By Seema Mehta, Maeve Reston and Michael A. Memoli, Tribune Washington Bureau –
SPRINGFIELD, Va. — President Barack Obama’s 2008 victory in Virginia ended the GOP’s nearly half-century reign over the commonwealth. But the furious campaigning taking place here — from the ads saturating the airwaves to Obama and Mitt Romney’s appearances Thursday — shows how clearly both sides covet putting Virginia in their column in November.
Polls show Obama opening up a lead here, but both campaigns insist the race is tight. Seeking to coax undecided voters and looking to energize their base, Obama and Romney are tailoring their pitches — to government workers in the Washington suburbs, blacks in the Hampton Roads area, women in northern Virginia and the more than 800,000 veterans who live here.
Romney spent Thursday decrying military spending cuts scheduled to take effect next year, arguing that they imperil the nation’s safety, diminish the quality of care for veterans and would cost Virginia 136,000 jobs tied to the defense industry.
“It is still a troubled and dangerous world, and the idea of cutting our military commitment by a trillion dollars over this decade is unthinkable,” Romney told several hundred veterans and other supporters at an American Legion post.
Left unsaid was that those cuts were part of an agreement between Democrats and Republicans in Congress — including Romney’s running mate, Rep. Paul D. Ryan — that would go into effect in January if Congress fails to reach a budget and debt-reduction deal.
Democrats also seized on veterans’ concerns, as Obama rallied supporters in Virginia Beach.
Introducing Obama, Virginia Sen. Jim Webb alluded to the secretly recorded video in which Romney dismissed 47 percent of Americans who he said would back Obama because they were dependent on government, paid no income tax and were “unwilling to take responsibility for their lives.” (The Obama campaign aired a new ad in Virginia on Thursday featuring the recording.)
Webb said some of the Americans included in that 47 percent are veterans.
Those who receive veterans benefits “are not takers,” said Webb, who is a veteran himself. “They are givers in the ultimate sense of the word.”
He noted that Romney failed to mention veterans in his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention.
Obama also praised veterans and took issue with Romney’s remark about the 47 percent. He added a new line to his stump speech echoing the theme of the new two-minute television ad, saying it was “time for a new economic patriotism.” He offered an overview of his plan for a second term, and mocked his GOP rival for lacking the same specificity that he said he was offering.
“Every few days he keeps on saying he’s going to reboot this campaign and they’re going to start explaining very specifically how this plan’s going to work, and then they don’t,” Obama said. “They don’t say how you pay for $5 trillion in tax cuts that are skewed toward the wealthy without raising taxes on middle-class families.”
Both candidates are heavily targeting women in Virginia, particularly in the northern suburbs of Washington, where Romney campaigned Thursday.
Democrats are accusing Republicans of waging a “war on women” by targeting reproductive rights. They point to a measure that failed in the Virginia Legislature this year that would have required trans-vaginal ultrasounds before a woman could have an abortion.
Romney’s soft-focus “Dear Daughter” ad — with images of a mother cradling a wide-eyed baby — was in heavy rotation on morning shows. The ad argues that Obama’s economic policies have been harder on women, noting that unemployment among women rose during Obama’s time in office and that the poverty rate for women is the highest in 17 years.
Outside groups are also weighing in, airing ads that feature Romney’s vow this year to eliminate funding for Planned Parenthood. A GOP group is running an ad featuring a young woman jogging with her daughter in a stroller, while the narrator describes herself as a former Obama voter whose husband was laid off twice. “The future is getting worse under President Obama,” the caption reads as the woman pauses for breath and leans over her crying child in the stroller.
