'Hope' is not a fiscal strategy

The fair and balanced A. Barton Hinkle follows last week's Kaine critique with a few choice words for Kilgore in today's RTD: Jerrynomics: Kilgore's Numbers Don't Add Up:

Jerry Kilgore has a different problem. He wants to have things both ways principally in one area: money. As numerous others have pointed out, Kilgore is running as a big-government conservative tax-cutter whose primary fiscal strategy is hope.

Kilgore floats vague platitudes such as "identifying wasteful spending" and "a comprehensive review of state spending, operations, and services", but I've got to think that he could spotlight at least a few specific programs or organizations to cut and trim from the gluttonous bacchanalia of Commonwealth spending - or do we have to buy the cow to get the milk?

R's want to vote for R's who'll cut ineffective spending, but it only takes a village of Kool-Aid drinkers to coronate a primary winner without any details.

And unless we Virginians would prefer the mob-rule democracy employed by our fruitcake brethren from the left coast, can we please drop this talk of referendums? Leaders lead in a crisis, they don’t put it to a vote among the troops in the foxhole.

Unable to calculate a ballpark estimate for the sum total of the Kilgore campaign promises, Schmolitics Senior Policy Analyst and former Arizona Cardinals wide receiver Rod Tidwell simply commented, “Show me the money, Jerry.”