On February 26, as the blogsphere swirled with the "Where's Webb?" meme, I wrote the following:
We?re all feeling the pressure, but the last thing we want is for James Webb go out without his message solidly in hand. If Wes Clark had had his Iraq policy down before he went in front of the press, he would have doubled the Average IQ of 21st century presidents.JC?s stuff on Jackson and McClellan is a good metaphor. I love what JC writes, and he?s definitely nailed the week.
Week 3 will read something like: James Webb finally came out with solid people and strong positions. People are waking up to him, but he?s still got ground to make up.
Week 4 will read something like this: remember a couple weeks ago when I was wondering what would happen with the Webb campaign? We were waiting, but Webb is the MAN and it was worth the wait.
[...]primary voters will overwhelmingly choose Webb over Miller, because he?s simply the better candidate.
Well, a few weeks later and Harris Miller's candidacy has diminished profoundly in the face of James Webb's near-universal grassroots support.
Around the same time as the above, I also wrote:
This is why I just smile every time the Miller people and the redstaters start screaming "where is he?"When they find out, they'll wish they hadn't.
Now James Webb is out of the gate and running like "Secretariat". Like a "quiet giant" he's taken the fight directly to Harris Miller's home in Fairfax and emerged the victor. Now the Gerrymandered Old Party is clearly terrified.
There was a lot to say before James Webb emerged as the leader for the Democratic nomination for the US Senate. At that time, I wrote the following and I still believe it:
[...]I predict that when the issues go to voters in the primary, James Webb will win for 2 reasons:
1. When Democratic primary voters look at Miller and Webb side by side, they'll ask themselves the same question about both of them: "Is this guy really a Democrat?" When they look at Miller they'll wonder, when they look at Webb, they'll know that he's the only Democrat running.
Despite 30 years of Harris Miller involvement in the Democratic party, his lack of southwest VA pull is forcing Harris Miller to espouse extremist Right-wing positions. Unlike Harris Miller, James Webb has all of the bone-fides in place to resonate with moderates, independents, democrats, and republicans.
He will take his own positions and those positions will resonate with democratic party voters because they are founded in beliefs that James Webb shares with all Virginians.
2. In the General Election, James Webb has the clout and the populist vision to cut Allen's support off at the knees.
James Webb's candidacy is a winner for the Democratic Party, for Virginia, and for the Nation.
The partisan rift, the red-state/blue-state rift, the rural/urban rift, the Democrat v. Republican rift... Webb's candidacy and election will serve as the beginning of the healing of this nation. There has not been the opportunity for voters to get behind American Greatness in Decades. James Webb's candidacy offers that opportunity.
2006 will go down as the beginning of the end of the "Bushist" doctrine of McCarthyism, Greed, and Corruption. James Webb's election to the US Senate will go down as the electoral bellwether that started our nations re-emergence as the world's moral leader.
I'm pretty new to this political prognostication game, but I'll say this; James Webb has never shied from a fight and before this is done, a new voice in politics will be heard regardless of George Allen.
I've never seen the party rally around a candidate like this. It makes me proud. I was right when I chose my party, and I was right when I chose to support James Webb.
When you're right, you're right.