Allen, Webb in Slashing, Wide-Ranging Debate [View All]

[cal04]

Virginia Sen. George Allen and former Navy secretary James Webb clashed over issues and character in a fast-paced and contentious series of exchanges during the last of three scheduled debates Monday night.

The 60-minute debate, held in Richmond and broadcast live on 19 public and commercial television stations statewide, gave Webb and Allen a chance to highlight the issues they hope will dominate the four weeks before the Nov. 7 election. For Allen, the Republican, those issues are taxes, same-sex marriage and a dislike of liberals. Webb, running as a Democrat, stressed the Iraq war and economic fairness as he appealed for support from independents and Republicans.

(snip)
When it was his turn, Webb assailed the rise in corporate profits at the expense of wages. And Webb, a decorated veteran whose son is serving as a Marine in Iraq, lashed out, indirectly, at Allen's lack of foreign policy or wartime experience.

"Very few of these leaders are willing to invest their own loved ones in this effort," he said of the war in Iraq. "America needs leaders who understand these divisions and want to repair them, leaders whose experience in foreign policy is formed by experience, not by sound bites."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/09/AR2006100901332.html