True Conservative's Hour of Reckoning

With Election Day drawing nigh, the importance placed on each congressional race can hardly be exaggerrated. In my area, the most apocalyptic battle is waged between Ret. Lt. Col. Jay Fawcett and Doug Lamborn, otherwise known as True Conservative.

Lamborn bested five other "conservatives"in the Republican primaries to earn such a prestigious title. Not since the early 1970s has a True Conservative faced the threat of losing this district in which I live, but this autumn has brought notable challenges to He who would become one of Colorado's new congressmen.

Primarily, it perturbs some Republicans in CD5 that the Former True Conservative -- and representative in a legendary 20-year term -- Joel Hefley, has not endorsed Lamborn. Lamborn, it should be recalled, had vanquished Hefley's heir apparent, Jeff Crank, in the primaries. Many voters were awed by the fell storm of negative ads that Lamborn rained upon Crank, many of those thunderclaps ringing with "pro-gay radical" allegations. Crank's base of supporters at Focus on the Family were especially confounded.

Joel Hefley was clearly dismayed that the protege he originally groomed to become True Conservative was unworthy of the title, as Colorado voters decreed, and Hefley is only withholding his endorsement from Lamborn because he is a bitter, decrepit old man who saw his foolish legacy puffed to a twinkling dustcloud.

(Neither would Hefley lend blessings to Lamborn's adversary, Jay Fawcett, for it is not done. It is not the way.)

Lamborn's path to victory began with his run for Colorado state senate, where he demonstrated his political fearlessness in a victorious 1998 campaign. One winning tactic was heralded in the Denver Post:

In May 1998, Lamborn ran against Tom Ratterree for the state Senate. Ratterree claimed in a story printed in The (Colorado Springs) Gazette that he had received copies of a letter circulated by Lamborn supporters suggesting Ratterree, who opposed euthanasia, took his wife off of life support.

His wife died of cancer in 1991 and had requested that she not be connected to life-support machinery.

Ratterree dropped out of the race, telling a Gazette reporter: "... the lack of Christian attitude by some people in the community, I don't need that."

Ratterree died in 2005.

Huzzah! Who could not have foreseen the makings of a champion during Lamborn's promising run for state senate? Such breathtaking strategy would indubitably come from he who is destined to become True Conservative. The frail cannot survive in Colorado politics, and Lamborn remains, as he always has, on two righteous legs.

Woe betide Democrat Jay Fawcett and his childish ambitions of representing Congressional District 5 in True Conservative's stead! Though he has not yet been beheaded in the town square, as I have foretold, he is falling behind in the polls within a week of Election Day. Backed into a corner, Fawcett called out True Conservative for a live radio debate that was later chronicled in the Springs Gazette. Among the Democrat's barbs:

“My opponent hides behind his fear, hate and false piety,” Fawcett said later in his closing statement. “He’s a liar and he has no plan on what to do in Washington.”

These tired accusations could barely faze True Conservative, for then in his everlasting poise, He riposted by calling Fawcett a liberal. A dire blow! The Democratic candidate was perhaps caught wholly off guard by this allegation. But still stood the stubborn bull -- how many swords must True Conservative plunge into Fawcett's hide before He can finally put the slouching beast to earth?

But as it is in battle, the more resistant the foe, the more glory won at his demise. For this reason, perhaps Lamborn would relish his victory all the more, provided that -- this time -- he is not too overcome by drink and merriment to make a coherent speech to his grateful and wise constituents.