Despite the fact that Virginia and Colorado are both politically competitive states, Republicans in both states are making egregious unforced errors that threaten to doom them in upcoming statewide races. Josh Kraushaar of National Journal describes recent developments in Virginia, where the state GOP eschewed a primary race in favor of a convention that nominated an unelectable clergyman who focuses almost exclusively on social issues, including opposition to same-sex unions and, more broadly, to various civil rights protections for lesbians and gays. It is worth noting that a Washington Post survey released earlier this month finds that 56 percent of registered voters in Virginia back same-sex civil marriage, including 40 percent of Republicans. One problem is that the wording of the survey question is problematic, i.e., it asks whether gay marriage should be legal or illegal, when in fact the issue is whether or not same-sex unions ought to be eligible for civil marriage rights. But the shift since 2006 has been dramatic, particularly among GOP voters. If we assume that some non-trivial number of Virginia Republicans who oppose same-sex civil marriage rights nevertheless favor other rights and protections for same-sex unions, one gets the impression that Jackson’s views are in the minority. This needn’t be a liability in itself, as it is possible that opponents of same-sex civil marriage rights are more intense in their preference than supporters. And it is at least possible that Jackson’s status as a non-politician could prove an asset in an anti-politician climate. The challenge for Jackson, however, is that he doesn’t seem to be conversant with the kind of economic and policy issues that matter most to Virginia voters. Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, the GOP gubernatorial nominee, has a number of vulnerabilities, but no one denies that he is familiar with the workings of state government. Just as the 2008 nomination of Sarah Palin appears to have damaged John McCain’s presidential campaign, Jackson’s nomination may well take what had been a roughly 50-50 race and tilt it towards Terry McAuliffe, the problematic Democratic gubernatorial nominee and Clinton ally. Beyond the gubernatorial race, no consensus candidate has emerged to challenge the popular Democratic Sen. Mark Warner in 2014.

And though the difficulties facing the Colorado GOP are not quite as colorful, they are just as serious. Kraushaar notes that Rep. Cory Gardner, a promising Republican candidate for statewide office, recently decided against taking on Sen. Mark Udall next year, leaving the party in a lurch. Tom Tancredo, the anti-immigration activist who won 36 percent of the gubernatorial vote as a third-party candidate in 2010, has entered the race for the Republican gubernatorial nomination, a move that will likely force his Republican opponents to either move closer to Tancredo’s anti-immigration stance, thus alienating swing voters, or loudly condemn it, thus alienating anti-immigration conservatives. Kraushaar ends his column with thoughts on the big picture:

These swing states are important precisely because they contain significant and growing numbers of the rising American electorate—Hispanics, single women, and young, college-educated voters—that are necessary for Republicans to win over for their long-term health. The party’s favorable short-term prospects in 2014—a path to a Senate majority can be won in exclusively Republican states—could easily blind Republicans to the long-term vulnerabilities it faces.

What’s remarkable is that these swing-state setbacks are taking place in what’s shaping up to be a promising political environment for Republicans. The off-year electorate, on paper, should be more conservative than in 2012, with younger voters and minorities less likely to show up for a midterm election. The scent of scandal threatens to weigh down Democrats over the next year. The implementation of Obama’s health care law, polling as poorly as ever, will be taking place right as the midterms begin in earnest. This is the stuff that should be catnip for prospective GOP recruits.

But instead we’re hearing crickets in these two Senate races, not to mention a handful of other battleground contests (Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, and New Hampshire) where Republicans should be faring better. It’s awfully telling that Republican Senate candidates have already lined up in many of the deeply conservative states up for grabs, but there’s comparably little movement elsewhere. Talk about two Americas.

One theory, which is surprisingly popular in activist circles, is that the GOP would have more recruiting success if the party were more consistently opposed to measures like raising the federal debt limit and more committed to short-term fiscal consolidation, on the grounds that this would energize conservative voters and convince independents and centrist swing voters that the GOP can be trusted to not just slow the rate of growth in government spending but to actually reduce government’s footprint, while leaving old-age entitlements largely intact for current retirees and near-retirees. That is, many conservative activists believe that the political approach championed by Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, who ran behind Mitt Romney in 2012 (57.2 percent vs. 56.45 percent), is more likely to yield political dividends in states like Colorado, Virginia, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, and New Hampshire than the pragmatism of Tennessee Sen. Bob Corker. Another view is that independents and centrist swing voters are already convinced that the main goal of the congressional GOP is to shrink government as such rather than to increase employment levels or to address barriers to upward mobility, yet these voters tend to weigh job growth and affordability issues more heavily than short-term spending reductions.