WaPo Endorsement: Creigh!

By now, the news has started to circulate that the Washington Post has endorsed Creigh.

Not only has the Post endorsed him, it has done so for the right reasons. The Post said:

However, delve a bit deeper, and the answer might surprise you. In 18 years in the General Assembly, Mr. Deeds has time and again supported measures that might be unpopular with his rural constituency but that are the right thing to do, for Northern Virginia and the state as a whole. He has demonstrated an understanding of the problems that matter most, the commitment to solve them and the capacity to get things done. Mr. Deeds may not be the obvious choice in the June 9 primary, but he's the right one.

This is a critical point: Creigh is the best candidate for NoVA, in part because he is not from there. As the Post states:

As he once told The Post, "A gentleman from Lunenburg County called me up to say, 'I don't want my taxes to go up so they can build roads in Northern Virginia.' I said, 'Who do you think is paying for your schools?' Right now, the economic engine that has been driving Virginia has serious transportation woes. It's in the interest of every single Virginian, no matter where he or she lives, to fix that problem."

This is not a new insight. It is an issue the Virginia Democrat touched on in this Post, Creigh's Unifying Vision, a while back.

I would just add the importance of Creigh's vision for redistricting reform as an engine for enduring Progressive reform in the Commonwealth. The Post touches on this, but doesn't give a lot of attention. Virginia is becoming more Progressive every day, which is why it is becoming "bluer." A governor committed to redistricting that is not seeking an advantage for either political party, but which seeks to more accurately reflect the desires of the voters, regardless of where those desires lead, naturally favors Progressive causes. The alternative, to do business as we have been doing it, will leave entrenched forces of Conservatism in key legislative posts not because it reflects the will of voters, but because it reflects the will of a political class consisting of both Democrats and Republicans who benefit from current gridlock.

Creigh just doesn't talk about redistricting reform -- he has a specific plan on how to accomplish it, whether the General Assembly cooperates with him or not, so the success of this critical part of his platform is not dependent on the long-shot of a Democratic House of Delegates. Furthermore, given McDonnell's recent flip-flop on the redistricting issue, Creigh is the Democrat best-positioned to make hay out of this critical issue in the Fall. It is the kind of issue that can take hold in a campaign, because it is about returning power to the people.

See Creigh and Redistricting: Changing the Calculus of Virginia Politics for more on Creigh and redistricting.

Last point: Quite apart from the substance of this editorial is obviously the mere fact of this editorial. It is difficult to over-estimate the value of a Washington Post editorial in NoVA in terms of free media and generating name recognition. Just yesterday, I got an email from a mostly non-political friend of mine, following the election mainly because of my interest in it, that read (in advance, what can I say, he's not a Moran fan):

The informal J--- L--- “eyeball poll” (lawn/roadside signs while driving around) is roughly McAuliffe 500, Moron 500, Deeds 0. I haven’t seen a single one.

Almost two years ago, I was interviewing Creigh for a story and he spoke about the difficulty of breaking through the noise in NoVA to reach voters. There was so much happening up there, he said, and people tended to focus their political energies North to Washington DC rather than South to Richmond, that it was just hard to be heard.

For today, at least, the best candidate for governor can be heard loud and clear up there.