Blue Victory in a Red State

There may be hope for the state Commonwealth of Virginia after all. Lieutenant Governor Tim Kaine (D) appears to have taken the Governor's Mansion in Virginia, defeating Jerry Kilgore.

Okay, yeah, so evidently Republicans appear in the lead in other races, like for lieutenant governor and attorney general, but at least there's a democratic governor.

The race was remarkably ugly. Politics has undertaken a tremendous downward spiral in the last few election cycles, and this is most unfortunate. At least for me, it makes me not even want to vote: why would I want to reward either of two negative candidates with the win? I wish there were truly viable third-party candidates more often. This "us-them" two-party system truly isn't working well anymore.

Speaking of nasty campaigns, I have to say it's markedly disconcerting when an "attack ad" -- a "you can't possibly want to vote for this guy" ad -- hawks an opponent who is "soft" on the death penalty, as Kilgore accused Kaine of being. And, in a bizarre attempt to "salvage" his reputation, Kaine takes to the airwaves to reassure voters that, indeed, he will gladly uphold the death penalty laws, and enforce state-sanctioned death: "Don't hate me! I really will kill these people, honest!" It just scares me to think that anti-death penalty voters in Virginia just aren't worth the political capital to go pandering to.

Random callout quote from the WaPo article:

Kilgore supporters in a nearby convention center ballroom were less upbeat. "We're not doing as well as we should be," said John Hager, a Republican former lieutenant governor, Washington Post staff writer Michelle Boorstein reported. "We have a Republican president we all love, and the media will spin this into another anti-Bush thing," he lamented.

Uh... seriously, did this guy actually say "we have a Republican president we all love"? Has this guy not looked at a single poll in the past three weeks? Dude, we have a Republican president that about 37% of the country's population likes (and about 42% strongly dislike). When you say, "we all," you are really just referring to your fellow Republicans (and even then, "all" is probably not accurate, even as lazy speech). And you know what? Elected office is not about just pandering to your own base. You are elected to represent the people. Start acting like it. So when you say "we have a Republican president we all love," you are betraying a stunning break from reality, and reinforcing a myopic worldview that Republicans are the only people worth considering. Perhaps this is why you lost the race.

Of course, at the same time, Texas yet again betrays a shocking -- SHOCKING! -- lack of homo-love. Have Peter and Matt -- among teeming others all over the Internets -- taught these people nothing?