Second thoughts after Oberweis loss in Congressional race

The news went from bad to worse for Jim Oberweis Saturday night.

Yes, he'd lost the special election for the 14th Congressional District seat.

But defeats -- even slim ones -- in his county, Kane; in his supporter Denny Hastert's county, Kendall; and the traditionally Republican DuPage were immediate fodder for Democrats predicting a growing blue coup.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee called the 5-percentage-point win by Bill Foster "a stunning rejection of the Bush administration, its Republican allies and presidential nominee John McCain."

Steve Brown, spokesman for Michael Madigan, state Democratic Party chairman, said the vote was "a reaffirmation of what's been going on here for several years."

Republicans downplayed Foster's win, attributing it to poor voter turnout or an uninspiring candidate.

"I think it would be an overstatement to say this means Democrats can be dancing in the streets," said DuPage County Republican Party Chairman Dan Cronin.

He said he hoped to see more Republican voters motivated to get to the polls in November.

"I think there may have been people who took this for granted," he said.

Two people who likely aren't taking their November re-election bids for granted are GOP congressmen Mark Kirk of Highland Park and Peter Roskam of Wheaton.

Both narrowly beat their respective Democratic rivals in 2006. Kirk again faces Dan Seals in the 10th District in November; Roskam takes on his second Iraq War veteran -- this time Jill Morgenthaler -- in the 6th.

"Every situation is going to be competitive," Roskam said. "There's no question that my race is going to be competitive. Mark Kirk's race is going to be competitive. (Eighth District Rep.) Melissa Bean's race is going to be competitive. The idea of having a competitive general election isn't a surprise to anyone."

Kirk also cited the relatively small turnout in the Oberweis-Foster race, noting he expected three times the turnout in his race in November.

"People in my district are much more interested in what's happening in their district and the nation than happenings in Aurora, Illinois," Kirk said.

Because of the rarity of the special election, the Oberweis campaign gets the chance to regroup for another shot, for a full 2-year term, in November.

"Obviously, we need to do something differently," said Oberweis spokesman Bill Pascoe. "We're going through that analysis right now."

That includes looking into how many Republican voters got out to vote on Saturday, he said.

The Oberweis campaign's polls had the two candidates in a "dead heat" going into Saturday, he said, underscoring the argument that getting voters to the polls might have been an issue for Republicans.

Former Kendall GOP Chairman Dallas Ingemunson said low voter turnout -- 22 percent of registered voters overall -- hurt Republicans.

"There seemed to be a lot of voter apathy on our part," he said.

He also wondered if an aggressive campaign, particularly multiple robo-calls from Oberweis' campaign in the days before the election, turned voters off.

"Jim made a mistake with all those," he said.

Others wondered if people were motivated to vote against Oberweis or stay home after a particularly negative battle against both primary opponent Chris Lauzen and Foster.

Former Kane County Republican Chairman Denny Wiggins, who worked on Lauzen's campaign, said voters put too much emphasis on personality.

"I believe that people are looking at the person, instead of what the person stands for," he said.

Wiggins said at least some Lauzen supporters didn't vote on Saturday, just a month after the special primary election.

He said he thinks that by the November election, those wounds will have healed.

"It's better to have a Republican in that seat than a Democrat," he said.