Can't Buy their love

In the nasty three-way race for California's Democratic gubernatorial nomination, Gray Davis was supposed to be the roadkill candidate: a bland career politician squashed by two glamorous multimillionaire opponents--airline tycoon Al Checchi and Representative Jane Harman. Davis, the state's solid but uninspiring lieutenant governor, was ignored by pundits and written off by insiders who are convinced that California has entered the age of the "virtual campaign," in which elections are won and lost solely in the ectoplasm of television ads. According to this theory, Californians don't follow politics, and the local news media barely cover it--so hiring hot consultants and buying...