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Pennsylvania Democratic Rep. Joe Sestak has come from behind before to score a surprise upset victory, and his campaign has insisted for several months that he can do it again this November in the general election for Senate against Republican former Rep. Pat Toomey.

Although Republican strategists have long believed that Sestak is a weaker candidate than Toomey, the Democrat has made a last-minute surge in a pair of polls, and RealClearPolitics now rates the race a tossup. Toomey has led in nearly all polling in the race this year, with the exception of a Sestak surge just after he upset Sen. Arlen Specter in the Democratic primary in May.

Toomey Communications Director Nachama Soloveichik did not acknowledge that the race is closing and said instead, "The polls are all over the place, with most of them showing a good sized lead for Pat Toomey." Soloveichik added, "But the bottom line for Pennsylvania voters is a clear choice between more of the same reckless Washington spending and high unemployment with Joe Sestak, or a change in direction toward fiscal discipline and job growth with Pat Toomey."

National Democratic figures including President Obama and Democratic National Committee Chairman Tim Kaine have made multiple trips to the state in the past two months to assist Democrats there like Sestak. The party has moved substantial funding to the state throughout the year, as it has been relatively reliable for statewide Democrats in recent years, although the GOP has never given up on it as a true blue state.

Now, the narrowing of the Senate race in recent days is bringing more attention and importance to the only two debates in the race, which will be held this week. Sestak and Toomey will meet tonight in a debate hosted by ABC in Philadelphia and again on Friday in a Pittsburgh debate hosted by the CBS affiliate.

Sestak's campaign is promoting the debate appearances on the front page of his Web site with a notice that lets voters know where they can view the debates. It's harder to find any mention of the debates on Toomey's Web site.

Soloveichik said Toomey's campaign is promoting the debate, however, and plans to stream the first debate live on the campaign's Web site tonight.

The back-to-back debates likely will shed some light on the candidates' positions on fiscal policies affecting Wall Street, which the candidates have sparred over throughout the race. The campaigns' ads have gone back and forth over Wall Street bailouts recently.

Just today, Toomey's campaign debuted a new video excoriating Sestak for voting for the Troubled Assets Relief Program, the bank bailouts, when he said in his own campaign ad, "It made me sick to bail out the banks."

The day before, Sestak spokesman Jonathon Dworkin issued a statement blasting Toomey for airing misleading ads on his position on bailouts and accused him of supporting "one of the most famous bailouts in Wall Street history." Dworkin noted that in 1998, Toomey supported the Federal Reserve's efforts to bail out the hedge fund, Long Term Capital Management.

Democrats have blasted Toomey for his ties to Wall Street throughout the cycle, but those attacks did not do much to damage Toomey's position in polling for much of the race.

Information sections of Toomey's Web site are packed with commentary about his opposition to bailouts, although a "Hypocrisy Alert" section on Washington spending includes information mostly centered on Specter and from just up until early May, when most campaign operatives thought the incumbent would prevail in the primary.

Republicans believed at the time when Sestak won the Democratic nomination that the race would be much easier for Toomey, but the Democratic tilt of the state may make it more difficult than they expected.

When Democrat Bob Casey challenged GOP then-Sen. Rick Santorum in the Keystone State in 2006, the Republican lagged far behind in all public polls for the entirety of the campaign cycle and never recovered, but the current race is proving not to be a repeat of the last big battle in reverse.