As this blog has noted before, despite a long tradition in Virginia that attorney generals resign from office when they run for governor to (i) avoid appearances of conflicts of interest, (ii) avoid politicizing decisions, and (iii) avoid the use of state employees as campaign workers. It has been a common sense approach for decades. But like in so many other things Ken "Kookinelli" Cuccinelli believes that he is above the law, U. S. Supreme Court rulings, etc. Consequently, Cuccinelli has refused to resign and appears to be shamelessly using employees on the state payroll to work his campaign. Today, the Virginian Pilot's main editorial demands that Cuccinelli step down. Here are highlights:
Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli wants to be governor. He wants to promote his new book. He wants to be in the national spotlight. And he wants to hold onto his job as attorney general.
But Cuccinelli has demonstrated that he cannot do all those things simultaneously, at least not well. The full-time endeavor that should be his priority has increasingly devolved into a perfunctory task, a platform facilitating an ambitious politician's quest to achieve more glamorous goals.
The immediate and proper solution is obvious: Cuccinelli should resign as attorney general. That decision would be best for his office and for the 8 million Virginians who need an attorney general capable of devoting full energy and attention to the job.
The attorney general, naturally, has rejected such suggestions. He has cast himself as the victim of a political Catch-22, where his critics would chastise him for quitting because he failed to serve his full term, as he promised, and for staying because he didn't honor Virginia's tradition of attorneys general resigning to campaign for higher office. He should be less concerned with political fallout and more concerned with doing the right thing, as his recent predecessors all have done.
Bob McDonnell, who resigned as attorney general in 2009 to run for governor, offered this assessment then: "The office is a very difficult job. It demands a full-time attorney general to do the hard work that's required."
Cuccinelli needs no help in drawing criticism or ridicule. His performance in that regard has been unparalleled, thanks to a style of public service that favors antagonism and uncompromising dogma. The list is lengthy, but highlights include:
** Interpreting a bill providing for new architectural regulations solely for abortion clinics, and bullying an independent board into agreement with him.
** Wasting taxpayer dollars on losing battles against federal health care reform and the University of Virginia, which had a professor whose climate research failed to comport with Cuccinelli's predetermined conclusion.
** Defending a Virginia sodomy statute that, due to a U.S. Supreme Court decision a decade ago, is hopelessly unconstitutional and in need of revision.
Cuccinelli's penchant for drawing attention to himself and pandering to supporters is matched only by his inability to see when his own financial interests undermine the credibility of the office he leads. That lack of awareness became apparent three years ago, when he dragged his feet on campaign donations from an official of a fraudulent charity, the U.S. Navy Veterans Association. That official had given Cuccinelli more than $50,000. Although the charity operated in Virginia, Cuccinelli deferred to officials in Ohio to investigate and pursue charges.
Until Friday, Cuccinelli's office was defending the state against a tax-assessment lawsuit filed by a company in which Cuccinelli holds a financial interest greater than $10,000. He has received thousands more in gifts from the company's owner.
Cuccinelli's blindness to such conflicts is problematic for any candidate, but devastating to confidence in the office of the attorney general. That distrust is magnified when the officeholder is as preoccupied with distractions as Cuccinelli has been. Which underscores why he must go.
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