Maf54: You in your boxers, too?
Teen: Nope, just got home. I had a college interview that went late.
Maf54: Well, strip down and get relaxed.

Another message:

Maf54: What ya wearing?
Teen: tshirt and shorts
Maf54: Love to slip them off of you.

And this one:

Maf54: Do I make you a little horny?
Teen: A little.
Maf54: Cool.

Still, a shift in the Senate was always considered a long shot this year. Some analysts now say, however, that there are enough Republican seats facing serious challenges to make it at least plausible.

...

In Pennsylvania, Rick Santorum, the No. 3 Republican in the Senate, has been lagging behind Bob Casey, the state treasurer, for months. In Rhode Island, Senator Lincoln Chafee, a Republican, overcame his primary challenge, but remains locked in a tight race with Sheldon Whitehouse, the Democrat and former state attorney general.

...

Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York, chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, said: “We will pick up seats. And if the stars continue to align, we can take back the Senate.”

...

The Virginia race — between Mr. Allen and Jim Webb, the Democrat — looked safe for the Republicans until Mr. Allen made a demeaning reference to a young American man of Indian descent — a Webb campaign worker — at a rally in August. Then, last week, Mr. Allen reacted angrily to a reporter’s question about whether his mother had been born Jewish, which began another distracting episode for his campaign.

This week, he has faced accusations that he used racist slurs in the 1970’s and 1980’s — allegations that Mr. Allen has flatly denied.

...

Analysts say the level of Senate competition should come as no surprise; Senate races are more likely to reflect national trends, they say, whereas most House districts are so carefully drawn on partisan lines that “they are safe against anything but a hurricane,” said Gary C. Jacobson, a political scientist at the University of California, San Diego.

Rep. Dave Obey of Wisconsin's 7th district fired back at Rep. John Boehner (R-OH) this week. Boehner fired off the tired right-wing talking point of questioning the patriotism of Democrats who continue to question the war in Iraq, and the Bush Administration's prosecution of it.

"I come from the state of Joe McCarthy," said Obey, D-Wausau. "(I) know a third-rate McCarthy when I see one. And we saw one yesterday."

McCarthy, a Republican from Appleton who represented Wisconsin in the Senate from 1947 until his death in 1957, made headlines by accusing the Defense Department of employing unnamed Communists.

House Majority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, said Tuesday that he wondered if his friends who are Democrats "are more interested in protecting the terrorists than protecting the American people."

Boehner's comment came in response to Democrats who accused President Bush of using his Monday night speech commemorating the fifth anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks to build support for the war in Iraq.