Well, the Republicans have a candidate for the Seventh Congressional District.  They may have four, in fact, for Friday’s caucus of district precinct chairs to pick a replacement for Jon Elrod.  But after this morning’s performance by the favored candidate of party leaders, I’m still not sure what they have.

  Social Worker Gabrielle Campo, who I’m told made a good impression when running against Elrod earlier this year, announced her candidacy at an 11 a.m. news conference at City Market.  But after telling us who she is and what her priorities are (energy, jobs, and education—who’d have guessed), she bounded away without answering questions on any of them, saying she had to go file her papers.  When I asked her if she intended to leave without talking to the media, she hesitated, then said she could maybe stay for one question.  So I asked her how she would “rein in” (her words) energy prices.  She said she’d talk about that after the precinct caucus, then swept away again, this time not to be stopped.

  Seventh District Chairman John Hammond, who’s been pushing Campo, told me he was sure I could track her down and ask her questions.  But why would I do that?  She was right there, a candidate nobody knows without any money facing an incumbent Congressman in Andre Carson, and she wouldn’t answer reporters’ questions that might get her more valuable air time on the news tonight?

  Later Ms. Campo called me on the phone and said she’d been advised not to answer any questions until after the caucus.  When I asked her why someone would advise her to do that, she said she didn’t know.  Wouldn’t you think that if you were a precinct chair voting on your party’s candidate for something as important as Congress, you’d want to know where she stands?

  I’m told Campo is an unusual Republican candidate, one who’s ideal to run against Carson.  Is that code for “more liberal than the average Marion County Republican”?  If so, maybe that’s why she isn’t supposed to talk until after the very conservative precinct chairs vote.  But if that’s the case, maybe she shouldn’t have had a big splashy announcement and invited the media.

  It looks like Republicans are finally going to get a candidate in the Seventh District race.  That’s the one from which Jon Elrod bailed after determining he didn’t have a snowball’s chance of unseating newly-elected Democrat Andre Carson.

  Newcomer Gabrielle Campo has scheduled an announcement for Monday morning at the City Market.  She will only say that it involves the Seventh District.  But since she’s the person District Chairman John Hammond has been pushing from the start, it’s fairly safe to say she’ll be announcing her candidacy.

  The only question is why it took so long.  Elrod quit the race on June 18th, almost a month ago.  Anyone declaring that day would have been way behind in gaining name recognition and raising money.  Campo is now even further behind.

  So what’s the reason for running now?  To gain name recognition for a later race, even though there’s little or no hope of winning this one?  Possibly.

(Watch Jennifer’s Hot Button commentary)

Republican Jon Elrod abruptly quit the 7th District Congressional race last week and is now trying to defend his Statehouse seat, which he won by a mere handful of votes in 2006.

Elrod said he was quitting because he couldnt beat André Carson. That much is certain. Elrod ran a terrible campaign in the March special election, and there are plenty of Republicans mad at him for that lackluster effort.

Still, Elrod would have been better off losing again to Carson than trying to save face by backtracking to House District 97, a Democratic seat with a well-qualified Democratic candidate running this time around.

Politics is all about opportunity, Jon, but you have to be smart about it. When you’re dead, you stay dead. At least for an election cycle or two. You certainly dont flip-flop from one race to the next like its some sort of shameless game.

The people you represent in House District 97 - I’m one of them, by the way - expect more from their so-called representative. My grandpa used to call it stick-to-it-ive-ness. Im sure youll have plenty of time to figure it out after the November election.

Seventh District Congressional candidate and occasional State Rep. Jon Elrod held a press conference this morning to announce that he’s dropping out of the former race in an attempt to retain the latter seat.

Talk about your all-time dumb political moves.

Elrod, who almost certainly would have been crushed in the Congressional race, now looks like the world’s biggest flip-flopper, opening himself up to criticism that he’s just running for whatever office will get him to the next office he wants to run for.

As a resident of House District 97, I’m disappointed, and as a political hack, I’m shocked.

Hang it up, Jon. You gambled on the special election, ran a terrible campaign and lost. You don’t get to come back and pretend like you were representing me the whole time.

Heck, you weren’t even representing me while you were at the Statehouse running for Congress, and it’s not like you won by an overwhelming mandate back in 2006.

There’s a time to fade gracefully and a time to fight desperately. I guess we know which road Elrod is taking.