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Ciruli: Ritter in for tough times
Colorado pollster Floyd Ciruli paints a dark picture of Gov. Bill Ritter’s more than two years in office in a column in today’s Rocky Mountain News, declaring that after the dust settles in November, the governor “may be in for a period of considerable criticism.”
The pollster cites Ritter’s mill levy freeze to the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission’s ongoing rule making to his employee associations executive order as the possible roots of his slump in the polls.
“When compared with his Montana counterpart, Gov. Brian Schweitzer, in recent Rasmussen polls, Ritter’s job rating lags behind Schweitzer by 19 points,” Ciruli wrote. “Only 45 percent of Colorado voters gave Ritter an excellent or good job rating, whereas 64 percent of Montanans rated Schweitzer as doing an excellent or good job.”
(Rasmussen Reports’ latest poll shows similar numbers for Ritter’s approval rating.)
Ciruli’s analysis is worth a read, however, if the Colorado Republican Party cannot find a strong candidate to take on the incumbent governor in 2010, Ritter’s approval woes might not be enough to unseat him.
*Ritter photo from the Associated Press.
Comments
By Not so fast
July 23, 2008 2:17 PM | Link to this
Less than 25% of voters say he’s doing a poor job or don’t know, meaning the rest of the state (75%) approve.
Ciruli is notorious for his fire and brimstone predictions … unfortunately the Rocky can’t seem to find anyone with an unbiased opinion when writing for them.
By Paint by numbers
July 23, 2008 9:54 PM | Link to this
His numbers right now do not bode well for 2010. He’s done a lot of damage to himself with his public policy issues. If he keeps it up, the Republicans will have lots of things to go after him for.
The real problem for Ritter is that he doesn’t get it. We put a lawyer in charge, and he can’t connect the dots when it comes to reading the economy and how badly his policies conflict with workaday people, small business and big business.
Economically speaking, Ritter is dumb.