2006 New Member Profiles
Virginia Senate: Jim Webb (D)

The Almanac of American Politics
© National Journal Group Inc.

Jim Webb
Born:	February 9, 1946
Family:	Wife, Hong; four children
Religion:	Christian
Education:	S. Naval Academy, B.S. 1968; Georgetown University, J.D. 1975
Career:	Navy secretary; assistant Defense secretary; counsel, U.S. House Veterans' Affairs Committee; writer.
Military Service:	Marine Corps, 1968-72
Elected  Office:	None

A single word that most Americans had never heard of -- "macaca" -- helped Jim Webb score an upset over Republican Sen. George Allen.

Allen's use of the obscure term, which refers to a genus of monkey and is considered a racial slur in some cultures, led to a firestorm that put his re-election campaign into a tailspin from which it never recovered. Allen was at a rally in southwestern Virginia in August when he used the word in referring to a 20-year-old Indian-American campaign volunteer for Webb who was videotaping the senator's appearance. The Webb campaign later posted the clip on YouTube, a popular Web site.

The incident sparked a frenzied media inquiry into exactly what Allen meant by the term. It also fostered a widespread media discussion of whether the first-term senator was a racist, a characterization that dogged him for the rest of the campaign. Before the macaca controversy, Webb's campaign had struggled to gain traction against Allen, who had been leading comfortably in the polls and was widely considered a top contender for the Republican presidential nomination in 2008.

Webb, a Vietnam veteran and a prolific writer, is a former Republican who served as Navy secretary under President Reagan. He faced a competitive June 13 Democratic primary opponent in Harris Miller, a wealthy lobbyist and former Fairfax County Democratic chairman. Although Miller had considerable support within state Democratic ranks, the national party viewed Webb as more electable and backed him. Webb won, 56 percent to 43 percent.

After securing the nomination, Webb sought to position himself as a "Reagan Democrat" in an attempt to broaden his cross-party appeal. His first television ad showed clips of the late president praising Webb as a decorated marine war hero, but Nancy Reagan requested that the campaign stop running the ad.

As the race closed and the candidates drew even in the polls, Allen put Webb on the defensive by publicizing sexually explicit excerpts from his novels that Republicans insisted were demeaning to women -- a theme that the Allen campaign revisited frequently. At the heart of the issue was Webb's authorship of a controversial 1979 article titled "Women Can't Fight," which argued against admitting women into the Naval Academy. The criticism tamped down Webb's popularity among female voters, but despite spending more than $14 million, Allen was unable to reverse his post-macaca slide.