Laesch Will Have a Primary Opponent.

Whatever you make of the challenge to Ruben Zamora's petitions, one thing is all but certain. We will have a Prmary race in IL CD 14. This is the first in (my) memory for the Democratic party in this heavily and reliably Republican district.

How exciting. There are two Democratic candidates vying for the right to challenge the Speaker of the House of Representatives.

That's the fight we need to take back to the Republicans, I thought. Remember Tom Foley and the whispering campaign about his sexuality? Republicans used a lie about Foley to not only take control of the House, but to defeat Foley in his home district. It was a humiliating experience for all Democrats.

Let's get Hastert, I thought. This is exactly what we need I thought. No whispering campaigns, though. We don't play that game. We'll sing in unison and raise the volume during the Primary.

At the very least, this might generate some great national press attention.

But all of that changed around 1 p.m. on December 19. The filing deadline was about 4 hours away when a copy of Ruben Zamora's petitions was requested by someone named Bridget Stencel of Chicago.

This caused a great deal of confusion for some time, because no one in the Blogger Intelligentsia could locate a Bridget Stencel at the address on record with the objection. Someone pointed out, however, that a Bridget Feeley shows up at the North Francisco address on file with the Board of Elections.

Remember that name, Feeley. It's important.

No matter the name, many Zamora supporters and plenty more Democrats wanted to know who this person was who requested the copies of the candidate's petitions. Everyone wanted to know who Joe Stupec, the challenger, was.

Above all, everyone wanted to know about their affiliations. When Joe Stupec turned out to be a Democrat, and a supporter of John Laesch, the questions boiled down to one word: What?!