3 for Senate on the stump
Politicians show up for shad planking
BY CHELYEN DAVIS
Date published: 4/17/2008
BY CHELYEN DAVIS
WAKEFIELD-- With a background of beer, Porta-Potties and pine trees, the three candidates in the U.S. Senate race traded jokes and, from one of them, more serious barbs at the annual Shad Planking.
Former governors Mark Warner, a Democrat, and Jim Gilmore, a Republican, along with Del. Bob Marshall are all running for the Senate seat being vacated by retiring Sen. John Warner.
The Shad Planking, an annual political event held in a stand of trees in rural Wakefield, is the first time the three have shared a stage in a race that promises to be a brawl. Warner followed Gilmore into the governor's mansion, and the two have bitterly disagreed over the state's finances and solutions to them (among other things) ever since.
Warner, the only Democrat running for the seat, talked about bipartisan cooperation, vowing to create a "radical centrist" group of 10-12 senators from both parties if he's elected.
"That's the only way we're going to get the transformative change our country needs," Warner said. "If there's one thing I learned as governor, you have to be bipartisan and accept the good ideas from both sides of the aisle. And if we're going to get our country back on the right track, it's going to take that kind of bipartisan approach to get things done."
While Warner and Marshall both peppered their talks with jokes, Gilmore made a serious speech focused almost entirely on Warner, not mentioning his primary opponent Marshall.
Gilmore accused Warner of breaking promises not to raise taxes as governor, and repeatedly tied Warner to the two Democratic presidential candidates, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. He said the Democrats want to raise taxes, retreat from the war in Iraq, support universal health care and oppose drilling for oil in Alaska.
"This is a race that makes a difference, and if we want to honor John Warner we're not going to turn over the seat to a member of the opposite party," Gilmore said.
Warner had given his speech before Gilmore, but told reporters afterwards that Gilmore's assertions on his positions were false: Warner said he doesn't support naming a specific date to leave Iraq, for instance.
"I don't know if he's making it up or he just doesn't have appropriate research," Warner said, adding that he's "not surprised by the tenor of Mr. Gilmore's comments."
Gilmore linked himself to Republican presidential candidate John McCain; even his campaign signs had McCain's name on them, as a McCain-Gilmore ticket, although Gilmore hasn't yet won the nomination over Marshall. Republicans will gather in Richmond at the end of May to nominate a candidate.
Marshall said Gilmore and Warner "represent two different sides of the political establishment.
"They're just going to take us over the cliff at different rates," he told reporters before the speeches.
Marshall is running to the right of Gilmore, saying the former governor isn't pro-life enough, and in his speech he talked of his own efforts to support traditional marriage and pro-life policies.
All three candidates noted the anniversary of the Virginia Tech shootings, Marshall by leading the crowd in the Lord's Prayer.
Chelyen Davis: 804/782-9362
Email: cdavis@freelancestar.com
Date published: 4/17/2008
Most recent reader comments:
Marshall and Gilmore should raise money for charity...
(posted by
Chiswald
, Apr. 17, 2008 11:13 am)
instead of their own dead end campaigns. Old Virginny is a changin', but these two dinosaurs sure aren't!
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