What follows is a brief survey of recent news about the Virginia Senate race.
The CLOSED Debate
In cooperation with the mainstream media, George Allen and Tim Kaine have decided to freeze out the other U.S. Senate contenders from the debates. Here is how a Washington Post blog, Virginia Politics describes the exclusion criteria.
Kaine and Allen, the prohibitive frontrunners for their parties’ nominations in the race to succeed retiring Sen. James Webb (D), are slated to face off Dec. 7 in Richmond as part of the annual AP Day at the Capitol. Several other hopefuls are running for the seat, but the debate rules say a candidate needs to average 15 percent or better in published, non-candidate primary polls, and raise at least 20 percent as much money as his or her party’s frontrunner by the end of October in order to participate.
Republican candidates Jamie Radtke and Timothy Donner complained at the time that the rules were unfair, and now Democratic candidate Julien Modica has gone a step further, filing suit in the U.S. District Court in Alexandria against the Virginia Capitol Correspondents Association and the Associated Press.
(Disclosure: Washington Post staff writer Anita Kumar is a member of the VCCA and serves on a committee that helped organize the debate.) (from here)
When will mainstream news media’s candidates debate?
The first debate of the 2012 U.S. Senate race in battleground Virginia is set for December, with the front runners, Republican George Allen and Democrat Tim Kaine, confirmed
as participants.The Dec. 7 debate will be part of Associated Press Day at the Capitol, an annual government and political news forum at the state Capitol hosted by the Virginia AP Managing Editors and the Virginia Capitol Correspondents Association. (continued here)
Will Allen Debate His Republican Opponents?
Maybe. The washingtonexaminer.com reported Nov 11 that RPV would arrange a debate.
The first debate is scheduled for the second week of April in Roanoke, followed by two debates in May, one in Northern Virginia and another in Hampton Roads. (from here)
Allen will debate Kaine this month and his GOP opponents in April? 
Does this year’s primary election occur before the general election?
As Disrupt The Narrative observed, If George Allen wants to anger a vast swath of the Republican base, he’ll participate in the Associated Press debate.
Governor McDonnell Endorses the Safe Republican
Here is the Washington Post‘s article by that Anita Kumar mention in the disclosure above. The title says it all: As expected, McDonnell endorses Allen for U.S. Senate.
Do Any Of The Excluded Candidates Have a Prayer?
RedState‘s Tim Griffin has definite opinions.
- George Allen will probably lose Virginia’s U.S. Senate Race (1 of 2)
- Jaime Radtke Will Win Virginia’s U.S. Senate Race (2 of 2)
Moore Common Sense‘s Alan Moore declares Game Over: Bob McDonnell Endorses George Allen for Senate. (More Common Sense is a relatively new blog.)
On the other hand, Bearing Drift‘s JR Hoeft thinks Jamie Radtke is fairly popular, Radtke wins third straight BD poll.
Red State Virginia notes that Richmond Tea Party Endorses Jamie Radtke For Senate
Virginia Right takes the opposite tact in Discussion: George Allen’s Record Examined in Detail. Tom White is upset with a stupid chain email he attributes to the Virginia TEA Party Patriots Federation. Here is what that organization has up on their website, Educating Voters on the Truth of George Allen’s Record. Obviously, they are not happy with Allen.
Because there is alway some truth in these stupid chain emails, White asks us to give Allen a little slack for some of his votes. And he has a point. Over the last couple of years a lot of people have started looking at the Constitution with renewed respect. However, it works both ways. Given the propensity of folks to spread stupid chain emails, White may wish to accord the Virginia TEA Party Patriots Federation a little slack too.
Personal Observation
Republicans could do far worse than George Allen as their U.S. Senate candidate. Unfortunately, Allen is shooting himself in the foot. When he lets the news media declare him the inevitable Republican nominee and starts debating Tim Kaine BEFORE he debates his GOP rivals, he makes himself look awfully arrogant.
The email from the VTTP was mentioned on Sara for America in this post, among other places. I believe the email has also been posted by other TEA Party groups as well. http://saraforamerica.wordpress.com/2011/11/29/vtppf-has-lost-its-mind/
Tom White – Thank you for your comment.
I am all for researching an email like that one and posting your findings. I don’t know who starts such emails, but the sooner a responsible blogger or journalist checks into them the better.
I googled a couple of lines from the email. I got about three hits besides your own website (including Sara for America). Like as not there are variations, but I doubt there are many. The main crime of the people who forward post such things without investigating them first is laziness.
How closely we should associate that email with the leaders of the Virginia TEA Party Patriots Federation is open question.
What I truly do not like is the silliness of declaring anyone a winner this far out from the primary election. The voters have not yet even begun to pay attention. Hence this post.
De Facto winner. No single challenger to Allen has made a compelling case to consolidate support behind him or her, none have made inroads gaining name recognition outside of their immediate region with any great success, and money has all but dried up. Focus has correctly turned to defeating Tim Kaine. Look at the financial story. While money is not always a true indicator of support, it is a pretty good indicator of how wide the support is. In a convention, one can stack a lot of delegates and overcome a lack of statewide support. But that is not possible in a primary. That favors the candidate with the best name recognition. It would be hard to find someone in Virginia that has never heard of George Allen. And if they have not, they’re not going to vote in a primary anyway. PPP polls in Feb. and July 2011 show Allen at 68% and all other candidates in single digits. Financials for Q3 2011 http://www.opensecrets.org/races/summary.php?cycle=2012&id=VAS1 tell a similar story. At 68%, the race is Allen’s to lose. Nothing short of a massive blunder by Allen, and we all know the history here, could derail him. I realize June 12 is a long ways off, but remember that the winner faces Tim Kaine 4 months after the primary. Allen is the only candidate with the money to run the race from June until November. And Kaine already has statewide name recognition. None of the challengers to either Allen or Kaine have the ability to fund and win in November. The window of opportunity has closed.
Thanks for the link! I appreciate it! 2 o’s in Moore though.
Pingback: SMART MONEY | Citizen Tom