Q1 Fundraising: Signs of Life from the Deeds Campaign?

The First-Quarter fundraising numbers have been released along with a Research 2000 poll, and it looks like there's great news for McAuliffe. T-Mac is in the lead with 2.5 million on hand, including 760,000 from in-state donors--that's more than either Creigh Deeds or Brian Moran. It's not a surprise that he's making it rain, but it is noteworthy that he's beating the two established in-staters in Old Dominion-based fundraising. Moran is behind McDonnell by one point, with McAuliffe only trailing McDonnell by five points. 

The question I want to ask is, "Where did Deeds come from?" Creigh now has $1.4 million in cash-on-hand compared to $825,000 for Brian Moran. In 44 days he has come away with more cash-on-hand than Moran produced in a full quarter of fundraising. Deeds took a lot of heat for hanging onto his seat and staying in session instead of campaigning full-time; the assumption was that Moran would absolutely smoke him in fundraising due to his full-time campaigning advantage, and I had all but written off the Deeds campaign. I saw Terry and Brian everywhere, with Creigh nowhere to be found. Between that and the GA fundraising hiatus, I thought it would either be McAuliffe or Moran carrying the party into November. 

But this gives me some pause. That amount of fundraising in that little time is no mean feat, especially in an economy as lousy as this one. If Deeds steps up the full-time campaign now that he's out of session--as his fundraising numbers indicate he should be able to do--this thing could turn into a three-way race again very quickly, especially since the poll found that 40% of Democrats are undecided in the primary. The flipside of that is that Deeds is furthest behind McDonnell--by 7%. Then again, Perriello was down 30 points to Goode in mid-August.

Update: Ward Armstrong on the Rejected Stimulus Funding

I'm glad we have a delegate who's actually standing up for us in Richmond:

It also doesn't hurt that he's in such a powerful position as minority leader. Let's give him a new title; I think "Speaker of the House" sounds about right.

Also, Tim Kaine, Tom Perriello and Sen. Roscoe Reynolds came to Martinsville's unemployment office on Friday, where they dropped their two cents on the GA's partisan chicanery.

Mike Signer in Martinsville

Mike Signer made a campaign stop at the old Henry County Courthouse in Uptown Martinsville on Thursday. Unfortunately I forgot to bring my camera and so was not able to get a picture, but the Martinsville Bulletin has a pretty good one today. As an aside, Signer also ripped the legislature on their absurd vote to let our tax dollars go to other states.

As with my post on Jody Wagner's visit to the area, I will refrain from endorsing any of the candidates for the time being, but I will say that I thought Signer was impressive, and I think he has some good ideas. I also found him to be an eloquent spokesman for progressive ideas, and that will not only help him in the primary, but it will also help our party if he gets the nomination. 

His staff handed out a media folder containing a bio, press release, economic plan and legislative agenda. I thought the campaign lit was especially clever; it reminded me of the Perriello ads, and it offered a clear vision for the kind of LG Mike Signer wants to be. The front fold simply read, "Can you name 4 things a lieutenant governor does?" followed by four empty fill-in-the-blank slots. I don't think most people can, because I don't think there are four things in an LG's job description. Basically Signer wants to be an active LG who actually does something. He mentioned social justice campaigning and working with the legislature, as well as campaigning around the state for positive change. It's certainly a change from previous LG's we've had, and it would set him up as a killer 2013 gubernatorial candidate if he were to win.

Looking through his legislative agenda, I really like his idea for a "Come Home" Act that would offer reduced rates on student loans for college grads who go back to their hometowns to work. Something like that could have a real impact in a place like Martinsville, where the youth population has been leaving in droves. I also like the plan to link our Urban Crescent to rural communities in order to increase opportunity and produce economic growth in small towns.

The bottom line based on my interactions with Wagner and Signer is that I've been very impressed with both of them. I think both are highly qualified and both are more than able to take down Bill Bolling. It's going to be a tough decision, but I'm very optimistic about our choices.

House GOP Betrays Southside

The Republican-run House of Delegates shot down a proposal yesterday to expand unemployment benefits to part-timers and laid-off workers in retraining programs. The plan also would have given the state access to $125 million in federal stimulus money. The proposals were part of amendments proposed by Gov. Kaine to make the state eligible for federal stimulus money. 

*Deep breath.*

This is an absolute betrayal beyond words. This reminds me of Gov. Gilmore's infamous move back in 2000 to deliberately screw Tultex workers out of unemployment benefits that had bipartisan support in the GA. Sure, some will say there's no need to help part-timers, but that reaction fails to see the big picture--in Martinsville and places like it, your chances of finding a full-time job are slim to nil, even when the national economy is supposedly "good." Instead, you might take two or three part-time positions that pay crap in order to make ends meet, and if you lose one of those you're in a real bind. I try to be patient with the other side and I try to acknowledge that there are legitimate reasons to disagree about political issues. But this failure to act warrants no such understanding or respect. The Republicans in this case have so flagrantly put their own agenda ahead of what's best for the people they are supposed to represent. They are so diametrically opposed to anything involving the government, especially the Obama Administration, that they are willing to leave places like Martinsville out to dry.

There are two Republicans in the House who actually deserve some praise on this issue. The only two Republicans to actually support this legislation were from the Southside--Del. Danny Marshall (R - Danville) and Del. Donald Merricks ( R - Pittsylvania). To their great credit, they broke with their party and actually did what was right for the people they represent. Kudos to them for trying to do the right thing, even if their own party wouldn't let them.

Aside from the staggering moral repugnance of what the GOP leadership did yesterday, I don't think enough can be said about how outrageously stupid this is from a political standpoint. It seems to me like some votes should be no-brainers--you never vote against children or veterans, and you never allow yourself to be perceived as anti-middle class during the worst downturn in a generation. And it wasn't just the party's legislators--Bob McDonnell came out against the unemployment benefits before the vote yesterday. 

I think it's very telling that this story was the front-page, above-the-fold, full-color story in this morning's Martinsville Bulletin. We have 20% unemployment. We take these things very seriously. What the GA did yesterday should be on every piece of literature printed by the DPVA in 2009. Every Democrat in the state should take note; the messaging here pretty much writes itself. Let's make 'em pay for it.

Ward Armstrong Endorses Jody Wagner for Governor

House Minority Leader Ward Armstrong has announced his support for Jody Wagner in the Lt. Governor's race today. From the Washington Post:

Former finance secretary Jody Wagner picked up the endorsement of the highest ranking Democrat in the House of Delegates, Ward L. Armstrong, in her bid for lieutenant governor.

Armstrong, the House minority leader, cited Wagner's experience as a member of Timothy M. Kaine and Mark R. Warner's administrations.

"Having seen firsthand the work she did in the Warner and Kaine administrations to help fix the state's fiscal problems...I know she has the right experience to balance our budget and maintain Virginia as the best managed state and best state for business,'' Armstrong said. "As an elected official, and more importantly as a Virginian, I trust Jody Wagner to keep Virginia moving forward."

Three other Democrats are running: Jon Bowerbank, a businessman from Russell County, Pat Edmonson, a member of the Virginia Beach School Board and Michael Signer, an attorney who worked for former governor Mark R. Warner.

I had heard that this was coming. It will be interesting to see how this affects the LG race on the Democratic side. With the recent PPP poll that showed a substantial lead for Wagner, it appears there is some momentum moving in her direction; then again, a lot can happen in the two months remaining before the primary.

Dem Bones in the Washington Post

Dem Bones got a shout-out in yesterday's Washington Post for a blog he posted on a controversy in the gubernatorial race. Rather than summarize the post, I'll go ahead and put it up in its entirety:

The Roanoke Times editorializes on Mike Huckabee's thoughtless jokes (here and here) at Republican rallies for gubernatorial hopeful Bob McDonnell:

He jokingly urged Republicans to let the air out of Democrats' tires and do whatever it takes to keep them from turning up at the voting booth in November. He called it "the Lord's work."

It was a bad joke, not funny, especially when allegations of voter suppression still dog elections. The Republicans who heard him laughed along, compounding the slap at the most fundamental right of our democracy. Maybe he could make some equally tasteless Polish joke next.

Worse than his lame attempt at humor was Huckabee's attempt to reinforce the urban-rural divide in Virginia. He would have Republicans play Northern Virginia against the rest of the state. That sort of divisive politics might work well on the national stage, but it has no place in this year's gubernatorial race. The next governor must represent all Virginians, not just the ones Huckabee thinks live in the right place.

The editorial board, for the second day in a row, scolds McDonnell for not dumping Huckabee, then and there, and re-focusing on the issues. And they offered similar rebuke to Terry McAullife and Creigh Deeds, who "could not resist attacking," for "overreacting" and, therefore, giving the jokes "wider play than they warranted." As such:

The campaigns owe Virginians an apology for derailing what had been shaping up into a substantive governor's race.

While I won't and can't defend Huckabee's poor taste in jokes, I too thought the outcry against the jokes was a little over the top. They clearly were jokes, just very bad ones, and I seriously doubt that Huckabee genuinely endorses voter suppression tactics. I, however, am not sure that McAuliffe and Deeds deserved this condemnation, as they were rightfully doing their jobs in calling out divisive rhetoric, no matter the harmless and humorous intent. And, funny how in rebuking McAuliffe and Deeds for giving Huckabee's jokes wider play, this editorial highlights his jokes for at least another day.

There are some good points in this post. It may surprise some of this blog's conservative readers, but I actually have a fair amount of respect for Mike Huckabee. His comments pitting NOVA against the rest of the state were way out of line, but most of the time I get the feeling Huckabee says what he really believes and sticks by it, whether it's necessarily popular or not. I would never vote for him, but I give him props for honesty.

Congrats on the shout-out, Drew!

Frederick Tweets on Being Ousted: "OMGZ guys, WTF was that?! >:-( :*-( "

No more Twittering past the graveyard, I suppose. Jeff Frederick is out. So saith the GOP central committee earlier today by a vote of 57-18:

Members of the Republican Party of Virginia’s central committee have voted to remove state party chairman Jeffrey M. Frederick. The unofficial tally was 57-18 with one abstention.

The first two hours of the meeting were marked by presentations from Frederick’s opponents and by two lawyers hired to defend the 33-year-old House of Delegates member from Prince William County. Frederick did not speak on his own behalf.

That sound you hear is the collective sigh of relief from the handful of moderates-in-exile scattered throughout the state GOP. They may finally be poised to retake their party and stage a resurgence. But wait! The plot thickens:

Earlier in the morning before the meeting began,  about 50 Frederick supporters gathered outside the hotel, held signs and chanted “elected, not selected,“ a reference to the state party convention that elected him to the post last year.

...

Frederick has vowed that if he loses his job today, he will fight his ouster by running again for the job when the full party convenes for its state convention at the end of May.

That other sound you hear is the Jeffophiles forming a mob with torches and pitchforks. 

There's a good take on this over at Fake Virginia: in a nutshell, Jeff's ouster will touch off an even larger civil war within the Republican Party and deliver a big advantage to the Democrats in November--Bob McDonnell came out against Jeff Frederick, so the hardcore loyalists may stay home. Unless, of course, McAuliffe gets the nomination, which would force the disaffected Republicans to vote for McDonnell. I could definitely see something like that unfolding, especially because Frederick's refusal to concede certainly won't help reconciliation. But I do think it depends on who the GOP elects as their new leader at the convention in May. If they put away the Frederick faction, choose someone on this side of sanity, and take a more moderate approach, I think Democrats might end up losing sleep over this.

I personally want the Republicans to be as big of a threat as possible, and here's why. While Jeff Frederick was running the party into the ground, a few state Democrats have begun the same toxic infighting that has cost them elections in the past. One manifestation of this was the recent blowup at Blue Commonwealth. The minute a party loses its external threat, it has no more incentive to stay united. Right now Democrats' biggest weakness is disunity--we have multiple candidates for two of the three up-ballot offices while the GOP already has much of their nomination work taken care of. The last thing I want is for our 2008 gains to be wiped away by redistricting because we were mad at each other.

Martinsville Launches Green Panel

Pretty cool article from the Bulletin this week. The city of Martinsville has launched its going-green panel to come up with ways of saving energy.

Before the next meeting April 20, committee members were tasked with investigating whether the state Office of Pollution Prevention could help the city’s efforts, researching green programs in other cities and finding out how many tons of waste the city and schools create.

An energy audit of city and school facilities is set to be completed by the end of May. The audit is examining electricity use in the buildings, traffic and streetlights.

The Green Committee aims to increase recycling, reduce waste, create more green space and take other measures to shrink the city’s carbon footprint, which is measured by the city’s environmental practices and amount of greenhouse gas emissions.

Not only will this help make our city a little cleaner, there's the added benefit that turning Martinsville into a green-conscious city will make it a more attractive place to live, particularly in Uptown--especially to young professionals who will be the key to reviving our area. I am often frustrated with our local governments, but this is very cool. Big props, Martinsville.

April Fools

Well, sadly I couldn't think of a good April Fool's joke, but luckily Fred2Blue had quite an excellent substitute for one. 

Glenn, let's get this crazy train a rollin'! From Fred2Blue:

Martinsville Unemployment Breaks Tultex Record

Breaking news over at the Martinsville Bulletin tonight:

Wednesday, April 1, 2009

By MICKEY POWELL - Bulletin Staff Writer

Martinsville’s jobless rate in February reached a record 20.2 percent, the Virginia Employment Commission (VEC) announced today.

The city again has the highest unemployment rate in the state, a distinction it held for many months before Williamsburg’s jobless rate hit 19.5 percent in January, VEC statistics show.

Martinsville’s previous unemployment record was 19.6 percent, set in December 1999 due to Tultex’s closing.

Unemployment rates for Henry and Patrick counties were not immediately available.

Further details on local jobless rates will be reported in the Martinsville Bulletin on Thursday.

Sadly, I can't say this surprises me. I was chatting with a local business owner today and we both noticed the same thing: Southside has known the economy was in trouble for a long, long time. A year or so ago, when the Dow was up and the media was telling us how great everything was, we were very puzzled as to what exactly they were talking about; we sure as hell didn't see what they did. Now that we're running to the lifeboats, it's almost amusing to see the talking heads suddenly get it after years of steaming toward the iceberg.