by Kerry Dougherty

Here’s some free advice for Virginia’s Republican Party: Get your act together before the Democrats sweep the November elections and Old Dominion turns into California East.

Intra-party squabbling and charges of extortion are not a winning message.

Cut it out.

Four years after stunning the nation by taking the commonwealth’s top three elected offices back from Democrat control, the Republican party is in disarray and appears on the verge of a schism with the governor on one side and some GOP committees and a former governor on the other.

In a close election, this will be fatal.

When news broke a week ago the Fairfax County’s most prominent Republican, Pat Herrity, had withdrawn his primary bid to be the party’s nominee for lieutenant governor due to health problems, it looked like the party was going to avoid a bruising primary altogether and focus on November.

Herrity’s withdrawal cleared the way for his opponent, John Reid, to be the nominee.

Reid is the son of the late Jack Reid, an 18-year Republican veteran of the House of Delegates. John Reid’s conservative credentials are impeccable: he interned in the Reagan White House, served as then-Sen. George Allen’s communications director and hosted a popular conservative Richmond talk radio show for eight years.

Reid has been a guest on The Kerry and Mike Show and he’s a smart, engaging guest. There’s no daylight between his issues and mine.

I’ll vote for him without hesitation. Continue reading.