Tag Archives: Dave Brat

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Cantor shows flashes of grace

I awoke this morning awaiting the Sunday news talk shows and figured one of the guests would be U.S. House Majority Leader (for the time being) Eric Cantor, R-Va.

What I didn’t quite anticipate was the grace that Cantor demonstrated as he answered Question No. 1 from all the talk show hosts who interviewed him: How in the world did you manage to lose that Republican Party congressional primary race this past week to someone no one believed had a chance?

http://www.politico.com/story/2014/06/2014-virginia-primary-eric-cantor-campaign-107815.html?hp=t3_3

I’ll stipulate up front that I am no fan of Cantor. I long have considered him to be a classic obstructionist who seemed more in love with the sound of his voice than he was in the doing the job he was sent to do, which is legislate on behalf of his congressional district and, yes, the rest of the country.

He lost this past Tuesday to a Randolph-Macon College economics professor, Dave Brat, who pounded Cantor mercilessly over immigration reform. Brat opposes it; Cantor supported some version of it. Brat also bloodied Cantor badly over the lawmaker’s seeming indifference to the cares and concerns of his constituents.

Thus, Brat beat Cantor in a turnout of something like 13 percent of Republicans in the 7th Congressional District of Virginia.

I didn’t hear Cantor utter a single harsh word about his opponent today. He didn’t gripe about being mischaracterized. Nor did I hear him accuse Brat of lying about his record.

Instead, I watched him take his lumps like a man and vow to stay engaged in the political process in the future, but as someone acting on the sidelines.

There’s something gratifying about watching someone demonstrate how to be a gracious loser.

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Texas GOP's madness is catching on

It now appears that the Texas Republican Party’s insanity is a communicable disease.

The madness has taken hold of the Virginia GOP, which this week booted a tea party congressional heavyweight out of office in favor of someone who’s even more in the tea party camp.

Go figure that one out.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/06/11/opinion/brazile-eric-cantor-gop/index.html?hpt=hp_bn7

Donna Brazile, a noted Democratic strategist and talking head for CNN and other media outlets, believes the tea party wing of the Republican Party can declare victory in its civil war with the establishment. The battle’s over, at least for now, says Brazile.

U.S. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor had his head handed to him by political novice David Brat. Cantor outspent Brat by a lot and still lost. Brat now is the favorite to win the House seat that Cantor occupied for seven terms.

If the tea party can knock Cantor off his feet, well, the Republican Party that many of us have grown to know and respect — at some level, at least — is a goner.

Texas Republicans met this past week and passed a party platform that includes a lot of extreme right-wing planks, one of which is to endorse something called “reparative therapy” that is supposed to persuade gay people to become, well, no longer gay.

By my way of thinking, that is a sure sign that the Texas GOP had gone around the bend.

What I guess I didn’t realize — until this week’s returns came in from Virginia — is that other state Republicans have been similarly afflicted. I had thought the tea party had talked itself out of business.

It’s ba-a-a-ck.

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Cantor loss leaves mixed feelings

Eric Cantor’s stunning loss Tuesday almost seems like a punch line in one of those “good news, bad news” gags.

You walk up to a Democrat and say, “Hey, I’ve got some good news and some bad news. What’s the good news? Well, the good news is that Eric Cantor was defeated in the Republican Party primary race for Congress; that means he won’t be around much longer to obstruct legislation at every turn.

“The bad news is that the guy who beat him will be even more of an obstructionist.”

That’s how I’m feeling just a few hours after Cantor got drummed out of office by a college professor, Dave Brat, who was running for political office for the very first time — and who got outspent a zillion-to-one by the well-heeled incumbent.

Cantor’s never been my favorite member of Congress. I always thought the tea party wing of the GOP loved the guy. Didn’t he boast about being one of them? Wasn’t he proud of the votes he cast to oppose initiatives proposed by his Democratic colleagues?

Well, it turned out that immigration was the deal breaker for tea party zealots. Cantor signed on to a version of the Dream Act pushed by President Obama. That did it as far as the tea party faithful went. They would have none of that.

Dave Brat seized on it and won by 11 percentage points.

I would be glad to see Cantor go except that the guy who’s now favored to win the House seat is even more extreme than the guy he beat.

And that, I submit, is really and truly saying something.

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Cantor loss deals blow to campaign reform

The thought occurred to me this morning after I awoke from a good night’s sleep.

U.S. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s stunning loss Tuesday to tea party candidate Dave Brat in the Virginia Republican Party primary Tuesday might have dealt a serious blow to the cause of campaign finance reform.

Why? Cantor outspent his Brat by something like 25 to 1 in a losing bid to keep his congressional seat.

Cantor was the well-funded superstar within the Republican Party. He had it all: looks, brains, the “right” ideology,” a gift of gab, ambition. You name it, he had it.

He also had money. Lots of it, which he spent lavishly to hold on to his House seat.

None of it worked. Brat is a college professor who’s never run for public office at any level.

Yet he beat Cantor by 11 percentage points in a shamefully low voter-turnout primary.

What happens, then, to effort to limit campaign spending? The argument always has been that money buys votes, that it buys people’s loyalty, and that it gives deep-pocketed donors more influence than Mr. and Mrs. Average Joe in setting public policy.

Dave Brat’s stunner in Virginia has just blown the daylights out of those arguments.

Let that discussion get fired up all over again.