Well, now that we really have a race for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senator, it’s time to compare the two candidates: former Governor Jim Gilmore and Delegate Bob Marshall. I’ll start with the current favorite, Mr. Gilmore; my next post will examine the guy I want to win (Marshall).
My first election as a precinct captain was in 1997; thus, I remember Gilmore’s last statewide campaign very fondly. He seized upon the personal property tax issue and set off the first genuine tax revolt in Virginia history. The strength of that campaign so buoyed the GOP that it swept the three statewide races that year (I knew John Hager would become Lieutenant Governor when he carried my precinct by 25 votes) and ended the Democratic majority in the House of Delegates.
Gilmore is a fierce partisan battler, and not to be underestimated, but he has one crippling problem: Jim Gilmore cannot win.
Why do I say that? It’s not the conventional reasons. I do not think Virginia voters are that upset about Gilmore’s tenure as Governor. I don’t think he is “yesterday’s man.” However, I know he will have problems with the GOP base; problems that cannot be overcome. This problem is two-fold.
The WBK War (to new readers – short for Wahhabist-Ba’athist-Khomeinist War, my label for the War on Terror): Jim Gilmore still has not addressed his terrible Washington Post op-ed from June (here are the choice quotes and my reaction). His apparent strategy is to pretend the op-ed was in favor of the President’s policies. I have no choice but to bring back this quote, because Mark Warner certainly will again and again (emphasis added):
American interests come down to protection of our national security, protection of Israel’s right to exist, and averting, if possible, a general war in the Middle East, nuclear or otherwise. Our present conduct in Iraq distracts from or is detrimental to those goals.
Gilmore cannot run away from this line; the more he tries, the more he makes clear he is not the candidate to keep this seat for the GOP.
Social issues: Given how much I’ve ripped Mike Huckabee in this space, it may surprise some of you to see me mention this, but I have always been keen to the interest of social conservatives. In fact, I agree with them on a number of major issues, including the one where Gilmore departs from us – abortion. Furthermore, as I assume Mike Huckabee will not win the nomination, social conservatives will have ruffled feathers. A nominee who is unabashedly pro-abortion (Ramesh Ponnuru) will be unable (and perhaps unwilling) to mend the fences and hold the Republican coalition together. Bob Marshall, a lifelong pro-lifer, will not have that problem.
Running afoul of the base on one of these issues is bad enough. To do it on both will lead the party to disaster. I like Jim Gilmore; I really do, but he cannot defeat Mark Warner, and for that reason, he must not be the Republican nominee.
December 21, 2007 at 1:26 am |
[...] The right-wing liberal “I am not a conservative; I am a man of the right” – Whittaker Chambers « Why Jim Gilmore cannot win [...]
December 21, 2007 at 10:28 am |
DJ:
Your rationale is that Gov. Gilmore vs. Gov. Warner that Gilmore cannot win because you interpret his words as he wants to ‘quit’ Iraq…. So our base will abandon him at the polls..
Your rationale on abortion is that Gilmore is not 100% solid pro-life, so our base will abandon him at the polls…
Now exactly where is Gov. Warner going to be on these issues?
He is obviously going to be to the left of Gov. Gilmore on both, and be dragging with him the baggage of Hillary or Obama….
i.e. You really think that two elements of our base, who will be driven enmasse to the polls by the threat of Hillobama are going to vote for Gov. Warner, because Gov. Gilmore isn’t 100% truest of true, fire breathing (in your opinion) on these two issues….
I got news for you, we are getting ready to have a Romney, Huckabee or maybe Thompson at the top of the ticket…. Will those two constituencies abandon the Pub and instead vote for Hillobama?
That is what you are saying…. You are saying that if we don’t have someone at the top of the ticket who is 100% hard right on every issue, our voters just won’t show up….
ask yourself, will you not show up to vote for Romney or Huckabee and elect hillobama so we have no chance at Conservatives getting two more seats on the Supreme Court? I think you will.
If anything the Marshall challenge makes Gov. Gilmore look… well not so hard right, which according to the pundits… makes him more electable….
Gov. Gilmore is going to beat Gov. Warner, because Gilmore has said what he is going to do, and done it…. Gov. Warner on the other hand ran on eliminating the car tax in his first or second term…. not to mention promising not to raise taxes….
Gilmore also going to win because he can simply say, fellow citizens if you elect Warner, he will join Harry Reid and strenghen the Democrat majority in the Senate to raise your taxes, he’s done it before, and are you going to believe him now when he says he isn’t?
Gov. Gilmore wins….
December 21, 2007 at 10:55 am |
STD,
My point (which you clearly missed) is that these folks will likely stay home, and a depressed voter base is a disaster. We saw it in 1992, 1996, 1998, 2001, 2005, 2006, and 2007.
I agree Gilmore is better than Warner on taxes, but not on much else. Marshall, by contrast, is head and shoulders above either.
December 21, 2007 at 10:59 am |
Oh, and one more thing, STD: how, exactly, am I supposed to interpret Gilmore’s June 18th words to mean anything other than that he wanted to quit on Iraq?
December 21, 2007 at 12:29 pm |
[...] that Gilmore will lose, and lose pretty baldy, to Mark Warner. I talked about a couple reasons here, but more have since come to my [...]
December 21, 2007 at 1:18 pm |
I think you fail to see that the Republican base will back Gilmore against Wrner for the sheer fact that Gilmore is more “right” than Warner. Spanky is dead on with “ask yourself, will you not show up to vote for Romney or Huckabee and elect hillobama so we have no chance at Conservatives getting two more seats on the Supreme Court? I think you will.” Conservative voter’s will turn out in masse’ to vote for the Republican nominee against the liberal altrnative since they now see the importance (at least in Virginia) of every vote; having lost the State Senate last month. The fact that Gilmore is not a hard line social conservative (as stated in your piece) lends him to getting more of the cross over vote than Delegate Marshall and a better chance to beat Warner……which we all want!
December 21, 2007 at 1:41 pm |
With all due respect, Judy, I’ve heard that over and over and over again, and it never pans out. The loss of 2001 wsa supposed to convince everyone to vote for Kilgore; it didn’t. Allen’s loss was supposed to convince everyone to vote in last month’s legislative elections; it didn’t. We ignore the base at our own peril.
Moreover, what about the single-issue voters? National security types who are liberal except for the War? Pro-life liberals like those that are driving Huckabee’s numbers right now? Will they choose Gilmore over Warner? I doubt it.
December 21, 2007 at 1:51 pm |
Hi DJ,
I saw that you linked to my blog post of the interview with Gilmore at the Advance, http://www.conservativa.com/wp/?p=252 . Can I ask you to play the interview again? Click on the link where it says, “Here is part of the Gilmore interview, with photos and audio all taken at the Advance.” Listen, and you will find at about the 0:54 mark (note that the piece starts at 1:33 and counts down to 0), he says plainly, “So we have to win!” In the WaPo piece he is criticizing the President’s approach to Iraq, but that doesn’t mean he wants to call it a loss. The opposite, in fact: “We have to win.”
-Conservativa
December 21, 2007 at 1:54 pm |
I did hear that; the trouble is he won’t address what he wrote; it’s a glaring contradiction that he simply refuses to resolve. That is not the sign of a good candidate.
December 21, 2007 at 3:54 pm |
DJ:
He Starts the op ed piece by supporting the ‘Surge’… Exactly how is that motive to quit Iraq? He is in it to win, and by knowing the history of Vietnam our mistake there was assuming to much of the fighting ourselves…
GWB probably over emphasized this and pushed an army (he disbanded and then rebuilt from scratch) a little too hurriedly… Now he finally landed the boom on the Al Quada and Sunnis with the Surge Thanks to Patreas and we have a workable situation….
To make the argument that the voters will perceive sending Gov. Gilmore to the US Senate, a veteran US Army Army Intelligence officer and with all his pre- 9-11 work , as opposed to a cell phone salesman, who will no doubt fall in line behind Sen. Jim Webb helping Harry Reid…. is a stretch to say the least….
You’re making stuff up, Non-issue.
December 22, 2007 at 4:59 pm |
I’m making stuff up? Then explain this quote from the piece:
“I believe the only realistic alternative — the least bad option, if you will — is a limited deliberate drawdown of our military men and women and a redeployment of the forces remaining in the region to areas where they can more efficiently and effectively carry out a clearly defined mission”
How can he square that with “wanting to win”? That line’s Murtha-esque.
December 29, 2007 at 6:46 pm |
Come on DJ… Jim Gilmore is now Murthaesque?
Gilmore’s position is exactly what’s currently playing out… He supported the ‘Surge’, which has worked, and now we are going to hand it all over to the Iraqi’s…. (barring unforseen circumstances)
A redeployment into Afghanistan since our unwilling NATO ‘allies’ don’t have the intestinal fortitude to kill Islamist extremists there will be the logical result….
You are reaching this big time…. and btw where was Del Marshall on this issue? Gov. Gilmore a Veteran Army Intelligence Officer, was bold enough to put his position in writing…. ahem…
December 29, 2007 at 11:13 pm |
STD, it was abundantly clear that he abandoned his support for the surge in June; if you’re not willing to confront his words, you’re being just as intellectually dishonest as he is. I’m sorry, but you can’t just make his words disappear, and neither can he.
January 7, 2008 at 12:01 pm |
I will agree with RWL on two points. First he is dead on that if the base is depressed they will stay home and being more conservative is not good enough, being conservative enough to excite the base is. He is also right that Gilmore should explain that op-ed. Where I differ is that I think Gilmore will explain it because Marshall will force him to and when Gilmore does I believe we will be satisfied with it. Then Gilmore will hopefully set about the work of uniting and exciting this party behind him.
January 7, 2008 at 2:54 pm |
[...] that Gilmore is a better general election candidate (I deal with the errors in that analysis here, here, here, here, and here). Occasionally, though, I get a reference to comments Marshall made [...]
January 9, 2008 at 12:10 am |
[...] State Senate election. Spanky is making the case for Jim Gilmore, while I am, of course, arguing for my candidate Delegate Bob [...]
January 9, 2008 at 9:10 pm |
[...] effort by Spank That Donkey to come to Jim Gilmore’s defense is, um, interesting. My continuing advocacy in favor of Delegate Bob Marshall is clearly getting to him. I would note, however, [...]
January 11, 2008 at 10:43 pm |
and where is Del. Marshall to publish his position on the War on Terror and specificially on Iraq? (still waiting)
He does not have credentials that Gov. Gilmore has as a Veteran, serving in Army Intelligence, Chairing a National Committee on terrorism preparedness, pre – 9-11.
I guess after Gov. Gilmore again addresses the issue, Del. Marshall will strategized the ‘issue’, then take his stance?
I don’t think your criticism of Gov. Gilmore, who has clear credentials on foreign & domestic terrorism related policy, and has taken a position, doesn’t justify your negative attacks… in support of a candidate that has done none of the above.