The good news for U.S. Representative Bob Dold (R) is that Barack Obama (D) won’t carry the remapped North Shore 10th congressional district by 61 percent, as he did in 2008. The bad news is that Obama will win it in 2012 with 57-59 percent.

That means Obama’s 2008 plurality of 67,030 over John McCain (R) will be in the realm of 60,000 over Mitt Romney (R).

The good news for Dold is that his predecessor, now-U.S. Senator Mark Kirk (R), withstood the 2008 Obama landslide, with an incredible 23 percent of the Obama voters (about 41,000) also voting for Kirk. The bad news is that Dold isn’t Kirk.

Dold has only been in office for two years, as contrasted with Kirk’s eight years in 2008. Dold hasn’t yet entrenched himself, is still relatively unknown,hasn’t developed an indelible “independent” image, and won’t win the support of one in five 2012 Obama voters.

The good news for Dold is that 2012 will not be a poisonous anti-Republican or anti-incumbent year, as was 2008 and 2006. But that’s also the bad news. Dold needs a poisonous anti-Democratic and anti-Obama year.

Dold was elected in 2010 atop an anti-Obama wave, as independent voters broke heavily against the president and the Democrats, and Republican turnout was heavy. 2012 is not a “wave” election. In the district, Romney will not run as dismally as McCain, but he will not amass the 45 percent that Dold needs to be competitive

The good news for Dold is that his Democratic opponent, Deerfield businessman Brad Schneider, is bland, boring, largely unknown and running a totally insipid and uninspiring campaign. The bad news is that blandness and insipidity is suddenly fashionable on the North Shore.

Schneider’s campaign theme is that he will, if elected, according to his media spokesperson, “work together (with other Members), regardless of party, to get things done.” That seems to be striking a responsive chord. After a decade of tumultuous elections, with $8 million spent in 2008 and $5.5 million in 2006, voters are fatigued and disillusioned. Kirk postured as a fiscal conservative and social liberal, accurately reflecting sentiment in this upscale district with a significant Jewish population, comprising 18-20 percent of the registered voters.

Democrat Dan Seals, of bi-racial heritage, was well-known, stirred fervor – at least in 2006 and 2008 – and ran as an unabashed liberal. In 2006, he spent $1.8 million, pounded Kirk as a pro-Bush toady, and got 46.5 percent. In 2008, Seals literally hugged Obama, again tied Kirk to the reviled Bush, spent $3.6 million, and got 47.4 percent, running an astounding 42,895 votes behind Obama in the district. In 2010, with Kirk running statewide, Seals ran again, but he had worn out his welcome, and engendered no enthusiasm. He embraced Obamacare, avoided any commitment to be a robotic Obama/Pelosi congressional vote, tried to portray Dold as a Tea Party “extremist,” and lost to Dold by 4,651 votes, getting 48.9 percent. Each spent $2.9 million.

For 2012, Schneider and his Democratic handlers have astutely drawn this conclusion: Voters want productivity, not combativeness or independence.They don’t want a congressman who will vote in lockstep with the pro-Obama (or anti-Romney, if he wins) Democrats, or with the anti-Obama (or pro-Romney) Republicans. A Republican House majority in the 113th Congress is certain, which means gridlock if Obama is re-elected. Schneider, if he wins, would be one of 435 members, and in the minority.

So the contrast, if subtle, is clear: Dold, if re-elected, will occasionally dissent from the Republican Majority, as did Kirk, thereby demonstrating his “independence,” but accomplishing nothing. Schneider, if elected, will eschew chronic partisanship, occasionally defect from the Pelosi-led Democratic Minority, and vote with the Republicans on some issues, perhaps accomplishing something. Whether that includes entitlement reform is unclear.

The good news for Dold is that he has avoided Tea Party association. He is pro-choice on abortion and supported funding for Planned Parenthood. He is not polarizing, not ideological, not confrontational, and not bombastic, like his colleague Joe Walsh (R-8). But the bad news is that he is a Republican. The Schneider campaign charges that Dold has “voted with the Republican majority on every key piece of legislation”: Repealing Obamacare, auditing the Federal Reserve, civil contempt of the Attorney General, the Ryan $3.5 trillion budget, payroll tax, debt reduction of $2.1 trillion, balanced budget, Patriot Act extension, National Public Radio funding cut, and House salary cuts. DELETE HERE

The catastrophically bad news for Dold is that the Democratic-crafted congressional remap made the new 10th District generically, perhaps hopelessly,Democratic. “No Republican is going to win that district,” predicted Cook County Commissioner Larry Suffredin (D), of Evanston. “It’s just too Democratic.”

Roughly 56 percent of the old district was in Cook County, and took in Republican-leaning Inverness, Rolling Meadows, Wheeling, Arlington Heights,Prospect Heights and Mount Prospect, plus all of Glenview, and moved east to the Lakefront to include Democratic-leaning Northbrook, Glencoe, Winnetkaand Wilmette. In 2008, 161,214 votes were cast in Cook County, and Kirk won by 16,498 votes; and 130,044 votes were cast in Lake County, and Seals won by 1,592 votes. In 2010, Dold won Cook County by 10,321 votes, while Seals won Lake County by 5,670 votes.

In the remapped 10th District, Lake County now casts 55 percent of the vote, with Schneider, who is Jewish, assured of solid majorities in heavily Jewish Deerfield, Lincolnshire, Buffalo Grove and Highland Park, as well as in Democratic-leaning upscale towns such as Lake Forest and Lake Bluff, where Obama is strong and Seals ran well. The remap, masterminded by Springfield Democrats, chopped out the Republicans’ Cook County base, which is basically everything west of Route 83 (Elmhurst Road); only Wheeling, Glenview, Northbrook, Glencoe, Winnetka, and pieces of Park Ridge, Morton Grove and Mount Prospect remain.

The old district took in the east half of Lake County, east of I-45, along the I-94 corridor, south of I-20 (Belvidere Road). It now moves north of Waukegan to the Wisconsin line, absorbing working-class and Democratic Gurnee and Zion, and moves west to I-12, absorbing Round Lake, Grayslake, Fox Lake, Gages Lake, Lake Villa and Lindenhurst – all Republican-leaning areas, but where Dold is unknown.

Turnout in the old 10th District was 202,207 in 2006 (with Seals losing 94,278-107,929); 291,258 in 2008 (with Seals losing 138,176-153,082); and 215,231 in 2010 (with Seals losing 105,290-109,941). That averaged, over three cycles, 112,581 votes for the Democrat, and 123,650 votes for the Republican.

2012’s turnout will be about 275,000, and the Republican/Dold base has shrunk to barely 100,000. Obama will get around 160,000 votes (57-58 percent). That means Dold, to win, needs one in five – at least 30,000-plus – Obama voters to opt for him.

“There will be an Obama drop-off,” said John McGovern, Dold’s campaign manager, who predicted that Romney will get 45 percent. Of Schneider, who won his March primary with 46.9 percent, McGovern said he has no special appeal, unlike past candidates Seals and Lauren Beth Gash (2000), who motivated their workers. “He’s a cookie-cutter Democrat.”

“Democrats are energized,” said Suffredin, who expects that a plethora of down-ballot state legislative races, including the Morrison-Friedman and Bush-Neal state senate races in Lake County, and the Sente-Mathias House race in Buffalo Grove, will drive turnout. “Whoever supports those candidates, and whoever supports Obama, will vote for Schneider,” Suffredin predicted..

Said another Democrat: “There is no Republican organization. Dold’s on his own.”

The good news for Dold is that, from 2011 through Sept. 30, he had raised a hefty $2.9 million, and had $2.1 million on-hand. That means he can afford the pricey Chicago media market, and spent almost $1 million during June and July on TV ads hyping his “independence.” The bad news is that the ad blitz may not have moved numbers.

The most recent poll, paid for by the Democrats, had the race tied at 46-46. That’s dubious. A June poll had the race at 39-39. Dold’s campaign has released no polling data. In all likelihood, the race is probably 40-40 – Dold versus a generic Democrat. It’s an ominous sign when any incumbent is well under 50 percent.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has a conundrum: How to intervene? They can’t go positive. Schneider is devoid of charisma, and promising to “work with the Republicans” is not a vote-getter. They can’t piggyback on Obama, hyping an Obama-Schneider team, because 10th District voters do not want a lapdog as congressman. They can’t go negative, and tar Dold as a Tea Party “extremist,” because he isn’t. So expect an insipid hybrid: Dold is a “partisan Republican.” Dold is “part of the problem” in Washington. “Let’s work together.”

None of Dold’s mailers or ads mentions that he is a Republican. “I’m an independent” worked for Kirk, who got 53 percent in the district in 2010. Expect Kirk to give Dold a ringing endorsement.

My prediction: Had Democrats nominated a more charismatic candidate, or a Jewish woman, Dold would be toast. But $3 million makes him competitive. In a turnout of 275,000, Schneider wins by 138,000-137,000.

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Russ Stewart is a political analyst for the Chicago Daily Observer
E-mail Russ@russstewart.com or visit his website at www.russstewart.com.