Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, August 2, 1993 TAG: 9309090298
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Last week, we praised Republican nominee George Allen for his interest (however tentative) in and attention (however fleeting) to reforming the commonwealth's archaic structure of local government.
Today, the praise goes to Democratic nominee Mary Sue Terry for her suggestion (however short on details), made Thursday in Roanoke, that more teachers should be put into schools in the state's poorest neighborhoods.
The idea has merit on its own.
Small class size is intimately related to classroom performance. This is particularly so in the early grades - and particularly among young children who, for reasons of financial or other distress, have a lot of catching up to do.
Much of Virginia's future is wrapped up in these children; their needs are ignored at Virginia's peril.
Moreover, Terry's remark raises a larger point. Discussion of school-funding disparities in the state tends to focus on such things as local tax bases, per-student spending, money-distribution formulas, and the like.
In other words, it is too often regarded as a funding-fairness issue rather than an education issue.
Ultimately, however, it is the latter. The aim is a good education for all Virginia children;only as it as it bears on this aim is school-finance reform a truly trenchant issue.
Unfortunately, such occasional forays into topics that really count are the campaign exception and not the rule, as exemplified by the ``debate'' over the weekend at the summer meeting of the Virginia Bar Association.
Terry has been under attack by Allen for, as he put it Saturday, ``sipping wine and nibbling cheese with Hillary Clinton,'' at a Washington, D.C., fund-raiser for her campaign. That might not surprise, dismay or otherwise bother most people, but it seems to bother the Allen camp.
And, apparently, Terry as well. She told the lawyers she favored the old policy on gays in the military, and opposed federal tax increases proposed by Clinton.
Exactly what either has to do with being governor of Virginia is less than clear.
Meanwhile, Allen has his own guilt-by-campaign-association difficulties - namely, the rest of a Republican ticket that lists noticeably to poliical starboard.
Indeed, Allen may find himself fending off charges - from his own running mates - of flaming liberalism.
Well, maybe not that. Still, by standards set forth by Jim Gilmore, the GOP candidate for attorney general, and Mike Farris, the GOP candidate for lieutenant governor, Allen doesn't quite come up to conservative snuff.
Recall, for instance, that when Republican Del. Steve Agee of Salem opposed Gilmore for the attorney-general nomination, Gilmore branded Agee a liberal. As evidence, Gilmore cited Agee's support for bills dealing with early release for state prisoners and the Salem lawmaker's votes against raising the legal drinking age to 21.
But Allen, while a member of the General Assembly, also voted for the early-release bills mentioned by Gilmore, and also voted against raising the legal drinking age to 21.
Now, Allen says he wants Virginia to be "toughest in the nation" on drunken drivers. Never mind that the "21" legislation was a key part of the anti-drunken-driving campaign when Allen voted against it in 1983 and 1984.
Allen also is playing "tougher than thou" on the issue of early release for prisoners. As governor, he says he'd abolish parole and tighten rules that give prisoners time off for good behavior.
Clamping down on programs that allow inmates to cut short their sentences would, Allen estimates, require that the state spend $683 million to construct new prisons plus up to $119 million a year to maintain the prisons.
But no problem. He says he's sure he could come up with the money without breaking his pledge not to raise taxes. Sure.
He'd get the $683 million for new prison construction by having the state issue general-obligation bonds. In other words, borrowing it.
Which puts him squarely at odds with Farris, who's making opposition to state-government bonds and debt a major issue in his campaign.
Says Farris: "Virginia's addiction to greater and greater debt reflects the same philosophy of government that has led our nation into a $4 trillion sinkhole."
That philosophy, presumably, is the flaming liberal's philosophy.
To avoid such a broad brush of damnation, Allen may have to run harder - away from his running mates.
Keywords:
POLITICS
by CNB