Evansville, Indiana
Republican congressman John Hostettler is standing, a bit stiffly, in front of the federal building in Evansville. The midterm congressional election is two weeks off, and this is his lone public event of the day. Beside the portable podium is a blowup of the obituary page of the Evansville Courier & Press from nine days earlier. All the stories are blotted out but one--a short piece, little more than a squib, about Hostettler's receiving the Homeland Defender Award from a group called 9/11 Families for a Secure America. Hostettler is upset.

Running the story on the obit page was a "callous indignity" to the families of 9/11 victims, he says. That placement was painful to "grieving families," "insulting," and, worse still, "insensitive to the people of the nation." Hostettler says the newspaper should apologize. But "to date the response has been I could write a letter about how important the award was."

It was a peculiar event, even for Hostettler. He is a campaign oddity. He has the distinction of being regarded as the most endangered House member in the most treacherous strip of the country for Republicans in the November 7 election. Yet he's pursuing reelection as if the political environment were unchanged from his five earlier reelection battles when Democrats confidently targeted him for defeat and wound up frustrated.

He's raised little money and is likely to be outspent by his Democratic opponent, Evansville sheriff Brad Ellsworth, by roughly 3 to 1. Hostettler has never hired outsiders to do polling, develop

Hostettler's on-my-own approach may prove foolhardy this time around. His district sits within a five-state stretch of territory--from Connecticut, through New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and ending with Indiana--that Republican pollsters and Democratic consultants alike expect to be the most fertile ground for Democrats to pick off Republican House incumbents. For Republicans, it's a potential blowout belt. Demo crats could gain enough seats in these five states alone to make their takeover of the House of Representatives a certainty.

A quite attainable goal is 10 pickups. If Democrats manage this, all they will need to take control of the House is to win five open seats held by Republicans. Five open seats where Democrats are leading are Mark Foley's in Florida, Jim Nussle's in Iowa, Tom DeLay's in Texas, the Arizona seat along the Mexican border, and a Colorado seat in the Denver suburbs.

Of course, nothing is ever assured in politics. And the blowout belt is a 5-10-15 matter. If Republicans close the campaign with a strong finishing kick, they could limit their losses in the five states to 5 seats. More likely, they will merely blunt Democratic momentum in the closing days, limiting Democrats to a pickup of 10 seats. But should Democrats actually generate the "wave" that the media are breathlessly hoping for, the Republican death toll will rise to 15 (or more) in the blowout belt.