1. “Democrat John Hickenlooper is really popular.”
2. “Republican Scott McInnis lost his best narrative for winning when Gov. Bill Ritter announced he would not run for re-election.”
3. “McInnis can talk about building business and growing jobs, but Hickenlooper has actually done it in the private sector. Repeatedly.”
4. “An incredible 37 Governors are up for re-election in 2010, including 22 that are open seats. Hick is going to raise as much (and likely more) money than McInnis, and given all the points above, it’s hard to see how McInnis is going to convince big national GOP interests that his race is worthy of top-tier consideration.”

Reasons two and four strike me as the most important for the McInnis campaign to reckon. Scott McInnis never really had to introduce himself to the public early in his bid, because the important thing was he wasn’t Bill Ritter.  Now, Team McInnis must recast the narrative–and point three from Colorado Pols nails the challenge there–and get his fundraising machine well oiled and tanked up, potentially without a lot of help from the national Republican party.

Mike Littwin called it pretty well yesterday when he pointed out that campaign season must be underway, because  the mayor tried to pull a snow job on a conference call with the National Western Mining Conference & Exhibition.

And when asked whether the blizzard had changed his mind on global warming, Hickenlooper answered:

“I don’t think that the scientific community has decided with certainty that climate change is as catastrophic as so many people think.”

He said the science was uncertain, particularly on rate of change, but “in a snowstorm like this, you have to look at it with some skepticism.”

Seriously? While the science behind climate alarm comes under increasing scrutiny, there’s no call for illogical vote pandering. As the mayor surely understands, weather and climate are not the same. A) I doubt the statement did much to impress folks who were on the call. B) I strongly suspect the statement only harms Hickenlooper’s favorability among voters who are predisposed to like him.

Here’s Littwin:

Hickenlooper was a geologist. That’s what brought him to Colorado. He knows the science well enough. The obvious question was whether he was putting politics over science. It has happened before.

Well called. I think the mayor, on reflection, would probably enjoy a do over.

To be sure, information about the telephone poll is limited. In addition to knowing that 500 likely voters were called, I’d like to know where those voters live (roughly). Specifically, I’d like a sense of how Hickenlooper polls among likely voters a) outside of Denver and b) on the Western Slope in particular, where McInnis ought to enjoy a broad base of support, being as he calls Grand Junction home.

It’s early, and such minutiae will come. In the meantime, Democrats must be pleased to see so much swing so soon just by virtue of tapping a quality candidate to replace Bill Ritter. So that tells us about name recognition. Now let’s see how both campaigns approach the issues.

By comparison, Scott McInnis, Politician, enjoys 1,954 Facebook fans.