REPUBLICANS PICK LOW-KEY CANDIDATE

U.S. Rep. Bob Barr, a conservative Republican perhaps best known for his
attempts to drive President Clinton out of the White House, conceded
shortly before 11 p.m. Tuesday to fellow Republican Rep. John Linder in
their primary election contest to represent the 7th Congressional District.

The Associated Press declared Linder the winner shortly after 10 p.m.

The lopsided results marked the end of a sometimes slapstick race
characterized by insults, one-liners, a controversy over a cartoon
character and the accidental shooting of a gun. The district is heavily
Republican, but Linder will face Democrat Michael Berlon in the November
general election.

With eyes misting and his wife, Jeri, by his side, Barr hugged and thanked
supporters who crowded into the 1818 Club in Duluth.

"We've been watching the numbers, and they don't look nearly as good as we
would have hoped," the 53-year-old congressman told a somber crowd of 300,
many with tears in their eyes.

Barr congratulated Linder, pledged his support and paid homage to hundreds
of campaign workers who went door to door, made telephone calls and hung
Bob Barr literature on doorknobs in the heated, sometimes nasty campaign.

"We've accomplished as a team more than any other congressman accomplishes
in an entire lifetime and I appreciate that," Barr said.

Linder, a low-key lawmaker known for working behind the scenes, expressed
his gratitude to supporters next door at the Gwinnett Civic and Cultural
Center.

"He ran a good campaign. We ran a better one," said Linder, 59.

Barr, the sober-faced and outspoken congressman often depicted as a
bulldog, watched results come in privately, holed up in a Duluth hotel
room, and later conceded to supporters quietly.

Linder, a soft-spoken policy expert who almost seems to avoid the public
eye, laughed with about 200 supporters in the civic center ballroom.

Both incumbents, Linder in office for 10 years and Barr for eight, came to
do battle after the redistricting process Democrats controlled in 2000
pitted them against each other.

At first, both kept to their promise to run a clean campaign. But as time
passed and opinion polls showed the two in a virtual dead heat, the
nastiness emerged.

Barr made fun of the fact that Linder often declines to give an opinion on
issues, saying he has no right to insert himself into people's lives. A
Barr commercial portrayed Barr as a bulldog and Linder as a whining,
whimpering dachshund. Linder touted himself as a family man, married to his
wife, Lynne, for 39 years, while he spoke of Barr's three marriages.

Linder teased Barr about an incident in which an antique gun accidentally
fired in the home of a Barr supporter while Barr and another person were
handling it. Days later, a Linder supporter dressed as the cartoon
character Yosemite Sam, known for shooting off pistols, mingled at a
pro-Barr event, touting himself as Barr's "personal gun safety trainer."
Adding steam to the fracas was a video on an Internet Web site that showed
Barr's adult son, Derek, shoving the man dressed as Yosemite Sam.

Late Tuesday night, Linder supporters -- mingling in the ballroom and
surrounded by red, white and blue balloons imprinted with "Linder" -- said
they believe the negative campaigning hurt Barr. They also said Barr was
perceived as an outsider.

"The reality is that Bob Barr appeals to a small number of people who
believe you get things done by yelling and screaming," said B.J. Van Gundy,
Linder's campaign manager in Gwinnett County. "John Linder thinks like the
majority. You work with people to get things done."

Linder's approval ratings were high before the race started, added Ed
Brookover, a Linder campaign consultant. "In the end, what came through was
that John was a solid leader," Brookover said.

The contest would have been disappointing to Georgia Republicans no matter
what the outcome, said U.S. Rep. Johnny Isakson, a Republican.

"We had two good men and we lost one," Isakson said. "Redistricting is a
process which sometimes has unfortunate results. This time and in this
case, it resulted in two incumbents having to challenge one another. It's
just disappointing."