IL-14: Fostering Victory

Bill Foster got a boost today when the right-wing Chicago Tribune endorsed him over his loudmouth opponent Jim Oberweis:

This page is closer to Oberweis than Foster on several economic and foreign policy issues. But we watched Oberweis in his races for the U.S. Senate in 2002 and 2004, and for governor in 2006. We've watched this race for Congress. His campaign style has consistently been nasty, smug, condescending ... and dishonest.
In 2004, he ran an ad in which he hovered over Soldier Field in a helicopter and said 10,000 illegal aliens come to the U.S. each day, "enough to fill Soldier Field every single week." The number was grossly inflated and the ad smacked of fear-mongering.

In 2006, he ran TV ads that used headlines from the Tribune and other newspapers to attack an opponent. But the headlines were fake. They hadn't appeared in the newspapers.

This year, Oberweis' campaign is based on the notion that his opponent is a big-spending liberal. Oberweis' TV and radio ads quote Foster saying, "There's nothing in life that you can't improve by pouring money at it. ..."

Foster did say that, at a League of Women Voters debate. But the transcript makes it clear he was talking about the federal government's "poor efforts" to improve air-traffic-control safety. His conclusion: "This is one example of a place I would look to save taxpayer dollars."

And Oberweis' immediate response at the debate? He said: "I find myself in the almost embarrassing position of tending to agree with Bill on some of his comments there."

The sum impression of Oberweis from four campaigns: He sees public office as an opportunity to pick a fight.

Barack Obama has recorded an ad for Foster to run in the district. You can help fund it here. It should be known that Foster is explicitly running against telecom amnesty and for getting out of Iraq. He's a better Democrat than many we have now, despite his moderate pose and desire to be a Blue Dog on fiscal policy. Matt Stoller described him as more of a Patrick Murphy than a Jim Cooper. At this point, with the rule of law at stake, that's good enough for me. Not to mention the fact that this would really hurt Republicans down the road.