Virginia 2009 Megathread

[Lief 🗽]

I'd really prefer Moran to win, but I think that McAuliffe probably will. And I think he'll have a decent shot at winning the governor's mansion.

Rep. Gerry Connolly talked to about twenty of the people in College Dems last night, and one guy asked him who he was supporting in the primary. He said that he wasn't committed to one of the three yet, but that Terry shouldn't be underestimated. Money is important, and the fact that he's raising gobs of it is good for the Democratic primary, because people like voting for someone who can raise a lot of money, so they have a good shot at the general, and it's good for the general, for obvious reasons, and because it shows to the people of Virginia that he has the kind of connections to bring job growth to the state. He also said that the carpetbagger claim probably won't hurt Terry, since all of Virginia's politicians are carpetbaggers. Connolly isn't some moderate hero either; he's very liberal, and I thought that he'd be pretty forcefully for Moran (the progressive in the race). I think McAuliffe's got this one locked up.

[Lief 🗽]

All that matters is turnout. A ridiculously small number of people are going to be voting in an off-off-year gubernatorial primary.

[Lief 🗽]

Wow. That poll is more than useless. I'm glad to see the worst candidate in 3rd place though.

[Lief 🗽]

and the most electable against a very strong GOP candidate

Nah. Polls I've seen show him to be about as electable as the others.

[Lief 🗽]

And why would Deeds do any better than Moran or McAulliffe? Because he's an OMG SOUTHERN MODERATE BLUE DOG!!!11 ?

[Lief 🗽]

He's not really a blue dog if you look at his record.  But yes, something in that.  Being from Virginia helps too.

Not really, at all. Three of the last four Governors weren't originally Virginians (and the only one that was, Jim Gilmore, was the unpopular one). Many of Virginia's successful politicians weren't born and raised in the state.

[Lief 🗽]

Terry and Moran are hardly flaming liberals though, and from what I've seen of their campaigns, they're emphasizing common sense, economic issues, like job creation and the like.

And Obama's victory in Virginia was larger than Webb's or Kaine's (neither of whom are actually that moderate, at least compared to Warner or Wilder).

[Lief 🗽]

Oh damn, seriously? I worked on Moon's campaign, and from everything I heard, it looked like he had it in the bag. What the hell happened there?

[Lief 🗽]

True story: The former College Dems President at my school, the first time he got drunk, was with Terry McAuliffe.

[Lief 🗽]

Terry's only raised $4.2 million in the first quarter, so he's not doing too well

haha, you and your sarcasm

BUT SRSLY, lean McAuliffe

[Lief 🗽]

Terry's only raised $4.2 million in the first quarter, so he's not doing too well

What have Deeds and Moran raised?

Let's just say that $1 million for Senatorial candidates is phenomenal for a first-quarter number.

Also, if Deeds or Moran raised one fourth of that, we'd probably have heard of it already this week, but I won't say that for sure.

Webb won despite being outspent 4-1 in his own primary,

Yes, but no one cared about that primary. As far as the voters knew, they were electing a sacrificial lamb.

[Lief 🗽]

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2009/04/09/creigh-deeds-shakes-up-virginia-money-race/

CNN fail, only read that as an example of how not to write a political article if you have an IQ under 40

Of course CNN will be supporting the Moderate Hero in the race.

As EH said, Moran is basically our only hope here.

[Lief 🗽]

Terry splitting the liberal vote??

I know a lot of College Dems supporting him for some reason.

[Lief 🗽]

Terry splitting the liberal vote??

I know a lot of College Dems supporting him for some reason.

Who I assume were hardcore Obama supporters. Did you let them know about his anti-Obama extremism and desire to perform cunnilingus on Queen Hillary?

I'm sure they're fully aware of that, BRTD. These are people that read DailyKos, 538, etc. daily and intern on the Hill and volunteered on the weekend for a special election for freaking county supervisor like a month ago. Though a fair number of them did support Clinton in the primaries, at least in January and February, if I remember.

[Lief 🗽]

Frankly, I doubt very many people care that McAuliffe was a huge Clinton hack in '08. Most Democrats like Clinton quite a bit now, and it's not as if Obama lost because Clinton stayed in until June or something. Hell, if not for Terry and the rest of them, Obama may not have won Indiana or North Carolina.

[Lief 🗽]

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/4/20/722247/-VA-Gov:-First-Debate-Impressions

DailyKos has a nice run down of the debate, as well as links to some segments. I thought, from the limited snippets I've seen, that McAuliffe did really well, for what's it worth, though Deeds and Moran weren't necessarily bad or anything.

[Lief 🗽]

Wow, gross.

[Lief 🗽]

Well, time to line up behind Terry.

[Lief 🗽]

Well, time to line up behind Terry.

Over my dead body.

PUMA!!!!

I'll probably support him in the GE, but not before then.

Well, yes, that's what I meant. I still support Moran until he loses.

[Lief 🗽]

So I probably support Deeds at this point, and I think he should win (though the primary is going to be low turnout and he probably has the worst organization of the three), but I'm kind of dreading Ben's reaction to his victory. The dude is leading by the margin of error in a few polls and the kid is practically ruining his pants in excitement.

[Lief 🗽]

Here's why I think that Deeds won't win, and someone who thinks he's going to win can disagree with me if they want. Deeds' entire strategy, and indeed probably the reason he's surged so much, has been putting money into a lot of TV ad buys, to the point that he's laid off staffers. This (along with the WaPo endorsement maybe) have caused his numbers to surge in the past few weeks. However, I have a hard time believing that this new support is not soft; I would guess that they're largely Democrats who've seen Deeds on TV and liked what he's saying. But these aren't the people that are going to turn out in a primary with literally less than 10% turnout by themselves. And Deeds now lacks the staff to get these people out to vote. It's also pretty much impossible to ID these people who have switched to Deeds within the last week or two purely based on ads, so he couldn't GOTV them even if he wanted to.

[Lief 🗽]

Exciting turnout pictures from the Wonkette:

[Lief 🗽]

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/virginiapolitics/2009/06/video_deeds_declares_victory_a.html

Two concession speeches and a victory speech, what what

Deeds sounds genuinely surprised to have won more than 15% of the vote.

[Lief 🗽]

Deeds was also down by 13 points in the last R2k poll.

[Lief 🗽]

Bob McDonnell says a naughty word: http://notlarrysabato.typepad.com/files/mcdonnell.f.word.wma

Taking a page out of the George Allen playbook I see.