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MSNBC via Reuters said:CLEVELAND — Dennis Kucinich, a colorful liberal in Congress who tried to have former President George W. Bush impeached over the Iraq war, was defeated by a fellow Democratic incumbent on Tuesday in the first of 11 primary races this year pitting members of the U.S. House against each other.
Kucinich, 65, lost to Marcy Kaptur, the longest serving woman in Congress, who touted her influence as a senior member of the powerful committee that decides on government spending.
In November, Kaptur will face the winner of the Republican primary -- Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher, better known as "Joe the Plumber." He gained national attention in the 2008 presidential race by pressing then-candidate Barack Obama on tax policy.
Kaptur and Kucinich, once friends representing neighboring northern Ohio districts, found themselves competing for the same job when Ohio lost two Congressional seats after the 2010 U.S. Census.
The reshuffling of Ohio voting boundaries by the Republican-dominated state legislature created an oddly-shaped district that stretches along the Lake Erie shore from Toledo to just east of Cleveland, forcing a primary race between the two.
While most attention focused on the Super Tuesday Republican presidential primaries, Ohio also held primary elections for a U.S. Senate seat, all of its members of Congress and local posts.
In the primary on Tuesday, Kaptur won nearly all the vote from her home area of Toledo, and Kucinich was unable to close the gap with votes in his Cleveland base.
Liberal Congressman Kucinich defeated in Ohio - Business - msnbc.com
Dennis Kucinich, just a short 3 1/2 years ago who ran in the Democratic Primary for President of the United States. While certainly a sometimes inflammatory character in Congress, some in the media are lamenting over his primary loss to Kaptur in Ohio's 9th district. Given that the Democrats completed the redistricting and possibly knew that such a move would make a primary battle for Kucinich tougher than in the past, one wonders if the Dennis had done something or perhaps did not do enough after 16 years in Congress to warrant a primary win. I just came back from Cleveland OH and though I didn't meet an excessive amount of people there, those who I did speak to did not seem like the average Kucinich supporter. While redistricting may have had a hand in his failed primary bid another hand may be that his progressive style became a bit tired.