Via Michael Sluss we learn that Democratic Sen. Mark Herring has decided to run for his party’s Attorney General nomination next year. Mr. Herring, though, is laboring under the assumption that his opponent in that contest will be the current incumbent, Ken Cuccinelli (who, as we all know, is seeking the GOP gubernatorial nomination in 2013). Sluss quotes the good Senator’s announcement at length. But here’s a taste:
“Over the last three years, we’ve watched Attorney General Cuccinelli pursue an ideological crusade that is out of step with the mainstream. Time after time, the Attorney General has abused the powers of his office and twisted the law to advance his personal political agenda, which has been costly to taxpayers and costly to the credibility of the office. It’s hurt Virginians and damaged our state’s reputation.
“It’s time to get politics out of the Attorney General’s office and return its focus to doing what’s right for the people of Virginia.
There’s more at the link, but you get the idea on Herring’s strategy: run against the bogeyman, because it does the base good.
It also diverts attention from his time in the Senate. It will be enjoyable listening to Mr Herring explain how he intends to restore Virginia’s reputation after the colossal snit Senate Democrats threw this year over power sharing (remember that? They nearly sank the state budget over their desire for a few chairman’s titles and gavels). Of greater interest to me will be how he explains his vote against the property rights amendment that will appear on this November’s ballot.
Republicans Rob Bell and Mark Obenshain (both of whom are seeking the Republican nomination for AG) sponsored their chamber’s respective versions of the amendment. But Herring hung with (most) of his fellow Democrats in opposition. He voted for the amendment in its first, constitutionally required, session.
But that was also an election year, and most of the Senate’s Democrats voted for the measure the first time so as to avoid uncomfortable questions about why they would favor property condemnors over property owners.
So we can lump Herring into “camp expediency,” which is a well populated place in election years. Or we can put him in “camp condemnor,” where he pitched his tent when the vote mattered most.
He’ll have a year to tell us which abode he prefers. And should the property rights amendment pass in November, he will also be able to use that time to explain to the people he so desperately wants to protect from Ken Cuccinelli (the amendment’s godfather) and other gargoyles why he thinks they were full of it.
