As the creator of www.NOLaHood.com , I thought I’d chim in on this little discussion. ;-) Much of your speculation about LaHood’s background and the nature of the 18th district can be found on that site.
To summarize, all those who posted that LaHood is a George Ryan type RINO who stabs his own party is the back was quite correct. LaHood was on record endorsing his “buddy” George Ryan for a 2nd term yet he went on the attack against our first Republican Senator in 20 years, Peter Fitzgerald, and told the media we could “do better” than Fitz because the Senator was independent and didn’t bring home the bacon to Mayor Daley (LaHood LOVES the mayor of Chicago). LaHood later trashed Jack Ryan’s campaign at every turn (long before any scandals even came up), and gave a de facto endorsement to Obama. After Obama and Melissa Bean’s win, LaHood even stooped to holding a press conference to gloat how Illinoisans would somehow have more “clout” in D.C. now that we have a majority Democrat delegation.
LaHood’s central Illinois district is about as “safe” as you can get, despite the city of Peoria being marginally Dem. The district as a whole has voted consistently Republican since the civil war era. The last time a Democrat won that seat was around 1916 or so. LaHood puts an “R” next to his name and established a marginal Republican record to “win” in the 18th, plain and simple. Even a pro-life Democrat is going to have an extremely hard time winning the 18th as a whole, and I don’t foresee any chance of a Dem pickup unless the GOP nominated a known child molester or something along those lines.
I’m happy LaHood has tossed his hat into the ring for Governor so we can defeat him in the primary and elect a REAL Republican in the 18th. LaHood “inherited” the job from Bob Michel and has never faced anything more than token opposition in the general. In the only real campaign LaHood ever faced, his 1982 campaign for state rep., he was defeated.
Jonathan Wright is a great conservative who is deputy Republican committeeman for the 18th and very, very popular in his home county (he got twice as many votes in the primary as Jack Ryan did there). I have heard he’s now principle of some elementary school and reluctant to run for office again, though my site hopes to start a petition to “draft” him for the job because he’d be the strongest candidate in the primary and the general. I’m not sure about David Ransburg or Stu Umholtz, but I will look into them and consider doing profiles about them on my site. The “powers that be” in LaHood’s district have anointed Peoria county officials for the last century, so I’m sure LaHood is looking to anoint a “heir apparent” in Peoria. We cannot allow a LaHood clone to skate through an uncontested primary.
Have you seen THIS man before?