A God in Ruins - Leon Uris [97]
Chapter 25
DENVER, 2002–2003
Quinn Patrick O’Connell Wins Governorship of Colorado in Off-Year Election
Governor O’Connell stood as a lone pine in a burned-out forest. The Republican sweep took the statehouse in Denver and a majority of the national delegation to Washington.
Tuesday follows Monday. Quinn awoke to the reality that a sensible gun-control law didn’t have a chance. He would take his time, build bipartisan coalitions, push the easy legislation first. Once he had a sense of his statehouse, he might unwrap his gun-control bill. That would be a year off, anyhow.
Quinn did not face automatic Quinn haters. His father had been a shooter, a Republican, a Marine hero. Quinn was a hero of the state, a successful rancher and state senator and a die-hard Coloradan.
For years the O’Connell office in Denver had been a place of civility, debate, and compromise. The Republicans relaxed, as long as Quinn didn’t push a liberal agenda too hard.
The mansion on 8th and Logan was too stilted for the O’Connells. They used it for state functions, Girl Scout troops, parties, and photo ops, but home was their Chessman Park condo a few blocks away.
During the first months Quinn traveled in the state’s King Air to get a pulse of the people and to prioritize his legislative program and win new constituents as a hands-on leader.
His first goal was to balance the state’s resources for the coming century. Land and water laws were needed to protect the ranches and farms, for mining, housing developments, and the enormous tourist industry.
Quinn’s blue-ribbon panel contained a cross section of ideology, but at his personal behest they worked in a professional and intelligent manner. Quinn had imposed on them the canon that if one segment of the Colorado economy defaulted, the nature of the state could be lost.
He took on commencement speeches, town hall meetings, a semimonthly TV show, business lunches, union picnics, ribbon-cutting ceremonies and, mercifully, he was a judge in the Miss Colorado beauty pageant.
Quinn ended his day’s work in the evening, phoning all over the state to congratulate the day’s winners or to express sorrow over deaths.
Denver was a legitimate small-time big city with generations of character and livability while retaining its cowboy gait.
He and Mayor Cholate formed a Coming to Denver committee. Gateway to the Rockies! Most sports-loving city in America!
The state supported the city in hiring a top museum curator to scout the world and put together exhibitions from Mongolia to Brazil to France and have their grand openings in Denver. Likewise, he won support, with powerful persuasion, for the funds to upgrade the Denver Symphony Orchestra.
The Coming to Denver committee purchased a small hotel, large enough for the cast and crew of a Broadway musical. Quinn and the mayor hounded New York producers to stage their big shows.
Playing on Aspen’s glitz, a series of events were telecast from skiing to the Aspen Music Festival in the summer. In a smaller way, Telluride’s film and country-western festivals reached millions.
Some of the ski areas had gone “soft” as the number of skiers dwindled. Quinn convinced the newly rich entrepreneurs of China and Russia to build vacation towns for their countrymen. Little Moscow and Little Shanghai came into being and resulted in an open door for the state’s export products.
Quinn Patrick O’Connell created a feel-good atmosphere.
But always hovering over him was the coming AMERIGUN convention. AMERIGUN sent shock waves through the state capital with their announcement that a regional AMERIGUN office was being established in Denver.
AMERIGUN was picking a fight, making a power play. It was a defeat that Governor O’Connell could not abide without throwing his delicately balanced program into a heap.
As the year of 2003 rolled on, endgame was near.
THE ALAMO—MARYLAND 2003
In the