The ongoing conversation at Bacon’s Rebellion continues, with my US$0.02 added for good measure:
The real question voters were asking was “what do we do about the problem?” Collectively, while I agree wholeheartedly with the Taxpayer Protection Pledge, we didn’t have a single voice on how to solve the problem. Sure we can cut off the oxygen and put out the fire, but to what ends?
I think voters are seriously looking for answers to the questions regarding transportation, education, and the like. TABOR is a good start. Devoting 65% of every dollar to the classroom is another (Virginia only allocates 61.6% on average). Restructuring VDOT so that rather than operating from the top-down, localities set the needs and agenda and VDOT chimes in. True tax reform that abolishes the car tax, property tax, estate tax, and comes up with a more equitable system of taxation that works at the local level first.
Those are ideas. Those are solutions. While we aggressively promoted them in the 54th, conservatives statewide didn’t speak with a single voice.
Statewide, conservatives did very well. As always though, there is room for improvement.