Tribune endorses Duckworth

[City Lights]

For Congress: Duckworth

Published October 18, 2006

For 32 years the 6th Congressional District of Illinois has been represented by Rep. Henry Hyde, whom this page has long admired. When he takes a position, you know he's standing on principle. He's not afraid to buck his own party, as he did in 1994 when he supported a ban on semiautomatic assault weapons. In the face of death threats, Hyde didn't back away from that. The Tribune said he made " a courageous decision." More recently, he has encouraged the U.S. to lead in the worldwide fight against AIDS. He is a giant in the House, respected as one of the great voices of conservatism. Now he is retiring.

So, who should succeed Hyde? We think it's someone who disagrees with him on many issues, but who would bring a similar sense of principle to the House. The Tribune endorses Democrat Tammy Duckworth for Congress.

Duckworth grew up in Southeast Asia, the daughter of a U.S. Army officer. She earned a master's degree in international affairs at George Washington University and wanted to pursue a career as a diplomat. But she also felt called to the military and enlisted in the Illinois Army Reserve in 1992.

In November 2004, she was piloting a Black Hawk helicopter north of Baghdad that was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade. She was grievously wounded; she lost both legs, and her right arm was shattered.

more... http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chi-0610180034oct18,0,5318540.story?coll=chi-newsopinion-hed

[greatauntoftriplets]

1. It was a great endorsement....

I am amazed that the Tribune's congressional endorsements so far are all for Democrats. And pleased.

[City Lights]

2. It was a great endorsement.

I lived in AZ for 5 years, but don't remember the Trib endorsing so many Dems in the past. It will be interesting to see whether they endorse Bean or mcweenie for my district.

[truebrit71]

3. Holy Shit! No wonder the RNCC has ratcheted up it's campaign of lies...

...against her...

I saw the first response Duckworth ad to the "illegal alien" bullshit they've been running...the gop pukes are scared...really, really scared....

[KharmaTrain]

4. Good News! But There Are Still Problems...

I posted the Daily Herald endorsement in GD the other night, but also saw this article that has me concerned:

http://www.dailyherald.com/search/searchstory.asp?id=239397

Supporters of 6th Congressional District Democrat Tammy Duckworth were left scratching their heads Monday at campaign finance reports that showed her with $206,000 left for the race’s stretch run.

Word of Duckworth’s relatively empty coffers comes as her campaign stopped running TV ads and as her Republican opponent, Peter Roskam, is up with a TV spot attacking her on illegal immigration.

For Duckworth backers who might fear the campaign peaked too early, the response coming from her spokeswoman Monday wasn’t too encouraging. Spokeswoman Christine Glunz said she didn’t know how much money Duckworth has raised since Sept. 30 and didn’t know when Duckworth would begin airing TV ads again.

By contrast, Wheaton’s Roskam had $1.5 million to start October, although he’s dipped into that for his TV ad blitz.

The Tribune endorsement is very big and worth 1,000,000 yard signs, but as I drove through DuPage County the other day, the RoSCUM signs were everywhere and lately all I see are RNCC slime ads on the cable. I expect another big cash dump in the days ahead. I'd hate to see Tammy not able to fight all this fire.

I've looked around on DKOS and other sites and haven't seen any mention of what could be a problem with one of the more important races for control of the House.

Cheers...

On Edit: I hope you share this on the GD and GD Politics forum...this is a very important endorsement.

[Norquist Nemesis]

5. Didn't Roskam also get a chunk when Bush was in town?

The RNC ads are disgusting mischaracterizations and lies. Glad to see the DCCC is running some against Roskam...but I've only seen that one twice. The RNC ads are running all over the place, repeatedly! :grr:

[KharmaTrain]

6. He Has Money Coming In Several Ways

Yep...he got a nice chunk of change...along with McSweeney at that downtown cash & grab last week that go right into their pockets. Then there's the expenditures of the RNC and RNCC that have been flowing heavy for a while. Each week more money has been dumped into these two races to buy TV time and that releases the other cash for ground and GOTV operations. Expect a very strong and coordinated effort for RoSCUM as they load up the church busses in Wheaton.

My concern is that this is such "virgin territory" for Democrats that you can't take the polls and endorsements for granted. With this cash drain, the ground game is going to be hampered and just like we saw ealier this year in the Billbray vs. Busbee race, that they got their vote out better than we did with ours.

I think many are looking at these RNCC hatchet job ads and either ignoring them or laughing at them. Plus with the frequency it's getting fine folks like you more and more pissed. Hopefully others feel the same way and this campaign doesn't come up short on election day cause it couldn't get the voters to the polls.

Cheers....

[AtLiberty]

7. This is a HUGE slap in the face for Roskam...

He's anti-gay, anti-abortion and anti-science.

He's pro-war, pro-guns and pro-permanent tax cuts for the rich.