"Kilgore is/was a poor candidate"
why do we always say a Republican who loses is/was a bad candidate?
Kilgore was the ONLY Republican who won statewide in '01, so he can't be that bad a candidate. AND, it turned out Mark Warner (for some unknown reason) is exceedingly popular in the Commonwealth and carried Kaine across the finish line.
"why do we always say a Republican who loses is/was a bad candidate? "
You may always say that but I don't. My point deals only with Kilgore. He was a bad candidate, or perhaps I should have said campaigner. He was totally underwhelming.
I say he was a bad candidate based on observation (please read my earlier post). Also, the guy that ran against Warner 4 years ago also ran a bad campaign. I expected Kilgore to lose this election just by observing his TV advertisements and what I heard on the radio. Despite his poor debating skills I believe he could have won this election if he had chosen better people to run his campaign but then that was his mistake.