IN POLITICS, there are those races that are so competitive and valiantly fought that once you finally emerge victorious from the struggle, you cannot help but feel some measure of empathy for your opponent. This year's gubernatorial contest between Tim Kaine and Jerry Kilgore was not one of those races.
Now, that's not to say that it wasn't a competitive race. The polls were showing a statistical dead heat going into last Tuesday's election, and most commentators expected an agonizingly long election night. But it was not to be. By nine o'clock at night, Kaine had a clear six-point victory, a landslide for a Democrat in a state like Virginia. So as Republicans begin to ask themselves what went wrong, they should probably start by looking in a mirror.
Even though Kaine's campaign efforts surpassed anything the Democrats have put on in Virginia thus far, this was always Kilgore's race to lose, and he and the Republican Party lost it spectacularly. They thought that they could win for sure in a red state by merely sticking to their old canon of tax cuts, social issues and "values," and by labeling Kaine as the most liberal politician to walk the earth. Their failure can be reduced to one of their chief characteristics and one they need to jettison quickly unless they hope to take an even bigger beating in 2006: cockiness.
The day after the election, Center for Politics Program Director Joshua Scott give his analysis at a luncheon sponsored by Democracy Matters. He said that the combination of Kilgore's inadequacy as a candidate and Democratic Gov. Mark R. Warner's popularity sealed the governor's race for the Democrats. While many voters had a rather positive view of Kaine's character and ability as a leader, he explained, "Most people didn't have a good gut feeling about Kilgore." Between Kilgore's extensive negative advertising and his inability to patch together a coherent message about important issues like education and transportation, he was simply a poor candidate to run in such a tight race.
Many conservative voters had some reservations about Kaine's policy positions, on issues such as the death penalty and abortion, but Kilgore's attempts to harp on these issues almost obsessively turned off many voters who were more concerned with responsible fiscal management and strong leadership qualities. The contrast between the two candidates was most visible during the closing moments of the campaign's only televised debate, when Politics Prof. Larry Sabato asked each of them if they would pledge that at least 50 percent of their ads would be positive. Kilgore, visibly uncomfortable, hemmed and hawed for his entire allotted time before Sabato put him out of his misery by saying, "Alright, I guess that's a no." Kaine then responded with an authoritative affirmative.
One point that Scott stressed is that following this election, Republicans need to reevaluate their strategy and turnout models, not only here in Virginia but in other red states that they usually expect to carry easily. With Kaine as a candidate who supported a rather substantial tax hike and held a somewhat equivocal position on the death penalty, Republicans were expecting an easy time in a state in which Republican candidates usually start with a five-point lead right off the bat.
Kilgore was no exception, and his strategy all along was to hunker down and hold onto those five points, occasionally popping up to label Kaine as a "liberal." Such attempts obviously failed, as Kaine, who could probably be best described as left-of-center, garnered 22 percent of the Republican vote, according to Rasmussen. Scott said that Kaine's link to the popular Warner, which he reiterated again and again, gave him the ability to attract independent voters, especially late in the race. Kilgore faced the daunting task of convincing voters that a change was needed after four years of solid Democratic management, but he made few attempts to define himself as a man who could bring such change. Instead, he tried to motivate his base to vote with traditional Republican boogeyman tactics, claiming that Kaine couldn't be trusted to execute criminals, save the lives of the unborn, etc.
From John Kerry's loss last year in Virginia to Kaine's win, Democrats experienced a 14-point swing. That should be a huge warning flag to Republicans both here and in other red states who have come to expect victory as long as they trumpet social issues and tax cuts and slime their opponents as "liberals." This election has proven that such cocky expectations are beginning to spell trouble for the Republican Party in the heart of its base, and that the Democrats are more than ready to make them pay, should they cling to them.
A.J. Kornblith's column appears Mondays in The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at akornblith@cavalierdaily.com.
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