Every year, the GOP vows to make a race out of Minnesota's Republican-leaning 7th congressional district in northwest Minnesota, which has been represented since 1991 by guitar-picking centrist Blue Dog Democrat Collin Peterson. The closest they got in the past decade was in 2010, when Peterson won by some 17 percentage points, largely, as usual, on the strength of his farm cred. But they're back again this year, starting with a $41,000 television ad buy in Fargo by the National Republican Congressional Committee. The week-long ad, starting Thursday, focuses on Peterson's support for the Obama administration's health care overhaul and his vote against the GOP budget plan. The ad appears timed for this weekend's GOP endorsing convention, which pits Peterson's unsuccessful 2010 challenger, Lee Byberg, against State Sen. Gretchen Hoffman. Speaking privately, Republican sources in D.C. say they are bullish about Hoffman's candidacy.
The ad says that Peterson has "changed." Now the GOP has to hope that it's fortunes in the 7th district will change change as well.
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