Robert Hurt "Haunted" by Tax Vote; Grovels to Grover

Laughable and pathetic:

Five years ago, Virginia legislator Robert Hurt (R) appeared on a Wild West-style “Least Wanted” poster of a prominent anti-tax organization after he voted for some tax increases in a budget plan to shore up Virginia’s shaky finances.

Hurt’s vote is a major issue as he campaigns for the 2010 Republican nomination to oppose one-term Rep. Tom Perriello (D) in Virginia’s 5th district, where the National Republican Congressional Committee is promoting Hurt as the party’s strongest candidate.

Hurt was in Washington, D.C., last week to do a little damage control: he participated in a weekly meeting of Americans for Tax Reform (ATR), the organization that blasted him in the 2004 poster and in an accompanying press release, and signed the group’s pledge to oppose tax increases as a member of Congress.

“He basically made the case that this was not a vote that he was comfortable with and that it wouldn’t happen again,” ATR president Grover Norquist, an influential conservative activist, told CQ Politics on Wednesday...

In other words, now that Robert Hurt is running for Congress and desperately needs the votes of "tea partiers," he finds himself groveling to Grover "Drown government in the bathtub" Norquist and apologizing for his past moment of responsibility - namely, voting FOR Mark Warner's 2004 tax package. Recall that Warner worked with Democrats and moderate (aka, "sane") Republicans like Russ Potts, John Chichester, Jeannemarie Devolites and...Robert Hurt (he was still sane back then) to pass that legislation, resulting in a net tax increase of $1.5 billion and saving Virginia's AAA bond rating in the process. Given Hurt's 2004 vote to join his fellow Republican moderates (at the time) for the $1.5 billion tax increase, it's sad to see Hurt today, running away from his past record of sanity and fiscal responsibility. Unfortunately, this is what happens in today's Republican Party, where "purity" is all the rage, and where "moderates" are considered to be evil RINOs.

P.S. Thank you to the "old" Robert Hurt, the one who voted for the $1.5 billion net tax increase that saved Virginia's financial solvency!