outnumber Republicans in Colorado. For the first time in many, many years.

As of Saturday, Colorado voter registration rolls showed 876,498 active Democrats, 870,435 active Republicans and 789,200 active unaffiliated voters, according to the secretary of state’s office. Despite the lead among active voters, Republicans still maintain a slight advantage over Democrats in registration numbers when inactive voters are included into the tally. When both inactive and active voters are combined, Republicans have nearly 13,000 more voters, with 1,062,773 people registered, compared to the 1,049,912 registered as Democrat. The total number of active and inactive unaffiliated voters is 1,069,634.

Now, at least in our area and the Springs (the places in CO I know best), “Republican” might be a bit of a misnomer. I think the correct designation for many Republicans here would be Libertarian at best. There is also some question as to whether “inactive” voters will be allowed to vote this year at all (thank YOU, Mike Coffman). Plus the independent/unaffiliated voters are the biggest group of all, if you count both active and inactive registered voters.

This does not in any way change my mood this morning. Especially when I saw this piece of news – McCain is saying buh-bye to the idea of winning Colorado. Ah, if only he had given up last week, before the dozen robo-calls we received in two days. Including one which, amusingly, thanked us for being “loyal Republican voters” and invited us to Sarah Palin’s rally in Das Springs yesterday morning.

UPDATE: Holy shit! Even the Guardian is writing about this. Amazing.

Former Secretary of State Colin L. Powell on Sunday endorsed the presidential candidacy of Senator Barack Obama, calling him a “transformational figure” who has displayed “a steadiness” during his race against Senator John McCain.

“He has both style and substance,” Mr. Powell said, speaking on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” He added, “Obama has displayed a steadiness; showed intellectual vigor. He has a definitive way of doing business that will do us well.”

He also expressed disappointment at certain, um, choices the McCain campaign has made; including trying to tie Obama with former Weather Underground member William Ayers and his choice of Sarah Palin as his running mate.

Despite my last Twitter post, I’m…cautiously optimistic at this point. However it works out in the end, this endorsement is huge.

We here in Colorado understand the importance of our vote during this election year. Really. We completely get that we have been designated the “new Ohio” this year. We appreciate the importance of our votes. We do.

Please, for the love of Cthulhu, enough already with the misleading – yes, even lie-filled – attack ads. They’re on both sides to varying degrees, so don’t bother taking the moral high ground here, even though McCain is proving to be far more negative than Obama. Far, far more.

A special note for the McCain/Republican party: There are plenty of right-wing, racist whack jobs out here. No need to incite more violence – we’ve already been there, done that. For fscks sake, don’t encourage any more of the crazies.

Enjoy your advertising stay here. Please don’t be offended if we throw things at the TV set and turn your sorry selves off. Have a lovely election season.

• Did anybody else think that Tom Brokaw was being overly deferential to ol’ PappySen. McCain? It could be that I’m just overly sensitive.
• I think I could also see smoke coming out of McCain’s head. Much like a Dalek before it starts spinning around and explodes.
• If you must watch the debate next week, you might want to give BBC America a try, if you’re able and/or haven’t already. Much less stressful.
• It seemed like McCain was trying, and failing, to channel Ronald Reagan. McCain’s not a good enough actor, apparently. Obama looked like the lone adult in the room – and yes, I’m counting Brokaw in that as well. I liked what he had to say on health care, although I wish that he would go farther and just advocate for expanding Medicare/Medicaid (you know, the “socialist” health-care system we already have).

In closing, I’d like to thank Senator “Pap” McCain for making my choice that much easier. It’s official – I’m voting for “that one”.

Oh, and when you’re going to the same media outlet that ripped your vice-presidential candidate a new one just hours before…maybe not the smartest choice.

Ready to be President, Mr. McC? We’ll see…

Video link courtesy of Crooks and Liars and Square State – along with every other political blog worldwide by now.