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Several years ago, however, Durrette left his past behind him both literally and figuratively. He moved from Fairfax to Chesterfield County in order to establish a “more central base” for his expected run for the governorship. There, in the heartland of Virginia conservatism, he breathed the air of the circulation area of the Richmond Newspapers and learned what real 100-proof right wingery is all about. His rightward hiatus from his days as a Northern Virginia moderate has, as we shall see in a moment, carried him distances which are truly epic.
The debate, or forum, which lasted 90 minutes, contained a number of elements of surprise. Two, however, stand out as especially noteworthy.
The first was the unexpectedly aggressive styl# with which Baliles assailed his opponent. This was not a matter of an occasional thrust, but a sustained pattern of pressure which began with his opening statement and continued throughout the encounter. He threw no knockout punches, but his constant jabbing clearly unsettled and aggravated his opponent.
While the strategy gave Baliles the initiative in this meeting, it is a political technique which has its dangers. Too much concentration on the negative sets poorly with the voters in Virginia’s campaigns. Lt. Gov. Dick Davis discovered that to his grief in both his unsuccessful U.S. Senate race in 1982 and in his recent run for the gubernatorial nomination against Baliles.
Still, it worked well for Baliles last week.
But perhaps the most mindboggling surprise of the event was the revelation of the depth of Durrette’s anti-abortion commitment and the apparent change in his views on abortion over the past decade.
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