I believe this race is one of the most important Senate races this fall, not so much because Jim Webb is a great candidate (though he was very impressive yesterday), but because the George Allen 2008 Presidential candidacy MUST be nipped in the bud via a loss of his Senate Seat. Allen is George W. Bush with better diction and without the booze.
Allen was right on talking point yesterday, delivering the White House talking points with a smile, and refusing to commit to serving his full six-year term -- which means he's running for president in 2008.
Webb is kind of a cold fish. A career military guy, he is strictly business. But he is smart as a whip, and does not labor under delusions that "as they stand up, we can stand down."
In the absence of the macaca incident, most people would be writing off this race. But despite Allen's "Some of my best friends are Negroes" (sic) protestations yesterday, the macaca incident has wounded his campaign.
Today the New York Times takes note:
In one of the sharpest exchanges of the campaign, Mr. Webb and Mr. Allen squared off on the war in Iraq on “Meet the Press” on NBC on Sunday, with Mr. Allen defending the Bush administration’s policy and denouncing the “second-guessing and Monday-morning quarterbacking” of the critics. “We’re going to need to do what it takes to succeed,” Mr. Allen said, when asked if he would support additional troops in Iraq, “because it’s essential to the security of the United States of America.”
Mr. Webb responded: “I know what it’s like to be on the ground. I know what it’s like to fight a war like this, and either — there are limits to what the military can do. Eventually, this is going to have to move into a diplomatic environment, and that’s where this administration seems to have blinders. They are not talking to Syria, they are not talking to Iran, and there are ways that we can do this, move this forward.”
Mr. Webb also took several digs at what he called theorists in the administration and among its allies who know combat only in the abstract. Mr. Allen, like the majority of the current Congress, did not serve in the military.
In recent days, the Allen campaign, acknowledging a newly competitive race, has gone on the attack. A Mason-Dixon poll conducted this month found Mr. Allen’s lead, once in the double-digits, had shrunk, with 46 percent for Mr. Allen, 42 percent for Mr. Webb, and a margin of error of 4 percentage points.
The mud has already started. The Allen campaign has already unearthed some rather ugly things Webb said about women in military leadership positions in 1979 -- which Webb parried well yesterday. The man is completely unflappable, and he had the best moment yesterday when he distilled perfectly the Iraq/terror connection on which Bush keeps harping:
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