Bill Owens is back in the news. It was sort of an awkward reappearance, in which Owens was heard expressing his thanks that the good people of Colorado have often, and wisely, ignored his counsel. (Campaign slogan: Pay no attention to that man behind the governor's desk!)

That's what can happen when you're the ex-governor and you get deposed in a Ward Churchill lawsuit - yes, Wardo is also back, a court case is on the way, and the talk-radio boys must be thrilled. But if we learned nothing else from the deposition, it's that Owens remains the rare Colorado Republican who can still draw a crowd.

What I mean is, Josh Penry? Cory Gardner? Troy Eid? John Suthers? Those not-exactly- marquee names, we're told, represent the future of the Colorado Republican Party, which is why, with two huge elections coming our way in 2010, Republicans are looking desperately into their past. Let's take a peek.

Yes, there's Tom Tancredo, sitting in his basement. And the guy in the black hat, still standing next to the wrong end of the horse - that's got to be Bob Beauprez. I wouldn't be surprised if there are even those Republicans prepared to beg Hank Brown to make a political comeback.

And then there's Owens, who dominated the Republican Party in this state for years. Of course, it was during those same years that the long-dominant Colorado Republican Party began to implode. And I know a few Republicans who still take that personally.

But Owens has name recognition, and, more than that, he's a conservative who understands that the Musgrave-Tancredo model doesn't work here anymore.

It's a desperate time if you're a Colorado Republican just now. In less than two years, Bill Ritter will be running for re-election and Michael Bennet will be defending his Senate seat. And the cynics are saying that the reason Ritter appointed Bennet was because Republicans would figure he's the rare Democrat who would be an easier mark than Ritter.

But who's going to run against either one?

Let's leave aside the fact that you have to go back to the pre-disco era to find an incumbent governor or senator who has lost in Colorado and concentrate on the more obvious issue - that if the Republicans don't win something sometime soon, they might as well bring back the Whigs.

Which brings us back to Owens. After Bennet was appointed, Public Policy Polling conducted a poll that found Bennet - whose name recognition is slightly better than the new Broncos' coach (can't name him, can you?) - beating Suthers (who says he won't run for the Senate), beating Scott McInnis , beating Tom Tancredo (who will inevitably run for something) but losing to Owens, if only by three points.

OK, let's assume Owens enjoys watching himself leading the polls. And let's assume, too, he doesn't mind being in the headlines again, if not necessarily for being tied to Churchill. If you missed the story, Churchill's lawsuit against CU is heading for court. And Churchill lawyer David Lane got Owens to admit in a deposition that by calling for Churchill to be fired - long before there were any allegations of plagiarism - he had, in Barack Obama's words, "screwed up."

Here's Owens' money quote - and if Churchill wins his suit, we could be talking real money - "I'm glad that the university, its counsel, and others who had a chance over a period of years to look at the law and look at the case didn't follow my advice and, in fact, chose to ignore it."

It takes you back, doesn't it? When Owens was running from one TV camera to the next, parroting the obvious about Churchill, that was Owens in his worst Boy Scout mode. But at the same time, he was working on a Ref C compromise that would put him at odds with his own party. In either case, it's Owens at the center of the Colorado political world - and no Republican has been there since.

Would he run in 2010? Those who know him doubt it, although I'm guessing the pressure will be intense. Certainly, there's a temptation to put his political career back together. But he left politics to go into, as they say, the private sector. And when asked during the deposition what he was doing, he said he served on the boards of several oil companies and also what he described as the second-largest railroad company in Russia. You can mine your own campaign ad here.

Imagine Owens running in a Senate primary against Tom Tancredo, who would, of course, hammer him over illegal immigration and Ref C while reserving, I'm guessing, a guest spot for Vladimir Putin.

It wouldn't just be ugly in the Holtzman-Beauprez mold. It would be all Colorado Democrats could possibly hope for.