CO-04: Penn Schoen Berland: Markey(D-Inc) trails Gardner

[Rowan]

CO-04

Gardner (R) 44%
Markey (D) 41%

http://thehill.com/house-polls/thehill-anga-poll-week1/122873-district-by-district-colorado

[Vasall des Midas]

Markey doing far better than I thought she would... is Gardner a crazy?

[Lief]

Yeah, that's surprisingly close for a seat I was sure was lost.

[Dgov]

Yeah, that's surprisingly close for a seat I was sure was lost.

This seat has Fort Collins in it, which has been breaking Democrat lately, which might be a part of it.

[So the Heroes Fall]

This seat isn't really the rural ultra-Republican one it looks like on a map. The Eastern Plains uber-Republican counties are very sparsely population and don't even make up 20% of the district's population.

Rather the seat's population centers are a bunch of small cities immediately north of metro Denver. Now satellite cities with some commuters aren't really Democratic-friendly territory either, but Fort Collins and Greeley have gotten so large they have their own inner cities and strong Democratic bases too (also universities.) The seat even has part of Boulder County. These aren't the type of places that want someone like Musgrave as their rep (who was actually from the Eastern Plains.) So if the GOP has nominated someone like her again and keeps doing so, the seat will probably keep voting against them. Of course once a Republican who isn't a complete embarrassment gets in, they're in it for a long time.

[Vasall des Midas]

A quick search on Gardner doesn't show up any Musgrave-style crazyness... but he is indeed from the rural part of the district.