Democrat Creigh Deeds and Republican Bob McDonnell traded barbs over taxes, wage discrimination, the environment and transportation Monday night in a gubernatorial debate set against a growing national backdrop.
The Richmond debate was the third of four planned for the governor’s race and the first to be televised live during prime time. It came amid increasing national chatter over the most closely watched political contest of 2009, and national policy issues were as much in play as state issues.
All eyes were on Deeds, who is hurting in polls and is looking to mount a late-game comeback with just three weeks until the Nov. 3 election.
He attacked what he called McDonnell’s “rigid social agenda” and vowed support for increased higher education and transportation funding, while hoping to deflect the GOP’s efforts to link him to divisive national topics. Deeds said health care reform can be accomplished without “the federal government taking over our health care system,” and restated his opposition to federal cap-and-trade legislation.
He tried to defuse criticisms over his inelegant, stammering speech patterns, which were on display throughout the debate.
“I’m not the most eloquent speaker, but like Harry Truman, I tell the truth and work hard to get things done,” Deeds said.
The Democratic nominee has made McDonnell’s 20-year-old master’s thesis, which contains criticisms of gays, working women and “fornicators,” a centerpiece of his campaign. During the debate, he suggested that McDonnell favored wage discrimination against women, a charge McDonnell responded to as evidence of Deeds’ “backwards looking, negative campaigning.”
Virginia Democratic leaders, including Gov. Tim Kaine, have advised Deeds to begin making the case for himself, suggesting the attack strategy isn’t enough to carry him to victory on Election Day.
McDonnell continued to press his attack on taxes, accusing Deeds of having no transportation plan other than an increase in gasoline taxes.
The race is a rematch of the 2005 attorney general’s contest, in which McDonnell bested Deeds by only several hundred votes. While recent polls give the Republican a comfortable lead, “conditions change in Virginia politics pretty rapidly,” said Bob Gibson, executive director of the University of Virginia’s Sorensen Institute.
“Deeds and McDonnell are about as far apart as they were four years ago at this point in the race, and that was a 360-vote race,” he said. “Everybody looks at polls and thinks they are determinative and predictive, and they are neither.”
