Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, September 15, 1993                   TAG: 9309150226
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C4   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: DWAYNE YANCEY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

DOLAN CALLS FOR FOE'S PHONE LOG

So down 12 points - the widest gap in the three statewide races - in the latest poll, Dolan has adopted a new, more aggressive tone against Jim Gilmore, his Republican opponent.

In talks to supporters during a two-day swing through Roanoke this week, Dolan began painting Gilmore as "part of an extremist right-wing movement," namely the religious right.

Tuesday, Dolan zeroed in with a more specific charge, suggesting that Gilmore, the Henrico County commonwealth's attorney, may have rung up campaign-related phone calls at taxpayer expense.

Dolan's evidence: A recent fund-raising letter that Gilmore sent out in which the Republican urges supporters to call him either at his campaign headquarters, or at the commonwealth's attorney's office.

To dramatize his point, Dolan toted enlarged copies of Gilmore's fund-raising letter onto the stage Tuesday during the taping of an interview show on Roanoke public television station WBRA-TV.

"If Jim Gilmore is running his campaign out of his office as commonwealth's attorney, that's wrong," Dolan said as he pointed out the offending passage of the letter.

He called on Gilmore to release his office's phone records "to prove whether or not his campaign is being underwritten by . . . tax dollars."

Gilmore said that wasn't necessary. "I don't charge any long-distance campaign calls to my office," he said. "I have a campaign credit card." He accused Dolan of simply trying to divert attention from Dolan's lack of experience as a prosecutor.

Whatever the merits of the charge, Virginia Tech political analyst Bob Denton - the host of the program where Dolan made his charges - said Dolan's aggressiveness was long overdue.

"He is somewhat measured, he doesn't polarize as quickly as Gilmore does," Denton said. "From the standpoint of getting free [publicity], Gilmore is better. Dolan is almost too reasoned and low-key at this point. He needs to find some real wedge issues."

For his part, Dolan disputed a recent Richmond Times-Dispatch poll that showed Gilmore leading 37 percent to 25 percent. But Dolan admitted he's having a hard time countering Gilmore's tough anti-crime message with one of his own.

Gilmore focuses almost exclusively on his role as a prosecutor; Dolan has tried to play up what he says is his more diverse experience in private practice, including a stint as president of the Virginia State Bar.

"We're trying to get across the breadth of the office, and we're not doing a very good job of it," Dolan said. "When you say, `It's the chief legal officer for the state,' " voters don't understand. "I try to explain the attorney general is not the commonwealth's attorney for the commonwealth. It's not a prosecutorial position. The only exceptions are for consumer protection and antitrust."

Keywords:
POLITICS