Fourth Face-Off May Tip A Red State Toward Purple (Indiana)

[babylonsister]

Fourth Face-Off May Tip A Red State Toward Purple
By Marc Rehmann | 2:40 PM; Aug. 17, 2007


Baron Hill was among three Indiana Democrats who took generally conservative districts from the GOP in 2006. Can he and his colleagues hold on in a year when Republicans are defending a 10-election presidential winning streak in the state?

By now, Baron P. Hill and Mike Sodrel probably know each other as well as any two political rivals in the country. They’ve been battling over the same swath of the Ohio River Valley for all of this decade, as good an indication as any that Indiana has become a bellwether for control in the House.

But when Hill, the Democrat, won their third contest last fall — ousting Sodrel, the Republican, after just one term, to reclaim a seat he’d held for six years — that victory signaled a turning point for Democrats, who also picked up two other seats in Indiana last November, transforming a 2-to-7 disadvantage in the delegation to a 5-to-4 advantage.

Hill won by 10,000 votes last fall. In 2004, Sodrel won by just 1,400 votes, aided in part by President Bush running for re-election and taking 59 percent of the district vote. Two years before that, Hill had won a third House term by 9,500 votes.

Now halfway through the first year of his fourth term, Hill is being targeted yet again as one of the most vulnerable Democratic incumbents in the country. Sodrel is widely expected to run for a fourth time in 2008 — when the most reliably “red” state in the Midwest will be predicted to vote Republican in an 11th consecutive presidential election — although numerous political observers who are familiar with politics in southeastern Indiana say he may not announce until next February, after the presidential primaries shake out.

“There are a lot of people desiring” another Sodrel run, said Dave Matthews, the GOP chairman in Floyd County, which includes Sodrel’s hometown of New Albany.

more...

http://www.cqpolitics.com/2007/08/fourth_faceoff_may_tip_a_red_s.html

[Chipper Chat]

1. Expect another visit from the pRetzeldent if Sodrel runs again.

Bushler'll be invited, but he could get a cold reception from a growing number of rapidly-turning blue river rats around Madison and Charlestown.

[saltpoint]

2. Good post. It highlights a district we won in 06 and need to keep in 08

and thereafter.

Hill's no fire-belching liberal really, but he's LOADS better than Mike Sodrel.

Much-more-liberal Bloomington is in that district, so our chances remain high of keeping that seat.

Plus, it will generally be a Democratic tide nationally, which helps our candidate and makes Sodrel's incline a bit steeper.

And there is at least an outside chance that Evan Bayh will be our veep nom. DUers' personal opinions of Evan Bayh aside, he would put Indiana into play and might float Hill's boat to a sooth docking.

[saltpoint]

3. By god, as long as we're on the subject of Indiana politics, it sure would be

nice if voters in mid-north-central Indiana would dump Steve Buyer.

That guy is bad news.

I realize the district is a Republican stronghold, but didn't Floyd Fithian come from that district some years back? Maybe I'm getting my districts mixed up.

Anyway, you Indiana Democrats do what you can to keep Hill in there against Mike Sodrel, and start working on dumping Buyer, too.