Below The Beltway

You wouldn’t know it, but there is a primary election in Virginia next Tuesday, and Northern Virginia has several races worth paying attention to.

There’s a Democratic Primary in the 11th Congressional District that could very well decide who the next Representative from that District will be. I don’t really have a dog in this fight, but the prospect of helping to keep Leslie Byrne out of Congress makes it tempting to cross lines and vote for Gerry Connolly, we’ll see what kind of mood I’m in on Tuesday.

In the 10th District, Vern McKinley is challenging long-time incumbent Frank Wolf in a Republican Primary. I’ve written about McKlinley before in the past, and he’s worthy of your vote if you live in the 10th CD and you’re sick of incumbents who forget where they’ve come from.

And, finally, there’s the 8th Congressional District. Jim Moran is running unopposed and, quite frankly, is in a safe seat, but that doesn’t mean that the Republicans aren’t running anyone. Mark Ellmore, who ran against Moran two years ago and lost, is running again.

And then there’s a guy named Amit Singh:

Amit Singh is 33 years old. If you were tending a bar when he walked in, you’d probably card him. Before his April speech to a slowly filling restaurant in Alexandria, Virginia, he ambles around the room, grabbing shoulders, shaking hands, smiling sheepishly. Friends who have shown up to support the unassuming defense industry engineer sit nearby, bemused.

“When he first showed me his website,” says Orrin McNamara, one of Singh’s neighbors, “I said: ‘Is this a joke? Amit for Congress?’ Seriously, I thought it might have been a joke.” He ponders for a moment. “I don’t know what the joke would have been.”

A bit after 7 p.m., Singh walks to the podium and sounds like what he is: a Republican congressional candidate. He talks about a “new vision for a brighter future.” Boilerplate, candidate-from-a-kit stuff. Singh smiles and darts his eyes down when he draws applause and laughs nervously when he takes a swipe at his Democratic incumbent. He doesn’t sound comfortable—until the speech shifts.

“We’ve seen how the politics of fear chip away at freedom at home,” he declares, sounding suddenly sure of himself. “Where are the defenders of freedom today? Where are our Thomas Jeffersons? Where are our Barry Goldwaters? There are a few defenders of freedom, but they are outnumbered, and they need our help.”

(…)

[W]hile national Republicans never took Ron Paul seriously, Virginia Republicans are sizing up Singh with interest. An internal poll shows him in striking distance of a primary win. Statewide Republican leaders, warm to the idea of an Indian-American candidate, are considering official endorsements.

Some will say that whoever the GOP nominates in the 8th CD is basically just a sacrificial lamb and, they’re right in the sense that the odds of Jim Moran losing in November are infinitesimal at best. What’s interesting, though, is that, this time, they’re not just running candidates with campaigns that exist mostly on paper and that one of the contenders for the nomination is someone with ideas that the party, both statewide and nationally, needs to pay attention to.

Even Singh’s opponent recognizes that, it seems:

Mark Ellmore, the Republican candidate who lost the 8th District nomination in 2006 and has been running for it ever since, warns that Singh will “have trouble securing the Republican base,” but that’s as far as the insults go. “Ron Paul supporters are absolutely great for the Republican Party,” Ellmore says.

If you’re voting in the 8th District on Tuesday, you should vote for Amit Singh. Win or lose, you won’t be throwing your vote away.