Why Virginia Democrats Are Right to Be Nervous

The National Review ^ | October 16, 2017 | Jim Geraghty

[HamiltonJay]

We shall see... I believe this is a winnable race... just not convinced Gillespie will get the turnout he’s going to need... I will be happy to be wrong. I am not on the ground in VA, and have no insider information on this race..... I am only drawing conclusions from general macro observations.

This is really a generic R vs generic D race, neither candidate stands out, or offers anything distinct. So what you have is an open seat, with the D trying to hold onto the seat... The current sitting Governor is not that terribly popular, but not hated either... so this really is about as generic a race as you can find.

Given that, and the fact its off year, this would favor higher party out of power turnout in terms of voting percentages. NOVA also does not have a personal checkbook motivation to show up... as in the Presidential race, they were going to show up because if Trump won their personal incomes were at stake... the VA governors race doesn’t affect federal DC spending, so that area will almost certainly have lower turnout.

The question in my mind is, will the Dem turnout decrease enough and will the R turnout improve enough to overcome the delta? My gut says, that given the R’s have run a GOPe candidate, that he can’t rely on the drain the swap, disenfranchised, forgotten man, blue dog democrats, etc that Trump got motivated and to the polls to show up for him... and without them I am not sure he’ll get a 5.5% swing to pull off the win.

Is it possible? Yes, I do think its possible, I just am not personally convinced its the most likely outcome. I do believe he COULD win, this isn’t a race where I feel, there is no way the R could pull an upset, I just don’t think that’s the most likely outcome. I am more than happy to eat crow and be proven wrong, but I think this is a D hold, but by a 1-3% margin.

If the R were a drain the swamp, american first, candidate I would be more than confident and comfortable predicting an R win, but with an GOPe/McConnell/Open Border shill? I think its the less likely outcome. It is possible, and again I am happy to eat crow if I am wrong, and would loved to be proved wrong, but I am hard pressed to see it.

Time will tell.

[loveliberty2]

Thanks!

If elected, then Virginia Republicans (with the emphasis on Republicans) must keep public pressure on them throughout their terms to focus on the principles of Jefferson as they go about their duties.

Below are the words of the Author of our Declaration of Independence and President of the U. S., Thomas Jefferson, in his 1801 Inaugural Address. Jefferson laid out what might be considered to be an appropriate description of the philosophy and role of an American president or Legislator:

(Excerpt, "Our Ageless Constitution," p. xiv, reformatted)
"Let us, then, with courage and confidence pursue our own Federal and Republican principles, our attachment to union and representative government. Kindly separated by nature and a wide ocean from the exterminating havoc of one quarter of the globe; too high-minded to endure the degradations of the others; possessing a chosen country, with room enough for our descendants to the thousandth and thousandth generation;

- entertaining a due sense of our equal right to the use of our own faculties, to the acquisitions of our own industry, to honor and confidence from our fellow-citizens, resulting not from birth, but from our actions and their sense of them;

- enlightened by a benign religion, professed, indeed, and practiced in various forms, yet all of them inculcating honesty, truth, temperance, gratitude, and the love of man;

- acknowledging and adoring an overruling Providence, which by all its dispensations proves that it delights in the happiness of man here and his greater happiness hereafter

—with all these blessings, what more is necessary to make us a happy and a prosperous people?

- Still one thing more, fellow-citizens—a wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned.

- This is the sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circle of our felicities.

"About to enter, fellow-citizens, on the exercise of duties which comprehend everything dear and valuable to you,

- it is proper you should understand what I deem the essential principles of our Government, and consequently those which ought to shape its Administration. I will compress them within the narrowest compass they will bear, stating the general principle, but not all its limitations.

- Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political;

- peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none;

- the support of the State governments in all their rights, as the most competent administrations for our domestic concerns and the surest bulwarks against antirepublican tendencies;

- the preservation of the General Government in its whole constitutional vigor, as the sheet anchor of our peace at home and safety abroad;

- a jealous care of the right of election by the people—a mild and safe corrective of abuses which are lopped by the sword of revolution where peaceable remedies are unprovided;

- absolute acquiescence in the decisions of the majority, the vital principle of republics, from which is no appeal but to force, the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism;

- a well disciplined militia, our best reliance in peace and for the first moments of war, till regulars may relieve them;

- the supremacy of the civil over the military authority;

- economy in the public expense, that labor may be lightly burthened;

- the honest payment of our debts and sacred preservation of the public faith;

- encouragement of agriculture, and of commerce as its handmaid;

- the diffusion of information and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of the public reason;

- freedom of religion; freedom of the press, and freedom of person under the protection of the habeas corpus, and trial by juries impartially selected.

These principles form the bright constellation which has gone before us and guided our steps through an age of revolution and reformation. The wisdom of our sages and blood of our heroes have been devoted to their attainment. They should be the creed of our political faith, the text of civic instruction, the touchstone by which to try the services of those we trust; and should we wander from them in moments of error or of alarm, let us hasten to retrace our steps and to regain the road which alone leads to peace, liberty, and safety." - Thomas Jefferson, First Inaugural

[going hot]

Anything that panics Krugman is fine by me.