Virginia’s Feb. 12 presidential primary now looks important; Rappahannock activists choose up sides
By James P. Gannon
Virginia’s presidential primary, normally a meaningless afterthought or a non-event, is shaping up in this wild political year as an important post-Super Tuesday contest.
Both Republican and Democratic candidates will be on the state’s dual-primary ballot for Tuesday, Feb. 12, and voters here will be able to vote in either contest–but not both.
In Rappahannock County, registered voters will go to the normal polling place for their precinct to vote between the hours of 6 a.m. and 7 p.m. Since Virginia voters do not register by party, voters may choose to cast a ballot in either the Republican primary or the Democratic primary. (Editor’s Note: You can vote for your favorite in the RappVoice survey posted in the ballot box below in the left column, and offer your comment in the comment form at the end of this article.)
Virginia’s primary has rarely played any significant role in picking the two parties’ nominees for president, because it was scheduled after earlier primaries had basically determined the outcome. But the contest is meaningful this year because results in the early contests were indecisive, and even Tuesday’s “super” primaries and caucuses in 22 states may not clinch a nomination in either party.
Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia all are holding primaries on Feb. 12, and this regional “Potomac primary” offers enough delegates and media attention to attract candidate appearances and TV ad spending in the week after Super Tuesday.
Turnout has been low in previous primaries; in 2004, only 9.3% of Virginia’s registered voters cast ballots in the Democratic presidential primary, and the Republicans had no contest because President George W. Bush was running for re-election.
But turnout next week is likely to be much higher because of the highly competitive contests in each party and the likelihood that candidates will be making apprearances in the state and running TV ads reminding Virginia’s that their vote will really count this year.
In Rappahannock, only 656 voters turned out in 2004 to cast a ballot in the Democratic primary, about 13% of those registered. The tough contest between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama promises to bring more Democrats to the polls this year, while the Republicans also have a reason to turn out to back their favorite among front-runner John McCain and challengers Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee–assuming both continue after Super Tuesday’s results are known.
In addition to the active candidates, the ballots for the Feb. 12 Virginia voting will include some also-rans who qualified earlier to be listed but since have dropped out.
The Democrats will have a ballot showing the names of not only Obama and Clinton, but also Joe Biden, John Edwards, Bill Richardson and Dennis Kucinich. The Republicans will find McCain, Romney, and Huckabee on the ballot along with Ron Paul, who is still an active candidate, and dropouts Rudy Giuliani and Fred Thompson.
Political activists in Rappahannock are choosing their candidates–some out of enthusiasm for one, others out of aversion to a rival candidate. Some have had to switch from a favored candidate who dropped out to a second choice.
Republican Demaris Miller, one of the GOP’s most active and outspoken local members, was an early and enthusiastic supporter of Tennessee’s Fred Thompson, whose campaign fell flat in the early contests. Now Miller is backing Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts.
“My choice is driven by policy and track record,” Miller said. “Mitt Romney supports a strong military, a strong economy, strong families, and a government that is limited to the role envisioned by our founders. Mitt Romney’s track record in the private sector and as a governor prove that he knows how to get things done and that he makes sound choices about what should be done.”
Walter Longyear of Washington, another prominent Republican, is not enthused about the available GOP choices. “I don’t have a favorite right now,” he said. “I just can’t get excited about anybody. I am a Reagan conservative, and there is nobody really stepping into that spot.”
Longyear said he supported McCain in the 2000 contest for the nomination against Bush, but he reflects the coolness of many conservatives toward the moderate party maverick from Arizona. “What concerns conservatives more than anything is that McCain represents a change in direction for our party,” Longyear said.
On the Democratic side, there’s some agonizing going on as well, as local Democrats ponder the Obama vs. Clinton choice.
Rappahannock Democrats “have been quite divided between Clinton, Obama and Edwards,” said Ray Boc, chairman of the county’s Democratic Committee. Now, with Edwards dropping out, “there’s a split between Clinton and Obama.”
Boc believes that the former supporters of Edwards are shifting more towards Obama than to Clinton. Part of that reflects a negative reaction among local Democrats to the Clintons’ campaign tactics against Obama, particulary the attacks made prior to the South Carolina primary by former president Bill Clinton. “There was some turnabout after Bill Cliniton came out and made a mess of things,” said Boc, who declined to state a preference in the primary due to his position as local chairman.
Jim Blubaugh of Washington, an activist Democrat and former candidate for Congress, is supporting Obama, partly because he’s eager to overcome the deep animosity between the two parties, which he believes has damaged our country.
“I believe that Hillary Clinton is very competent, but unfortunately she would cause the polarization between the parties to be even worse,” Blubaugh said. “Government would essentially be paralyzed if she were president. Obama seems to me to be the person who could most effectively work on bringing us back together as a country, to bridge the animosity between the parties.”
He also is impressed that “Obama speaks to morals. Many people are worried about the use and misuse of religion in politics; but we all support morals. People sometimes get these concepts confused. They are not the same thing. Obama speaks to morals, which is important to me.”
Ben “Cooter” Jones of Washington, who campaigned in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina for Edwards, has switched his support to Obama also. The former Democratic Congressman from Georgia and TV actor is scathing in his views of Hillary and Bill Clinton.
“The Clintons were the worst thing that ever happened to the Democratic Party,” said Jones, who served in the House of Representatives during Bill Clinton’s presidency. “Under them, we lost the House, we lost the Senate and came out of that period with fewer governors and state legislators….all of that came off on Al Gore and we wound up with eight years of this idiot Bush.”
Nominating Hillary Clinton would be “bad for the party,” Jones said. “Hillary will have toxic coat-tails,” said Jones, who believes that Democrats running in ‘red states’ and marginal congressional districts would be hurt by having to run on a ticket headed by Sen. Clinton. “It will really hurt the party in the South and the heartland,” Jones believes. The Clintons, he added, “are offering a co-presidency, a pair of prevaricating pols” in the White House.
-- James P. Gannon
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