Virginia Tomorrow

The initial results are in.

Scott Rasmussen released today the first poll taken after the controversy over the words and views expressed in Bob McDonnell’s 1989 thesis at Regent Unuiversity erupted this week.

The overall results show McDonnell leading Deeds 51% to 42%, mirroring the 8 point lead McDonnell held when Rasmussen polled a month ago.

Rasmussen suggests that it is too early to know for sure how the controversy will eventually play out.

I think that the agnostic position about the ultimate impact of the thesis makes sense right now. While there is little evidence that voters’ views about the race have changed dramatically, it sometimes takes a couple of weeks for these matters to percolate.

Moreover, the Deeds campaign is making a determined effort to use the thesis to reduce McDonnell’s standing among women voters and we really can’t yet measure the impact of this strategem.

My intuition tells me that the controversy is generating a more intense anti-McDonnell sentiment among Democrats and may be narrowing the “enthusiasm gap” I observed earlier in the race.

But even if Democrats are getting more excited about the race, they need to take a very sober look at a set of numbers in the Rasmussen poll that illustrates the challenge that the party has to overcome, regardless of how the thesis plays out.

On the question of which gubernatorial candidate do you trust more on taxes, 50% of the respondents say McDonnell and 35% Deeds.

On the matter of which candidate do you trust more to cut government spending, 51% say McDonnell and 29% Deeds.

In a nutshell, here’s the problem:

The Rasmussen numbers suggest that, at least at the moment, Deeds is trailing McDonnell (badly) on key dimensions of fiscal responsibility- matters that have assumed increased importance to voters in challenging economic times.

Yet Democrats in Virginia run best when they are perceived to represent the party of fiscal responsibility.

Ask Chuck Robb, Doug Wilder and Mark Warner just how important this reputation is.

McDonnell’s ability to regain the fiscal issue for the GOP may be his most important accomplishment in the campaign to date, though Democrats in Washington probably have to be given a lot of credit for this reversal.

Creigh Deeds and the Democrats are going to have to fight like heck to recapture it (unless, of course, they find that McDonnell also wrote a Master’s Thesis in Economics).