NEWS ARTICLE
October 10, 2006

OXFORD, Conn. (AP) - Connecticut's three moderate Republicans already are a rare breed in a party dominated by conservatives. This tumultuous election season, they're struggling for survival in fiercely contested races that could decide who controls Congress.

The three - Reps. Christopher Shays, Nancy Johnson and Rob Simmons - are under fire for their pro-Iraq war views, support for President Bush's agenda and a festering GOP sex scandal on Capitol Hill that threatens to drag the party down in next month's midterm elections.

"They're calling Connecticut ground zero," said Shays, whose splits with the GOP on issues such as campaign finance reform have made him a national figure - and a pariah in some party circles.

On a recent Friday, amid billowing smoke from the gas grill at a volunteer firehouse steak dinner, Shays was blunt about his prospects in an election in which Democratic hopes for seizing the House are high.

Shays is no stranger to living on the edge. He barely survived a challenge two years ago.

"I think it's my election to win," he said, "but you never know."

Both parties are waging aggressive campaigns in the state, flooding the airwaves with ads and dispatching several of the country's most prominent politicians, including President Bush, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass. and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., for fundraisers and campaign appearances.

Democrats eager to recapture the House after a dozen years need to gain 15 seats and Connecticut potentially could deliver a fifth of the winning margin.

Simmons narrowly won his seat six years ago in the most Democratic of the three districts in play, a working-class district that encompasses the eastern half of the state and boasts casinos and Submarine Base New London in Groton.

Anti-war challenger Joe Courtney brands Simmons a Bush cheerleader. Simmons answers back with classic GOP attack lines, accusing Courtney of being weak on defense and eager to raise taxes.

On the other end of the state, in a district of farmland, cities and immigrants, Johnson is a 12-term incumbent and a leading House voice on health care who usually runs up comfortable re-election margins. Democratic state Sen. Chris Murphy, 33, has assailed the 71-year-old for her support of the war and her role crafting the Medicare prescription drug program that he says has hurt seniors.

The trio is among a small band of embattled Northeast moderates Republicans, including Rhode Island Sen. Lincoln Chafee, who often buck their party on social issues such as abortion and the environment. It can be a tough balancing act in an increasingly polarized political climate dominated by hardliners.

A drumbeat of bad news this fall on Iraq and the unfolding scandal involving disgraced former Rep. Mark Foley and his contacts with congressional pages threatens to depress GOP turnout and tip the balance in close races. Democrats hope to ride an anti-incumbent tide.

"It's a difficult time to be a Republican," said Sarah Chamberlain of the Republican Main Street Partnership, a moderate national group. "In Connecticut, frankly, every two years it's a tough race. But we're alive and kicking and fighting."

All three incumbents are stressing their independence and their ability to work with Democrats to get things done for Connecticut, a state where ballot-splitting is common.

They are running in a state where both Bush and the war are unpopular. Bush's approval rating was 33 percent in a recent poll and Democratic Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., beat the president by 10 percentage points in 2004.

In August, three-term Sen. Joe Lieberman lost the Democratic primary to anti-war challenger Ned Lamont. Lieberman launched an independent bid to retain his seat and Democrats feared his push for Republican and independent votes could stoke support for the three House Republicans. Unaffiliated voters are the state's largest voting bloc.

But less than a month before the election, the impact has been less dramatic than expected.

"All three are as competitive as they've ever been," said Ken Dautrich, a University of Connecticut public policy professor.

Shays is locked in a rematch of his 2004 fight with Diane Farrell, a former local official from Westport, Conn., who came just 4 percentage points of toppling him. Bush lost the district, which is anchored by Greenwich and other wealthy suburbs outside New York in the state's southwest corner, by 6 percentage points in 2004.

Farrell has hammered at Shays' support for the war. The Republican has honed his Iraq views, calling for a timeline for troop withdrawals and seeking Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's resignation.

"My opponent is running against George Bush," Shays said. "She's running against the war. She's running against Republicans and trying to paint me as a particular kind of Republican."

Farrell, who is expected to outspend Shays, casts him as a Bush apologist.

"We can't keep electing Chris Shays if we are going to make the changes we need," Farrell urges in a TV spot.

"All of the Democratic challengers are coming back to the war," Dautrich said. "It's really all about the war. The Republican incumbents are all saying, 'It's not just the war. We're Republicans but we're different than those other Republicans running things down in Washington.'"

The unfolding Foley scandal, meanwhile, looms as a wild card.

Shays quickly sought to distance himself from GOP leaders when the scandal broke, saying anyone who knew or should have known about the extent of the page scandal should not serve in a House leadership post. Johnson returned $1,000 she got from Foley's political action committee.