I’m a big fan of the late and great singer and songwriter Harry Chapin. Harry was an amazing human being, donating more than half his total income each year to projects designed to feed the hungry. I count the day I got to spend with him, not long before he was lost to us in a stupid traffic accident in 1981, as one of the highpoints of my life.

In one of his songs, one of his characters asserts “reality is just another word.” In Harry’s context, the lyric was about love and believing, but I confess that same lyric popped into my head as I read a recent story on Colorado Politics (Editor: that one was quite a reach…).

Attempting to recover from the ongoing disaster movie that is the Colorado Republican Party, that organization is attempting to pick its next state party chair. The winner of this contest will take over a party that has been largely shellacked (I chose that metaphor because I’m a woodworker) in recent elections. In three straight elections the voters have rejected the far-right platform and candidates put forth by the state GOP which, of course, makes me breathe a sigh of relief.

So, what is the solution to this problem? Well, according to each of the six folks running for chair, it is to move the Colorado GOP even farther to the extreme right because, well, I can’t think of a good reason. I suspect that it is the odd and ongoing fidelity to a certain former president, who just gave a two-hour speech to a conservative organization, wherein he lied at least 23 times about major and minor policy points. Some were what could be charitably called massive exaggerations, while others were complete re-writes of actual history, and his audience loved it. Did I mention that he went on for two hours? Maybe he is trying to emulate the leader of the country the GOP used to believe was our enemy?

Now, you might expect me to comment on one particular candidate for GOP chair, Tina Peters. The former Mesa County clerk has been convicted – let me say that again – convicted of obstruction when she refused a judge’s order to turn over a tablet computer she had likely used in her crime. So, she’s a convicted criminal, and she is a legitimate candidate for the GOP state chair position. Oh, and she goes on trial for seven felony and four misdemeanor charges that will be tried in August. That should tell us something about the modern state of the GOP.

But I’m not going to talk about Peters…

Instead, I’d like to draw your attention to a couple of lines from the CoPo story: “None will say that President Joe Biden is the legitimate winner of the 2020 presidential election, with three of the candidates stating flatly that former President Trump won reelection and a fourth saying he believes Trump won but can’t be sure.” Currently all six candidates to lead the Colorado Republican Party are election deniers, who to various extents embrace the big lie.

That is, dear reader, shameful.

It should be clear (although for far too many on the far-right it is not) that Trump lost the 2020 election. I won’t go over the dozens of court cases, many before Trump-appointed judges, that all found no evidence of systemic or meaningful fraud. Heck, even Rudy Giuliani, standing in a yard service company’s parking lot, with hair dye running down his cheek, could not produce any actual evidence to support the crazy claim.

Trump’s poison has trickled down the GOP structure quite thoroughly, and now we know regardless of whomever wins the state GOP chair race, he or she will be someone who denies the truth. Reality, to that person, is just another word.

As I think all the candidates are reasonably bright, I don’t think any of them (well, maybe Peters) truly believes the big lie, but they know that in today’s climate, to oppose the big lie, to oppose Donald Trump, is to somehow be disloyal to, well, party and country.

From a very pragmatic and practical perspective, as a former Democratic Party County chair myself, I’ll admit I’m not unhappy about this. I truly do believe the current state and national GOP is a threat to liberty, to women’s rights, to LGBTQI folks and, frankly, to free and fair elections.

Now, if the current and future state GOP leadership was convinced they needed to do a deep dive into why they have been losing, and decided to make sincere and widespread changes to the nutty part of the party, I’d be worried. Reasonable Dems and reasonable GOPers can have honest differences of opinion on the best way forward for our state and our nation. Those reasoned discussions might well result in positive reactions from our state’s voters.

But as long as the leadership contends the big lie is really the truth, the GOP becomes easier and easier to defeat. And there are some cracks emerging in the Trump façade. Nikki Haley is running for president and just this week, New Hampshire Gov – and another GOP up-and-comer – Chris Sununu said he was considering a run for the White House and he’s sure Donald Trump will not be the GOP nominee in 2024.

At the same conference that saw Trump speak for two hours, a fancy dinner took place. And who did the organizers select as the keynote speaker for that dinner? A person who took a reasonable and thoughtful approach to the GOP’s future? Nah, I’m just kidding you: they selected failed Arizona governor’s candidate and former TV talking head Kari Lake, who, in spite of vote totals, lots of yelping, and many losses in court, still contends falsely that there was massive election fraud in her race. Again, pathetic, but from a Dem point of view, keep taking Kari!

I don’t know who will lead the Colorado GOP. But what appears to be quite likely is whomever that new leader is, the party is destined to make a hard right turn, to engage in more fantasy and falsehoods and, thankfully, even fewer electoral wins.

The Grand Old Party still has some leaders of character (Bill Owens, John Suthers, Sally Clark) but until those leaders are listened to, our lovely state will get bluer and bluer.

Whew.

Hal Bidlack is a retired professor of political science and a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel who taught more than 17 years at the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs.