Rod Blagojevich is highly deserving of a sound drubbing, but the machine could steal it for him.

Illinois has had such a gaggle of miserable governors, that it should adopt a one term and out rule.

The Illinois race will probably be one of the tightest in the nation. On one side, there's Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who's running for re-election on the defensive. An ongoing investigation of the governor and his administration has revealed possible misconduct in the way his administration hands out state jobs and contracts. He was elected in 2002 on a reform platform. Today the perception is that Blagojevich hasnt lived up to those expectations. Much of the controversy is rooted in the fact that Republicans had controlled the governors mansion in Illinois for 26 years, thus many state jobs were controlled by Republican appointees. Most likely, what happened here was that the Democrats, in their zeal to rid the government of Republican appointees, cut out a few people who were protected by various civil service protections. In short, this is just politics as usual, although illegal.

Nevertheless, the Republicans have a solid candidate in Judy Baar Topinka, the moderate State Treasurer. Polls seem to indicate an upward trend for her, and moderate Republicans like her usually have a good record of winning elections in Illinois. Obviously for Blagojevich, its not a good year to have a political scandal. Right now, this race is a toss-up. Of all the gubernatorial races this year, this race is the Republicans best chance at picking up a seat from the Democrats.