Yesterday I attended an event to raise money for Sal Pace, the 3rd District’s Democratic candidate. Sal keeps improving as a candidate, but he is still stumbling on occasion.

One example, a few days ago PBS ran a story about health care in the U.S. Because Grand Junction has a very unique health care system, it has been receiving national attention for years. It has even drawn President Obama to town. Dr. Michael Pramenko, who has been an advisor to Obama, and several other locals were featured in the television production. Given our national prominence, one would think that the candidate who is seeking to represent us would know something about our local system.

When mentioning health care, Pace attempted to compare Grand Junction with his hometown of Pueblo. You could feel the room atmosphere change when he said that in Pueblo you see billboards advertising hospitals all over town because there were two hospitals competing for business. He said that because Grand Junction has only one hospital, we don’t see that here.  For the record there are three hospitals in Grand Junction: Community Hospital, St. Mary’s Hospital, and the V.A. medical center. We frequently see both billboards and television advertising for the two private hospitals.

I had the privilege of driving an 85 year old man home from the event because he no longer drives. This is no ordinary 85 year old man. He has taught at university hospitals for years. In fact he is still on the teaching staff at a hospital in Chicago—one affiliated with a major university. He has been an executive in a company that makes medical implements. He knows medicine and the problems facing the health care industry. He said that he left a rather nice check for Pace, but that someone needs to get to Pace to tell him to dig a bit deeper into the things he is talking about.  The good doctor said that I should “sell” myself to Pace for that purpose. So, Victor, this note to Sal is for you.

The good news is that Pace noted several times that he is a Catholic, but is able to separate his religious beliefs from public policy. When pressed on that point, he said that he would call himself Pro-Choice. He got a lot of applause from the women in the room when he said that. John Salazar could never bring himself to say in public that he was Pro-Choice. A lot of women, who had previously supported Salazar, dropped their support for him in 2010 because he wouldn’t stand up for women’s issues.

I’ve been thinking way too small. I was thinking that the Third Congressional District in Colorado would get the 12,000 additional people needed to make the district meet the population requirements for a district from a mountain community. Leaving the existing borders essentially unchanged. Instead, it seems, a map produced by Colorado Democrats, lumps us into a district with Boulder.

I remember the first time that John Salazar won election in this district. I was watching the local election results. Early on, it appeared that Salazar would go down in defeat because the only election results available were from Mesa County. The celebration at the Republican victory party was dampened when results from Pueblo started being reported. Pueblo went overwhelmingly for Salazar, and he won.

Salazar, as a Blue Dog Democrat, and a farmer was a pretty good fit for the voters in this district. He understood the importance of water to the Western Slope. He was not a strong advocate for the most liberal Democratic policies supporting women’s reproductive health care or the GBLT community, because of his Catholic faith. Republicans didn’t like him because he was a Democrat, and liberal Democrats didn’t like him because he was too conservative.

I’ve been grousing about Scott Tipton almost since the day he took office. His vote for the Ryan Destroy Medicare Plan would probably cost him reelection, even in the mostly Western Slope Third Congressional District. But he may not be running for reelection in the district representing Mesa County. If the Democratic maps are approved by the legislature, Grand Junction would be thrown into the district currently represented by Jared Polis.

Hold on to your hats, Mesa County. You’ve never seen a candidate like Jared Polis. He’s openly Gay and independently wealthy. He helped to finance the campaign to get and keep Colorado’s Senate in Democratic hands. When I first signed up as a candidate at ActBlue, an organization that helps Democratic candidates raise money online, the leading fundraiser in the nation was Jared Polis. He has his own PAC that helps to fund other liberal Democratic candidates.

I was thinking way too small. I was thinking that I’d happily settle for a John-Salazar-like candidate to oust Scott Tipton. Instead I might be getting a Representative that actually thinks like I do.

Homework:

Charles Ashby Story on Redistricting

State's Website RE Redistricting

Polis Website