Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, November 4, 1993 TAG: 9401150010
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A13 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Ray L. Garland
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
And George Allen had coattails, lifting Republican challengers into contention against several senior Democrats in the House of Delegates. Republicans gained six seats, bringing their total in the 100-member House to 47 - their high this century. The state Senate, now divided between 22 Democrats and 18 Republicans, wasn't on the ballot this year.
The Virginia result, added to GOP victories in the New Jersey governor's race and the mayoral election in New York, made it a very good night for Republicans. They have now won all the high-profile races since President Clinton came into office.
It is tempting in retrospect to say Terry never really had a chance. My first column assessing the campaign, dated June 15, was entitled "How Allen Can Win." That was when the respected Mason-Dixon poll showed him 18 points down. But it took a candidate of exceptional energy, courage and determination to take the hand Allen was dealt in June and turn it into a landslide.
While it would be excessive to claim that Allen has saved the Republican Party of Virginia, after three consecutive Democratic sweeps it clearly owes him an enormous debt. The GOP will be energized and optimistic going into next year's congressional elections, and looking toward the '95 midterm contests for all 140 seats in the General Assembly.
People who make it their business to follow politics - Democrats and Republicans alike - will appreciate the steadiness with which Allen confronted the prophets of doom (and his own almost nonexistent bank balance) in the beginning. But perhaps most of all, they will respect the helping hand he offered fellow Republicans once the polls turned in his favor.
The greatest testament to Allen's political cool can be found in the way he dealt with Mike Farris, seen by many as the albatross that would sink the whole ticket. While I'm sure the Farris campaign has its complaints, Allen never cut the ground from under them and ended by clasping Farris to his bosom. Not every frontrunner is so generous.
Sen. John Warner made the mistake of his political life in miscalculating the electoral mood and distancing himself from this ticket. His disdain of Farris will not soon nor easily be forgiven, which is too bad. In his steadfast opposition to Clintonism, Warner had regained much of the esteem he had lost among conservatives by appearing too cozy with Senate Democrats. He was warmly received at the GOP's Richmond convention, where Farris supporters packed the halls.
The target of one of the most vicious campaigns of demagogic exaggeration ever seen in Virginia, Farris gave an exceptionally good account of himself. In fact, by energizing voters who may not have been all that interested, he may have proved more of a help than a hindrance. Let it not be forgotten, Farris outpolled Terry while spending perhaps a sixth as much money.
By refusing to blow his cool in the face of relentless assault, Farris has in a real sense legitimized the role of religious conservatives in state politics and is likely to be heard from soon again. With his brood of children and wholesome countenance, Farris was the perfect candidate to raise the seldom-asked question, "What's so wrong with standing against some of the besetting sins of this society, such as wholesale abortion and a 30 percent rate of illegitimate births?"
For years, people will shake their heads at the tale of the colossal wreck of the good ship Mary Sue. If there ever was a campaign that fell between two stools, this was it. She started by waving her fat bank accounts and lists of well-connected sponsors under the noses of the media. And this at a time when people were supposedly in revolt against big-money, special-interest politics. She was then at pains to distance herself from the leaders of her own party, President Clinton and Gov. Douglas Wilder - and from such dependable constituencies as the AFL-CIO and government employees.
That was compounded by gestures of approval for the austerity measures imposed by Wilder, and a frank admission that she expected to continue same. In sum, she would be the fiscal conservative offering no hope to those who see tax-and-spend as their bread-and-butter. Then, in an abrupt reversal, she ended the campaign on a note of shrill liberalism that wouldn't have been out of place in San Francisco, but which had never been seriously tried in Virginia.
In the context of a candidate oppressed by an unholy trinity of albatrosses in Clinton, Robb and Wilder, but fearing to commit herself to genuinely "progressive" policies, the five-day waiting period for handguns was doubtless seen as a godsend. Here was a popular nostrum requiring no state appropriation that would make her seem bold into the bargain. But polling is an art. Those against gun control may be a minority, but perhaps a minority that makes this issue its main criterion in voting.
We might measure the effect by looking at the vote in such traditional Democratic strongholds as Lee, Wise, Dickenson, Buchanan and Tazewell counties, where Terry was overpowered. She even lost her native Patrick County!
If Terry rises from the ashes of this incredible disaster to fight another day it will be a miracle. But it isn't too early to discern in George Allen's remarkable advance a future leader of considerable promise and possibility.
\ Ray L. Garland is a Roanoke Times & World-News columnist.
by CNB