it's official: Hill wants to be in Congress again

From Lesley Stedman Weidenbener in the C-J, a report on Rep. Baron Hill's official announcement to run again...

U.S. Rep. Baron Hill filed yesterday to run for re-election, setting up a fourth battle with Republican Mike Sodrel.

...and of course, a second "battle" with me! ;-)

Hill, standing outside the Secretary of State's office at the Statehouse yesterday, said the last election -- when he took back the seat from Sodrel -- was about changing the direction of the country. Hill said the Democratic-majority Congress has done that "in part."

"We increased the minimum wage. We made college more affordable for students," he said. "We've not been very good balancing the budget, much to my dismay, and I think we need to get back to fiscal responsibility...."

OK, they made it more painful to hire the unskilled. They took money from average taxpayers to give to those who will drop out of school or graduate from school and have above-average incomes. They haven't balanced the budget-- to his "dismay". Yet Baron helped with that by voting for the stimulus.

This year's election "is about continuing that change and moving the country in a different direction," Hill said.

I agree with him on this. If voters want real change, there's only one qualified candidate who provides that.

Then in 2006, Hill unseated Sodrel by taking about 50 percent of the vote. Because Libertarian Eric Schansberg was also in the race, Hill won by nearly 5 percentage points.

"Because" I was in the race....Hmm...If I got more votes from those who would have otherwise voted for Sodrel, then the margin was larger than it would have otherwise been. If I got more votes from typical Hill voters, then I kept the race closer for Mike. I emphasized issues that could attract either set of voters. And the late polling data indicated that I pulled more from Hill. But no one knows for sure...

This year Schansberg, a professor at Indiana University Southeast in New Albany, intends to make a second run for the seat.

Hill acknowledged yesterday that the 9th District race has recently been "rough and tumble," referring in part to the negative advertising that has marked his battles with Sodrel.

"One of the things I want to do is elevate the level of the discourse in this so it's not as nasty as it was the last time," Hill said. "I'm going to be reaching out to my opponents to see if we can conduct ourselves in a better fashion."

Well, that will be nice. Of course, they both promised that the last time! We'll see...