The Massachusetts Senate race between champion-of-the-left Elizabeth Warren, a former Harvard professor, and incumbent Sen. Scott Brown, who is backed by the Tea Party, is turning into one of the most competitive, watched and expensive races this election season.

Warren quickly rose to prominence as the head of the TARP fund (i.e. bank bailout). For the left she was an identified hero, a critic of the banks and defender of taxpayer interests. Liberals rallied for a more high-profile position in the Obama administration. When her ambition to become head of the consumer bureau failed to come to fruition, Warren was encouraged to run for the Senate. And as The New York Times notes her campaign has attracted national liberal support and tons of money:

Ms. Warren’s haul — $24.5 million so far — has already catapulted her to No. 15 on the list of most successful Senate money-raisers in history...“She has become a darling for the left, and a lot of that money is incredibly frustrated and is looking for a place to go,” said Meredith McGehee, policy director of the Campaign Legal Center, a watchdog group in Washington....While Ms. Warren’s donors include Hollywood glitterati like Barbra Streisand, Sally Field, Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, they also include people with no public profile, like Joseph Alarid, 80, a retired personnel administrator who lives in Villa Park, Calif. Over the last few months, he has sent Ms. Warren a few hundred dollars in small checks of $25 here and $50 there.