Then came the crash. If the Old Dominion’s donkeys thought that 2008 represented a fundamental realignment of Virginia’s voting pattern, the Republicans disabused them of that notion with a convincing sweep of statewide offices in 2009. And, while the Democrats managed a minor rebound (what Wall Street wits call a “dead cat bounce”) in early 2010 by capturing Ken Cuccinelli’s recently vacated state senate seat, the trajectory of their political stock since then has been straight downhill.
In fact, after the brutal drubbing that Dems took in the mid-term elections, the giddy gains of 2008 seemed so distant it was hard to believe they happened at all—kind of like when AOL bought Time-Warner.
Whereas two years ago the typical citizen-activist was seemingly represented by Brian Bills—the earnest young brainiac who founded the Charlottesville High School’s Young Liberals group before he was old enough to vote and acted as a special assistant to Tom Perriello during his first campaign—that mantle seems to have been handed off to folks like Donna Holt. A Ron Paul supporter and Executive Director of the far-right Virginia Campaign for Liberty, Holt spends her time traveling the Commonwealth and decrying the threatening enviro-facism of “Agenda 21,” which she describes as “the United Nations blueprint for the complete restructuring of nations and local communities to fit into a proper mold for global governance…It’s an all-encompassing plan to rule from an all-powerful central government.”
But if that’s the case, then how to explain the recent survey by Public Policy Polling that showed President Obama besting his most likely 2012 Republican opponents in Virginia (Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee, Newt Gingrich and Sarah Palin) by anywhere from five to 11 percentage points? Or the one that showed Jim Webb beating George Allen by four points in a senatorial rematch?
Really, what is up with you people? Would it be too much for you to pick one political philosophy and stick with it for longer than a week? You really need to decide: Do you want to disband the federal government and move into the hills to fight the U.N.’s blue-helmeted “sustainable development” shock troops? Or are you finally ready to accept the benevolent socialist dictatorship of your new Kenyan-American overlord Barack Obama?
To be honest, whatever you choose is fine with us, since we’re going to continue to make fun of you from our deep underground bunker regardless. But, please, for God’s sake, stop it with the schizophrenic political posturing already. If we have to endure one more inexplicable electoral backflip, we’re going to seriously consider the implementation of Agenda 22.
And no, we won’t tell you what that entails. But trust us: Unless you want to see all of Virginia’s polling precincts replaced with petting zoos, you’ll do exactly as we say.