The Tancredo campaign sent out an e-mail blast this afternoon noting that Tom will be on the Glenn Beck Show, to be aired on Fox Television on Sunday night at 5 PM.  That’s fine – I’m ambivalent about Glenn Beck – but what really got my attention was Tom’s explanation of why Beck is supporting him:

He knows when I’m governor I will launch a tenth amendment revolution.  I will ask fellow governors to join me in drawing a line in the sand and telling the feds not to cross again - and they can take their stimulus dollars and pound sand with it.  Colorado is not interested.

This is precisely the kind of issue and approach whereby governors can and should have real impact, and it’s this sort of interest in and fidelity to the Constitution which I believe makes Tom Tancredo, while not everyone’s perfect candidate, far and away the best – and obvious – choice for Colorado voters as we come down, mercifully, to the last few days of this campaign.

Sure, Tom Tancredo is a politician.  Sure, people can find things they don’t like about the guy.  Some people complain that he didn’t honor a term limits pledge, to which I would point out that he did get out of Congress, albeit 4 years later than promised, even when he could have won certain re-election.  Libertarians say he’s too conservative on immigration; conservatives say he’s too libertarian on marijuana. And some, like me, might complain that he didn’t capitalize “Tenth Amendment.” To all those nit-pickers I say “Please tell me whether you’d be trying to hold any other politician to this same standard of perfection or whether you’re just looking for any lame excuse to avoid supporting the only conservative who can win.”

Indeed, to anybody who plans to vote for Dan Maes, I ask “If Tom Tancredo hasn’t insulted your mother, what could you possibly be thinking?"  Don’t give me some lame excuse about Republican Party operations.  If the state GOP means more to you than good governance in our state and nation, you have your priorities seriously screwed up.  Don’t give me some lame excuse about “process".  What’s the purpose of process except to let people elect the candidate of their choice, while giving us the best possible chance for good government?  Furthermore, just because the process by which Tom got in was unorthodox does not mean it was improper.  And don’t give me some lame excuse about issues over which a governor has absolutely zero authority.

It’s simple: Do you want Governor Hickenlooper or Governor Tancredo? Really, that’s all there is to it.  Anyone who tells you different is either a liar (or at least deluded) or a self-indulgent ideologue who is, as I said before in a bit of imagery that I was proud of myself for coming up with, busy patting himself on the back while forgetting that he’s holding a long, sharp knife in his hand.

In my experience – and that’s all I have to go on – Tom Tancredo says what he means and means what he says.  He’s always been open to listening to alternative viewpoints, which is not to say he’s going to change his mind every time someone pushes back on a major issue (unlike Dan Maes whose flip-flop on amnesty was perhaps the first big clue that he was not ready for prime-time).  Tancredo is extremely intelligent, despite what the Denver Post and left-wing web sites would have you believe.  And although he is and should be best known for his views on immigration, he has strong and principle-based positions on a wide range of issues, most notably issues which a governor actually can impact (which do not include federal immigration policy, but which do include tax and spending issues, energy regulation issues, and, yes, sanctuary city issues.)

Hearing a candidate for anything, but especially for governor, take a strong stand for the Tenth Amendment is a rare breath of fresh air in a political world full of bloviating self-promoters who couldn’t tell the Bill of Rights from the menu at Appleby’s.  Indeed, there is perhaps no more important issue for residents of all states right now than to try to elect state-wide politicians who understand our one true defense against the tyranny of an all-powerful federal government; that defense is the 10th Amendment.  Tom Tancredo is the only candidate for governor who thinks about and supports the 10th Amendment.  (Hickenlooper would be against it because it would tend to limit his idol, Barack Obama’s, power, and Dan Maes doesn’t know where to go look up what it is.)

In short, Tom Tancredo is, if you’re not a leftist, the best and only real choice for governor.  I don’t say this only as someone who wants John Hickenlooper to lose, which I surely do, but as someone who has come to believe that Tom Tancredo affirmatively deserves my vote – and yours.

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For people who haven’t been through this debate with me a dozen times already:

I’d like to repeat, for those of you who are on the fence or are relatively new readers to these pages, that I am not a long-time Tancredo cheerleader. In fact, back in July, I urged Tom not to get into the race…but not because I didn’t like him; rather it was because I wondered whether his reputation was as someone too extreme and divisive for him to be able to attract independent voters.  Particuarly with the Denver Post’s horrible pro-Hickenlooper bias, knowing that Tom would never get the benefit of the doubt of the state’s major news oulet, it was and remains a real question.  But obviously, based on current polls, my fears were too strong.  Tom’s message of restraining government is hitting home with hundreds of thousands of Colorado voters who are sick of seeing government at every level spend as if our money grows on their trees.

Tom and I have substantial difference on immigration policy (especially as it relates to legal immigration.) The other side of the coin is how impressed I was with Tom’s courageous stand for marijuana legalization, and I say that as someone who has never smoked pot (or even taken a puff of a cigarette) and wouldn’t if it’s legal.

Early on, before Dan Maes’ spectacular implosion, I cautioned my readers that this race could probably not be won by anyone but Hickenlooper and that conservatives and libertarians should focus their energies and money on other races, particularly in efforts to win back at least one house of the state legislature.  At that time I said that Tancredo was my preferred candidate of those still in the race, but that the race was a lost cause for non-liberals.

On October 11th, after Dan Maes’ self-destruction through errors, gaffes, and gigantic question marks which need not be rehashed here, I reappraised the situation, aggressively endorsing Tom Tancredo (and contributing to his campaign.)

There have been many spirited debates among Republicans and Libertarians and liberty-oriented independents on these and other politically-oriented web site, almost a mini Civil War among GOP activists and elected officials (both current and former) about the merits and demerits of supporting Dan Maes simply because he is the official Republican candidate who got his place on the ticket through the standard process.

I have argued strenuously – actually since way before I endorsed Tancredo – that Maes would come in third. In fact, in the first half of September, I wrote that “I thought Tancredo had a better chance to beat Hick than Maes does – though still a very small chance – and that therefore it was a vote for Maes that’s more like a vote for Hick.”

With Maes now down to single digits in the polling, one key question remains: Will enough stubborn Republicans (and conservative unaffiliated voters) stick with a man who should never have been a candidate for anything rather than voting for the most conservative electable candidate and hand the governorship to John “Obama-lite” Hickenlooper? For those of you who do just that, I wonder if you’ll be able to live with yourself if Hickenlooper were to win by the slimmest of margins…