Cuccinelli is Losing the Money and Conflicts of Interst Races

Another good review of the state of the Virginia gubernatorial race can be found in Jeff Shapiro's column in the typically pro-Republican Richmond Times-Dispatch.  It reviews the status of the current mudslinging between Cuccinelli and McAuliffe and also focuses in on two big problems for Cuccinelli: he is losing the fundraising race and the Consol Energy debacle is hurting him big time in Southwest Virginia which he must win big time to have any chance of winning in November.  Read the whole article, but here are highlights that must be causing angst the so-called Republican establishment which opposed Cuccinelli's nomination in the first place:

• Cuccinelli is losing the money race — badly.

Fundraising is a referendum on candidates. With McAuliffe way ahead in cash, even more could flow his way because donors gravitate to perceived winners. McAuliffe has raised more than $12.6 million; Cuccinelli, nearly $8.9 million. McAuliffe has on hand $6 million; Cuccinelli, $2.6 million.

• Geopolitics are skewed by issues and personalities, possibly exaggerating McAuliffe’s advantages and diminishing Cuccinelli’s.

Northern Virginia is heavily Democratic. Because it is next door to Washington, national and local politics are one and the same. McAuliffe is relying on this to boost turnout, especially in the outer suburbs of Loudoun and Prince William counties.

It may not be hard because it’s easy for Democrats to vote against Cuccinelli. Cuccinelli, by his own hand and the national media, has been reduced to caricature: a no-no-a-thousand-times-no tea partyer whose policies toward women seem misogynistic; toward immigrants, nativistic.

Cuccinelli must be competitive in the urban crescent. He has to win going away in the countryside, a Republican bulwark.

That’s a challenge in Southwest Virginia. Republicans say Cuccinelli is losing friends fast in the region because of a controversy associated with his day job as attorney general.

A federal judge expressed outrage that a lawyer in the attorney general’s office advised two large energy companies in a fight with landowners over natural gas royalties. The state’s inspector general was sufficiently alarmed, too. He’s now investigating Cuccinelli’s office.

It’s bad enough, locals say, that Cuccinelli is seen as siding with corporate big boys. Worse is his perceived conflict of interest, having taken more than $110,000 in contributions from one of the firms, Consol Energy.

And we still have 65 days to go.

My biggest concern is that Democrats will become over confident and not turn out in mass on election day.  In my view, it is important that Cuccinelli and his fellow extremists - "Bishop" E.W. Jackson and Mark Obenshain - lose in November.   But it is equally important that they lose spectacularly so that a message can be sent to the increasingly lunatic base that their candidates are toxic to the rest of America and, if the GOP seeks victories, the Christofascist and Tea Party favorites cannot be nominated.  Period.