With the retirement of John Warner, Virginia Republicans are disappointed at their apparent choices for his successor: Tom Davis or Jim Gilmore. Davis is seen by many as too liberal -- particularly for a state that's still pretty conservative -- while Gilmore is seen as... a disappointment.
Patrick Ruffini offers a great suggestion -- Eric Cantor:
Tom Davis could best serve the Republican Party by staying where he is, something he can well appreciate as a former NRCC Chairman. He’s the right fit for where Fairfax County is right now. If he goes, so does his district.
As for Jim Gilmore, we need look no further than his recent 11th place publicity stunt to evaluate his skill as a candidate. Yes, he was always a longshot, but the fact that he ranked well below three sitting U.S. Congressmen who both started with near-zero name ID should tell us something. The guy had less of a chance than Ron Paul for crying out loud. He ended as Governor on a low note and was a terrible RNC chairman. Gilmore is not the conservative Virginia needs.
2 comments:
Davis isn't going to back down, and he is no liberal.
He votes with President Bush more than Congressman Frank Wolf to his west.
Thanks for the comment.
I agree that Davis won't back down. On that, Patrick Ruffini is too optimistic. I also agree that Davis is not liberal.
As for loyalty to President Bush, I'm not sure whose measure you are using. Wolf scored higher than Davis in both 2005 and 2006 -- at least according to Congressional Quarterly (http://public.cq.com/public/housebystate.html). Eric Cantor scored higher than both of them.
But that assumes that President Bush is a solid conservative, and there are a lot of Virginia primary voters that will disagree with that.
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