Election Patterns?

Today was primary day in Virginia, as well as for a special election in Ohio, for the U.S. House seat vacated by Rob Portman, the new USTR. In Virginia, six GOP incumbents in the House of Delegates faced anti-tax primary challenges after voting for Governor Mark Warner's compromise tax increase, which was necessary to balance the budget without massive cuts in social and educational program funding. As of now (10.04pm), five seem to have prevailed, while a sixth is losing.

In Ohio, meanwhile, a wild four-way primary battle for the GOP nomination (tantamount to victory in a district that has sent only one Dem to Congress in the last half-century) was captured by the most moderate candidate in the field, former state Rep. Jean Schmidt. Schmidt took 28 percent of the vote, around 700 votes better than former congressman Bob McEwen. As In Virginia, Schmidt came under attack (in an ad sponsored by the conservative Club for Growth) for having supported a tax increase in the state legislature.

It's always tough to read trends from off-year elections. But, for today at least, the anti-tax message which has been at the core of GOP philosophy since the late 1970s didn't carry the day in Republican primaries.