Mountain West is battleground for '08 vote: Colorado, Nevada, Arizona, NM "up for grabs"

[DeepModem Mom]

CNN: Mountain west battleground for '08 vote

....The Democrats are holding their presidential convention in the Mile High City next summer. Setting aside California, it’s been 80 years since the Democrats held a convention west of Chicago, and they are coming here for good reason. Colorado has a Democratic governor and a Democratic controlled state legislature for the first time in 40 years. “I think Colorado is absolutely a state that the Democratic Party could win,” says Colorado Governor Bill Ritter. He continues, saying “Bill Clinton won it in 1992. No Democrat has won it since, but we are in a different place than we have been in recent elections.”

And it’s not just Colorado. Democrats made major gains throughout the Rocky Mountain states. They’ve picked up four House seats, two Senate seats and three Governorships in the past two elections. “I would say there’s a four state area, Colorado, Nevada, Arizona, and New Mexico, that truly are going to be up for grabs in the presidential election and some others as well could be surprises,” says Arizona’s Democratic Governor, Janet Napolitano. “So when you combine those electoral votes if you’re looking at the map and how to get to that magic number to be elected as president, there’s a big clump of votes out there to get,” she adds.

The Mountain West’s population is growing and changing. Many residents now come from the East and West coasts and there’s a growing Latino population. But it’s not just California transplants and East Coast retirees who are changing the nature of politics here. It is concern within the natural constituency of the Republican Party that there is a threat to the things that make this region special. Increased oil and gas drilling has sportsmen and ranchers worried about quality of life issues....

But one can overstate the case. Western Democratic governors are moderate to conservative. And that’s why the head of Colorado’s Republican Party can’t wait for the Democrats to hold their convention in Denver next summer. “They are going to adopt a liberal platform that I think will be out of the mainstream of most Coloradans. But most importantly I predict they will be nominating Hillary Clinton in that hall in downtown Denver,” says Dick Wadhams, Chairman of the Colorado Republican Party....

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2007/11/11/mountain-west-battleground-for-08-vote/#more-3039