Congress, 16th District: Manzullo

The choice in the 16th Congressional District, which covers most of northern Illinois from Cary west to the Mississippi, is a difficult one.

Republican incumbent Don Manzullo has held the office for 18 years. He is a partisan politician who bitterly opposed the Obama health-care plan and the federal stimulus plan and is significantly right of center on many social issues. He claims to work well with Democrats, but his voting record suggests otherwise. It's time he lived up to that claim.

Still, he knows his district inside and out and has worked tirelessly to improve transportation and the business climate in his district. And he favors a fix of the problematic earmark process.

Democratic challenger George Gaulrapp, by most accounts, is an effective mayor of Freeport (a town the size of Huntley) where he cut his pay and his budget. But his singular call for “Jobs. Jobs. Jobs." isn't well developed. Green party candidate Terry Campbell is also running. Manzullo is endorsed.