In late April, the forces of compassionate conservatism issued notice of yet another battle won over the evils of Clintonism. "Bush Shows Strength in Pacific Northwest," proclaimed a press release from the Bush campaign in bold faux newspaperese. And indeed, according to two new polls, George W. Bush was edging Al Gore by one point in Washington and three in Oregon. But though the Democrats have indeed lost ground in the region, it's not Bush who's winning it: Garnering a surprising 7 percent in the Oregon poll was longtime consumer gadfly and Green Party candidate Ralph Nader.

Yesterday, Republican Randy Forbes narrowly beat Democratic
Louise Lucas in a special election for Virginia's 4th
Congressional District. Predictably, the GOP is claiming
that this amounts to a "bellwether" victory for their
president and their party; as goes Virginia's fourth CD, so,
apparently, goes the nation. Also predictably, this is
mostly nonsense. There's no doubt that this was a win for
the GOP, which now holds a seat formerly occupied by the
late Norman Sisisky, a Democrat. And it's a setback for
Terry McAulliffe's Democratic National Committee, which is
pouring serious money into Virginia these days (and which
dispatched grassroots guru Donna Brazile to help out Lucas).