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In California, it's the money that matters and Boxer has raised plenty
of it. By the end of the campaign, she'll have dumped more than $10
million into a nasty bunch of television and radio ads, most of them
slamming Fong's more conservative positions on such hot-button issues
as abortion, environmental regulation, gun control and tax reform.
The shift in the political winds shocked Fong, who has tried all along
to portray himself as the low-key, moderate alternative to Boxer, an
unabashed liberal whose feisty, in-your-face political style has made
her plenty of enemies among California voters.
With the election slipping away, Fong finally started to respond to
Boxer's relentless pounding. An ad that began running just four days
before the election describes Boxer as “too extreme and too ineffective
for California'' and Fong hammered that theme at every stop on the campaign's
final weekend.
But it might be too little, too late, especially since polls show Democrats
gaining rapidly in almost every statewide race. Boxer and the Democrats
received more good news when the Secretary of State's office predicted
a 62 percent turnout for Tuesday's vote, above the 59 percent average
for off year elections. As Boxer put it early in the campaign, “With
a big turnout I win. With a low turnout, I lose.''
--John Wildermuth
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