Episode 199: The POST-Primary Political Podcast for the People

There are a lot of hot (and, let’s be honest, freezing cold) takes out there about the primary elections in Colorado on Tuesday. One narrative is that “the far left lost to the moderate center,” and there’s some evidence for that, but there are also some counterexamples! Another narrative is the candidates who ran the better campaigns or who had the most outside money won because they were more sophisticated or better funded. Again, there is some evidence to support that, but there are also counterexamples there too!

For a real deep dive into the fundamentals here and what we think went well and what we think happened, first make sure you listen to this episode right here, or wherever you get your pods. Then, pop on over to ColoradoPols.com and read Jason’s Winners and Losers of the 2024 Primaries post.

On this episode, we break the election down into a few highlights, but the theme that we thought ran through the election that we didn’t see in any of the other coverage is, contrary to the narratives of “liberal/progressive/far-left/moderate candidates won/lost/drew,” we’re putting forth a different narrative:

Normal, regular, every day, non-extreme, dare we say “normie” Colorado voters won.

Here’s a harsher but related take: if the self-proclaimed “grassroots candidate(s) of the people” couldn’t manage winning a few thousand extra votes or increasing turnout above historic lows in a state like Colorado with month-long mail ballots, maybe they aren’t the community or neighborhood champions they claim to be. Or maybe they should have spent less time at rallies alongside radical extremists and saying objectionable shit on social media and more time on doors and talking to voters?

Electoral politics isn’t perfect, duh. The candidate with the most money or the largest number of independent expenditures often wins, and nobody is denying that. But the truth is, hard work pays off in this business. All other things remaining equal, or even tilted in one direction, the candidate who works harder can overcome humongous odds, enormous spending, and even institutional opposition.

We’ve heard from some supporters of the more “politically extreme/further-left/losing/whatever” camp that the amount of outside spending was just too much to overcome or Republicans were playing in Democratic Primaries and how horrific that was. We don’t need to remind them that Democrats play in Republican Primaries all the time and they don’t seem to object too loudly to that, or that their narrative just has a few inconvenient counterexamples.

We also think this guy would like a word with those who think money wins all elections.

That’s it for this week’s episode! If you loved listening to it as much as we loved recording it, you can thank us by subscribing to the pod wherever you listen, following us over on Nice Twitter aka Threads, and forwarding this email or sharing this post with your friends, your enemies, and the losers of Tuesday’s primaries, they suddenly have A LOT of time on their hands! THANK YOU so much for listening, and we’ll see you next time!