Joe Oddo will thwap me for saying this, but maybe her withdrawal will goose other IG candidates in 3-man races (like Joe) to withdraw and throw their votes behind their Dem candidates.

The ones who are the sole opposition against incumbants should soldier on, but I’d like to see Al and others like him in hotly contested races get a break before election day.

Posted by TLPatten on 26 October 02006 @ 5pm

That’d be great if it happens, but she sure doesn’t strike me as a “real Green” in the first place. I guess we’ll know for sure what kind of a Green she is if she throws her support to Allen, Mr. Top-5 in Oil Company Contributions.

Posted by Nell on 26 October 02006 @ 5pm

But would people who otherwise would be voting for Gail Parker then vote for James Webb? They might decide to operate by a “lesser of two evils” principle, but I thought most of them were not voting for James Webb because they did not see him as much of a better option than George Allen?

Posted by CR UVa on 26 October 02006 @ 6pm

Many Democrats see Webb as a Republican in Democrat’s clothing. (Shocking though that may sound to a conservative.) Those way to the left (about 2% of the state’s population, apparently) will support the Green candidate before they’ll support a conservative Democrat. The same people who voted for Nader in 2004 would be voting for Parker this time around — they’re both Greens, after all.

A certain percentage won’t vote at all, in disgust, but many will cast their vote for Webb because he will be, as you point out, the lesser of the two evils.

Posted by Waldo Jaquith on 26 October 02006 @ 6pm

The SurveyUSA numbers for Parker were telling. She received 2% of the conservative vote, 2% of the votes from self-described moderates, and 2% of the vote from liberals.

Party affiliation: 1% GOP, 2% Dem, 5% Independent. Age breakdown: Generation Y 4%, the other age demographics were 1%.

As has been pointed out elsewhere, unless this race reaches 2005 AG territory, I don’t see this as being much of a factor. Then again, I would not be surprised at all to see the VA Senate race playing out in a manner similar to the 2005 AG race. Unless there are major shifts in the last week plus, this one is going to be very, very tight race.

Posted by JPTERP on 26 October 02006 @ 9pm

JPTERP those numbers are interesting. One of my frequent rants is how in-appropriately named some of Virginia’s political parties are. The Independent Greens have nothing to do with the Green Party. They are completely separate and in many ways polar opposites of each other, but because “green” is part of their name a lot of lazy reporters truncate and just say “green” not knowing that they’ve just changed from one single-issue party to a completely different slate of issues party.

I was about to argue that Gail dropping from the race would probably help Allen, not Webb, as her voters are likely to be conservative. That was in the absence of any real numbers… interestingly the numbers you cite from SurveyUSA would indicate that I’ve been giving voters too much credit for having the smarts and acument to understand how they respond to these surveys and (presumably) vote… that’s a little scary… it looks like more people are fooled by the whole “green is equal to Left” line of bull-feathers. Scary.

I am still not that worried. Anyone who really does not want to vote for either Democrats or Republicans is still not likely to. Without a choice they’ll write in something sarcastic, or leave it blank I am sure.

Posted by Scott Nolan on 27 October 02006 @ 7am

I doubt that most of the people planning to vote for Parker are really doing so on the basis of a sophisticated understanding of her positions. Most people vote ‘Green’ as either a protest vote or because they think that they are voting for the farthest left candidate in the race. Take Parker off the ballot and the lefties will mostly shift their support to Webb as he would become the farthest left candidate in the race (which is to say right of center but left of Allen). Meanwhile, I suspect that most of those conservative protest votes will shift to write-ins.

JPTERP,

Rasmussen has this race 49/48 right now. Other current polls average out to around the same. This thing is a dead heat. It could easily come down to a few hundred votes either way. I don’t think that anyone can make an intelligent prediction about the outcome anymore.

Posted by Jack on 27 October 02006 @ 1pm

Independent Progressive Brad Blanton withdrew from his year-long race in VA 7 last week and threw his support to Democrat Nachman in his race against incumbent Shrubbie US Rep. Eric Cantor.

Posted by Skyline on 27 October 02006 @ 4pm

Independent Progressive Brad Blanton withdrew from his year-long race in VA 7 last week and threw his support to Democrat Nachman

Does that put the 7th CD into play?

We are not getting much news about this race at all up in NOVA, is it in play, or does Cantor have such a margin that it makes little different?

Posted by Scott Nolan on 28 October 02006 @ 1pm

Folks thanks for the intelligent discussion.

Those of us inside the Gail Parker negotiations can tell you the truth, and facts.

Our purpose in opening negotiations was to be constructive, and get rail built now, and get our tax money counted properly at the pentagon. To leverage our support for positive action NOW!

Comptroller General David Walker at the Government accountablity office (GAO) tells us year after year. In fiscal year 2006 DoD spent nearly $650 Billion (apprx)… and the money can’t be tracked.

It’s our money. It’s our taxes.

We asked both other campaigns to install the auditable accounting system now in 2007 rather than the scheduled and always delayed 2011. And we asked for both light rail and high speed rail legislation be introduced immediately.

Negotiations were difficult from many reasons. The presure of the closeness of the election made negotiations worth while and also hard to complete.

We have campaigned on three issues:

cut wasteful spending – by counting tax dollars spent reliably.

Build rail “More Trains, Less Traffic”

“More candidates, Less apathy”
Encourage more people to run.

Early Saturday morning Nov 3rd Gail – already having traveled 50,000 Virginia miles – launches the last 1,000 mile Vote For Change Virginia Tour!

Fairfax, Fredericksburg, Richmond, Petersburg, Emporia, Frankin – with 4th District candidate Albert Burckard -, South Hill, South Boston, Clarksville, Danville, Martinsville, Augusta, Lynchburg, Bedford, Roanoke, Bristol, Harrisonburg and more

The Independent Greens are mostly conservatives, though obviously are inclusive enough to endorse progressive independents like Jim Hurysz, – and have Dr. Blanton serve as District Chairman for 3 years.

If you can’t vote for Gail, Vote for Change!

Posted by Reverend Martin Jeffrey on 3 November 02006 @ 9pm

So… Can someone tell me what Gail Parker’s electoral results were? no one talks about 3rd party candidates in the press… It seems important to me to know what happened, given that the Senate race still hangs in the balance.

Posted by Janet on 8 November 02006 @ 4pm

Gail Parker got 1.11% of the vote. Here’s the breakdown by locality. Her top performance was in Fredericksburg, where she got 1.76% of the vote. Her worst performance was in Bristol, where she got 0.60% of the vote, or 6 people.

Posted by Waldo Jaquith on 8 November 02006 @ 4pm