Virginia’s hills are alive with the sound that Sen. Jim Webb won’t run for re-election. While that may be welcome news within the George Allen camp, Webb’s announcement has thrown Virginia Democrats into a tizzy of speculation – all of which point to a rather shallow Democratic bench.
Many have likely forgotten, but Webb was in a lot of ways the commonwealth’s first Internet candidate. Online backers helped recruit him for the 2006 primary against Harris Miller, the establishment choice to challenge then-Sen. George Allen. The online progressives got Webb, helped him beat Miller and, through means both fair and foul, kept the Webb campaign humming throughout the summer and fall and ultimately to victory in November. Only very late in that contest did Allen begin to grasp what a force the web had been for Webb…but by then the damage was done.
With Webb now out, where will his netroots supporters turn?
There are a few non-starter possibilities: former Govs. Doug Wilder and Tim Kaine. It’s easy to understand why not Wilder – his jilting of Sen. Creigh Deeds in the 2009 gubernatorial race with Bob McDonnell still rankles. But Kaine? Part of that can be written down as disappointment with Kaine’s stewardship of the Democratic National Committee…and the loss of three Democratic House seats in Virginia last November.
Among those three – Tom Perriello, Glenn Nye and Rick Boucher – there’s already some early interest. The online buzz is that Nye is already making calls about a candidacy. The more progressive netizens are reaching out to Perriello, their darling who out-performed expectations in 2010, but still lost to the already forgettable Republican, Robert Hurt. As for Boucher…time will tell.
urt. Hurt.
So what about Terry McAuliffe? Nope. The once-and-future Democratic gubernatorial hopeful still has his eyes set on the Governor’s Mansion in 2013.
The netroots are floating other possibilities – Del. Dave Englin, Sen. Chap Petersen, Sen. Don McEachin…all good liberals with the kind of profiles that appeal to activists. But, as was discovered in McEachin’s case when he was crushed by Jerry Kilgore in the 2001 Attorney General contest, those credentials aren’t exactly saleable statewide.
The jockeying is only getting started on the Democratic side. As for Republicans…more candidates will declare their intentions soon. And who knows? One of them may be Ken Cuccinelli.
