A conversation with Tim Kaine
over dinner last night. His campaign reached out to a group of us, bloggers from Northern Virginia and the head of Virginia Partisans, the most important LGBT political organization in the Commonwealth.
Most of us got to know Tim when he was running for Governor, back in 2005. In fact, a good number of us were involved with a blog called Raising Kaine, which passed on a few years ago. We were also joined by several of his campaign staff: Mike Henry, his campaign manager; Brandi Hoffine, his communications director, Nickie Titus, his new media director; and Eli Kaplan, who had organized similar get-togethers for the gubernatorial campaign of Terry McAuliffe back in 2009.
The entire conversation, over a pleasant dinner in an Arlington restaurant for two hours, was on the record.
Kaine began by talking about the three key issues on which he will contrast himself from George Allen - or should I say, on which he has already contrasted himself from Allen, since they have already debated. First is the economy, where Allen is committed to "drill, baby, drill" (more in a bit); second is the budget; and finally is Common Ground, where Kaine focused on his record of getting things done.
Please keep reading. . .