Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, May 7, 1993 TAG: 9305070609
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Where are the bangs, bells and whistles? Where are the "history in the making" stories?
Former Attorney General Mary Sue Terry is about to become the first woman nominated for governor in Virginia and nobody (save, presumably, Terry) is giving much of a hoot.
In at least one respect, the lack of ballyhoopla is a good thing. That Terry's nomination is taken for granted symbolizes how many barriers have come down for women in Virginia. Not so long ago, the prospect that a female might be elected governor was practically inconceivable.
The less pleasant view is that political stupor may be stemming, too, from an assumption about the Virginia GOP: that it is about to nominate a statewide ticket so far right of center as to render a fourth-in-a-row Democratic sweep inevitable.
Does that possibility, as much as Wilder's threats to challenge fellow Democrat Chuck Robb for his U.S. Senate seat, explain why political interest and speculation seems already to have moved beyond 1993 to 1994?
This is passing strange in Virginia where, by long tradition, gubernatorial races are the political Super Bowls eclipsing all other elections.
To be sure, U.S. Senate races deserve more attention than they're normally afforded in this state. (In large part, blame the parties. When they cede Senate elections - as Democrats did by giving Republican John Warner a free ride in 1990; as Republicans did by wimping out with a token opponent for Robb in '88 - it's natural that Senate elections would attract less than a groundswell of excitement.)
And what with the potential Robb-Wilder Armageddon, and Republicans indulging their suicidal streak by cozying up to Ollie North, next year's Senate election could prove a doozy.
Still, the important business at hand is the election of an attorney general, a lieutenant governor and, most especially, the governor who will lead Virginia for the next four years. Terry may well be that governor, but Democrats would do well not to be lullabied to sleep on that assumption.
Virginia Republicans might still give them a wake-up call by producing, at their June convention, a slate not stillborn in their far-right wing.
Keywords:
POLITICS
by CNB