"corporate media" of Virginia's Senate race.  WAY too much focus on personalities, pre-fabricated "story lines," and other such silliness rather than a substantive discussion of the differences between Webb and Miller, the national significance of this race, etc.  Lame.

Harris Miller went negative early with his attack mailings and robot phone calls.  The intent is to discourage people from voting.  Yeah, Miller's hoping for a low Democratic turnout and cross over voting from Republicans to put him over the top.  If he wins the primary at least he can pay himself back the big bucks he's lent his campaign.  If he loses, it's back to lobbying business.

Jim Webb could use a big Democratic turnout and probably some help from independents voting in the Democratic primary. Jim's an underdog in some neighborhoods because Miller's been campaiging a lot longer and got there first, but a growing national focus on the race should bring out more voters next Tuesday.  The long list of Democratic Senators endorsing Jim should put persuade any fence sitters about who to vote for. I don't think Miller got any national endorsements.

 

would help suppress turnout - which may play into Miller's hands. 

But then again, there is a lot of buzz about Webb.  I've brought up the primary with a few friends who don't follow politics and before I mentioned names they said "Webb".  So with good buzz, and the strong following on the internet, Webb could do very well.

I think the biggest danger (if you're a Webb supporter) is a turn out of those who don't follow closely but consider themselves strong Democrats and/or Liberals.  They'll be turned off by the Webb-Reagan connection and the 2000 elections and may very well vote for Harris.

But articles like this WAPO seem to muddy the water and that will leave them not knowing who to vote for or cause them to stay home.

So Miller may have orchestrated the negative attacks for voter suppression, but I doubt many candidates would want this sort of confusion - it leads to unexpected results.

"Miller's perfect political moment was interrupted by Virginia's bloggers…"

Ha.

"Patient Miller Deems Time Right: Critics Question Senate Candidate's Commitment to Party"

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/06/AR2006060601387_pf.html

...is unmentioned.

The WAPO has long been a cheerleader for this program, editorialising regularly in support of this program and repeating without question the lies of the ITAA and the business lobby.

The WAPO does say:

Mike Gildea, executive director for the AFL-CIO's Department for Professional Employees, calls Miller "the premier front man for the offshore export of American high-tech jobs."

BUT offshore outsourcing is only PART of the pattern of worker replacement that Miller has his hands in. H-1b is central to the offshore outsourcing of many jobs and it permits corporations to keep a low wage non-American workforce in the U.S. doing work which would otherwise be performed by Americans.

See the related article by Paul Craig Roberts for a viewpoint distinct from that pervading the WAPO (http://www.raisingkaine.com/showDiary.do;jsessionid=C211A80BA47ED93468B4295B876CFA59?diaryId=2901)

It used to be that "liberal" was a dirty word and even democrats would deny being one.  Now it seems the worst thing you can call someone is a REPUBLICAN!