The only reason Schauer even won the seat was because of the NRCC tossing Walberg overboard after he bucked the establishment and voted against the big bailout of 08. They stripped Walberg of funding in the final weeks of the campaign, called him a lost cause and Schauer won by a whopping 2%.
The tea party returned the lost cause to Washington in 2010.
My all-time favorite guv race in Mich was when Engler beat Blanchard; my second favorite was when people of both parties voted in the Demwit primary in Engler’s first reelection bid and put Kevorkian’s lawyer on the ballot. Naturally he had his ass handed to him, but my buddies who had their heads up the union butthole had to go from dismissing him during the primary while pushing for the whatever drone they’d wanted, to having to act like they would work just as hard for the ambulance chaser.