Jigsaw Politics

Kirk's less-than-hardline record merges a stated devotion to fiscal conservatism with more liberal views on social issues and the environment. That has been a hit in suburban Chicago's 10th Congressional District, where voters in 2008 re-elected Kirk with 53 percent of the vote even as they gave 61 percent to homestate senator Barack Obama as the Democratic presidential nominee.

That track record is why Republican recruiters view him as their strongest candidate for the seat currently held by appointed Democrat Roland W. Burris, who announced Friday that he won't run in 2010. This is the seat that Obama won in 2004, then vacated after he won the 2008 presidential election.

But you may have heard that there has been a "battle for the soul" of the Republican Party going on in the wake of last year's shellacking at the polls. And it pits those who say the party needs to field candidates with proven cross-party appeal (such as Kirk and Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, the party establishment's prize recruit in his state's open-seat Senate race), and those who argue that the only way to prove that the GOP's conservative principles are right is to nominate candidates who stand by them steadfastly.

Kirk could find navigating these stormy waters more than a little difficult. Kirk recently was one of just eight Republicans (out of 176 voting) who favored legislation to address climate change that Democratic leaders pushed through the House by a narrow margin. Reports of a conservative backlash were so rife that they prompted a story, published Friday by the Washington Post, that Kirk had decided not to run for the Senate after all. Kirk and his aides had to scramble quickly to deny that he was quitting the race.

The conundrum Kirk faces can be seen in Congressional Quarterly "party unity" study of House votes taken so far this year.

Kirk voted with most fellow Republicans against most Democrats on 76 percent of roll calls that broke mainly along partisan lines. To some Republicans of a more conservative stripe, this well-below-the-party-average score will be seen as too great a willingness to stray from the GOP's conservative line.

Yet voting three-quarters of the time with the Republicans hardly makes Kirk a Democrat in a state where that party holds both Senate seats, the governor's office, a 12-7 lead in the U.S. House delegation and solid majorities in both state legislative chambers. And Democratic strategists undoubtedly are preparing to spend big bucks to tell Illinois voters that a center-right Republican is still too far right for Illinois.

Although Kirk would provide the Republicans with their most experienced and best funded statewide candidate in years, the inherent edge that the Democrats have been in Illinois likely will put him into at least a slight disadvantage to whomever emerges as the winner of a Democratic primary that may match up state Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias, businessman Chris Kennedy (a son of the late New York Sen. Robert F. Kennedy), and Cheryle Jackson, president of the Chicago Urban League.

The biggest barrier to the Democrats holding Obama's former seat fell last Friday when Burris submitted to the reality of his rock-bottom approval ratings. Burris never was able to justify his controversial appointment by scandal-plagued Democratic Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich, who subsequently was expelled from office and indicted on corruption charges that include an alleged attempt to "sell" the vacated Senate seat for personal or political gain.

A conservative primary challenge that forces Kirk to reach deep in to his campaign treasury -- and possibly prompts him to emphasize the "right" in that center-right equation -- thus could lengthen his odds for a general election victory. Whether he can work within Republican Party ranks to avoid such a contingency will be a good first test of his viability as a statewide candidate.