Wow, I mean Wow! (True Blue - 11/20/2007 1:28:18 PM)
It's almost like Gilmore has forgotten how to campaign, isn't it?
Wow, this is nasty, especially coming from a leading conservative (senior editor for National Review magazine and author of "The Party of Death: The Democrats, the Media, the Courts, and the Disregard for Human Life").
Jim Gilmore, a Republican and a former governor of Virginia, is running for the Senate.During his brief run for the presidency earlier this year, he had lunch with a few reporters from National Review. He showed up 20 minutes late, with no apology. He was testy and abrasive throughout. He kept saying that he was an expert on terrorism, because he had run a commission on it before, during, and after September 11.
He was, at the time, running as the real conservative in a field of phonies and heretics. I asked him whether his support for abortion as an option early in pregnancy would make it harder to make that case. He said that Republicans who wanted a candidate who took "the Catholic position" on the issue could choose Brownback or Huckabee. A colleague gently pointed out that the "Catholic position" was also the position of the Republican platform and the party's last three presidents.
Gilmore said that it was very important to reform health care so that it wouldn't be socialized. I asked him what he had done about health care as governor. He said he would get back to me on that. He never did.
He finished by demanding that we cover him more. (Governor, consider yourself served.) I am amazed that this man was ever elected to anything. Can't Virginia Republicans do better?
Ouch!
The RPV puts a premium on abrasiveness, radicalism, and knee-jerk incompetence.
It's astounding, but the more they lose, the more they make decisions to set them up for future losses.
RPV: If it's good for Virginia, we want no part of it.
long answer: No, and apparently they don't want a better candidate, since they basically threw Tom Davis on his face.
However, in the end the GOP will either put a non-political type (Peter Pace) or choose a different elected official (a congressman or GA member) to run against Warner. Although my suggestion two months ago that the GOP needed to select someone other than Gilmore or Davis got me called a "mouth breather" by a diarist at RK, the arguments I made two months ago at my joint still hold true.
Davis is gone...as far as Gilmore goes, if you are running against a juggernaut, better to have the solid candidate who can make a case is always better than running someone who-although with higher office on their resume-will tick people off just by being themself.