Candidates work for votes during Labor Day event

BUENA VISTA

Ah, Labor Day. The last carefree day of summer, when students make resolutions for the coming school year and politicians kiss babies in parades, then body-slam their opponents.

So it was on Monday in the annual two-mile parade in this town of 6,400 nestled in the Blue Ridge Mountains.

Jim Gilmore, the Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, labeled his opponent an untrustworthy tax hiker who is afraid to debate on television.

Mark Warner, the Democrat to whom Gilmore referred, responded in kind. He accused Gilmore of being so adamant about cutting taxes that even members of his own party abandoned him.

As he does every year, Warner jogged the parade route, zigzagging across the street to offer a toothy grin and a sweaty handshake to everyone on the sidewalks. Gilmore, a few hundred feet behind, walked a brisk pace. He offered his hand to fewer people, but it was dry.

The procession, complete with marching bands, top-down cars and flocks of aspiring politicians, ended in an outdoor pavilion in a park. That's where the speaking took place before about 300 people in a pro-Warner crowd that had no difficulty drowning out the chants of Gilmore supporters.

The politicians are longtime rivals. Gilmore was governor from 1998 to 2002 but could not run for re-election because Virginia bars its chief executive from serving successive terms. Warner succeeded him, serving from 2002 to 2006.

Gilmore minced no words in a 4-1/2-minute speech. He criticized Warner for opposing oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He said Warner was overly benevolent to unions and, if elected, would vote to repeal tax cuts ushered in by the Bush administration. Warner has said he only wants to end the tax cuts for families earning about $250,000 a year or more.

Gilmore panned Warner for breaking a 2001 campaign pledge not to raise taxes. Warner ushered in a record $1.4 billion tax increase in 2004, saying he was forced to break his promise, in part, because Gilmore left state finances in unexpectedly poor condition.

"Who do you trust?" Gilmore asked the crowd.

"Warner, Warner," the audience chanted back.

Warner, when he took the podium, threw it back at Gilmore. He noted that Gilmore failed to get budget revisions passed by the General Assembly during the final year of his governorship even though the legislature was controlled by Republicans.

"You have one candidate who is all about partisanship, all about attacks, all about tearing things down," Warner said. "The last thing Washington needs is somebody who couldn't even pass a budget when his own party controlled the legislature."

After the speeches, Gilmore criticized Warner for pulling out of a scheduled debate sponsored by the League of Women Voters that was to be televised across Virginia. Warner said he will participate in other debates but declined to offer assurances that he will agree to a televised exchange. 

Warren Fiske, (804) 697-1565, warren.fiske@pilotonline.com