Webb Will Try To Turn Past GOP Loyalty Into Advantage

"He doesn't have to worry about proving to everyone in the room now that he's a Democrat. He's been ratified."

National Democrats are still not ready to move Virginia into the top tier of races that they think will help give them a majority in the Senate.

Allen has never lost a statewide race, and he has a huge advantage in fundraising: He has raised more than $10 million. And as withdrawn and shy as Webb sometimes can be, that's just how outgoing and gregarious Allen is on the stump.

Democratic Gov. Timothy M. Kaine said at the outset of the campaign that Allen has an important political skill. "You'll see him at some event talking to someone, and he seems like there's nothing he'd rather be doing than talking to that person at that time," Kaine said.

That's not a description that would be applied to Webb as this point. But the man who made his campaign slogan "Born Fighting" shows signs of taking the battle to Allen.

"We, at the moment, have not a lot of money, a candidate who's never run for office and 2,500 rag-tag rebels who volunteered for . . . " The crowd's cheers kept Webb from finishing the sentence. "I like those odds," he finally concluded.

So Virginians will choose between the cowboy-booted Allen and the combat-booted Webb.

Showdown at Macho Gulch.