George Allen Talks Deregulation

Gov. Bob McDonnell and many members of Loudoun County’s delegation to the General Assembly rallied behind George Allen Monday in Ashburn, on the eve of a .

Allen faces three opponents—tea party member , minister and Del. of Prince William County in Tuesday's for the U.S. Senate—vying to take on Democrat Tim Kaine in the fall election for the seat Sen. Jim Webb won six years ago. Webb defeated then-incumbent Allen in 2006.

Allen and his endorsers said the key to jump-starting investment and job creation in America is to ease regulations and taxes on businesses that have struggled to recover from a national recession. To highlight the point, coordinators held the rally at Prototype Productions Inc. in Ashburn, a contractor that focuses on innovating manufacturing processes. Allen said the country needs entrepreneurs, but that the federal government stands in the way with over-regulation and high taxes.

“Folks, we’re in competition with the rest of the world. We need to reinvigorate the entrepreneurial spirit of our country,” Allen said, adding that a message must be sent to the rest of the world: “America is open for business again.”

Using sports analogies—common with Allen, whose father was the coach of the —PPI owner Joe Travez said businesses are overtaxed and overregulated, making it difficult to break new ground.

“Big government keeps moving the end zone,” Travez said. “It really does crush ingenuity and innovation.”

Gov. McDonnell followed, calling PPI a “tremendous entrepreneurial company,” and said the country needs more like it.

“Boy do we need more entrepreneurship in America,” he said, adding that changing the balance in the U.S. Senate would help. At a time when Republicans are calling for change in Washington, McDonnell called Allen the “greatest reform governor of the modern era in Virginia.”

To back up the claim, McDonnell pointed to welfare reform, job growth, the transition to the “digital Dominion” and other accomplishments during Allen’s term as governor. McDonnell then said Allen championed lower regulations during his time in the U.S. Senate.

“This election is about two very different competing interests,” McDonnell said. One side believes people can be anything they want to be, while the other pushes for bigger government and an entitlement society that drives the country further into debt. “The control of the Unites States Senate could be decided right here in Virginia. It’s game time. It’s time to get this done for George Allen.”

Allen said that if elected, on his first day, he would introduce legislation to authorize drilling for oil off Virginia’s coast. He also vowed to push to deregulate “clean coal” technologies.

“We need to reign in government. It’s meddling in too many things,” Allen said.

He also called for simpler tax laws to draw more business to the country, while eliminating entitlement programs.

“The most important social program of all is a job,” he said, promising that his ideas would create an environment where businesses can create more jobs.

While Allen faces three opponents in the Tuesday primary, he did not utter one of their names.

One of the few Democrats currently representing any part of Loudoun issued a statement criticizing Allen prior to the Ashburn event.

"Virginians remember the last time George Allen went to Washington—he helped turn a record surplus into massive deficits, adding trillions of dollars in new debt,” said state Sen. Mark Herring (D-33). “At the same time, he voted to raise his own pay and give away billions in taxpayer dollars to special interests like big oil.  Virginians remember and we can't afford another six years of the same failed economic policies that helped send our economy into a tailspin."