In Special Elections, GOP Tests Anti-Obama Strategy

Informed that a victory Saturday would make him a superdelegate, Cazayoux would not say whether he would back Obama or Clinton.

Casting himself in the mold of conservative Democrats such as former senator John Breaux (La.), Cazayoux has worked to distance himself from the hot-button topics that have become handy wedge issues for Southern Republicans in recent decades, shifting the conversation to his family roots every chance he gets.

"My grandfather is 94 years old. I visit him on a weekly basis. And he's doing great," said Cazayoux, a boyish-looking 44, drawing applause from the crowd at the senior center.

His parents appeared in a commercial touting their son's opposition to abortion and support for gun owners' rights, positions that put him at odds with most members of the Democratic caucus.

"They're not running against me as a person; they're just saying I'm going to be at the extreme left on the issues, and that's just not correct," Cazayoux said. "People are looking for solutions -- I'm not sure if they're looking for Democrats or Republicans."

He even left open the possibility of voting for someone other than Pelosi, who has abysmal approval ratings here, for House speaker next January.

That Cazayoux faces this Obama predicament is an indication of the hard times that the Republican brand has fallen on since the party was swept from the House majority two years ago. President Bush won this district with 59 percent of the vote in 2004. Former congressman Richard H. Baker, a Republican who regularly won with at least 70 percent, ran without Democratic opposition in 2006.

With Baker retired to life as a hedge fund lobbyist, national Democrats have flooded the 6th District with more than $1 million, mostly to fund attack ads against Republican Woody Jenkins, a former state legislator who owns a chain of weekly newspapers around Baton Rouge.

Jenkins has been outraised four to one by Cazayoux in the final weeks of the race, but he has had television support from the NRCC and groups such as Freedom's Watch, a political nonprofit group run by former White House and GOP aides.

Jenkins has embraced the effort to nationalize the campaign, saying his No. 1 issue in stump speeches is trying to punch holes in the idea that a centrist Democrat would resist the initiatives of a President Obama and Speaker Pelosi.

"We connect the dots. This is a national election in the 6th District of Louisiana," he said after a crawfish-boil rally with popular Gov. Bobby Jindal (R).

There are indications that that message is breaking through. In a recent poll, Cazayoux's disapproval rating jumped to 28 percent among voters, a number GOP aides said was up from 4 percent after he secured the Democratic nomination a month ago.

After the crawfish boil, Jack Datz walked away with two "Jenkins for Congress" yard signs. An independent, Datz, 56, joined a union as a machinist early in his career, only to quit after right-to-work laws weakened labor's sway here. Having survived kidney failure as a child, an accidental poisoning, cancer and a stroke, Datz said health care is important to him. He also puts ethics reform -- an Obama hallmark -- among his top concerns.

But he's backing Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). Obama's preacher "said some radical things," Datz said. "He should have taken a stand. To keep black people from getting mad, he didn't. And that is not a leader."

Frances Heath, 76, who asked Cazayoux about the "Tax You" ad, said, "I don't think we are ready for a black president. I don't think we are."

Back in Washington, many Republicans privately discount Jenkins -- who has run and lost several big races in the past two decades -- as an imperfect vessel to test the anti-Obama line. The better indication of the tactic's effectiveness may come in Mississippi.

But should Jenkins pull off a win, it could dramatically change the conversation, both in the Democratic presidential contest and in the battle for Congress.

"It really is the beginning of [long-term] Democratic control of the House, or the beginning of the end," Jenkins said.