Bacon's Rebellion

Democracy Thrives in Sunlight

The Madness of Virginia Republicans

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by

Peter Galuszka
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cantorBy Peter Galuszka

Virginia’s Republicans are posed to take big hits because of the infuriating deadlock in Congress over the budget and debt ceiling. The ones looking the worst are U.S. Rep. Eric Cantor, the House Majority Leader, and gubernatorial candidate Kenneth Cuccinelli.

Both have played too hard to Tea Party anarchists whose scheme seems to be to crash government just to show they can do it. The stakes are extremely high since the U.S. presents the underpinnings for much of the global finance.

Their pandering, and House Speaker John Boehner’s utter  incompetence, show how hard right elements have come to dominate the Republican Party to the detriment of all. Stocks, bonds and your retirement accounts could crash thanks to some yeah-hoos who run around with tri-cornered hats and rattlesnakes on their flags. Cuccinelli reflects how radically conservative Christians who want to dictate their ideas of morality on everyone else have come to dominate terms in the state GOP.

Unfortunately, Cantor appears politically safe because of the conservative voters of the 7th Congressional District. As for Cuccinelli, poll after poll shows that  he is trailing Democrat Terry McAuliffe who will likely win on Nov. 5. If that happens, one hopes that the state Republican Party will undergo a housecleaning.

Meanwhile, the bad news continues to pile up for Cuccinelli. State Inspector General Michael A. Morehart, a former FBI agent hired by Gov. Robert F. McDonnell, has found that a deputy attorney general improperly aided two out-of-state coal companies in a lawsuit involving natural gas rights.

Incredibly, Brian Gottstein, a spokesman for the attorney general’s office, says the finding “vindicates” Cuccinelli because it shows he did not condone or know of his deputy’s action. That makes him sound like one hell of a manager.

And Cantor sounds like a hell of a negotiator, too.

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20 responses to “The Madness of Virginia Republicans”

  1. DJRippert Avatar
    DJRippert

    The Republicans are more incompetent than evil. They should be claiming that they refused to pass a “clean” spending bill because they wanted to delay the individual mandate provision of Obamacare. They should say that a delay was necessary because the federal government wasn’t ready to competently implement the individual mandate portion of Obamacare.

    They would be right. Obamacare wasn’t ready to be implemented.

    They should be dragging that half-wit Sebelius before congressional committees along with the CEO of CGI.

    Rumor has it that the Obama Administration and Sebelius gave a sole sorce contract to a Canadian systems integrator, along with $93M, for this failed web site project.

    Republicans need to get off their heels and come out swinging over the obvious incompetence of the Obama Administration.

  2. Neil Haner Avatar
    Neil Haner

    The problem with the radicalization of the GOP, both in the Commonwealth and nationwide, is tied to the primaries (or caucuses or conventions, as cases may be). Time after time over the last 5 years we’ve seen the moderates of the party get RINO’ed to the sideline in favor of the so called “true conservatives” that play better to the primary/convention/caucus electorate.

    I want to say to moderate republicans, “don’t be so afraid of the Tea Party, stand up for your reasonable, bipartisan ideas, and let the general populace get your back.” But the reality of it is that Tea Partiers will just raise holy hell at your next primary, fervently run one of “their” kind of Republicans against you, and in many cases unseat even the most tenured (See the case of Christine O’Donnell and Mike Castle in Delaware).

    The end result of this of course is that the ultra-conservatives win in the “safe” districts (thank you decades of GOP gerrymandering) and lose the swing districts and statewide offices because the non-partisan voters, and even large swaths of the moderate republicans (myself included), can’t bring themselves to get behind the TP’s social agenda (as much as we may abhor the Left’s spending habits, the ACA, etc).

    As far as Virginia goes in making sure the radical right loses their influence, switching from a convention back to a statewide primary is the first step. Thankfully we already have open primaries, so we don’t face that hurdle that other states have restricting primaries voting access to only those blindly dedicated to the GOP. But we’re 3+ years away from the GOP getting another shot at the statewide ticket, and if current trends hold and Obenshain wins as AG, he’ll be essentially nominated as the GOP 2017 candidate for governor already. Whether or not they backtrack at the other two spots will be worth noting.

    With the GA, I don’t think you’ll see any motivation to change until some major losses happen in their number of seats. The Democrats getting the majority in the Senate would be some sort of a wake-up call, but really it won’t come unless they see some of that super-majority in the House erode. That’s probably still a few elections away.

    It’s going to be interesting this winter how the makeup for the State government could mirror the Federal, with a Democratic Statehouse, a small majority in the Senate, and a strong Republican majority in the House. We can see how well that’s working for Washington so far…

    1. TMT Avatar
      TMT

      I agree wholeheartedly we need primaries for both parties. Conventions suck.

      1. DJRippert Avatar
        DJRippert

        Conventions do suck. And the Star Wars Cantina scene that the RPV pulled off earlier this year sucked more than most conventions. Something like 2/3rds of the delegates had already left the mismanaged disaster when the final ballot for Lt Governor put crazy EW Jackson on the ballot instead of Pete Snyder.

        Ask yourself …. how would this election look if it were Bolling, Snyder and Obenshain?

        Would Virginia be looking down the barrel of a Democratic Party sweep?

        The best possible answer for the RPV would be to convince Peter Snyder to take over the job as Chairman of the RPV – on November 6. Pat Mullins is probably a pretty good guy but he was kind of thrown into the position when the Jeff Frederick incident went down.

  3. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    before Obamcare, it was Bengazi, before Bengazi it was Fast and Furious, before Fast and Furious, it was the stimulus, before the stimulus it was the birth certificate before that it was Jeremiah Wright…etc, etc…

    the 17 trillion dollar debt was created a long time ago before this guy was POTUS and dozens of CRs were agreed to since then (with the original spending rates) and more than a few debt expansions were agreed to – with hardly a whimper.

    so we go for years with the above situation and now – right now this very moment – we have to fix all of it or else we shut down the govt and default on our debt?

    if a bad website rollout is the worst they can say about this guy compared to “heckuva job Brownie”, WMDs in Iraq and Mission Accomplished..

    here’s the bottom line – the GOP, especially the hard right have never accepted the reality that this POTUS was elected – twice and they have continued a strategy to harm this guy – even when it harms the country.

    At times.. it borders on racism – at other times – they call him a socialist – a weak leader, an apologist for America, .. listen to the words that come from the Glenn Becks, the Rush Limbaughs, the Sara Pallins, the Sean Hannity’s, and michele bachmann.. hate and venom… batcrap crazy ….stuff

    but here’s a question

    if Ted Cruz ran for Senator in Va could he be elected?

  4. Breckinridge Avatar
    Breckinridge

    Ollie North was as Tea Party a Virginia candidate and you can imagine and gee, he did not get to the United States Senate….so on Cruz, I’d say, no. I don’t know about right wing radio (and I listen for laughs sometimes) but when I crave REAL hate, bigotry and inflammatory libel, I go to Blue Virginia and get plenty.

    1. DJRippert Avatar
      DJRippert

      I read and comment on both BlueVirginia and Bearing Drift. They are both a bit over the top. A lot depends on the author of the various articles. Ivy Main, Dan Sullivan and Paul Goldman all write passionate but reasonable commentary on Blue Virginia. Lowell can be reasonable at times although I feel like it takes him a lot of effort to do so. Norm Leahy, DJ Spiker and (sometimes) Shaun Kenney can manage a reasonable line of thought on Bearing Drift. The occasional note from Chris Saxman and the odd Op-Ed from John Fredricks are always worth reading.

      1. larryg Avatar
        larryg

        I also read both but not all the time and I find neither of those sites anywhere near the likes of Michelle Malkin, Limbaugh, Beck, Hannity etc in terms of their attacks on the POTUS – not over policies – they attacked from day one over his person… over the fact that he is black and in their minds not a true American. Virtually all of the policy attacks are just plain disingenuous – for instance, all of them say that Obama is responsible for the debt – that he’s the one who spent the money causing the debt – because he is a ‘socialist’, etc, etc.. that’s over the top.. way over BD and BV.

  5. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    Ollie North was no Ted Cruz for sure, so probably agree unless it was a weak Dem… but Cruz would take RoVa, no question.

    in terms of hate and bigotry -I’m talking about national media personalities who are focused on one person – the POTUS.

    Have you actually listened to the likes of Michelle Malkin or Laura Ingram or GLenn Beck or Rush Limbaugh with respect to the POTUS? for the last 5 years?

    Have you seen these images: http://goo.gl/DZDWhq

    take a look and tell me what you think.

    1. DJRippert Avatar
      DJRippert

      George Allen and Jim Gilmore couldn’t be elected. No chance that Ted Cruz would win.

      Important notice for Jim Bacon: As Virginia gets more and more blue / liberal – you might want to reconsider your love affair with Judge Dillon. Who will protect the patchwork of conservative areas in Virginia from an increasingly Democratic and liberal state legislature? Henrico County? Not under Dillon’s Rule it won’t.

      1. larryg Avatar
        larryg

        trying to separate out “blue Va” from “Dillon”.

        I forget how exactly the last election map looked but generally the cities were blue and RoVa was red with the exception of a couple of heavily black counties that turned out for Obama (and probably won’t for others).

        But I picture the Va House of Delegates like I do the House of Representatives which both emphasize rural and both can and will
        drive legislation or as we are seeing – blocking much of it they don’t like.

        the amount of legislation that “dies in committee” in Va is astounding.

        and it would not surprise me in the least, if the next strategy of the hard right is to do away with the winner-takes-all electoral rules and attempt to convert all states to electoral vote allocation by Congressional District which – combined with Gerrymandering and voter suppression will let the part of old white guys hang on longer.

        The GOP owns the Va Ga. If they proposed such a thing, how would they be stopped? They would effectively isolate and minimize the blue parts of Virginia, right?

  6. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    I’m looking at Blue Virginia: http://www.bluevirginia.us/

    is this what you meant?

    and I swear I don’t see much in the way of hate and bigotry.. no where near
    what I hear from the likes of Malkin, Limbaugh, Beck… all focused on one POTUS – for the last 5 years…

    could you point me to where in Blue Va they are spouting bigotry and hate?

    1. DJRippert Avatar
      DJRippert

      http://bluevirginia.us/diary/10420/vicious-homophobe-misogynist-theocratic-extremist-pat-robertson-gives-10000-to-mark-obenshain

      “Vicious Homophobe, Misogynist, Theocratic Extremist Pat Robertson Gives $10,000 to Mark Obenshain … Over the years, the deranged, theocratic bigot Marion G. “Pat” Robertson has given huge amounts of money to the Virginia GOP ($720k+) …On and on it goes; where Pat Robertson’s extremism, bigotry and outright insanity end, nobody knows.”

      1. larryg Avatar
        larryg

        isn’t the labeling largely true? Have you ever watched Robertson?

        labeling a proven “bigot” a “bigot” is not foul play… in my book…

        attacking a POTUS because he is black is what folks like Robinson do.

        1. DJRippert Avatar
          DJRippert

          No, it’s not largely true. Lowell leveled eight personal insults at Pat Robertson in three sentences. Bigot was only one of those insults. Do you believe that Pat Robertson is “outright insane”? You asked where Blue Virginia spouts bigotry and hate and I gave you hate. Now, let’s move to bigotry:

          http://www.bluevirginia.us/diary/7507/lindsey-graham-gop-problem-is-not-enough-angry-white-guys

          I wonder what you would have thought about Bearing Drift complaining about Jesse Jackson not having enough angry black men to lead.

          I don’t know why Pat Robertson dislikes Barack Obama. I don’t waste a lot of cycles on the political views of religious people. However, I know why I dislike Barack Obama – he’s an arrogant, ill prepared empty suit who will sell out America to see his personal political vision prevail. He has put America’s economy into the freezer with a series of “do gooder” bad ideas. Businesses aren’t investing because nobody knows what the half wits in the Obama Administration might do next.

          1. larryg Avatar
            larryg

            I think Robertson has an ample record of bigotry, DJ.

            Calling him bigot is not racism.

            Racism is going after someone for no reason other than the fact that you don’t like his race.

            If you want to go after the POTUS for being an empty suit or arrogant or whatever – then fine.. do what they did to Bush but don’t go after a man’s ethnicity.

            and DJ, it’s even worse coming from someone who claims to be a man of GOD.

            keep the racism and bigotry separate from the other complaints, in fact – keep it out of any of it so it’s not an issue at all.

            You cannot say that about Robertson. He’s clearly hard over on it.

            and DJ. there’s not a hell of a lot ANY POTUS can do – if Congress is going to oppose everything he proposes – even proposals that they had supported in the past under other POTUS.

            In case you haven’t been paying attention – it’s not the POTUS who weirded out business.. it’s the anti-govt, destroy-govt, vandals on the right … that even moderate GOP have pointed to as the problem.

            when you’ve got a group of people who are willing to harm the country to oppose the POTUS – don’t blame the POTUS – put the blame where it belongs – on the wacko birds…

            at some point most voters are going to “get it”. These people are not patriots.. they are taliban types…

          2. larryg Avatar
            larryg

            thinking on this.

            on one hand you have a person who has a history of engaging in speech that many consider racist and bigoted.

            on the other hand you have someone who has never been accused of any of it – but they ARE black and thus the subject of attacks – not based on their bigoted behavior but instead because they are black.

            DJ – do you not see a disconnect here?

            are you not essentially equating those who have been the subject of racism and bigotry with the folks who actually engage in racism and bigotry?

            tell me how I got this wrong… please…

  7. Darrell Avatar
    Darrell

    Why would I vote for a RINO if I can vote for a Democrat? Especially when I’m more in a RENO mood.

    Why would I want a taxpayer paid primary if the party makes up the rules as they go and everyone can vote? Shouldn’t the STATE general election rules rule? If the party wants a primary, let them pay for it and restrict the ballot to party members.

  8. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    If the state (taxpayers) are playing for Primary’s – it’s wrong.

    but perhaps what we’re seeing with the Tea Party is inevitable – and in the long run – good … because…

    I think most folks are NOT on the fringes of either side and when one of the fringes takes over the party – it usually results in empowerment of the opposite party.

    If RINOs can’t run as GOP – will they not run at all or will they run as something else?

    the other thing – Tea Party can apparently run nationally… more successfully than the can at the state or local level.

    I do not think a Tea Party type would last long at the local level but perhaps I’m wrong… does anyone know of Tea Party folks at the local level?

    we have some in Spotsy but they are careful to not be overt… it’s almost like a shadow movement and they often get forced into making decisions that involve the property rights of opposing parties where each side has good arguments rather than it being a govt vs property owner scenario.

    people who oppose regulation often forget where regulation comes from.

    Take Kepone on the James. Was it big bad govt squashing Allied Chemical from running an jobs-producing businesses or was it a tradeoff between the company’s property rights and Virginian’s property rights?

    you start out with no regulation… there is then a disaster and people demand that those who use their property rights to harm others be restricted.

  9. Darrell Avatar
    Darrell

    Del. Mark Cole knows who pays for primaries.

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