Profiles in Independence: Virginia – Jeff Vanke for Congress
Underdog candidate Jeff Vanke has recently come to my attention, from some people I know who are involved with the one of the centrist third parties I have come across, the Modern Whigs. I had the pleasure of talking to Jeff by email, and liked a lot of what I heard.
Vanke has a bio a campaign manager would die to have in a candidate. He literally does work as a budget consultant, has a PHd in Political History and even published a book recently, by the name of “Europeanism and European Union”. In other words, the guy has chops. On the personal side – another ideal list of attributes. He’s actually an Eagle Scout, PTA volunteer, sings in his church choir and is a Sunday school teacher.
Much like any other independent, his campaign’s biggest problem is lack of infrastructure. He’s lucky in that there isn’t a democrat in the race, leaving just him and his GOP opponent Bob Goodlatte. Camp Vanke (apparently rhymes with lanky), is also being aided by a Libertarian who should peel some votes off of Goodlatte as well.
On Jeff’s website, he goes directly for the sweet spot, after his opponent’s record on fiscal issues. The district is a conservative one, but I was impressed that Vanke has the targets he needed to hit to win on hand when I asked. According to him, he’s going to need most of the voters who went for Goodlatte’s opponent last time around, as well as around another 20%, mostly independents and moderate republicans I would guess, that are likely to be the most dissapointed with their congressman’s performance.
All the necessary pieces are there for a potentially winning upstart campaign. What remains is Jeff hitting the canvas every day, knocking on doors and making phone calls… raising money and pressing the flesh at events. He polled at just 12% a few weeks ago, so he’s got quite the mountain to climb in a short time.
Vanke is working big events so he can meet as many people as he can, he’s knocking on doors, making calls… and getting the word out about how his experience is just what D.C. needs right now. In his own words, speaking of how he has been flipping supporters of Goodlatte:
… he led $288 billion in agribusiness subsidies when he was on the majority of the Agriculture Committee, and just this past May joined many other Republicans and many Democrats to vote in a majority for $485 million for a duplicate jet engine for the F-35, even though the Pentagon doesn’t want it, the Obama administration doesn’t want it, and even the Bush administration didn’t want it.
Lets hope that message gets to enough voters, and puts someone in office who actually cares about balancing the budget.
Read more about Jeff at his campaign website…
The very fact that your posts on the Islamic cultural center have about six dozen comments and this one has zero (until now) makes me worry for true centrist candidates. Moderates/centrists/whatever are being portrayed as "mild mannered" (WSJ article) and having no real passion (bullshit). I detest the fringes of both parties. And I detest that the right wing has been taken over BY its former fringes.
Its not a race that has garnered much attention, and isn't controversial. The posts on here that have brought the most comments have been about things that are in the news a lot, and things that are controversial… Vanke's a huge underdog. He seems to have what it takes to be a great congressman, but only the really wonky people, like me, outside of his district will have heard of him.
True about the controversy angle. That is what sells, unfortunately. And those in the center really don't bring that to the table. Too bad common sense and reasonable debate don't sell. That's why I'm glad I found your site and a couple of others that keep the debate civil, even if the disagreement wants to turn vehement.
In local races, you don't necessarily need controversy, you need voter contact. Although Jeff would do well to listen to the political adage that "sometimes… to win a fight, you need to start a fight". With such a tiny amount of money to spend on the race, he is almost forced to go balls to the wall with door knocking, phone calling and event glad handing… he can make waves by throwing his energy into something hot button.
You can be aggressive, without being nutty. I haven't looked closely at his opponent, but if he's got chinks in his armor, Jeff's gotta go after them, HARD, or that huge gap in the polls aint going anywhere. As long as you keep it substantive, its all fair game.
I wish I'd started this blog a year and a half ago, when I first got the idea. Then maybe I would have had enough traffic to throw his way to make a bit of a difference. 2000 page views a day is awesome for a two month old blog, but a speckle of water mist in the ocean of the political blogosphere as of yet, heheh
Appreciate the props :)