'Family' Reasons? Theories Abound on Warner's Exit

RICHMOND -- What's the real reason?

That's the question everyone has been asking me since former Virginia governor Mark R. Warner announced suddenly last week that he will not be running for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008.

Warner, who had done everything but announce his candidacy, stepped back from the brink of an all-out presidential campaign, citing what so many politicians do: a desire to spend more time with his family, in this case his wife and three daughters.

There is, his aides said, simply nothing more to it than that.

But almost no one I know has been willing to accept that as the complete answer. Whether friends and family, or Warner's political adversaries, or anonymous pundits who send me e-mail, there are few people who think Warner told the entire truth about his surprise decision.

As Grover Norquist , a conservative foe of Warner's, put it: "I'll believe that when politicians start saying they are running for office because they want to spend less time with their families."

It is true that Warner's wife, Lisa Collis , has never been enthusiastic about a national campaign. Warner said last week that he had nudged her from "negative to neutral." And his daughters are teenagers now, a handful for anyone. Even so, he said, they would have been supportive if he had gone forward.

But if family is not the entire reason, what is?

For some, the first thing that comes to mind is some sort of scandal he wants to keep hidden. In this era of skepticism, perhaps it's no surprise that people would jump to that conclusion.

Perhaps the scandal-a-day headlines from Washington are too much for people to accept a decision such as Warner's at face value. But since he made the announcement, not a whiff of scandal has emerged.

So what does that leave? Perhaps, despite his protestations to the contrary, Warner's decision was a cold, calculated one made after determining that the odds were against his winning.

I've heard this theory now several times from people who are close to Warner, and it makes me think there's something to it, even though Warner's pollster, Geoff Garin , denied it on the day the former governor made his announcement.