by Independents and Democrats. From a fundraising perspective, Owens positioned himself perfectly for any future race.

As far as the Republican rank-and-file are concerned, after another legislative session where he uses his veto as he did in the 2005 session (he cast a record 47 vetoes, sending many Democratic bills to their grave), Owens will have endeared himself once again to almost everyone in the Republican Party. In the last session, he positioned himself as the Defender of Republican Virtues and there are no obstacles to a repeat performance in 2006, much to the chagrin of Democrats.

If Owens were to run for the U.S. Senate in 2008, his backing of C & D and his perceived sacrifices would make him the State’s Number One centrist candidate -- which is exactly how statewide candidates win most elections in Colorado. Democrats would be emasculated by Owens’s C & D leadership and would fail miserably at any attempt to paint him as a conservative, Right-wing extremist -- as they successfully did in his first gubernatorial race (to the point where he won his statewide race by less than 8,000 votes out of 1.3 million cast). And while announced U.S. Senate candidate Mark Udall, the Congressman from Eldorado Springs, clearly is the Democrats’ strongest candidate for that office today, after his C & D victory, Owens would have to be the favorite by a wide margin even in that head-to-head contest.

In the end, Bill Owens was much smarter from Day One than the experts and pundits gave him credit. He carved a leadership path on C & D which was simultaneously what he felt was best for the State of Colorado and which increased his political strength to the point where he now likely has cemented his political future to the exclusion of all of his opponents. This Guv is smarter than a fox.

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Aaron Harber hosts "The Aaron Harber Show," seen Fridays at 9:00 pm and Sundays at 2:00 pm on PBS Station KBDI Channel 12. He is the Political Analyst for WB2 (KWGN/TV-2) in Colorado. Send e-mail to Aaron@HarberTV.com. His exclusive interview with Gary Hart is available in the "Broadcast Videos" section of his Web site.