Today former Gov. Jim Gilmore officially jumped into the race for senate against his successor to the governor's mansion, Democrat Mark Warner. The Warner campaign wasted no time in welcoming him to the show (h/t Raising Kaine.)

"Virginians will have an opportunity to make a clear choice between two starkly different records and two dramatically different styles of leadership. [...]

"We look forward to making the case for Mark Warner's brand of commonsense, results-oriented leadership. We welcome Jim Gilmore to the campaign and we look forward to a spirited discussion."

As has become common practice, Gilmore announced his run via an online video, and a quick side-by-side comparison of the two former governors' respective campaign launch videos really couldn't make their differences in style more clear.

Gilmore's video is dark, the camera is static and Gilmore looks shifty, uncomfortable and bored; Warner's video on the other hand is bright, the camera is in constant motion and Warner projects confidence, friendliness and, well, acts as though he's already won.

Perhaps the greatest contrast, though, can be found in what is actually said. Both Warner and Gilmore talk about the challenges facing the country but while Warner talks of war, our stature in the world and our need for a responsible and innovative energy policy, this is how Gilmore frames the country's biggest challenges:

These are challenging times for our country. We're threatened by terrorism, concerned about a difficult war, stuck in traffic...

{thud}

No wonder, then, with such an inauspicious senate campaign debut, that a young Virginia state Delegate considered by The Hotline to be an "up-and-coming star of Virginia politics," Chris Saxman, would confirm that he's "strongly considering" a challenge to Gilmore at the nominating convention next year. Gilmore is a guy whose tenure as governor ended in 2002, so people know him and have pretty much made up their minds about him and still the most support he can manage to garner against Warner in a head-to-head match-up is 37%. In other words, nominating Gilmore is essentially conceding the seat.

There's more...

WaPo's Chris Cillizza is reporting that Rep. Tom Davis is expected to announce later this week that he won't compete for the Republican nomination for senate after all (h/t American1989 in the diaries).

Several informed Republicans with ties to Virginia politics told The Fix earlier today that Rep. Tom Davis could announce as soon as this week that he will not run for the Senate seat being vacated by John Warner (R) in 2008.

When Sen. Warner announced just before Labor Day that he would leave the Senate at the end of his term, Davis was widely expected to enter the race. But the congressman has been hinting for the better part of a week that he has changed his mind.

It looks as though the decision of the Virginia GOP a couple weeks ago to hold a convention to determine the nominee instead of a primary has, as expected, compelled Davis to step aside, although Davis is officially denying he's made any such decision.

In the time since the news of Davis's decision was posted here around 8 p.m. ET Monday evening, Davis spoke with Washington Post reporter Amy Gardner, saying that while he plans to talk to the media on Thursday about his political future, he has not made a final decision about the race.

This leaves many things up in the air including whether Davis will even run for re-election to his congressional seat next year, whether he'll give a senate run against Jim Webb in 2012 a go and even whether former Gov. Jim Gilmore will get in the race as he is expected to do and remain the only Republican in the field. But one thing's for sure, as Cillizza put it in his Senate rankings listing John Warner's seat the one mostly likely to switch parties:

Let's see. Former Gov. Mark Warner (D) raised more than $1 million in the first 17 days of his candidacy. The Post's own poll put Warner 30 points ahead of both of his potential Republican opponents -- Rep. Tom Davis and former Gov. Jim Gilmore. Republicans recently opted for a convention rather than a primary, a move likely to favor the more conservative, but less general-election friendly Gilmore...Put simply: It's good to be Mark Warner right now.

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This morning, the Virginia GOP's Central Committee, made up of 85 statewide Republican activists, met to decide whether the state would hold a primary or a convention to decide the Republican nominee for senate next year. They chose a convention.

Virginia Republicans will hold a convention rather than a primary next year to choose their candidate to succeed retiring U.S. Sen. John W. Warner.

The state party's central committee voted 47-37 on Saturday in favor of a convention. No date or location was decided.

Supporters of a convention argued that it's more economical and the party would avoid a divisive public squabble between GOP rivals in a primary.

The decision was hardly free of politics, however. From The Politico:

[Congressman Tom] Davis and his allies were lobbying for a primary, while his likely GOP opponent, former governor Jim Gilmore preferred a convention. Conservative activists dominate the GOP conventions, and Davis' home base of Northern Virginia is usually under-represented among GOP activists. By contrast, anyone can vote in a GOP primary - including Democrats - because the state does not register voters by party.

So, not only does this decision, as James at Raising Kaine says, make it much less likely that Tom Davis will win the nomination, but it actually makes it much less likely that he'll jump in at all. From The Washington Post:

[The] vote by the 84-member Republican State Central Committee on whether to hold a convention or primary in June could play a major role in whether Davis enters the Senate race.

The Politico concurs:

Davis has said that a primary was crucial for his campaign, so he could increase his name recognition outside of Northern Virginia.  Some political observers have questioned whether he will even jump in the race, given his obstacles for both the nomination and in the general election.

Thus this morning's decision is somewhat bittersweet, for if it does prevent Davis from running for senate, that means we lose the opportunity to take his very winnable northern Virginia congressional seat but at the same time, a Gilmore candidacy makes a Warner victory all the more assured. For, while this week's WaPo poll shows Warner beating Davis more handily than he does Gilmore, Davis is far less well-known throughout the state and has much more room for growth. On the other hand, Gilmore, as a former governor, is well-known throughout the state so opinion of him is pretty well fixed; in fact, as the Washington Post poll makes clear:

Gilmore, a conservative who dropped out of the presidential race this year, could be hampered in a general election against Warner, because people's perception of Gilmore has worsened since he left the governor's mansion in 2002.

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The results of a new Washington Post poll (1,144 adults, incl. 993 RVs, Oct. 4-8, MOE 3%) out of Virginia provides the best evidence yet that this traditionally red state is shifting blue.

In the race for senate, while the Rasmussen Poll from a month ago showed Mark Warner with a lead against his most likely Republican rivals, former governor Jim Gilmore and Congressman Tom Davis, of 20% or higher, WaPo actually finds Warner is ahead by 30% or above.

Warner leads Gilmore 61 percent to 31 percent, a 2 to 1 margin replicated in nearly every region of the state. Warner leads Davis 63 percent to 28 percent.

In touting his own potential to beat Warner, Davis likes to say he has plenty of room to grow as only part of the state, his own district in northern Virginia, really knows him. But remarkably, even among his own constituents, Davis doesn't fare much better against Warner.

In vote-rich Fairfax County, where Davis argues that he would have more appeal than some recent statewide GOP candidates, Warner is up by 24 percentage points over the congressman (57 percent to 33 percent).

Warner's appeal against these potential Republican rivals is explained by his 67% favorability rating, which is remarkably consistent across party lines.

More than 7 in 10 Democrats have a favorable impression of the former governor, as do 69 percent of independents and 61 percent of the state's Republicans.

The senate race should become a bit clearer on Friday when the 84-member Republican State Central Committee decides whether to hold a convention or primary in June, 2008 to determine who the Republican senate nominee will be. The WaPo article suggests that Davis would benefit from a primary (versus a convention where several thousand GOP activists meet to decide the nominee) and in fact the impending decision by the committee may actually be the determining factor in whether Davis ultimately gets in the race.

Perhaps the most interesting result to come out of the WaPo poll, though, is this throw away line from the third paragraph, which goes unaccompanied by an actual numerical result (I assume it will be forthcoming tomorrow with the official release of the poll):

The Senate race will unfold against the backdrop of next year's presidential campaign, and the poll suggests that the state's 13 electoral votes could be up for grabs. By a margin of 11 percentage points, Virginians would prefer that the next president be a Democrat, indicating that even a reliably red state could flip in 2008.

Bush won the state by 8% in 2004.

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And then there were nine (not counting Thompson, Fred, of course, who is technically still in a "testing the waters" place and apparently will be until August):

Former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore ended his long-shot campaign for presidency on Saturday.

[snip]

"I have come to believe that it takes more than a positive vision for our nation's future to successfully compete for the presidency," Gilmore said. "I believe that it takes years of preparation to put in place both the political and financial infrastructure to contest what now amounts to a one-day national primary in February."

Yeah, 'cuz that's been working so well for John McCain. It says a lot about the GOP primary electorate that the first one to go out was actually kind of sane.  

OK, who had Gilmore on July 14th? Thoughts on who's next to drop?

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