Tom Davis Is Really Gone
By streiff Posted in 2008 | dipsticks | republican main street partnership | RINOs | tom davis — Comments (13) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
Virginia's Tom Davis, after hinting at it last week, has virtually made it official. He will not run for the senate seat of the retiring John Warner. His reason, according to the Washington Post, is that he doesn't like the Republican party so much.
Yawn.
Read on.
Rep. Thomas M. Davis III will not make a run for the U.S. Senate next year, in part because of what he sees as the Republican Party's increasingly narrow focus on candidates who pass conservative litmus tests on taxes and abortion, several people close to his office said yesterday.
[...]
Still, others close to Davis -- who spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak on his behalf -- said the seven-term congressman was deeply disappointed by the Republican State Central Committee's decision this month to choose a convention over a primary to nominate the GOP Senate candidate in the spring. They also said he is angry about how his party selects candidates.
Because conventions tend to draw more conservatives, the decision probably gives an advantage to former governor James S. Gilmore III, who is viewed as more conservative than Davis. But the choice of the convention also met with widespread scorn among moderate Republicans and Democrats, who predicted a Gilmore defeat against Democrat Mark R. Warner, the popular former governor who has declared his plans to run.
And there is the problem.
Davis knows he can't win in a convention where actual Republicans will be present and vote. The reason he can't win in a convention is that he really doesn't believe in hardly anything in the national Republican platform and he doesn't much care for Republicans anyway. This sort of begs the question of why he wants to hold elective office as a Republican. Other than rank opportunism, of course.
Back in 2006, when Tom Davis and Mark Foley headed the Republican Main Street Partnership they spared no effort in denigrating conservatives within the Republican party. In 2006, when the RMSP was decimated at the polls they continued to blame conservatives, not noticing that conservatives didn't get hurt that badly at the polls. Now Davis is blaming conservatives again.
As I said in my coverage of John McCain receiving the Chafee Award from the RMSP, I don't have a problem with a big tent. I just don't want said tent to be filled with people who devote an inordinate amount of time flinging monkey poo at other people in the tent.
So I, for one, am overjoyed at Davis's decision. Though his absence puts Warner's senate seat into play in a major way, the last thing we need in the Senate is another Linc Chafee or Olympia Snowe or Susan Collins who can't even be bothered to help their caucus on tough votes. That is what Tom Davis would be.
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Tom Davis Is Really Gone 13 Comments (0 topical, 13 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
"Where are the hard right members in D +1 or R +2 districts?"
What about Tim Walberg? What about Rick Santorum I know that he lost in 2006, but prior to 2006 he was elected, and then reelected as a Senator in PA.
...a long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appearance of being right...
---Thomas Paine---
"RMSP members are generally in the most marginally R districts. Put an RMSP member in a solid R district and they wouldn't lose either."
Put an RMSP member in a solid R district, and there's a pretty good chance they'd never even win the primary.
Crapping on the party should help Davis get re-elected in a tough House district.
But good riddance to him as a Senate candidate.
"No compromise with the main purpose, no peace till victory, no pact with unrepentant wrong." - Winston Churchill
Is he planning to run for re-election? I recall reading something less than a week ago indicating that he was undecided. Dems will give him a tough race in 2008.
... but I draw the line at taxes. If you cannot be a Republican on either social or fiscal issues, why the hell should I care whether you're in office or not?
I'm no fan of Davis, but to me the way the VA GOP is picking their senate candidate is wrong. What's wrong with a primary (only for registered GOP's if you don't want independents) to pick who will run?
We don't register by party in Virginia. The only way to keep Democrats out is to have a convention.
Why not let party activists decide on who the nominee is going to be? Virginia Republican conventions are some of the largest political conventions in the world. I think sometimes there are more than 5,000 delegates who attend.
I have been trying to figure out why Tom Davis is a Republican for years. He is a liberal on spending, taxes, guns, abortion, etc. I'm glad he is not going to be the GOP Senate nominee.
Sure it has, but I disagree on his reasons. It's as simple as the fact that the GOP learned to love the feeding trough as much, if not more, than liberal Democrats.
You are vastly overstating what he's saying. He's criticizing Republican tendencies to create a circular firing squad for people on our own team, which is stupid, and is exactly what you are doing here.
I'm glad Davis isn't running, because he'd lost to Warner anyway and we need him to keep his house seat. That said, I don't think we should attack him, he's a decent enough guy for his seat.
Jindal/Palin '16
Gilmore is a loser, and I'm sure the VAGOP understands this. Pace could now take the convention easier, if he does decide to run.
Tom Davis is another RINO who would have tried to replace the current one in office.
I say to Tom Davis "Don't let the door hit you where the good Lord split you".
"In 2006, when the RMSP was decimated at the polls they continued to blame conservatives, not noticing that conservatives didn't get hurt that badly at the polls."
RMSP members are generally in the most marginally R districts. Put an RMSP member in a solid R district and they wouldn't lose either.
Where are the hard right members in D +1 or R +2 districts?
And yes it is very possible that moderate Rs lose if the party moves to far to the right. That's about to knock off Sununu and possibly Coleman and Smith.
This happens in the other direction. Can Pelosi liberalism hurt Ds in moderate districts? Sure. Daschle and Reid are both nominally pro-life, but they are both going to lose their seats b/c their party is moving to the left.
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