Interesting Article on Allen

The AP presents an interesting article on George Allen's Presidential and Senatorial ambitions.

First of all, it is yet more national (and presumably nonpartisan) recognition that the VA Senate race is important.

A loyal foot solider for President Bush, the Virginia lawmaker faces a surprisingly tough re-election campaign that is keeping him pinned down in his state while other Republican presidential hopefuls traverse Iowa, New Hampshire and other important places in the 2008 nomination fight.

Just as worrisome, the Senate campaign has already dredged up a few unpleasant issues — both personal and political — that could shadow his plans for 2008.

Even better, the article outlines his past racist tendencies, including his affinity for the Confederacy before he had ever lived remotely near the South.

In his high school yearbook photo, Allen is wearing a Confederate flag pin. He said he cannot remember why, but suspects the pin was part of a nonconformist phase. He said a pal wore one, too.
"We probably did it for some sort of — I don't know what you call it — for the fun of it," Allen said, spitting tobacco juice between his cowboy boots. "It wasn't any major statement."

In the magazine article, classmates recalled Allen driving California's streets in a red Mustang with a Confederate plate. Some spoke of a graffiti-spraying incident and said it was racially tinged. Allen said he was suspended for the prank aimed at an opposing basketball team but denied writing anything racial.

Of course these were harmless pranks, right? A noncomformist phase? If so, it was a phase that lasted all the way to his tenure as Governor of Virginia, when he kept a confederate flag in his home and a noose in a tree in his law office.

Of course he tries to say it was only when he became governor that he became aware of the implications of the Confederate flag. But a damn noose? Come on.