Allard: No third term

There’s a long list of potential candidates for Allard’s seat, including Rep. Mark Udall, D-Eldorado Springs, and various Republicans, such as outgoing Gov. Bill Owens, Tancredo, McInnis and Schaffer.

Even before Allard’s decision, the Cook Political Report and the Washington Post political blog had called Colorado’s 2008 Senate contest one of the top races to watch.

An anticipated retirement by Allard was one reason, but analysts also point to Democratic gains in Colorado and other Western states.

The 2008 contest will happen in a presidential election year, and some Democrats are urging their party to pick a presidential nominee who reflects Western values. If so, that could give the party’s Senate candidate some coat-tails to ride.

Allard has been more folksy than flashy during his 24 years in elective office, starting with eight years in the state Senate, six years in the U.S. House of Representatives and so far 10 years in the U.S. Senate.

"Senator Allard’s great political strength was that Coloradans could look at him and say, ‘He is like me. He works hard every day.’

And I think there’s a commonality between Coloradans and Sen. Allard that we haven’t seen many times in elected officials," said Republican consultant Dick Wadhams, who managed Allard’s Senate campaigns in 1996 and 2002.

Allard has been a champion of fiscal discipline and traditional social values. That included two unsuccessful bids to pass a proposed constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.

In recent years, Allard often cast predictable, party-line votes with fellow Republicans, and he was known as one of the more reliable allies of President Bush’s White House.

Allies liked to say Allard has been a "work horse" rather than a "show horse" in Congress. Still, Time magazine in 2005 dubbed him "The Invisible Man" and one of the five "worst" U.S. Senators.

Longtime Allard chief of staff Sean Conway dismissed the ranking as "laughable," citing the senator’s accomplishments, including cutting years off the schedule for cleaning the former nuclear weapons plant at Rocky Flats; defending the state’s military installations from base closings and spearheading the investigation into sexual assaults at the U.S. Air Force Academy.

Allard was the only one from the nine-member state delegation to sit on an Appropriations Committee, a strategic place for securing federal funds for the state. First-term Sen. Ken Salazar, D-Denver, already has expressed an interest in an appropriations seat, although the positions are hard to come by.

But Allard might be remembered just as much for his down-home appeal and affable manner than his legislative record.

Allard played up his roots as a veterinarian and small businessman. He bragged about being a member of the two-person Senate Veterinarian Caucus, and he sometimes examined colleagues dogs in his Senate office.

Meanwhile, he lightened up his policy speeches by lacing them with yarns about his experience running the Allard Animal Hospital back in Colorado.

For example, his appeal for reforming the nation's health care systems included his story about being stuck with a high out-of-pocket expense for surgery after he hurt his back lifting Great Danes and other heavy dogs onto his examination table.