Virginia Tomorrow

It felt like the end of October.

Every insider on the phone with legislators and lobbyists getting their take on what the impact might be.

The national media descending on Richmond.

One story turning a somnolent race firecracker hot.

We got the dueling emails from the competing camps.

The Democrats said that McDonnell’s thesis was the prologue to a legislative career that focused on promoting a conservative social agenda and remains his ”blueprint for governing”  Virginia, albeit one that has been skillfully camouflaged in the campaign to date.

You want to know what he’d like to do as Governor.

Read the pdf file of the thesis the Post has up.

Democrats said that their phones were ringing off the hook- the base now recognized what was at stake in the election

Republicans wondered what was the big deal.

A twenty year old thesis- you’ ve got to be kidding.

Where was the outrage about Jim Webb’s writings on women in the military when he ran for the Senate?

If McDonnell thinks it’s so wrong for women to be in the workplace, how did his own daughter join the military and serve in Iraq?  What’d she sneak out the back window when he wasn’t looking?

By mid-day, the campaign recognized that email wouldn’t do it.

McDonnell met with reporters on the phone for almost 90  minutes, explaining that his views had evolved over time- backing away from the most controversial assertions of the thesis and assuring everyone that there isn’t a hidden agenda- what you ‘re seeing now is what you’ll get.

The Democrats weren’t buying it- to them, it was just another artful dodge.

So where are we?

First, the matter is not going away anytime soon.

The Democrats won’t let it because it reflects two key features of Deeds’ strategy.

Excite the base.

Scare the moderates.

To win the election, the Democrats have, at a minimum, to drive down McDonnell’s favorability ratings and they believe that this can be the catalyst.

For Bob McDonnell, it’s the first big test of the campaign.

And it is one that was going to come sooner or later- Gardner’s story simply moved up the timetable.

It’s important that McDonnell recognize what the exam is really about.

It’s not about his thesis and what he thought twenty years ago.

And it’s not even really about his position on abortion, gay rights, and the role of feminists in society.

But it is about countering the stereotype that Republicans are intolerant and won’t work to advance the hopes of aspirations of everyone, including people whose backgrounds and beliefs may be very different from their own.

Part of the Democrats’ recent electoral ascendance on the national stage can be attributed to their success in persuading voters that Republicans are intolerant and really don’t like certain kinds of people.

Many Republicans would tell you that it is a steroetype that isn’t true and that ignores all the biases that Democrats hold toward people who aren’t sufficiently “progressive.”

But since perception and reality can have the exact same impact politically, it’s a sterotype that Republicans have to fight (just as Democrats must contest the belief that they’re inherently sof t on crime) .

It’s also the test (and, in reality, the opportunity) that Bob McDonnell is facing right now.

Virginians aren’t going to grade him this November on his thesis.

But they are going to want to know that his instincts are tolerant and inclusive

And that he has the capacity to lead

The kind of society we’re becoming

Not just the one we used to be.