The sad truth, I’m sorry to say, is that VA has been trending blue. BHO carried the state twice. The state as two liberal Dem US Senators. The huge increase in the size of the federal government and a huge increase of liberals in Northern VA has no doubt contributed to this trend.
Cuccinelli lost by a couple of percentage points. If he didn’t have the rug pulled out from under him and if the GOP controlled state government had cracked down on Democrat vote fraud then Cuccinelli would have won easily. The GOP would rather lose to the Democrat than allow a conservative to win.