McDonnell for governor

But then along came the third little governor. Mr. Deeds promised he was a moderate Democratic problem solver just like the others, but he had something they didn't - a magic plan called a "bipartisan commission." After the fantastically powerful bipartisan commission, all of Virginia's transportation problems were supposed to be solved.

Virginia's last two Democratic governors may have marketed themselves as moderate Democratic problem solvers, but that doesn't mean they were. The facts are in. Mr. Warner and Mr. Kaine didn't solve problems. They raised taxes. Mr. Deeds, who hopes to be the third little governor and is packaged in the same deceptive garb, promises to give Virginia more of the same.

That's why the only choice for governor of Virginia is Robert F. McDonnell. Dealing with Virginia's recession requires a leader who is willing to take responsibility, not hide behind the soft and fuzzy rhetoric of bipartisanship and commissions.

Virginia's business leaders - focused on the bottom line, not ideological litmus tests - have come to the same conclusion. The Northern Virginia Technology Council, representing the future of the state's economy - IBM, Google, Microsoft, AOL and Cisco, among others - has endorsed the Republican through the organization's political action committee. The Hampton Roads Chamber of Commerce, the Fairfax County Chamber of Commerce, the National Federation of Independent Businesses, the Virginia Association of Realtors and the Virginia Farm Bureau Federation have made a united choice that Mr. McDonnell can best steer the commonwealth through troubled economic times and position Virginia for job growth.

Unlike his opponent, Mr. McDonnell has experience as a statewide elected official running the attorney general's office and as a local legislator. Instead of building his campaign on how the government can do more by stripping resources from families and private-sector job creators, Mr. McDonnell is leading with ideas on how the state can focus its efforts on the priorities that matter. For instance, if the commonwealth gets out of the booze business, there's more money to address transportation.

Mr. Deeds and his supporters have run a vapid campaign, focused more on a 20-year-old college paper written by Mr. McDonnell than anything happening today. Many of the outrages they've manufactured incite puzzlement more than anger. Purportedly, as one of the other newspapers in town editorialized, in "Mr. McDonnell's Virginia ... information about birth control would be hidden." What a strange quibble to characterize as a crisis. Only in a fairy-tale Virginia are voters more worried about condoms than about years of failed Democratic leadership.

Virginians face a simple choice this November: Keep trying the same old policies and hoping the results will be different or actually doing something different by electing Mr. McDonnell.