Obama’s former Senate seat becomes national test

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This was Barack Obama’s seat.

The nation’s longest-running 2010 Senate race -- with a field set Tuesday in Illinois’ early party primaries, Democrat Alexi Giannoulias versus Republican Mark Kirk -- will quickly become a national race.

The Senate seat once held by President Barack Obama -- never mind the place-holding appointed Sen. Roland W. Burris -- offers a national proving ground for a contest between a rising Republican Party running against the way things have been done in Washington and a defensive Democratic Party locking its focus on the lingering economic struggles of a nation recovering from a recession.

‘Jobs the big issue,’’ blared the logo of the winning Democratic candidate positioned for every photo shot of the party primary’s winner last night.
‘Arrogance’’ is the issue, the way the GOP tells it.

For more details, see the Swamp.

-- Mark Silva