Kirk is running
U.S. Rep. Mark Kirk is set to run for higher office.
A release from his office announces today that he will make it official on Monday in a press conference to "announce his candidacy for statewide office."
A Republican source had told the Daily Herald Kirk intends to run for Senate. There has also been talk that he may run for governor, but that has died down lately since Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan backed out of a threatening bid for that post and Senate.
The Highland Park Republican has been expected to run for Senate for months, but he has not pulled the trigger, leading some other GOPers to float their names.
Most recently, Illinois Republican Party Chairman Andy McKenna was aggressively pursuing the bid. But on Monday he said he wouldn't run if Kirk did.
State Rep. Jim Durkin, a Western Springs Republican who ran for Senate in 2002, is also potential primary challenger.
Kirk has previously told the Daily Herald he less interested in running for governor than Senate.
The five-term congressman has taken heat from party members for voting for President Barack Obama's cap-and-trade legislation. But Kirk's Democratic-like positions on the environment and social issues have also made him an attractive candidate to national party leaders as they look for the best candidate to win statewide in Illinois.
Kirk has taken heat from some Republican congressmen lately, but he also has the avid support of others, like U.S. Rep. Judy Biggert, a Hinsdale Republican.
But this is an indication of the state of the Illinois GOP
http://illinoisreview.typepad.com/illinoisreview/2009/07/mitchell-ousted...
They don't allow anybody but RINOs to have a voice. I'd personally like to hear from some honest-to-goodness real conservatives - that's the only "change" I can believe in.
There is no difference between Kirk, Sandy Cole - and other RINOs and democrats - and they practice the same cultural marxism - the only voices they allow to be heard are theirs.
They don't represent the people who voted them in, and that's a real shame.
Watching candidates wait for Lisa M. was really embarrassing.
Speaking personally, I'll vote for Kirk in the general election over the Democrat, but isn't it just awful that the entire Republican establishment was too frightened of the Madigans to do anything until they decided what they were going to do.
Who are these cowards, and how wimpy do you have to be to wait for the Madigans?
I've heard all the talk about her poll numbers, but if they were all that great, she'd be running for Senate or Gov. It is far more likely that they know what all the tepid and frightened establishment Republicans can't even conceive of anymore...
That principled fiscal conservativism, combined with well-stated social conservative positions, are popular with the electorate - even here in Illinois. If you want extreme social positions, one need only look at Lisa Madigan and Mark Kirk, who are virtually indistinguishable in their social extremism.
The "only a moderate can win" Republicans have been proven wrong time and time again.
It's time for new people with new ideas. Sadly, the Republican party has spent too much time looking inward, and seen only the butt-sitting pension collectors. It's time establishment Republicans realized that the new faces in their reform wing are the only way back to power.
Furthermore, once back in power, the Thompson-Edgar-Ryan-Topinka wing needs to realize that the Thompson-Edgar-Ryan-Topinka method of "managed surrender" to the spendthrift left is a failed model.
As Reagan said, when confronted with the morally illegitimate USSR..."How about we win?" The political class of Illinois has become morally illegitimate (just read the headlines), and if new leaders have the courage to give the voters a real choice, the voters will choose such leadership.
Kirk used to be my congressman, and I've always agreed with him. However, he was ONE OF EIGHT Republicans who actually voted FOR Cap N' Trade! Huh? He's beholden to the radical environmentalist groups who gave him money. Anything would be better than Burris. Let's see who the opposition's going to be.
I don't mind a moderate, but there is NOTHING moderate about that bill, it's destructive of the economy.
He's either ill-informed, or worse, uninformed.