Good News From OH-02


Friday comes bearing news from OH-02, well known as the home of 'Mean Jean' Schmidt, famous for her " Marines don't cut and run" speech directed at 30 year veteran Marine John Murtha. That speech earned her honor guard status with the wing nut faction of the GOP and gave her a national profile. However prior to that,MJ was well known for
something else. OH 02 had gone overwhelmingly
Bush in '04 but when she ran to fill the vacant district she had as her opponent Paul Hackett, a Marine reservist,veteran of Iraq. Hacket was the first of what has become known as the 'Fighting Dems', veterans of some or many of the conflicts of the last few years who are standing up for another term of service on a different front ( the FD's number approximatly 30 at this time as opposed to
2-3 for the GOP--shows who's enlisting for service,doesn't it? Fighten'Dem vs Yellow Elephant).


Hackett (with a little online help from the blogosphere,notably Dkos) came very close to beating Schmidt. Its apparent that the attention he garnered,coupled with MJ's brilliant perfomance in the house has given a huge leg up to the Democratic cantidate this time around, Dr Victoria Wulsin. Todays Survey USA Election Poll (#10292, to be exact) has the two at 45-42, a margin of error tie. And this in what was a very red district. Great news for a Friday afternoon. This race,of course, now has a higher profile than it might have had in the past but it can't be a good sign for GOP Congressional hopes if they are in trouble in 02. With any luck (and a lot of hard work) OH 02 will have a new Rep come Nov.,one we know won't crap on veterans while dressed as a 1970's Olympic gymnast.