Kaine visits Manassas for Obama

By Kipp Hanley

Published: August 16, 2008

The hour-long town hall meeting with Gov. Timothy M. Kaine on behalf of Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama was just as much a figurative suggestion box as a question-and-answer session.

The crowd gathered at Grace E. Metz Middle School on Saturday gave Kaine advice on everything from Obama running a positive campaign to playing up Obama's voting record on issues pertaining to military veterans.

The meeting was one of six for Kaine this weekend throughout Virginia.

The longtime Obama supporter and potential vice-presidential candidate gave thorough and sometimes frank an-swers to people's concerns, whether it was on the environment, health care or education. When he wasn't answering questions, Kaine was touting the characteristics of Obama and his goals as presi-dent.

He also spent a number of minutes praising Virginia and its role in the national election. An key battleground in Virginia appears to be Prince William County, judging by the attention Obama has given it.

The Illinois senator has opened campaign offices in Woodbridge and Manassas, spoken at a rally at Nissan Pavilion in Gainesville earlier in the summer and had Kaine speak for him at Saturday's meetings. Kaine pointed to his success in the county in 2005, along with Democrat Jim Webb's defeat of former Virginia governor George Allen in 2006 to become a U.S. senator as benchmarks for possible national success in 2008.

"I think Prince William was sort of seen as a jurisdiction as out of reach for most Democratic candidates. But then I won Prince William in 2005, which frankly surprised me," Kaine said in a one-on-one interview after the town hall meeting.

"Our goal was to hold the margin [of defeat] down in Prince William and then we won. And Webb won in 2006 and I think that what it shows is [Prince William] is a part of Virginia that's big, that's growing and that politically is very much in play. And if you pay attention and you invest the time, and you can put good people in, then you can win."

Near the end of the session, Kaine told the crowd he was confident that Obama would make a good choice regard-less of whom he selected as his vice presidential candidate. Judging by the several series of applauses from the crowd throughout the meeting, it was clear that Kaine—if no more than a campaigner—conveyed Obama's message.

That message didn't resonate with attendee Glenn Hurowitz, however. A former Kaine campaigner, Hurowitz used his public time to criticize Kaine's energy record.

Hurowitz cited the new coal-fired plant in Wise that was recently approved by the governor as something Obama wouldn't have pushed for in his renewable energy platform.

"I think Governor Kaine was right on when he described how Senator Obama would bring about change," Hurowitz said after the meeting.

"Unfortunately, I don't think Governor Kaine's own performance in office meets the standard that Obama has set."

Kaine disagreed with Hurowitz's assessment and told the crowd that like it or not, getting coal out of the energy picture simply isn't in the cards just yet.

"We do not have a no-coal

future in this country any time soon," Kaine said. "What we need to take is take the coal portion ... and make it smaller and make it cleaner."

Staff writer Kipp Hanley can be reached at 703-369-5738.