I don't know that this is true. I still don't believe that Novelgate had any effect. When Rasmussen polled on it, 20% said the writings were of concern to them. I believe the NRSC's decision to go after him for his reaction to Tailhook was the real turning point. Webb stood up to the feminazis and the NRSC slammed him for it. How stupid could Elizabeth Dole have been. Tens of thousands of normally Republican military voters throughout the state decided to thank to Webb for standing up to the feminazis who turned a minor incident into an inquisition. That alone could have been the 7,000 vote difference.
And how many conservatives were turned on by attacking Webb for saying Tailhook was overblown, or that back in 1979 he opposed women in the military -- didn't most military people come slowly to women in the military?
Webb never even said women shouldn't be in the military. His piece was about women in combat. As I have said here many times, what kind of conservative attacks a guy for saying that ground combat is no place for a woman.
The problem with the campaign was two-fold: the decision to run Allen as a radical feminist sympathizer, and the relentless attacks of the media. If Webb had used the word macaca, do you think it would have been mentioned in 200 Washington Post articles?
The women in the academies felt that his comments created a hostile environment for them.
He also said women at Annapolis were, by definition, sluts.