|
Hope
Against Hope
Jim
Gilmore sounds like a man who wants to run for
office again. If you're a Democrat, cross your
fingers and pray that he does.
Somebody
call the fire department!
Jim Gilmore’s pants are on fire!
Has
this guy got the hots, the lust, for elective office
again, or what? Wouldn’t
you think getting sacked by Little Bush would have
sort of put a damper on that?
G’Mo
lit up the GOP state convention in Richmond
a few days back. Well,
actually "lit up" is a very relative sort
of term here, which brings to mind a short,
diversionary question?
What
does it say about the caliber of the other speakers?
If
Gilmore, who speaks with the verve and passion of a
middle manager in Cleveland
explaining the details of an insurance program, is
firing up the crowd, how’d you like to have to sit
there and listen to the rest of them?
Talk about death by tedium!
Of
course, the man who almost single-handedly reduced
Virginia
to a fiscal laughingstock with the recklessness of
his 'no car tax" program, assailed the
historic, bi-partisan budget compromise reached
during the last session of the General Assembly.
He
called passage of the tax increases that made the
compromise possible “extremism in its worst
possible form” and said “responsible mainstream
leadership in this state, not just Republican
leadership, does not support these tax increases and
neither do the people of Virginia.”
Uh,
Jim? Excuse me. Am
I confused, or was it a Republican Senate and a
Republican House of Delegates that made passage of
those tax increases possible?
Help me out on that one.
And
that line about "responsible mainstream
leadership" not supporting them — help me out
with that one, too. All
the business groups in the state supported them.
The Virginia Chamber of Commerce supported
them. Every
local government in Virginia
supported them. All
the town councils. All
the boards of supervisors.
All the school boards.
All the commonwealth attorneys.
All the sheriffs in Virginia.
Moody’s Investment Services supported them.
Every advocacy group in the state supported
them. And the
citizens of this commonwealth supported them.
Go
over for me, if you would, which of these groups is
irresponsible. Would
it be the Chamber? Moody’s?
Which one?
In
fact, Jim, let me give you a little help here.
Most of the House and Senate Republicans
didn’t get on board with this one until after they
got hammered at all of these public hearings around
the state.
The
speech so moved Boyd Marcus — who probably wrote
it — that Marcus got a lump in his throat —
probably a hair ball — and proclaimed Gilmore
"the leader" of the Republican Party in
Virginia, with another elective office in his
future.
What
would that one be, Boyd?
State Dog Catcher?
If
Gilmore is "the leader" of state
Republicans, what does that make Jerry Kilgore?
Bill Howell? John
Chichester?
Oh,
I see. It
depends on which Virginia Republican Party we’re
talking about. Despite
all the lip service about cohesion and coming
together, and all that blather, there are two
distinct ones, for sure.
Maybe three. Virginia
Republicans are more fractured than they’ve ever
been. And the
gulf is getting wider.
Chichester
is beginning to focus on the state’s
transportation needs (and when Chichester
focuses, things get hot). Howell is busy exacting revenge on
Preston
Bryant
,
Chris Jones, and others, for their leading role
performances as statesmen during the budget
negotiations.
And
now Gilmore is trying to arm wrestle Kilgore for
control of the Flat-Earth wing of the party — that
wing that denies reality where all things fiscal are
concerned, that wing that believes all challenges,
and even opportunities, are best met with “Just
say, no!”
What’s
the smart Democratic strategy in all of this?
Lay
low. Be
reverent. Light
a candle. Cross
your fingers. Send up a prayer.
Hope against hope that Virginia Republicans
let the coming election become a referendum on Jim
Gilmore.
-- June 21, 2004
|
