Two rallies this week in Colorado have provided a very stark and clear reminder of the difference between 2008 and 2012.

While Romney was forced to turn thousands away from his raucous Red Rocks rally, Obama saw a shocking drop off in his Denver rally, pulling over 100,000 people in 2008, but only 16,000 yesterday in Denver — and probably significantly less as that number was provided by the Obama campaign and not independently verified.

It’s not just this little ‘ol conservative blog making this point, but ABC News’ Jake Tapper:

Democrats were quick to complain that the 100,000 rally was on a Sunday, while the Denver rally was mid-week, but no amount of spin is going to be able to wash off a drop off of 85,000 people. Jake Tapper agrees:

It’s not only the Denver rally where the lack of enthusiasm can be felt. At CSU, Obama saw his rally of 45,000 in 2008 fall to merely 13,000 this year.

Go figure, Allison Sherry — the Democrat blogger for The Denver Post — didn’t mention the shocking crowd juxtaposition in her write up today of the Obama event. While Sherry willfully ignored the bad optics for Team Obama, for everyone else it was an unavoidable comparison.