Nearly 30 years ago, then-Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan coined the term “irrational exuberance” to describe the overheated stock market.

That descriptive phrase could also apply to much of the political realm. The hype in politics often grossly exceeds the reality on the ground.

In that vein, let’s focus on Colorado’s precinct caucuses held earlier this month, the first step in the process leading to the Democratic and Republican state assemblies. Democrats will gather this coming Saturday, with Republicans following two weeks later, both conventions interestingly to be held in Pueblo.

Caucuses attract the most active, dedicated, engaged, and opinionated members of each party. Democratic participants tilt to the left of their party’s median; Republican attendees are to the right of their party’s median.

Those who join this series of meetings should be honored for their commitment. They constitute their party’s backbone. But that hardly makes them representative of broader sentiment.

In 2018, the last time both parties featured intense contests for multiple statewide offices, 503,000 Coloradans voted in the GOP primary, while 637,000 took part in the Democratic primary. The state experienced significant growth in intervening years, and I would anticipate a still higher number of voters in this June’s primary elections.

Those activists who attend precinct caucuses, much less the far fewer who stay with the process all the way through the state assembly, are but a minuscule fraction of those who will cast a primary election ballot.

Colorado Democrats report that roughly 13,000 party stalwarts attended caucuses at the beginning of March. It will be a surprise if the primary electorate is not 50 times larger. Colorado Republicans have yet to report such numbers.

For the balance of this column, we will concentrate on the Democratic side. Sad to say, Republicans in these parts have time and again shot themselves into irrelevance. Beyond that, Democrats have exhibited a corrective mechanism to reel in excesses of their most zealous loyalists.

In the Denver congressional district, word is that insurgent Melat Kiros, with positions to the extreme left of the party spectrum, is outperforming longtime Rep. Diana DeGette.

Regular readers know that I find DeGette past her sell-by date and have urged her to step aside. Still, the odds of Kiros besting her for the nomination are remote. Kiros is the flavor of March and the heartthrob of those who populate caucuses. She is likely to be an afterthought when the votes are counted at the end of June.

Ditto for the U.S. Senate race. Challenger Julie Gonzales, whose platform is virtually identical to Kiros’s, is cleaning up at caucuses and county assemblies. So much so that Sen. John Hickenlooper decided to withdraw from the assembly process and rely solely on petitions to secure his ballot spot.

No matter Hickenlooper’s expired shelf life, the odds of Gonzales pulling off this upset remain as distant as when she entered the race last December.

There has long been a disconnect between what makes the hearts of caucus attendees and delegates go pitter-patter and what resonates with that exponentially larger mass of primary voters.

Think back to 2018, when Cary Kennedy prevailed at the state assembly only to lose the primary to Jared Polis. Or to 2010, when Andrew Romanoff was the darling of the activist base but decisively lost the Senate nomination to Michael Bennet. Countless examples from years prior underscore the point.

On a related note, too many press stories around the state assembly will reference “the coveted top-line designation.” “Coveted” by whom? It simply does not matter.

For sure, there is a core discontent among much of the Democratic Party about outsized donor influence, politicians overstaying their welcome and prominent office-holders falling short of the moment.

But that undercurrent does not translate into little-known, under-financed candidates with views removed from the Democratic mainstream turning caucus success into much more than that.

We also hear much demeaning chatter about candidates who eschew caucuses and assemblies in favor of collecting petition signatures to win a place on the ballot. Somehow, it is seen as “going around the party.” Forget such nattering as well. Voters do not care. Colorado law provides two equally legitimate paths for access to the primary ballot.

Hickenlooper, Bennet and aspiring Attorney General Hetal Doshi made calculated decisions to abstain from the assembly and collect petition signatures instead. Just as Gonzales, Kiros and gubernatorial contender Phil Weiser have invested everything in recruiting delegates. All are acting in their self-interest and maximizing their prospects. In other words, they are practicing politics.

Also working against the upstart challengers is growing evidence that Democrats across the country are intent on victory this year. That has not always been the case. Despite a comfortable lead in late polls, Texas Democrats dismissed Jasmine Crockett, an ultra-progressive performative sort, in favor of the toned-down James Talarico.

While the coming state assemblies will be entertaining, their impact and ultimate consequence are less clear. They bring to mind the idea of a bubble – both in the sense of a rather insular collection of true believers and akin to an inflated stock market driven by its own fanfare and ripe for a crash.

Eric Sondermann is a Colorado-based independent political commentator. He writes regularly for Colorado Politics and The Gazette. Reach him at EWS@EricSondermann.com; follow him at @EricSondermann