GOP bastions under siege here (in the 'land of Hyde")--

[rodeodance]

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/politics/chi-061022sixth-eighth-story,1,5693890.story?coll=chi-news-hed&?track=sto-topstory


GOP bastions under siege here
Democrats gaining in land of Hyde, Crane, poll says

By Bob Secter, John Biemer and Susan Kuczka
Tribune staff reporters
Published October 22, 2006

Once finely balanced between the city and the suburbs, the political scales of metropolitan Chicago have been tipping ever more Democratic, and fierce congressional races in two long-safe Republican bastions now are putting that trend to an important new test.

With 82-year-old U.S. Rep. Henry Hyde stepping aside, the west suburban 6th Congressional District seat he has been re-elected to easily since the Watergate era is now very much up for grabs, according to a new Tribune/WGN-TV poll.

In the northwest suburban 8th Congressional District, the survey found strong re-election support for freshman Democrat Melissa Bean, suggesting that her 2004 upset of 35-year Republican U.S. Rep. Phil Crane was no fluke.

If Republican leaders feel blindsided by the turn, then they would do well to pay a call to the Wheaton home of Lois and Gerald Sheridan, for years one of the GOP precinct committeemen who rallied voters for Hyde at election time.........

[ChairmanAgnostic]

1. unbelievable

one year ago, I would have paid good money on two districts I thought were locks.
DeLay's in texas and Hyde's in my home state.

I am actually getting excited about our prospects.

two years ago, I was becoming fretful and worried and pissed and frustrated and angry and depressed.

That was then; this is now.

[DeepModem Mom]

2. The GOP finally paying for its wacko turn to the right. nt

[Demeter]

3. Get Hyde! Blood in the Water!

He's been asking for a reckoning for decades! That I will live to see this is my greatest dream, right after sending BushCo to the Hague. This could be the first election that's better than sex.

[Greeby]

4. Umm hardly, he's retiring nt

[Demeter]

7. I'm Sure A Little Digging Will Turn Up Something Indictable

He can't get off that easily.

[murielm99]

8. He went after Clinton viciously.

Then it came out that he had an affair with a woman when he was in his forties, that he quipped was a "youthful mistake."

He broke up the woman's family. That sort of thing is not indictable, but it shows his hypocrisy and lack of character.

[yellowcanine]

5. "America's most Republican County" - GOPers. Be still my heart.

"Hyde's 6th district sits mostly in DuPage County, which the GOP establishment is fond of calling 'America's most Republican County.' And Crane's 8th district, rambling north of Hyde's to the Wisconsin border, was thought a close second."


Go Duckworth and Bean!

[calimary]

6. "America's most republi-CON County" - we'll see about that.

Perhaps this will turn out to be a claim that winds up being just like all the other ones the republi-CONS make all the time - a lie. Or maybe wishful thinking (if I'm in a generous mood, that is).

While I would have LOVED to have seen that shit henry hyde get his directly, I guess we'll have to settle for sticking it to him indirectly. It would be a MOST pleasing insult to his legacy to see his district fall securely into OUR hands - OUT of the Darkness and into The Light!

But let's not get complacent. It's not in the bag yet. Still gotta work like hell... and never take our eyes off the prize.

[w4rma]

9. I'll be rooting for Dr. Jekyll. (nt)