Oct. 23
TEXAS:
Judge grants delay in capital murder trial
State District Judge Jim D. Lovett has granted a 3-month delay in the
capital murder trial of 22-year-old Christopher Cobb, who is charged in
the August 2004 deaths of his great-grandparents.
Defense attorney Steven Miears of Bonham was notified Thursday that his
motion for a continuance had been granted.
Jury selection originally was scheduled to begin Nov. 28, the Monday after
Thanksgiving, in 6th state District Court.
Because the prosecution is seeking the death penalty, jury selection is
expected to take 2 weeks or longer, with the trial itself likely to last
more than a month.
At the time the original trial date was set, it was expected that the
trial would be the 1st major proceeding in the renovated Lamar County
Courthouse, but now the move to the new facility is not expected until
after the 1st of the year.
The current courtroom, on the third floor of the old U.S. post office that
has served as the courthouse for the past two years, is considered
inadequate for a capital murder trial. With the Cobb trial likely tying up
the courtroom for 6 weeks or more, no other felony or civil proceedings
could occur.
Officials have said the courtroom that would have to be used in a November
trial would be too small and uncomfortable for the logistics and magnitude
of a 300-person jury panel.
Also, Lovett just underwent surgery, and his recovery could jeopardize the
continuity of the trial if it is held next month.
Earlier in the year, Lovett denied motions by Miears aimed at keeping the
prosecution from using statements that Cobb made in the presence of police
last Aug. 30, the day his great-grandparents were found slain next door.
Miears argued that police investigators arrested Cobb on a felony theft
warrant for taking and pawning rings and other jewelry belonging to his
parents. Their real motive, Miears said, was to implicate him in the
murders of Charley Smith, 89, and Ruth Smith, 88, who were killed in their
home at 3715 Smallwood Road.
Further, Miears argued, the police pursued the theft warrant on their own.
Cobbs parents never at any point told police they wanted to prosecute
their son for taking the jewelry, he said.
Cobb was subsequently charged with capital murder, based partly on his
statements during questioning, including his comments to his mother over a
recorded telephone line shortly after he was booked at the Lamar County
Jail on capital murder charges.
The judge also denied Miears motion to suppress physical items seized
during the day. Police said a bag containing marijuana was found in his
room, and a plastic bag containing cocaine was found on his person.
Several articles "that had blood stains" were found in Cobbs room in his
parents house next door to the Smith residence, according to a police
report.
In another motion, Miears sought unsuccessfully to disqualify Lamar County
District Attorney Gary Young from prosecuting the case because Young
represented Cobb in his divorce.
Miears put Young on the stand and questioned him at length on what he knew
about Cobb. Miears argued that it was a conflict of interest for Young to
"seek to kill" a former client, using information he gained during his
representation of him.
Young said most of what he knew about Cobb came in discussions with Cobbs
mother. Young was appointed on a later date to represent Cobb on a
criminal case, but did little work on the case because Cobbs mother didnt
want him on the case, he told Miears.
Young said he had discussed the cases with state officials, who told him
there was no conflict of interest and no reason not to handle the
prosecution of the capital murder trial.
(source: Paris News)
***************
It's what we do, not what they do
Bill Pelke is a Vietnam veteran. For 30 years he was a crane operator at
Bethlehem Steel. His 78-year-old grandmother, Ruth - he called her Nana -
was a sweet Baptist lady who taught Bible stories to the neighborhood kids
in Gary, Ind. Solid, Midwestern salt-of-the-Earth people, the Pelkes.
One day in 1985, 4 9th-grade girls came knocking on Nana's door, asking
about Jesus. She let them in. They whacked her on the head with a vase,
stabbed her 33 times and took off with $10 and her 10-year-old car. They
drove to the arcade to play video games and left her bleeding to death on
the dining room floor.
A year later, the ringleader, 16-year-old Paula Cooper, was sentenced to
death, the youngest inmate on death row. Bill felt justice had been
served.
Then one day, while scooting his crane around in the steel mill, Bill
asked himself a question. What would Nana say about Paula's death
sentence?
"The answer is to love those who hate you, to love those who persecute you
and to love those who do all manner of evil against you. I am a Christian,
and Jesus said, 'Whosoever has no sin, cast the first stone.' Under that
criteria, none of us can cast the stone of death."
That's what Nana would have said. Bill started writing to Paula. He
visited her. He worked to get her death sentence commuted.
Paula is now serving a 60-year sentence. Bill still writes to her. He
started a group called The Journey of Hope ... from Violence to Healing,
bringing together other family members of murder victims who have found
healing in forgiveness.
People like Bud Welch, whose 23-year-old daughter, Julie Marie, was killed
in the Oklahoma City bombing. Like Marietta Jaeger-Lane, whose 7-year-old
daughter, Susie, was abducted and killed 25 years ago during a family
camping trip. And Renny Cushing, whose father, Robert, was killed by 2
shotgun blasts fired by a stranger in 1988.
But don't take it from me. The Journey of Hope is in San Antonio. Bill,
Bud, Marietta and Renny can tell you their stories themselves.
The 1st Peace Center event I attended was part of the last Texas Journey
of Hope, a lunch at Temple Beth-El, in 1998. I was skeptical. Sure, I was
ready to work for peace and justice, but why expend all that energy on
criminals? I wanted to work against war, child abuse, domestic violence,
drive-by shootings.
It took me 7 years, but I finally got it. A quote by Victor Hugo changed
my mind.
"Que dit la loi? Tu ne tueras pas! Comment le dit-elle? En tuant," he said
in 1829.
If your French is rusty, that means, "What does the law say? You will not
kill! How does it say it? By killing!"
Why do we fight pre-emptive wars to show other countries that war is
wrong? Why do we spank children to teach them that hitting is wrong? Why
do we torture people to show that torturing people is wrong?
Sen. John McCain asked this question during hearings on an amendment to
the defense appropriations bill that would establish uniform standards for
treatment of prisoners of war and other detainees.
"We fight not just to preserve our lives and liberties but also American
values," McCain said. "The enemy we fight has no respect for human life or
human rights. ... But this isn't about who they are. This is about who we
are."
It's all about who we are, not who they are. That's the common element,
the link between the death penalty and war. When we kill the killers, we
become killers ourselves. That's not who I want to be.
(source: Opinion, Susan Ives, San Antonio Express-News)
*********************
Pair's Journey of Hope opposes death penalty
Family members of murder victims spoke out Thursday against the death
penalty and what one speaker called the "widening circle of pain" created
by executions.
The pair of speakers, who have both suffered the loss of a family member
to murder, spoke at St. John's United Methodist Church during a meeting of
the Lubbock chapter of the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty.
The group offered the program as part of the Journey of Hope - an
organization led by murder victims' families who oppose the death penalty.
"Not all victims' family members want to have someone put to death," Renny
Cushing told about 2 dozen attendees Thursday night. "I know because this
is my story."
Cushing's father, Robert, was gunned down in their New Hampshire family
home some 17 years ago.
Cushing spoke along with Aba Gayle - whose daughter Catherine was stabbed
to death in California in 1980.
Although the two speakers have traveled through Texas in the past, this is
their first trip through the state with the Journey of Hope.
"It is the capital of capital punishment in the United States," Cushing
said of Texas, where currently 411 people await execution on death row.
But Cushing, a lifelong opponent of capital punishment and a former New
Hampshire lawmaker, maintains that people in this state, as well as
others, are open to the Journey's message, which promotes the healing of
victims rather than executing criminals.
"If I had changed my feelings about the death penalty," Cushing told the
group, "that would have compounded the crime because not only would they
have taken my father, they would have taken my values."
Gayle and Cushing oppose the death penalty, the act of execution and the
idea that it provides peace and healing for the victims.
"Healing is not an event," Cushing said. "It is a process."
Gayle spent 12 years coming to terms with her daughter's murder, before
forgiving her killer.
"I've discovered that being a victim is a choice," she said. "And I don't
want to be a victim anymore."
Her daughter's killer is awaiting execution in California, and Gayle does
not want his execution to tarnish her daughter's memory.
"They do it in your name," she said. "And what does that make you."
The pair will travel to San Angelo today as they continue their 17-day
speaking tour. The Journey of Hope will conduct a march against the death
penalty Oct. 29 in Austin.
source: Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, Oct. 21)
*******************
State denies parole in police officer killing
A 50-year-old man convicted of killing a Corpus Christi police officer in
September 1987 was denied parole by the state on Wednesday.
Alberto Alaniz Valdez was given the death penalty for the murder of Sgt.
Dan Bock, but his sentence was reduced last year to life in prison after
he was deemed mentally retarded.
A U.S. Supreme Court decision in 2002 ended the death penalty for the
mentally retarded.
Domingo Ibarra, president of the Corpus Christi Police Officers'
Association, said Valdez is a danger to the public and to police officers.
"We will diligently track any further hearings and we look forward to
keeping the public informed," he said.
Valdez will be eligible for parole again in 2008.
(source: Corpus Christi Caller-Times)
******************
'Dead Man Walking' author to speak at St. Mary's
Sister Helen Prejean, author of the best-selling book "Dead Man Walking,"
will headline a group of speakers against capital punishment Monday at
area colleges and universities.
Her 7 p.m. public lecture at St. Mary's University's Bill Greehey Arena is
sponsored by Journey of Hope From Violence to Healing, an organization led
by murder victims' family members who advocate alternatives to the death
penalty.
The Catholic nun renewed a national conversation on capital punishment
with her book, which was turned into a popular film starring Susan
Sarandon, and then into an opera. Last year, she published a 2nd book,
"The Death of Innocents."
Just before Prejean's lecture, Robbie Meeropol, son of executed spies
Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, will speak at a private dinner for the Journey
of Hope members.
Meeropol was 6 years old when his parents were executed in 1953 for
espionage.
They were convicted of passing atomic bomb secrets to the Soviet Union.
Journey of Hope members also will tell their personal experiences with the
death penalty from 2 to 4 p.m. Sunday at the Unity Church of San Antonio,
1723 Lawndale St., and at 11 a.m. Tuesday at VIVA Books, 8407 Broadway.
On Monday, they'll address students at St. Mary's, the University of the
Incarnate Word, Our Lady of the Lake University, the University of Texas
at San Antonio, San Antonio College, Northwest Vista College, Trinity
University and the Oblate School of Theology.
(source: San Antonio Express-News)
CALIFORNIA:
Death Penalty Unlikely in Children's Deaths
San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris has not yet decided whether
to seek the death penalty against the woman accused of throwing her three
young children into San Francisco Bay.
Lashaun Harris has a history of mental illness and UC Hastings Law School
Professor Rory Little says this is unlikely to be a death penalty case.
"It's seems to be clearly a case where you would not seek a death penalty.
There is a real question about this womans mental health, how focused at
the time of the event and overall. So theyre going to have a difficult
time even convicting her without an insanity consideration in front of the
jury and putting in a death penalty would be outside the bounds of what we
normally would see in death penalty cases," Little said.
DA Harris campaigned on a no death penalty platform and even angered some
police officers when she decided not to seek the death penalty for the man
accused of murdering police officer Isaac Espinoza.
(source: CBS News)
USA:
Hard-Living Singer Gives Voice to the Executed
Steve Earle turned 50 this year, got married for the 7th time and moved
from Nashville to New York City. It was 1 of 2 birthday presents to
himself (the move, not the marriage). The other is surfing lessons, in
Australia, at the end of this month.
All this came out in the first few minutes of a breakfast conversation
with Mr. Earle, who is a former cocaine and heroin addict with an
8th-grade education and a prison record, and who has a hard time staying
silent or still. Seven marriages is quite a few, he acknowledged, about
his wedding over the summer to Allison Moorer, a singer who opened for him
on a recent tour.
"But it's the first time I've ever been married sober," said Mr. Earle,
who looks like someone who has only lately begun to take care of himself.
He's not a slight man, but he has the thin, slightly hunched shoulders of
someone who has lost a lot of weight, which he has. He wore a black
T-shirt, saggy jeans and the antihip eyeglasses of a pharmacist or an
accountant.
If his life has the contours of a country song - eventful, teary and
redemptive - well, he is, of course, a country singer, though that's more
of a convenient, rather than adequate, description of his music. His fat
songbook resonates with the distinctive western twang of his native Texas,
but it trespasses on many genres: country ballads, Irish folk dances,
hard-rocking anthems, rhythm and blues, even a lullaby or two.
He is also a death-penalty opponent, a fiction writer, a radio host and,
it turns out, a playwright. His play, "Karla," which was written in
Nashville and produced there in 2002, began a 16-performance showcase,
directed by Bruce Kronenburg, at the Culture Project at 45 Bleecker Street
on Thursday, and runs through Nov. 13. Now in previews, it opens tomorrow.
The play is about Karla Faye Tucker, the murderer who in 1998 became the
first woman executed by the State of Texas since the Civil War, in spite
of an apparently sincere jailhouse conversion and a flood of opposition
from abolitionists. ("It's pretentious, but that's what we call
ourselves," said Mr. Earle, referring to his fellow death-penalty
opponents.)
The play makes use of Tucker's biography and even her own words -
including some taken from an interview with Larry King just weeks before
her execution - but her trial, as presented in the play, is fictional and
a little surreal, with Karla, played by Jody Markell, both addressing the
audience and performing with four actors who portray her family members,
friends and lovers, as well as her victims and the judge and jury.
The play argues the abolitionist view that "the death penalty diminishes
all of us," as Mr. Earle put it, but unlike his songwriting, which has
taken a distinct political turn in the past few years, it's more
philosophical than polemical, more rueful than argumentative.
Indeed, it seems almost personal, bespeaking Mr. Earle's curiosity about,
and sympathy for, the kind of character he evidently was himself - that
is, someone of tainted decency and fouled potential. When he speaks about
Tucker, it seems clear that he feels almost a kinship with her, and a kind
of sorrow for the turn her life didn't take before it was too late.
He believes her born-again experience was real, he said, and though he
himself is not a Christian, "or anything close to it," he does believe in
God; he had his own awakening in Alcoholics Anonymous.
"I'm a recovering addict; I have to believe in a power greater than
myself," he said. "I wrote the play thinking that at the end, when Karla
leaves, she's going to Jesus."
But "Karla," he said, is not about religion or faith.
"The play's about forgiveness," Mr. Earle said, and his fans will
recognize this as a theme in his songs. One, "Billy Austin," is a lament
of a death-row prisoner; another, "John Walker's Blues," is a ballad
written from the perspective of John Walker Lindh, the young American who
joined the Taliban.
In the play, as in those songs, Mr. Earle isn't out to excuse grievous
acts, which in Tucker's case were especially horrific. (She and her
boyfriend, in a drug-induced frenzy, entered the home of a sleeping
acquaintance and hacked him to death, along with the woman in his bed,
with a pickax.) But Mr. Earle's instinct is the writerly, not the
political, one, and the play, like many of his songs that tell stories,
has the genuine mark of a curious man, someone who has imagined himself
inside the head of another.
"My strong suit, the muscles I was born with as a writer, lend themselves
much more to narrative than they do to poetics," said Mr. Earle, whose
short-story collection, "Doghouse Roses," was published in 2001. He began
writing - other than songs, that is - after his 4-month stint in jail on a
drug charge in 1994. He hadn't written a song in 4 years because serving
his habit had become too time-consuming.
"I stated writing fiction as kind of an exercise," he said. "There wasn't
always a melody lying around, and I was really paranoid about writer's
block. I had never tried to write anything but songs because I thought, 'I
have an eighth-grade education, so I can't write anything but songs,' but
then I thought, 'the only reason I'm not totally ignorant is that I read a
lot.' I wrote a story, and then another."
It was the songs "Billy Austin," written in 1990, and then "Ellis Unit
One," written for the 1995 film "Dead Man Walking," that led Mr. Earle to
the death penalty abolition movement. Inmates began writing to him; so did
organizations like Murder Victims' Families for Reconciliation. As part of
his 12-step recovery plan, he began, as he put it, "doing real, live,
hands-on activism, washing dishes and picking people up at the airport."
"Most of the people who talk about this issue, they don't know anybody on
death row, but I do," said Mr. Earle, who witnessed the execution of one
of his correspondents, Jonathan Nobles, in 1998 (and wrote a song, "Over
Yonder," about him). "I've known a lot of them, and most of them are dead
now. And none of my guys were innocent."
That, for Mr. Earle, is not the end of the drama, but the beginning. The
play's tensest scenes are confrontations, set in purgatory, where Karla
has to face her victims. Ms. Markell, who is from Memphis, said she was
attracted to the part because Karla had an Every Southern Woman quality
about her, and because Karla's spiritual conversion in prison struck her
as both genuine and moving.
Still, the confrontation scenes were so graphic in literal detail that Ms.
Markell said that when she first read the script, "I didn't see how I
could even say these things, much less play them."
In life, Karla never allowed herself to own up to what she did, Mr. Earle
said. She hid behind her conversion. But she would have gotten there, he
said, if she hadn't been put to death. She wasn't given the time.
"I fully believe we executed a different woman from the one we convicted,"
he said.
(source: The New York Times)
ILLINOIS:
Former death row inmate asks panel to recommend pardon
A 54-year-old former death row inmate has asked the Illinois Prisoner
Review Board to put an end to his "18-year-plus nightmare" and recommend
to Gov. Rod Blagojevich that the killings of two people be erased from his
record.
But the Appellate Prosecutor's Office told the board Friday it needs 2 to
3 months more months to determine whether it wants to retry Gordon "Randy"
Steidl, the Chicago Tribune reported in its early Sunday editions.
"We are either going to retry him or say this is a dismissal for all time,
when we finish the investigation," said Ed Parkinson of the Appellate
Prosecutor's Office.
Steidl was the 18th person since Illinois reinstated the death penalty in
1977 to be freed because of a wrongful conviction after serving time on
Illinois' death row. A federal judge ruled in June 2003 that the jury that
convicted him of the murders did not hear all the evidence.
Steidl is seeking a pardon "based on his innocence," but prosecutors have
said he is still a suspect in the July 1986 deaths of newlyweds Dyke and
Karen Rhoads of Paris.
The Review Board held a 2 hour hearing Friday that will continue in
January when the board hopes prosecutors will have finished their
reinvestigation.
"It puts a little more pressure on Parkinson's office," said Review Board
chairman Jorge Montes.
Steidl - who spent 17 years in prison, including a dozen on death row -
said he is waiting for the truth to set him free.
"I am here today asking you to give back to me my good name, my family's
good name. I know I am innocent," Steidl testified Friday. "Please put an
end to my 18-year-plus nightmare."
Steidl's 1-time co-defendant Herb Whitlock is awaiting an Edgar County
judge's decision on whether he will reconsider his ruling to deny
Whitlock's request for a new trial.
Whitlock is serving a life prison sentence for the murder of Karen Rhoads.
Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan also is investigating Whitlock's
case, Madigan's chief deputy Barry Gross said. He declined to provide
further details.
The case also spawned a federal lawsuit by a retired state police
investigator who alleged he was demoted for continuing his reinvestigation
of the killings despite being told to stop because it was too politically
sensitive. A federal jury in April ruled 2 Illinois State Police officials
violated Michale Callahan's civil rights.
***********************
Hundreds Wait For Blagojevich To Rule On Clemency
Robert Gayol spent 5 years behind bars for a murder he didn't commit. Then
the real killers were caught, and Gayol was released to begin rebuilding
his life.
That would be easier if he got a pardon that officially cleared his record
and allowed him to seek compensation from the state. It's been two years
since Gayol asked the state for clemency, but Gov. Rod Blagojevich still
hasn't taken any action.
"I don't think it should be on my record. I had no knowledge of this. It's
just unfair," said Gayol, of Chicago.
Hundreds of people across the state are waiting for Blagojevich to rule on
their requests for clemency.
Some are hardened criminals taking a desperate shot at freedom. A few,
like Gayol, are innocent. Most are petty offenders hoping to have some
long-ago crime erased so that they can join the military or apply for
better jobs.
Whatever the reason for their request, the answers are slow in coming.
Blagojevich has about 1,100 clemency petitions on his desk awaiting
action, and his aides say they feel little pressure to handle them
quickly. They object to calling the situation a "backlog," arguing that
the word wrongly implies Blagojevich has failed to meet a deadline.
"Legally, we're not required to respond within any particular time," said
Blagojevich's senior counsel, Matt Ryan. "The governor's doing his best to
be fair and give these important decisions the attention they're due."
Ryan said he is the attorney primarily responsible for reviewing the
"unprecedented volume" of clemency requests, but he cannot devote all his
time to the task. Two other attorneys help with the work when possible.
Before the clemency petitions reach the governor's office, the Prisoner
Review Board carefully studies them and gives the governor a confidential
recommendation on whether to grant clemency.
Critics say Blagojevich does not need to let the requests pile up when
that board already has reviewed them. He could at least act on the ones
where the board's recommendation is unanimous, they argue.
The Democratic governor's office estimates 40 % of the recommendations are
unanimous. But even in those cases, the governor still has to take a hard
look at the requests, said spokesman Gerardo Cardenas.
"Just because there's a recommendation from the (board) doesn't mean that
the case does not warrant further review, since the clemency power is an
extraordinary power and is used judiciously by the governor," he said.
Scott Zauhar, of Algonquin, is another person waiting for an answer from
Blagojevich.
Unlike Gayol, he is actually guilty. 26 years ago, he arranged to rob a
gas station with the help of a pellet gun and a friend working there. He
was caught and sentenced to probation.
Now Zauhar would like the "stupid" high-school offense wiped off his
record so he can do more business as a security consultant.
"When people see my schooling and resume and things I've done, everybody
wants to hire you. Then they go and do a check and you're just blackmarked
immediately," he said.
Nearly three years after Zauhar filed a clemency petition, he's still
waiting for an answer. "I'm just getting lost in the shuffle, and that's
not fair," he said.
Once a little-known option, executive clemency got a shot of publicity
under Republican Gov. George Ryan. Just before leaving office in 2003, he
used his authority to pardon several people on death row and commute the
sentences of every other condemned inmate to life in prison over concerns
of unjust convictions.
After that, other clemency requests came flooding in.
At one point, Blagojevich had 1,600 clemency petitions awaiting his
decision, but his senior counsel Matt Ryan said that over the summer the
governor rejected about 500 petitions from violent criminals that
obviously did not merit clemency. The governor won't grant clemency to
people who committed violent crimes, he said.
Blagojevich, in his nearly three years in office, has granted clemency to
more than 50 people. A handful were innocent, Ryan said, but most were
minor offenders who deserved a break.
It's a complex job to decide when to clear someone's record or release an
inmate and the process should not be rushed, Ryan said.
"We're hopeful that we'll be able to resolve them in a reasonable amount
of time," he said.
Rob Warden, executive director of Northwestern University's Center on
Wrongful Convictions, argues the lack of urgency on clemency petitions is
part of the official mind-set that leads to innocent people being
convicted of crimes they didn't commit.
"The mentality that creates all of these atrocities is essentially the
same: They don't care about people and the ramifications of the policies
they're establishing," Warden said.
Illinois justice system improved after wrongful convictions made it clear
that officials had to make changes, Warden said, and the Prisoner Review
Board takes its work more seriously, too.
"Now if we could just get the governor to do what he is supposed to do,"
he said.
(source for both: The Associated Press)
VIRGINIA:
Our Choices in Virginia
This year's gubernatorial race in Virginia has lacked a compelling theme
or personality. Much of the contest has been driven by wedge issues and
other distractions divorced from most voters' central concerns. Both major
candidates have avoided straight talk about the cost of improving the
state's road network and other priorities. But all that should not obscure
this basic conclusion: Lt. Gov. Timothy M. Kaine, the Democratic
candidate, would make a much better governor than former attorney general
Jerry W. Kilgore, the Republican.
Possessed of an agile, incisive mind and slightly allergic to the allure
of sound-bite politics, Mr. Kaine is the kind of politician who is
impressive in small groups but can fail to inspire on the campaign trail.
A former city councilman and mayor of Richmond, he is a policy wonk in the
best sense of the term -- probing, analytical and at ease with the broad
implications of competing choices as well as the details of how government
works. He commands respect on both sides of the partisan divide in
Richmond, an increasingly rare trait among elected officials.
At the same time, as a somewhat left-of-center candidate in a
right-of-center state, he has tried to do some genuinely hard things. He
acknowledges his long-standing qualms about the death penalty, while
pledging to carry out the law on capital punishment if elected. He
embraces Gov. Mark L. Warner's sizable tax increase of 2004 (or "tax
reform," as he prefers to call it). And he insists that as a devout
Catholic who spent a formative year in his youth as a missionary in
Central America, he will not concede the "values" issue to the
Republicans.
The contrast with his opponent is stark. Mr. Kilgore, though personable
and politically astute, too often gives the impression of a man treading
on a paper-thin pane of scripted positions, constantly at risk of plunging
through and into the void should an unexpected question arise. He has been
publicly embarrassed on several such occasions. Even some Republicans were
left shaking their heads at Mr. Kilgore's stumbling showing and
superficial cant at the debate with Mr. Kaine in Northern Virginia last
month. Some local officials who have tried to engage Mr. Kilgore on
particular policy issues have found him pleasant but unimpressive.
Mr. Kilgore has taken the path of least resistance in this campaign,
adopting doctrinaire GOP positions, brandishing the word "liberal" as a
weapon directed at Mr. Kaine and opportunistically trying to exploit
hot-button issues that come his way -- illegal immigration and the death
penalty, in particular. His record as the state's secretary of public
safety in the 1990s and, more recently, as attorney general, is solid if
unremarkable. But he has given Virginians no reason to believe a Kilgore
governorship would be anything beyond pedestrian. In the event of an
economic downturn,
He could leave Virginia as bereft of public funding, and flirting with
fiscal disaster, as did the state's last Republican governor, James S.
Gilmore III.
Mr. Kaine's candidacy has been disappointing in some respects as well.
Like Mr. Kilgore but to a lesser degree, he has taken refuge in the facts
of Virginia's buoyant economic growth and overflowing coffers to finesse
any talk of tough budget or tax choices. Both candidates have proposed a
glittering array of programs and initiatives: Mr. Kaine wants to offer
universal free preschool for 4-year-olds; Mr. Kilgore favors huge new pay
increases and incentives for teachers. Neither bothers to explain how the
state might afford them in the long run. Like Mr. Kilgore, Mr. Kaine has a
position, but no real plan, to address what the state forecasts will be a
$108 billion shortfall in transportation funding over the next 20 years.
Still, the contrast between them is plain. Mr. Kilgore positions himself
as an unyielding opponent of new taxes. He proved it last year by opposing
Mr. Warner's tax package, which bailed out the state's fragile finances
and buttressed public schools -- and was backed by more responsible
members of his own party. In his campaign for governor, Mr. Kilgore said
he would allow traffic-clogged areas like Northern Virginia to tax
themselves if voters approved, but he also suggested he would not even
support that new tax. Mr. Kaine is clearly more flexible. And while he
denies any intention of raising taxes again -- as plausible candidates for
public office apparently feel they must -- he grasps that voters who
insist on improvements to education and transportation will probably be
willing to invest in them when the chips are down.
In the end, the race may have been dispiriting, but the choice is easy.
Mr. Kaine has the potential to be a remarkable governor -- a responsible,
forward-thinking, unifying, principled politician with brains, guts and
know-how.
We have skirted any mention until now of the 3rd man on the ballot for
governor, Republican state Sen. H. Russell Potts Jr. of Winchester, who is
running as an independent. Mr. Potts is a curious case -- a plain-spoken,
engaging figure whose take-your-medicine straight talk predictably failed
to excite much voter interest. Alone among the gubernatorial candidates,
he has an actual transportation plan, one that would yield $2 billion in
new annual revenue from taxes and tolls for road and rail improvements.
Lacking campaign funds and public exposure, however, he has little chance
to exceed a single-digit showing on Election Day. His candidacy may have
been bracingly honest, but a vote for him is a backhanded way of helping,
or hurting, the two main candidates. He is a spoiler, and while we admire
his straight talk, Mr. Kaine would make a far better governor.
Voters will also face races for lieutenant governor and attorney general,
the jobs Mr. Kaine and Mr. Kilgore won 4 years ago. For lieutenant
governor, the choice is between polar opposites -- Democrat Leslie L.
Byrne of Fairfax, a former state delegate, state senator, congresswoman
and White House official, and Republican state Sen. Bill Bolling of
Hanover County. Ms. Byrne is as close to a traditional liberal as Virginia
has to offer; Mr. Bolling is an orthodox conservative; both are smart,
tough and articulate. We are swayed less by their ideological leanings
than their stands on fiscal matters. There Ms. Byrne has the edge, having
backed the Warner tax package last year.
For attorney general, a refreshingly civil campaign has been waged between
Republican state Del. Robert F. McDonnell of Virginia Beach and Democratic
state Sen. R. Creigh Deeds of Bath County. Mr. McDonnell is an able,
articulate legislator, but we worry he would bring a dogmatically
conservative social agenda to the job. He has been among the General
Assembly's staunchest opponents of abortion rights and a supporter of
state intervention in end-of-life decisions, as in the Terri Schiavo case.
Mr. Deeds, a rural lawmaker, is no liberal; he won the National Rifle
Association's endorsement. We think he would be the more pragmatic choice,
and a better attorney general.
(source: Washington Post)
