In Which I Agree With Tom Davis...

While I tend not to agree with Tom Davis, he understands Virginia politics very well, and his analysis of last week's primary was spot on. When asked by Politico what the most important election result was, and what we can learn, Davis made the point that the establishment is in trouble and even pointed to Virginia as an example of this.

"It's a political revolt out there. Jane Harman's numbers were down. Gary Miller's under 50 percent. Even the establishment Republicans in Virginia who run, they had multiple candidates against them and they were well under 50."

In VA-2, VA-5, and VA-11 there were very clear establishment candidates in Scott Rigell, Robert Hurt, and Pat Herrity. Scott, had the full backing of Bob McDonnell and Bill Bolling, Robert Hurt had the support of most Republican officials because of his electability as opposed to his positions, and Herrity had the support of almost every party leader and elected official in the 11th district including Becky Stoeckel and Anthony Bedell. With all this support all three of these candidates failed to top 50% of the vote, and in probably the biggest surprise of the night, Herrity lost to Fimian by double digits. The only reason the establishment won in the 2nd and 5th is that the opposition was very disorganized and self centered and split the vote at least 5 ways in each race. When you combine these results with Howie Lind and Bill Stanley's victories in the 10th and 5th District Chair races, combined with victories in a number of unit chair races, this has to be a discouraging year for the establishment in VA. When the grassroots organizes and works together it can win any race. As a result we now have a much stronger party as we work together to win every congressional district in the state this fall.