Luke Skywalker versus the Darth Vader. Well–if Darth Vader looked like death warmed over.
Seriously there are four Democratic candidates with incumbent tool Dan Lipinski, unknowing plant Jim Capparelli and two decent guys running as reformers in Mark Pera and Jerry Bennett.
Lipinski is probably favored simply because he’s an incumbent backed by the machine and the machine will be in operation since Madigan and the elder Lipinski are relatively close. That said, Lipinski has run an especially anemic race without even many dirty tricks and it’s almost as if the elder Lipinski isn’t trying. The expected flyers of Pera eating babies never appeared with a lame piece showing up in two color talking about left wing extremist punks from San Francisco.
Caparelli fits the profile of a typical plant in a race. Same ethnicity as a real challenger and absolutely clueless that people might use him.
Mayor Jerry Bennett is a good candidate and a good guy. I think the momentum of the support to Pera with Pera getting out there early hurt him quite a bit, though he does have the possibility of stringing together a number of locals to do well.
Pera has been the netroots star and a great fighting Dem. He’s centered in the District, smart, well financed and fits the new profile of the District. He has a great campaign team and he’s worked tirelessly to get this nomination. All reason says don’t bet against the machine, but I think the stars might just be aligned here. He’s gotten a good reception and Barack Obama is on the ballot to increase turnout well over last cycle’s turnout. He’s reached more voters than John Sullivan and Caparelli isn’t nearly as good of a plant as last time.
The wild card is how hard Madigan goes for Lipinski. We’ll know more tomorrow, but while it might just be based on hope, I’m thinking Pera takes this in a tight race.
On the Republican side it’s two no names against a white supremacist, Art Jones, who has supporters who will join in comments talking about the Jewish Wars. The best thing for the Republicans is to nominate a no name with no chance. IOW, whomever wins the Dem primary, is the next 3rd District Congressman. Strangely, they won’t actually take office for 11 months however.
Also, if Lipinski doesn’t win, look for a machine guy to get in as an independent in the general. It cannot be Lipinski himself, but an ‘independent’ candidate register as late as June 23rd.