Stories by Chad Dotson
Posted at 5:13pm on Dec. 24, 2006 2008: Obama is in
He's no Dennis Kucinich!
By Chad Dotson
Okay, this will surprise no one, but since Mark is talking about Mitt Romney, I thought I'd mention this. Robert Novak reports today that Illinois Sen. Barack Obama is in the 2008 race for President on the Democratic side:
Contrary to reports that Barack Obama is still trying to make up his mind on seeking the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination, sources close to the first-term senator say he is unequivocally committed to making the race.
The word has spread through political circles that Obama's wife, Michelle, is resisting the campaign out of fear for her husband's physical safety as an African-American candidate for president. But an Obama insider dismissed that as a problem. ''We took care of that last summer,'' he told this column.
The most interesting portion of the Novak piece, however, is below the fold.
Read on...
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Posted at 1:20am on Dec. 15, 2006 Opposition research...on bloggers?
Wonder if they know about my Cincinnati Reds obsession?
By Chad Dotson
There has been a bit of a kerfuffle (love that word) lately about reports that Virginia Senator-elect Jim Webb's campaign compiled huge opposition research files on a number of Virginia bloggers. Shaun Kenney has the story, and William Beutler has more here. The plan appears to have been to keep some ammunition on hand to smear bloggers who might dare print something damaging about Webb.
Read on...
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Posted at 12:21pm on Dec. 9, 2006 Insiders pick Clinton and McCain for 2008
National Journal poll: take it with a shaker of salt
By Chad Dotson
As you probably know, National Journal publishes an occasional poll of D.C. "insiders." The results are in:
National Journal's latest survey of Democratic and Republican Insiders [PDF] -- members of Congress, party activists, fundraisers, consultants, lobbyists, and interest-group leaders for whom presidential politics is an "all-engrossing topic" -- finds that Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton and Republican John McCain continue to be viewed as the candidates most likely to clinch the major parties' 2008 presidential nominations.
You can look at all the results here (it's a PDF file).
I admit that I'm a sucker for this type of poll, but let's acknowledge the limited value of this exercise. One year ago, Sen. George Allen was picked by the "insiders" as the probably GOP nominee. On the Dem side, Mark Warner was listed in second place. Now, however, Allen and Warner are nowhere to be found.
So, let's hear it: who are your picks for the 2008 nominees?
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Posted at 1:53am on Nov. 29, 2006 Virginia: not blue yet
Another postscript to Allen-Webb
By Chad Dotson
A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned that the Washington Post's analysis of the George Allen/Jim Webb Senate race in Virginia was faulty, and that Virginia wasn't quite blue just yet. More specifically, I continue to maintain that the influence of Northern Virginia -- below the Beltway -- on Commonwealth politics has been vastly overstated.
On this point, I noticed this post by an pseudonymous contributor at the "Not Larry Sabato" blog. The post compares the Allen/Webb contest to 2005's campaign for Virginia's Lieutenant Governor, in which Republican Bill Bolling narrowly edged Democrat Leslie Byrne. Read the entire post for all the analysis, but this point captured my attention:
Going forward; the Dems cannot count on a “Macaca” comment from every GOP statewide office seeker in the future, nor can they expect to consistently get candidates who have the same military credentials as Webb....
To a lesser extent, it also proves NOVA isn’t big enough yet to single-handedly control state politics. Only campaigning in NOVA will not deliver a victory unless you have other benefits going for you (a mistake by your opponent, ability to make inroads in a group of voters, bad GOP environment, etc). Even with all the other factors, had Allen been able to stay even with Bolling in the 3rd CD; he would still be a Senator.
Read on...
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Posted at 5:11pm on Nov. 11, 2006 The Washington Post gets it wrong
A postscript to the Allen-Webb campaign in Virginia
By Chad Dotson
With all the intrigue following the extremely close US Senate race in Virginia, I didn't want this article by Robert Barnes in the Washington Post to escape our attention. Now that George Allen has conceded that race to Jim Webb, Republicans in Virginia and elsewhere are trying to figure out what happened. The analysis provided by the WashPost is, frankly, shallow and misses the mark.
Barnes suggests that changing demographics in Northern Virginia is what did in George Allen. Well, NoVa certainly didn't help the Allen campaign, but there were other, more important factors.
Read on...
Posted in 2006 — Comments (137)/ Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 11:49pm on Oct. 10, 2006 Sen. Allen and this Stock Option Nonsense
Blowing smoke and pretending there's fire
By Chad Dotson
You may have been following the story about Virginia Senator George Allen and absurd allegations about some stock options. As the AP summarizes:
For the past five years, Sen. George Allen, has failed to tell Congress about stock options he got for his work as a director of a high-tech company. The Virginia Republican also asked the Army to help another business that gave him similar options.
Ummmm...except that's not even close to what happened. As The A-Team puts it, the AP writers pushing this story are either sloppy or lazy. Or both.
Jon Henke has done a very effective job of rebutting these charges here and here. I won't go into the detail that Jon has, but I do encourage you to go read his posts.
The short version, however, is this:
Read on...
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Posted at 12:32am on Sep. 29, 2006 Jim Webb's Very Bad Day
A very bad day indeed.
By Chad Dotson
More on this ad in a moment....
I missed most of the fun today, as I had more important things to attend to (namely, I was in court all day), but you can't escape the fact that Virginia's Democratic candidate for US Senate, Jim Webb, had a very bad day on Thursday. If you haven't seen this WaPo story by now (buried in the Metro section, rather than on the front page, where the WaPo always finds room for negative stories about Allen), go check it out:
Cragg, 67, who lives in Fairfax County, said on Wednesday that Webb described taking drives through the black neighborhood of Watts, where he and members of his ROTC unit used racial epithets and pointed fake guns at blacks to scare them.
"They would hop into their cars, and would go down to Watts with these buddies of his," Cragg said Webb told him. "They would take the rifles down there. They would call them [epithets], point the rifles at them, pull the triggers and then drive off laughing. One night, some guys caught them and beat . . . them. And that was the end of that."
Read on...
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Posted at 6:39am on Sep. 14, 2006 Jim Webb on women
By Chad Dotson
We've already told you what female graduates of the US Naval Academy had to say about Jim Webb's neanderthal views that created a "pervasive air of sexual discrimination at Annapolis in the early 1980s."
Well, now let's look at Jim Webb, the Democratic candidate for US Senate in Virginia, in his own words:
“And I have never met a woman, including the dozens of female midshipmen I encountered during my recent semester as a professor at the Naval Academy, whom I would trust to provide those men with combat leadership.” (pg. 148, “Women Can’t Fight,” Washingtonian Magazine, November 1979)
“Many women appear to be having problems with their sexuality…What kind of woman would seek out the Academy routine?” (pg. 282, “Women Can’t Fight,” Washingtonian Magazine, November 1979)
Read on for more...
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Posted at 12:51am on Sep. 8, 2006 Democrat's campaign staff promotes "Monkey Fest" stunt at ethnic rally
By Chad Dotson
I'm almost speechless. Almost.
James Webb, the (somewhat amateurish) Democratic candidate for US Senate in Virginia, has recently taken a bit of heat because of the over-the-top antics of a couple of his paid campaign staffers. Since their candidate has given them so little to discuss (Webb has no money, and even the Washington Post has acknowledged the fact that Webb is a disaster on the campaign trail), Webb's paid staffers have decided to resort to racially offensive nonsense like this.
Here's the scenario: this weekend, at Edison High School in Alexandria, Virginia, an "Ethnic Rally" is taking place. As shown in the above link, Webb's people are planning to crash the event. What's worse, they're calling it "Monkey Fest" and planning racially offensive stunts that are unthinkable in the context of a race for US Senate in 2006.
This site, "Raising Kaine," is operated by two paid members of Webb's campaign staff, Lowell Feld and Josh Chernila. Chernila is responsible for promoting this "Monkey Fest" post, and Feld commented that a Republican ethnic rally would include ethnic groups such as "white, caucasion, anglo, saxon" etc.
As you will see below, this has touched a nerve with the minority groups who are actually putting the rally together. As Jon says: "That — 'Monkey fest' and white exclusivity — is what Webb campaign staffers have to say about the ethnic rally being put on by Virginia minority groups. "
On Thursday, the folks who are organizing the rally sent the following letter to James Webb:
Read on...
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Posted at 7:15am on Aug. 17, 2006 The manufactured controversy
By Chad Dotson
Cross-posted from Commonwealth Conservative.
What a complete joke. Need more evidence of the hysteria of the left, their willing accomplices in the MSM, and why we must continue to fight this nonsense? Take a look at this roundup, followed by my thoughts on the entire incident (as someone who actually attended the Allen event in question):
RCP on "The Phony Racial Incident":
Watch the video for yourself. It is pretty clear, at least to me, that Allen is good naturedly ribbing a guy who is following him around and harassing him. The reason for him being singled out is not because the Webb volunteer, is non-white, but rather because the guy is following Allen around, unwanted, trying to catch him on film in an embarrassing incident.
Do you honestly mean to tell me that if Sidarth was just there all alone, among a hundred people Allen would have singled him out because of his ethnicity? Gimme a break. The guy was singled out because he is there unwanted, filming.
Read on...