Democratic gubernatorial candidate R. Creigh Deeds said yesterday that if the General Assembly passes a bipartisan bill that includes a tax increase to fund Virginia’s transportation needs, he will sign it. But the state senator from Bath County said during an online chat at the Richmond Times-Dispatch that he would not sign a transportation bill that took money from education or other “general fund priorities” to finance the fix.

Joe Biden is the Old Faithful of national politics. Every 90 minutes or so, another torrent of nonsense gushes from his mouth. The vice president was in particularly fine form the other day when he swung through Virginia. During an appearance at J. Sargeant Reynolds, he said the country would go bankrupt without massive expenditures. “People, when I say that, look at me and say, ‘What are you talking about, Joe? You’re telling me we have to go spend money to keep from going bankrupt?‘ The answer is yes.“

Military strategists are always in danger of fighting the last war. The same could hold true of constitutional strategists. FDR’s string of presidential victories encouraged Republican support of the 22nd Amendment—whose two-term limit fell first on the popular Dwight Eisenhower. Richmond therefore faced the peril of embracing changes to its charter most relevant to a situation no longer in effect: the mayoral administration of Doug Wilder. His tempestuous term roiled city government as he wrestled with the City Council and the School Board over issues great and small. It would have been easy for the city’s charter-review commission to let that experience so color its deliberations that it went overboard trying to correct the mistakes of the past.

Wilder pushed the revisions to the City Charter proposed by the Wilder-Bliley Charter Commission on the grounds that the role of the mayor be more clearly spelled out. When he was elected, he sought—and got—more powers.

And now, a moment of silence by the local media corps. L. Douglas Wilder’s departure from the mayor’s suite in Richmond City Hall should leave local news gatherers in a state of mourning.

Richmond will press its legislative agenda today with members of the General Assembly, but neither the mayor nor his successor is likely to be there. Mayor L. Douglas Wilder, who will step down in January, will not attend the annual legislative gathering this afternoon “out of deference to the mayor elect,“ spokesman Linwood Norman said.

Richmond Mayor L. Douglas Wilder has tapped the city’s next police chief. Wilder is scheduled to announce the chief at an 11 a.m. news conference at City Hall. A search committee recently recommended two finalists to succeed former Police Chief Rodney Monroe. Maj. David M. McCoy is serving as the acting chief.