Too Conservative compiles an interesting list of winners and losers from last weekend’s Republican convention in Richmond.
Here are a few of the more interesting ones, starting with a winner:
Democrats
Particularly Mark Warner. It’s not like Warner really needed a split GOP in order to cruise to victory, but his opponent winning with only 50.2% of the vote is the best he could have hoped for.
However, more than just Warner gains here. Everything from yesterday has a mountain of potential gains for Democrats, ranging everywhere from an easy Senate victory to a pickup in HD-52 to battling against a novice GOP Chair to strengthening their grip on the middle. And though the full repercussion of it won’t be felt until Election Day, the folly of choosing a convention reverberated throughout the entire day’s course.
Nothing makes this clearer than yesterday’s sour grapes announcement from Marshall refusing to endorse Gilmore unless Gilmore essentially committs political suicide by flip-flopping on the abortion issue.
Before the convention even opened, Warner had a consistent double-digit lead over Gilmore, not to mention an overwhelming fundraising advantage. Nothing that happened in Richmond is likely to change that significantly and, if anything, it’s only likely to get worse depending on how the Marshall thing plays out.
If Warner still has a double digit lead over Gilmore on Labor Day, then the race is essentially over.
Now, one of the losers:
Keith Fimian & Northern Virginia Republicans
Ken Cuccinelli is an anomaly, and his 101-vote margin proves it rather well. Successful Northern Virginia Republicans need a strong pragmatist streak, one that’s evident in Congressmen Wolf and Davis as well as several local members of the General Assembly and other candidates. Newcomers Keith Fimian and Pat Herrity fit perfectly into that mold which emphasizes good governance and solution-based results rather than adherence to an ideology and cultural issues like abortion and immigration.
While the author is far more sympathetic to guys like Frank Wolf and Tom Davis than I tend to be, there is a point here. If Republicans are going to win in Northern Virginia then they’re going to have to run candidates that people in Northern Virginia will vote for — you would have thought that the defeat last year of candidates like Jay O’Brien and Jeanmarie Devolites Davis, and the near defeat of Ken Cuccinelli, would have sent a message to the RPV. After what happened this weekend, it apparently wasn’t received.
As for Fimian, his biggest problem in November is going to be the fact that he has an R next to his name in a year when the Democrats will be running a still-popular former Governor for Senate and a charismatic Illinois Senator for President. I fully expect Warner to clean up in Fairfax County, and Obama is likely to do the same, and that is going to make Fimian’s chances of victory next-to-impossible no matter who the Democrats nominate in VA-11.
The only good news right now seems to be that there’s a very strong 2009 ticket ready to hit the ground running once the November elections are over.
June 3rd, 2008 at 11:05 am
That Ken Cuccinelli is an anomaly fails to explain why he wins, even by a 101 vote margin. If Republicans preach a true conservative message of liberty, freedom, and restoration of the Republic through a return to the Constitution, the voters do respond positively in Northern Virginia.
All too often, conservatives get stuck with a tag line of, for example, one who cuts taxes and welfare hurting the poor. They bring it on themselves because they fail to articulate that tax cuts and welfare reduction extends freedom to the poor. Rather than embrace this argument, they come up with cute terms that backfire such as “compassionate conservative”.
None of the Republican candidates are tackling these issues head on. The more they try to appear moderate, the more disingenuous they are seen to be. Why? Because they can’t overcome the “you’re hurting the poor” nonsense.
Ronald Reagan was a long shot. He didn’t shy away from attacking the flaws of the socialists or the liberals. He appealed to that sense of right and wrong, the up or down philosophy, rather than the left-right dialectic.
June 3rd, 2008 at 2:03 pm
Yeah, I think the results you discuss merely demonstrate that the BS offered by the “Believe in Nothing” crowd is sheer folly. O’Brien ran as a strong Conservative and lost narrowly (having voted for HB 3202); JMDD ran to the LEFT of Chap Peterson, and was trounced. The only “trend” that may be apparent there is that the GOP “name brand” was tarnished. Perhaps the deeper lesson is that Republicans who abandon their base pay the price. Perhaps to varying degrees, but a price is to be paid.
June 3rd, 2008 at 3:08 pm
James,
Well, that’s why I really think this is more of a “brand” issue than ideology.
As I said in the post, I don’t think that the average voter looks to ideology as much as those of us who are more involved politically might think they do, especially not when you start getting down to the state, county, and local levels of government.
What has hurt the GOP nationally, and in Virginia, is that they have left the public with the impression that they don’t have the answers people are looking for, and campaigns that focus on ideology or on wedge issues like abortion aren’t going to help that problem.
June 3rd, 2008 at 9:02 pm
Doug & James: I agree with what you say to a degree. A degree that can be measured. I think what James Young says adds to your comment and nails it.
HB 3202 was a litmus test for the Republican Conservatives vs the Establishment Republicans. It cost every good guy RC who went wobbly for just a moment and voted for it. It helped every true braveheart RC who stood up to the leadership for promoting an UNCONSTITUTIONAL law - that expanded government and increased taxes.
June 3rd, 2008 at 10:54 pm
James,
I’ve said before that Marshall deserves credit for what he did in standing up on the transportation funding bill, but he wasn’t alone in that respect anyway.
In some sense, though, it still gets back to what I’ve said several times already. The voting public is looking for solutions on issues like transportation and they are perceiving that the GOP is not providing them. Whether that’s a failure of message, or a failure of policy, I don’t know — but it’s a failure nonetheless and one that will cost votes if it’s not fixed.
June 4th, 2008 at 10:32 am
I would endorse my friend JAB’s comments, and would add this in rejoinder to your comments, Doug: the problem for the GOP Caucus in Virginia’s legislature is that it is and has heretofore been unwilling to crack the bigger nut of making transportation a priority sufficient to address with General Fund revenues. And I don’t think it’s a problem exclusive to ERs; RCs have been unwilling, by and large, to address it as well. They have been willing to attack the idols before which the Dems worship (government schools, etc.) and in so doing, have conceded the rhetorical high-ground.
In some ways, it goes back to Doug Wilder’s attempt to distinguish between “wants” and “needs.” Until the GOP is willing to do that, I’m not sure the structural problem can be solved.