The editors of the Washington Post examine the Virginia gubernatorial candidates’ stances on education, and find a key difference on charter schools as well as overall detail:

If elected, Mr. McDonnell promises to give charters another avenue of appeal through the state Board of Education, as well as providing resources to support the growth of quality charters. “I will work with the Obama administration to put Virginia in the vanguard of the charter school movement,” Mr. McDonnell says; his willingness to align himself with a Democratic administration that has threatened to withhold federal funds from states hostile to charters is noteworthy. Mr. McDonnell is equally reform-minded in other areas of education, supporting performance pay for principals and teachers and favoring ways to give parents more of a choice in their children’s schooling.
Mr. Deeds’s education stance is less defined. His Web site promises that he will make college more accessible and affordable, expand pre-kindergarten opportunities, and provide more money for teachers. Mr. Deeds says that he supports charter schools but, as the Richmond Times-Dispatch noted, he is less enthusiastic than Mr. McDonnell is. Mr. Deeds did vote for a bill during this year’s legislative session to remove limitations on the number of charter schools a school board may approve. Sadly, though, he doesn’t want to deny local school boards the power to control the start-up of charters in the misguided belief that it would drain money from public education; never mind that charters are public schools.

I, and many others, would be surprised if the Post endorsed McDonnell this fall; their primary endorsement made pretty clear that they’re inclined to support the Democrat in the general election. But on education, they’re calling it as they see it.