Coming Friday: A Decision Virginia Special Report

Do you know where your representative in Virginia’s General Assembly’s district office is?

Did you know he or she gets $15,000 a year to operate that office.. but are not required to actually open one?

Friday night on NBc12 at 11, we investigate to see just how the money is tracked.

You might be surprised to see what some high ranking government leaders think about the system.

Friday night at 11 on NBC12-TV .. and then posted in it’s entirety later on Decision Virginia.

Republicans attack Democratic “Common Sense Tour”

Ryan Nobles – bio | email

While Democrats continue to make the argument that Virginians are up in arms over the Republicans refusal to expand unemployment benefits, the Republicans are not backing down. Today the GOP held a press conference where they outlined specific points that they claim show, they had Virginia workers best interests in mind when the turned back the expansion and the $125 million in stimulus funds that came with it.

Democrats feel they have made progress with voters by harping on the issue. All three candidates for Governor are among more than 9,000 Virginians that have signed an online petition attacking the Republican’s move and calling for a change in leadership.

In addition to the GOP press event (which I will have more on later), the Republican Governor’s Association put out a press release today, calling the Democratic “Common Sense Tour” a failure. The Common Sense Tour followed Bob McDonnell around the commonwealth hoping to find Virginians angry over McDonnell’s decision to support the Republicans in the House and their opposition to the unemployment expansion.  The release points to two different independent press accounts they reported  a minimal response to the Common Sense effort.

**UPDATE**  Common Sense Virginia sent me a response to the RGA’s release. They  claim that  “Bob McDonnell either doesn’t know or doesn’t care about the challenges Virginians face in these tough economic times.”  Their entire statement can be found after the jump as well. 

Whether or not this is indicative of the success Democrats are having in gaining support over the issue is up for debate, but it does show that Republicans are attempting to stop the bleeding.

Tonight on NBC12 news and here on Decision Virginia, I will take a closer look at the issue and the marked change in the ultimate goals by Democrats when it comes to the battle over the unemployment benefits expansion.

The full release from the Republican Governor’s Association and the Common Sense response is after the jump..