The Presumed Favorite

Mark Warner announces his campaign for the U.S. Senate.

FORMER governor Mark R. Warner of Virginia steps into the 2008 race for the U.S. Senate facing a daunting adversary: overconfidence, at least on the part of his supporters. That much was clear yesterday from scanning parts of the blogosphere that, in the immediate aftermath of his video announcement, were teeming with his partisans proclaiming the race a slam-dunk and an automatic pickup for Democrats in the Senate. Memo to the Republicans: Don't bother fielding a candidate.

Put aside the faint echoes of former Republican senator George F. Allen's disastrous reelection campaign last year, whose launch was similarly accompanied by chest-thumping declarations of invincibility. It's true that Mr. Warner comes armed with a dazzling sheaf of advantages. Given his innate caution, he is highly unlikely to make any misstep approaching Mr. Allen's "macaca" moment. In addition to an impressive career in business that left him with a personal fortune estimated in the tens of millions of dollars, Mr. Warner was a highly competent and successful governor. Having taken office in 2002 facing a deficit of several billion dollars, he left the governor's mansion in 2006 with the state running a surplus. Moderate by disposition, conciliatory by nature and about as nonpartisan as governors get, Mr. Warner governed from the center, mustered critical Republican backing when it counted and became one of the most popular governors in Virginia's recent history. In addition to enjoying a huge lead in the polls over any possible opponent for the Senate, he has the luxury of facing a Virginia GOP whose internal rivalries have often erupted into open feuding.

So certainly, Mr. Warner is the presumed favorite. It is worth remembering, though, that his short-lived exploratory campaign for the presidency last year exposed some of his shortcomings, ones he will need to address. Although he spoke confidently in his travels around the country about domestic policy and the achievements of what he called the "Virginia story," Mr. Warner was much more halting when it came to foreign policy and defense. His challenge in the campaign will be to demonstrate a mastery of issues beyond those that preoccupied him in Richmond and to show Virginians that he would make a worthy successor to the retiring incumbent, Republican Sen. John W. Warner.