In the Virginia Governor's Race, a Drizzle of Ads Portends a Deluge

Deeds might be trying to get a jump on establishing himself as the anti-McAuliffe, particularly outside Moran's stronghold of Northern Virginia.

"There's a strategy here -- that is, to create a buzz that this is the guy who's willing to make his presence known," said Mark Rozell, a professor of public policy at George Mason University. "He's trying to say he's the alternative candidate, the true competitor to the one who seems to be attracting most of the attention."

But Moran has yet to hit TV. What kind of ads is he likely to run when he does?

One clue might be gleaned from his closing statement at a blogger-hosted debate last week, the last head-to-head meeting scheduled until the candidates meet May 19 for a debate at Northern Virginia Community College in Annandale sponsored by The Washington Post.

During his two-minute closing, Moran twice called himself a "fighter." He referenced McAuliffe 15 times, knocking his rival's business investments and his management of the DNC.

Add to that Moran's vigorous dissemination of Sunday's Post story examining McAuliffe's history of complex business dealings, and it seems that Moran could use the airwaves to try to ding McAuliffe, given McAuliffe's potential front-runner status.

"If they're going to take McAuliffe down, they're going to have to do it personally," said Robert D. Holsworth, a political scientist who runs the Virginia Tomorrow politics blog. "The attack on McAuliffe will get not only louder but also more pointed and more negative."

The biggest ad buy of the season has come not from a candidate but from Common Sense Virginia, a Democratic political action committee heavily funded by the Democratic Governors Association. The half-million dollar TV spot this week is an indication of how the severe the storm might become in the fall, when big national groups will come to play in Virginia.

Common Sense Virginia flooded airwaves across the state, including vote-rich Northern Virginia, with an ad slamming Republican nominee Robert F. McDonnell over a decision by the GOP-led House of Delegates to reject $125 million in funding for unemployment insurance from the federal stimulus package.

"If Bob McDonnell won't stand up for Virginia's unemployed, do you think he'll stand up for you?" the ad asks.

McDonnell's campaign slammed the effort as a union-funded, out-of-state attack.

The sirens won't truly sound in this campaign until one of the three Democratic candidates or McDonnell goes on the air in the D.C. suburbs, the nation's ninth-largest TV market in terms of households. Running ads in the area is so expensive that some campaigns doubt their utility there; after all, plenty of people who see them live in Maryland and the District, not just Virginia.

But experts say it's only a matter of time before all of the TV time, all over Virginia, is swamped.

"You're going to have steady rains with periods where it gets very heavy," Tracey said. "But there will be a torrential downpour right before the primary."