Stop the Presses | Seriously, Jody, cut it out

I just love getting caught up in the crosshairs of a political controversy.
“We appreciate the Augusta Free Press setting the record straight,” an e-mail from the campaign of Republican Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling offered up, after having explained that we had reported that Democratic Party lieutenant-governor nominee Jody Wagner had gotten it wrong when she said on a campaign stop in Waynesboro last month that Bolling was a newcomer to the realization that the Governor’s Opportunity Fund has been woefully underfunded by the General Assembly.

We did so after Bolling’s chief of staff, Randy Marcus, who has been gracious with us over the years, as has Bolling, for that matter, made contact with me and presented me with links to Bolling’s legislative agendas and copies of letters from Bolling to Gov. Tim Kaine that made it clear to me that Bolling is no Johnny Come Lately on the Fund.

Wagner has since brought up the claim again, in an interview with a Central Virginia newspaper in which she said that “(f)or the past seven years, both Warner and Kaine’s administrations have been asking for more money in the Governor’s Opportunity Fund, which is one of the tools we use for incentives, and I never once heard Bill Bolling advocating to pass it.”

I mean, I have to say that I can’t swear that it was one of Bolling’s top priorities or anything like that, or that he even deep down cares about funding for the Governor’s Opportunity Fund. But it’s obvious that he’s included it in his legislative agendas more than once, so it’s been on his radar.

Ugh. This is one of those instances where I have to say, My side is getting this one wrong, way wrong.

– Column by Chris Graham