Bacon's Rebellion

I’ve played out the string on my “sabbatical” and Jim has graciously invited me to return to these pages. With editorial guidelines in place and most of the partisan passions of the election behind us, I felt like it was the right time to return. I look forward again to the give and take with contributors and readers that this blog provides in abundance.

Bacon’s Rebellion concentrates on the “wonkish” side of all things Virginia and I’m comfortable with that specialization, but I may also collaborate with other Virginia bloggers on their blog or on a blog that heads into Monty Python territory–something new and completely different. We’ll see. I know I have enjoyed my guest blogging over at Chad’s place, Commonwealth Conservative.

Tuesday’s election demonstrated that being civil and being positive matters. If we just add being substantive–talking about real issues realistically and offering solutions, not bromides–we might have something that makes a difference. Jim Bacon has always tried to be positive, civil, and substantive with this blog and his e-zine. I’m proud to be associated with it again.

Ok, wonks and political junkies, the election’s over. The Dems are scrambling for positions in the Kaine administrations and the ‘Pubs are wondering what to do with their lives. In either case, it’s time to get back to the serious business of building your personal network.

Bacon’s Rebellion ran a brief beta test of its “Political Network” back in August. Now it’s time to roll it out for real. Our Political Network is like those social networks you’ve heard a lot about. Except we’re not interested in your favorite band or your sexual orientation. This is for activists and politicos. Here’s what’s involved:

• Create a professional profile. This is like a curricula vitae converted into searchable database format. List your areas of expertise so other people can find you.
• Invite your political/activist associates to join and create their own profiles. Build your network.
• Use the search function. Looking for direct mail expertise? Use the search function. Tracking down someone who worked on the Byrne campaign? Use the search function. Looking for Wahoos engaged in politics? Use the search function.
• Keep a journal. This feature is like a blog — only simpler to set up.
• Promote events. Free listings for political/policy-related meetings, conferences, events.
• Start a message board. Any subject.
• Create a group. Maintain privacy — restrict communication to selected members of your group.

The service is free (unless you want premium features). Click here to register.

Fred Barnes, executive editor of the Weekly Standard, made an interesting observation about the Virginia governor’s race in today’s Wall Street Journal:

[Jerry] Kilgore “ran on what voters, at least here in Virginia, perceive as national issues: guns, immigration, gay rights, death penalty. That strategy failed. … The odd thing is that if Mr. Kilgore had been running against [Tim] Kaine for the Senate, he might have won.

Senate races are highly ideological in Virginia. But governor’s contests are quite different: They are non-ideological. Mr. Kaine adjusted to this reality, jettisoning the liberalism of his days as mayor of Richmond. Mr. Kilgore stuck to his conservative views with only a few fudges.”

There may be something to do this. Many Virginians emphasize the ideological qualifications of the warriors they send into the hyper-polarized environment of Washington, D.C. That doesn’t mean they like the polarization — they just understand that the state’s two senators are powerless to change it, and they might as well send representatives to Washington equipped to do battle there. But electing a governor is a different matter. A governor can set the tone for a state, as Mark Warner so clearly did. A huge majority of voters appreciate Warner’s pragmatic, problem-solving approach. Tim Kaine got the message, Jerry Kilgore did not.

In deciphering the meaning of Tuesday’s elections, let us not forget Russ Potts, the candidate errant from Winchester. Though Potts was beloved of Virginia’s punditry for his “straight talk,” voters would have none of him. The independent candidate garnered less than 2.2 percent of the vote. That’s not exactly a ringing endorsement for the No. One plank in his platform: raising taxes by some $2 billion a year to fund a massive expansion of Virginia’s road and rail construction.

Potts and his defenders will argue, of course, that he did not raise enough money to get his message out. But that begs the question. Why didn’t he raise enough money? It’s not as if people didn’t know he was there. He suffered from no lack of press attention. Perhaps he didn’t raise enough money because he couldn’t find enough people who agreed with his solution to traffic congestion.

Transportation, argue Stewart Schwartz and Laura Olson at the Coalition for Smarter Growth, did play a key factor in the race, however. Especially in Northern Virginia. Here’s their take:

All three candidates for Governor talked about transportation issues, but Kaine hit a chord with voters when he linked transportation solutions to land use and growth issues. For five years polls have shown that Northern Virginia residents believe better managing growth is the best way to deal with traffic problems. This year, they had the choice of a gubernatorial candidate who focused on: more money for transportation, general fund for transportation or managing growth to reduce traffic, and they chose the third. (See full comments on the Road to Ruin blog.)

Kaine’s election and Potts’ pitiful performance does not bode well for those in the state Senate who would raise $1 billion to $2 billion per year to enact a Potts-like transportation policy.

I’m posting a missive from John Farmer, a Richmond intellectual property attorney and a friend of mine, who felt compelled to e-mail his post-election analysis to friends and associates this morning. I thought it worth adding to the blog. Jim Bacon

The recent Virginia gubernatorial election is being spun mainly as a defeat for President Bush, in addition to being a setback for the Republican Party generally. Past electoral history contradicts this analysis. See the chart below.

Notice that, since the advent of modern politics – the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980 – the party that wins the national election always LOSES the Virginia governorship the next year.

Next, notice how all three statewide offices go. Beginning again with the modern era, no Republican held statewide office until Allen and Gilmore won on 1993, immediately after Clinton’s reelection. Beginning with that 1993 election, the Republicans won 2 (1993), 2 (1997), 1 (2001) and 1 or 2 (likely 2, but AG race isn’t clearly resolved). McDonnell appears to be leading narrowly. No downward trend there for Republicans.

Next, notice that, if McDonnell wins, this will be the first election in the modern era in which the party that won the governorship lost BOTH down ticket races. Stated conversely, starting in 1981, the party that won the governorship always won at least one down-ticket race.

So what conclusions can we draw? One theory is that middle-ground Virginia voters are fickle – they are always dissatisfied with the person holding the Presidency and vote in, narrowly, the other party to the governorship the next year in Virginia.

That theory doesn’t really hold water well. Virginia hasn’t voted Democratic for President since Johnson. Thus, while mushy-middle Virginians may have been dissatisfied with Clinton, and Clinton may not have been a positive force for Terry or Beyer, they mostly didn’t vote for Clinton.

The best explanation is that Virginians in the middle don’t tend to link their vote for President and their vote for Virginia Governor the next year, and don’t let the perceived performance of the former dictate the election of the latter. If they did, almost every, if not every, Virginia’s governor’s race would have come out the opposite way.

Here’s my take:

First — Jerry Kilgore ran a lousy race. Unlike Allen or Gilmore, he didn’t seize on a single, positive issue with which to play offense in the election (parole abolition, car tax elimination). Instead, like Early, he tried to glide through under the assumption that having an “R” after his name would carry the day. He ran an unfocused, sometimes shallow, sometimes demeaning campaign. On top of that, he treated the AG position entirely as a stepping-stone for Governor rather than an office that was an end itself and to be managed toward excellence, and many people (including many Republicans) picked up on that and didn’t like it.

On the other hand, Kaine ran a disciplined campaign. He hid his liberalism under a bushel basket, feigned some seemingly conservative positions, and his naturally sunny demeanor shined through.

Second – A big reason why Republicans win national elections is national security. That issue is largely out of the picture in state elections. Thus, for a Republican to win statewide office, he must pick an issue on which to play offense and ride it hard. Just showing up won’t do.

The blogosphere’s response to the election has been subdued so far. Only the briefest of comments as of 9:30 a.m. (I suspect many bloggers stayed up too late last night watching the election returns!)

Kenton Ngo at 750 Volts: “Hark the Herald Angels Sing…”

J.R. Hoeft at Bearingdrift: “I have to admit, Gov. Warner is pretty popular here and I think that helped Kaine with his association.”

Steven Sisson at Blue Dog: “Congrats to Tim ‘the choir boy’ Kaine.”

Poli Amateur at Commonwealth Watch: “I wish like heck we would have won with Jerry Kilgore, but it is what it is, and Governor-elect Kaine deserves our congratulations at this point.”

Shipwrecked at Cries in the Night: “Why I didn’t vote for Kilgore. … Kilgore would do nothing to advance the cause of life. … Kilgore took the exact position that tax-hiking Mark Warner did in 2001: local referendums. … Kilgore kept proposing more and more government spending and programs. … Because of his electoral ineptitude Kilgore held back down ticket candidates, and I hold him responsible for contributing to Dick Black’s loss and Bill Bolling and Bob McDonnell’s tougher than necessary races.”

Alice Marshall at FCDC: “Thank you Tim Kaine for carrying our party standard to victory. Now comes the hard part, governing. But you have experience with that.”

Norm Leahy at One Man’s Trash: “I didn’t vote for Tim Kaine, but I congratulate him nonethless for winning the governor’s race. I wish him luck…I really do… And as for Mr. Kilgore… he ran hard, he ran well. But he was not the choice of the majority of Virginia voters tonight…. Now about 2009…”

Lowell Feld at Raising Kaine: “This was a clear and strong affirmation of Mark Warner’s loyal lieutenant, Tim Kaine, a clear and strong reward for Kaine’s positive campaign, and a clear and strong mandate to continue the Mark Warner policies the next 4 years.”

“This was NOT a great Election Day for Virginia Democrats overall, even if many spend today patting themselves on each others’ backs. Sure, it was a great day for Mark Warner. Absolutely, it was a great day for Tim Kaine! But a great day for the Democrats overall? Sorry, but I don’t think so. A tremendous repudiation of Bush and his entire agenda? Ditto — I don’t see it.”

MR JMS at Too Conservative: “Today was very disappointing for everyone. We need to dust ourselves off and re-evaluate how we are operating as a party– especially in Northern Virginia. … For now though we should have one single focus in the GOP… Ensuring Bob McDonell is our next Attorney General. I encourage everyone to volunteer with the recount that is almost certain to come tomorrow.”

Waldo Jaquith at Waldo Jaquith: “The tides have shifted. Republicans are losing their grip on power in Virginia, in no small part thanks to President Bush’s weakening grip on power in the United States. … Let’s get to work on 2006. We’ve got a House of Representatives to take back.”

I am nothing if not contrary on mornings like this, so let’s rub some fur in the wrong direction. Hindsight is always 20-20, of course, but it was actually clear over the weekend that the President’s 11th hour, 50th minute visit to Virginia provided a late but measurable boost to the Republican effort all over Virginia. Had he not come, I think Kilgore’s loss would have been worse and another 1985-style sweep could have resulted. Both internal and published polls indicated the trend was very strong for the Democratic ticket as a whole, and had there been a complete meltdown it would have bled into more House races. I think the Survey USA tracking poll, showing 9 for Kaine and then 5 for Kaine and a tie on the final day of tracking, reflects the impact of the Bush visit.

The absence of an earlier appearance by Bush was a problem for the Kilgore campaign. What happened and why with that Norfolk opportunity is unknown, but there was widespread news reporting that somebody snubbed somebody and that had to depress the President’s hard core faithful. Those of us who voted for him — those of us who have sent our children to war — are not enjoying his travails and look for a comeback.

This was an act of political selflessness on Bush’s part. By coming, and everybody behind the curtain must have known if wouldn’t save Kilgore, he gave Bush-bashers around the world a video clip we will see all week and maybe up through the 2006 midterm election. By coming he turned a possible nightmare for Republicans into just a bad night (with a couple of recounts pending to see how bad.) Republicans, repeat afer me: Thank You, Mr. President.

To all from all parties who stood in the whirlwind yesterday, and did what most sane people won’t and made the run, thank you. The process only works when there is competition, and we sure had that.

Starting with a seven- to 10-point lead in the polls back in the summer, the race for governor in Republican-leaning Virginia was Jerry Kilgore’s to lose. But lose it he did. Tim Kaine won by a 5.7 percent margin, representing a cumulative swing of 12 to 15 points over the campaign. The question is why. Here are some morning-after thoughts.

• Kilgore expended his resources attacking Kaine on “cultural” issues — the death penalty, immigration, gun control, etc., but opinion polls showed clearly that the electorate was more focused on pragmatic issues such as education, government spending, taxes and transportation. Gov. Mark Warner had consistently steered clear of the culture wars, sticking to good-government themes and achieving extraordinary levels of popularity as a result. Kaine campaigned as Mark Warner Jr., assuring voters that he would give them four more years of the same. Kilgore’s strategists ignored the obvious and Kilgore paid the price.
• Kilgore never forced Kaine to defend the $1.4 billion tax increase that he and Warner backed in 2004. That’s probably because opinion polls showed that the Virginia public largely approved of that tax increase. But that public approval, I maintain, was skin deep: the result of fawning press coverage and division among Republicans at the time. Since 2004, massive budget surpluses have demonstrated clearly that the tax cut was never needed. But other than going on the record as having opposed the tax increase, Kilgore never made the budget an issue. In effect, he gave the “Warner/Kaine administration” a free pass on its claims to have done such a magnificent job of managing the state budget.
• In contrast to Kaine’s discipline about staying on message as the pragmatic, can-do successor to Mark Warner — Kilgore never established a dominant theme. He tried a lot of things: the death penalty, immigration, etc., but none of them gained traction, so he jumped on to the next. He never convinced the electorate that he bad a better blueprint for governing.
• Labeling Kaine as “liberal” did not work. If Virginians thought that Kaine was liberal in the mold of a New York or California Democrat, he would have been unelectable. But simply calling someone a liberal does not make him so. Kaine effectively countered Kilgore’s charges by emphasizing his religious faith and tying himself to Warner. He maintained a tone of moderation and pragmatism throughout the campaign. The “liberal” label just didn’t stick. In fact, it boomeranged. A lot of Virginians were turned off by the consistently negative tone of Kilgore’s ads.
• While denouncing Kaine as a liberal, Kilgore failed to energize his conservative base — especially the low-tax, small government wing of the party. Although he trotted out some ideas for tax cuts, he simultaneously served up lots of ideas for spending more money. He never convinced the small-government conservatives that he was serious about controlling the size of government.
• Kilgore never projected an image of leadership. His unwillingness to debate his opponents, and his less-than-stellar performance in the debates he did conduct, did not create the persona of someone in command.

Jerry Kilgore is a decent, honorable and personally likeable man. He wasn’t a bad candidate — he just wasn’t good enough to overcome the mistakes he made. The Virginia electorate made it very clear that it prefers the politics of substance over the politics of cultural symbolism. If Republicans want to hold onto their majority status in the legislature, they need to think more creatively about how to apply their ideals to the issues that matter to the voters.

All those negative campaigns ads may have disgusted the electorate — but they didn’t dissuade people from heading to the polls today in large numbers. There was a steady stream of people running through the voting booths in Henrico County’s Tuckahoe precinct around 9 a.m. this morning. I asked one of the volunteers who checked off the voting rolls how the numbers were running.

“We can hardly breathe,” she said.

“It’s like a presidential election,” said another.

Henrico County is reliably Republican, which will help Jerry Kilgore locally, but high turn-around across the state, according to the conventional wisdom, will help Tim Kaine.

Gov. Mark R. Warner and Tim Kaine are still boasting how they increased taxes in 2004. In the same e-mail quoted in my previous post, described as “from the desk of Mark R. Warner,” the Kaine campaign makes the following statement: “In 2004, we joined with responsible legislators from both parties to enact the most sweeping tax and budget reform in the nation in the last decade, cutting taxes on food and incomes, and raising them on cigarettes and a half penny on the sales tax.”

The e-mail blast doesn’t mention the fact that budget “reform” ended up raising taxes by roughly $700 million per year. Nor does it mention the large and growing budget surpluses that promptly followed.

When you go to vote tomorrow, just bear this fact in mind: The Commonwealth of Virginia is on track for a more than $2 billion surplus this year. Had the state not increased taxes in 2004, we’d still be on track for a surplus of $1.3 billion or more! We could have paid for Mark Warner’s huge K-12 education spending programs, the clean-up-the-Bay initiatives, growing Medicaid bills and a whole lot more without raising one extra dime in taxes.

But don’t believe me. Scan Secretary of Finance John Bennett’s September 2005 report. September, he notes, is the “first significant data point” for the fiscal year. Here’s how the General Fund is doing so far: It’s brought in $3.55 billion in revenue compared to $3.11 billion the same quarter last year. We’re running 14 percent ahead of last year — and 16.9 percent of what we actually need, given the humongous surplus last year!

The bottom line: The tax increase was absolutely unnecessary. Tim Kaine wants to own that tax increase. Let him. And when the General Assembly figures out how to spend the surplus — with massive increases in state spending the inevitable result — let him own that, too.

It was one day before the election, and I was still agonizing over who to vote for. Jerry Kilgore is, for all his failings, more likely to hold the lid on future tax increases. Tim Kaine, on the other hand, has the better grasp of transportation policy, the most important single issue in the year ahead. Who to vote for… who to vote for…

Then, a half hour ago, an e-mail from the Tim Kaine campaign arrived in my in-box. It pushed one of my biggest hot buttons… the wrong way. Boy, am I steamed. I know that campaign communications from both sides play fast and loose with the truth, but this one played fast and loose with the truth on an issue that I really care about. Here’s what the e-mail, putatively from Gov. Mark Warner, said:

When Tim and I were elected to lead Virginia in 2001, our predecessors’ fiscal irresponsibility had left the state with historic shortfalls – that grew to $6 billion. We made some tough choices and cut the budget. Tim even cut his own salary!

Let’s go through this step by step. “… left the state with historic shortfalls — that grew to $6 billion.” The situation was dire when Warner and Kaine entered office during a recession, and Warner had to scramble to close a looming deficit. But the deficit wasn’t anywhere close to $6 billion. The key is understanding what Warner means by a “shortfall.” It’s not the same as a budget deficit. The term represents a cumulative gap between anticipated spending and revenues over three years. That gap consisted of roughly one part revenue shortfall (i.e. revenues coming in less than anticipated) and one part spending increase. That $6 billion “shortfall,” to be precise, included $3.1 billion in “required new spending” on Medicaid, prisons, K-12 education and car-tax relief that the previous governor had never contemplated.

“We made some tough choices and cut the budget.” Gov. Warner and the General Assembly — oh, and Tim Kaine, too — enacted approximately $3.3 billion in spending cuts over a three year- period. Factor in the spending increases noted above, and the net cuts amounted to $200 million. Over three years. Not quite $6 billion.

The parsing of words is technically correct, so Kaine/Warner cannot be accused of “lying.” But the words are carefully designed to mislead — and they have succeeded marvelously in doing so. I’ve seen commentators repeat over and over — never once corrected by the Warner administration, much less the lapdog press whose job it is to expose such claims — that Warner & Co. cut spending by $6 billion, or closed a $6 billion budget deficit. (For details, read my column “What’s a ‘Budget Shortfall’?” here.) The Governor deserves credit for a number of very real budgetary accomplishments. But he tarnishes his legacy — and Tim Kaine tarnishes his reputation for integrity — by shamelessly exaggerrating those accomplishments.

From today’s Washington Post: “Northrop Grumman Corp. and CGI-AMS have been selected by the Commonwealth of Virginia to spearhead a 10-year, multibillion-dollar initiative to transform its information technology.”

The Northrop Grumman piece is valued at $1.9 billion over 10 years to modernize the state’s 1980s-era infrastructure. CGI-AMS will handle the business-process applications; the value of that contract has not been made public. Sayeth the WaPo:

If Virginia had not pursued the transformation initiative, the state would have spent $200 million over the next 10 years to support “an increasingly outdated and expensive infrastructure,” James F. McGuirk II, chairman of the state IT investment board, said in a statement.

The overhaul of Virginia’s IT operations will be one of the most lasting legacies of the Warner administration.

Writing for the Cooper Center in February 2002 about Governor Warner’s election, Professor Larry Sabato wrote, “Since 1969, the party with the advantage on the ‘Ten Keys to the Governor’s Mansion’ has invariably captured the governorship.”

I don’t know how Professor Sabato is calling the race this year, but here’s my take on his “Ten Keys” applied to this year’s Governor’s race:

1) Economy: Advantage N
While gas prices are high and folks are concerned about how they’ll heat their homes this winter, taxes in Virginia remain lower than in other states; per capita income is still up and unemployment is still down (except in rural parts of the state where dissatisfaction may help Kilgore).

2) Party Unity: Advantage (D)
This is the first time in years Republican candidates have run from the party “brand” failing to include it in advertisements. Why? The Party has been injured by scandal (the eavesdropping case), and the primary season was bitter.

Democrats are united behind Kaine, albeit with less enthusiasm than he would want.

3) Scandal: Advantage (D)
The eavesdropping case…the resignation of a Congressman…the link between Bolling and a failed insurance company… none of this helps the R’s.

4) Campaign Operations and Technology: Advantage (R)
It will take the D’s in Virginia years to make up for the Party’s failure to enter the technology age sooner.

5) Campaign Money: Advantage (R)
Kilgore has shown, once again, that unless a Democratic candidate is a millionaire, Republicans will out raise Democrats (especially when they get to hide the names of their contributors)

6) Candidate Personality and Appeal: Advantage N
Kilgore seems brittle; Kaine seems elastic. Kaine’s natural charm isn’t translating in the media.

7) Prior Office Experience: Advantage (R)
Kilgore’s experience as Attorney General and Secretary of Public Safety has given him a solid record to run on. Kaine’s tenure in the “weak mayor” job and on City Council, left him fighting the negative perceptions of the City without marginal success.

8) Retrospective judgment of previous governor: Advantage (D)
Governor Warner’s popularity is a huge asset but difficult to leverage. Kilgore can hardly tout Gilmore.

9) Presidential popularity: Advantage (D)
Bush is down, but not out in Virginia, but he won’t help Kilgore with independent voters who are the key to this election.

10) Special issues and dominant circumstances: Advantage (R)
Like it or not (and I don’t), the immigration issue provides Kilgore’s campaign with some momentum going into election day.

Net Advantage: 4(D), 4 (R), 2 (N)

Guess we know why the race is a “dead heat,” with the deciding factor out of the candidates control…it’s what Sabato calls the “prevailing conditions.” This year the voters have a very positive view of the direction in which Virginia is headed and a pretty negative view of Bush and the federal government. Clearly, this factor favors Kaine.

But, there’s one thing that Sabato’s “Keys” don’t address, which is voter intensity about the candidates and about the election itself. Although articles in the MSM today quote insiders as saying that voter interest is picking up, it is still likely that “I don’t give a darn” may be the spoiler candidate this year rather than the independent candidate Potts.

If turnout meets Sabato’s projected 2 million voters (slightly higher than in 2001), I think Kaine will win. If turnout is below 2001’s 46.2%, and especially if turnout among African American voters is less than 15% of the total, I think that Kilgore wins.

We’ll all know Tuesday (or maybe later if the election is as close as many predict). Who knows? If it’s a close as some think it will be, we may not know who won until after all provisional ballots are counted and the final count is certified by the State Board of Elections. And, even then, we might be headed for a recount.

At least we won’t have butterfly ballots.

In the Saturday edition of the Wall Street Journal, English writer John Derbyshire reviews a book, “Talk to the Hand,” by fellow Brit Lynne Truss, who laments the deline of civility and good manners in both U.S. and British culture. Truss, he observes, seems to think that reversing the collapse in good manners is a lost cause in England.

Writes Derbyshire: “I think she is right, and my own advice to English folk like herself, who are tired of it all, is to move to the U.S. — if possible to the southeastern states of the old Confederacy, whose inhabitants practice far and away the best manners in the English-speaking world.”

If good manners and civility make Virginia and the South distinctive, let us by all means celebrate our uniqueness.

The Audit Bureau of Circulation, the notes the Saturday version of the Wall Street Journal, will publish its semi-annual figures on newspaper circulation, and the news is not expected to be good. Gannett, the nation’s largest publisher with 100 newspapers, has already said its circulation is down 2.5 percent from year-ago levels. Knight Ridder’s numbers are down 2.9 percent. The Tribune Co. warns that its readership is down 4 percent.

“More Americans are getting their news online; about 30 percent of adults turned to the Internet for news in 2004, compared with almost none in 1996,” the WSJ notes. Newspapers are scrambling to make sure that online readers get their news through the newspapers’ own websites, not filtered through Yahoo, MSN or other Internet-only sites.

But the Internet-based model is not as attractive as the traditional newspaper model. Yes, Internet advertising is up, but it doesn’t generate the same revenues per reader that print ads do. Newspapers may succeed at retaining readers, and they may succeed at generating more Internet advertising, but I am skeptical that Internet advertising will be sufficient to support the large news staffs we saw in the newspapers’ glory years.