The rally at the Douglas County Fairgrounds Event Center on Tuesday started in typically upbeat fashion.

An honor guard launched the meeting with a crisp pass around the room. More than 200 stalwart conservative activists joined together in a hardy rendition of the Pledge of Allegiance. And, when the speeches started and high-profile Republican Party candidates and officeholders took turns jibing Democratic figures and lampooning liberal policy positions, the crowd hooted and laughed.

But, as the event progressed, the mood in the building grew dark.

When the honor guard was gone and the speeches all done, no one in the crowd could have been under any illusion that the event hadn’t been fueled by fear that Election Day disaster loomed for Republicans and that the only way to stave off disaster would be to reenergize voters like the men and women who had attended the rally – Republican voters whose great hopes for victory this year seemed tempered by events and whose usually reliable enthusiasm for campaigning might well be draining away just when the long election season was turning into its crucial final stretch.

Planners billed the event as a campaign rally for Colorado 4th District U.S. Rep. Ken Buck. Headline speaker U.S. Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) was joined by Colorado U.S. Senate candidate Darryl Glenn, rising-star state Republican District Attorney George Brauchler, University of Colorado at-large regent candidate Heidi Ganahl and Colorado Republican 1st Congressional District candidate Casper Stockham.

But, as everyone in the room knew, Buck needs little campaign help this year. His deeply conservative district should hand him an easy victory against Democratic candidate Bob Seay, an ernest but underfunded political novice.

Indeed, Buck appeared on stage at the rally for mere minutes. He celebrated the state’s Republican candidates, praised Gowdy as a shrewd lawmaker and true friend and delivered a blunt message to the crowd. “We need to turn things around,” he said, “We’ve got to make sure we win the White House.”

Gowdy gave a speech that was part apology and part tough love. He said he understood the anger and frustration gnawing at party activists this year. In recent elections, he conceded, Republican voters had delivered GOP majorities in the U.S. House and the U.S. Senate, but the promise of those victories had gone unfulfilled.

“We weren’t straight with you,” Gowdy said. “We should have told you that we need to win the executive branch. The cure to your frustration and your anger is for us to win national elections again.

“We have won one out of the last six popular votes for president. One out of six,” he said. “I made a ‘D’ in my last math class, but I can tell you, that ain’t good. If you’re into trends and statistics, that ain’t good. One out of the last six times, our fellow citizens have gone into the booth, pulled the curtain behind them and chose R over D only once.”

Gowdy said Republicans have been losing the national political conversation. Now he said it’s necessary to explain to a skeptical younger generation why Republicans believe what they believe and how exactly what they believe is best for the country.

“Is the manner of our communication truly calculated to persuade?” he asked. “Because when you’ve lost five out of the last six (elections), you better start persuading. You better start persuading the people who voted for Obama last time to give us a chance.”

“If you want to change the direction of this country, you have got to influence the people in your own sphere. It ain’t Kenny Buck’s job. It ain’t my job,” Gowdy said. “Start with the people you know best. Tell them why you believe what you believe. Tell them in a hopeful and persuasive way. Understand, you are the single best messenger we have.”

Derrick Wilburn, vice chairman of the Colorado Republican Party, told the crowd that he believed the country had turned a terrible corner and that men and women alone couldn’t turn it back around. He said God was the answer.

Wilburn described GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump as “a flawed candidate in many ways” and said that U.S. Senate candidate Glenn’s campaign is “vastly outmanned” by incumbent Democrat Michael Bennet’s campaign.

“Darryl’s campaign is built of spit and mud and duct tape and toothpicks and a bunch of volunteers,” Wilburn said.

“What I believe we need to do and to encourage those in our circles to do is to start getting on our knees and taking this into prayer,” he said. “Can I get some volunteers tonight to join in an effort to fast for our candidates. Will you commit for the next three days to skip a meal and take that time to instead pray for our nation and pray for our candidates, for three days. If you commit to that, we can move mountains.”

Glenn is trailing Bennet in the polls by double digits and he has suffered a recent bout of negative news coverage.

“You have to believe we can win,” Glenn said, pacing the stage. “The media is trying to discourage you. They have stopped being objective and turned into activists … We have to get that Republican swagger back.”

Rising-star state Republican District Attorney George Brauchler asked the crowd to consider the party’s down-ticket candidates who rely on grassroots efforts to drum up support face to face, door to door.

“It’s important that we turn out,” he said. “We have less than 70 days – less than 70 days. That’s daunting. Our responsibility to each other, to Colorado and probably to the nation is to try to figure out how to have two conversations, or four conversations, eight conversations, sixteen conversations,” Brauchler said. “Damn the polls. Damn the left-wing media.”

Tim Wigley, an energy industry executive and former New Mexico Republican Party director who is now one of the chairs of Colorado’s Trump Campaign team, cautioned rally attendees against split-ticket voting. He recalled the presidential election of 1992, when many conservatives voted for independent candidate Ross Perot over Republican President George H. W. Bush. Democrat Bill Clinton won the White House that year with well less than half the popular vote.

“I know some of you are down about this election,” Wigley said. “I’m pleading with people this year, let’s not make that same mistake.

“Look, I told the campaign I was going to say this today and they know I’m going to say it: (Trump) wasn’t my first, second, third choice. I was like many of you,” he said. “But I believe in the process we have. When a person wins the most states, the most delegates and the most votes, we have got to think about this. Hillary Clinton says she’s going to ban fracking and she’s going to ban public land development of minerals and coal. I just think the decision is fairly simple. I’d vote for anybody but her.

“I ask you to support Donald Trump, to campaign,” Wigley said. “We need volunteers.”

– john.tomasic@gmail.com