Daily Kos: GOP Collapses in Virginia.

[onenote]

44. Win or lose, Virginia is going to stay a swing state

Over the past 20 years, Virginia has established itself as a solidly purple state when it comes to statewide elections. Republicans George Allen and Jim Gilmore cruised to victory in 1993 and 1997. Then Mark Warner and Tim Kaine turned things around for the Democrats in 2001 and 2005. And then Republican Bob McDonnell crushed the Democratic Party candidate, Creigh Deeds in 2009.

It looks like McCauliffe is set to take the statehouse back for the Democrats in 2013. But it hardly signifies that the state has become a blue state. Typically, when the repubs field a candidate who is not a scary crazy guy, their candidate gets between 56 and 58 percent of the vote. The best that the Democrats typically are able to do is around 52 percent. There is clearly a swing vote of around 8-10 percent that determines the elections and they are less driven by party identification than by whether the candidate seems "moderate" to them.

The repubs have shot themselves in the foot a couple of times now by selecting their nominees via convention rather than primary, thus empowering the crazies to control the decision. If this year's governor's race turns out the way it appears it will turn out, there is likely to be a civil war within the Virginia republican party. If the more "moderate' (and I use that term advisedly when referring to repubs) group, represented by someone like former Lieutenant Governor Bolling, prevails, the party will be competitive again. But if not, then the nutjobs will continue to scare away the swing voters. Let's just be thankful the nutjogs got their way for this election. A Bolling/McCauliffe race would look much much different I suspect.