CHICAGO (Reuters) – Still reeling from the loss of the late Edward Kennedy’s Senate seat to Republicans in Massachusetts, Barack Obama’s Democrats now face the prospect of losing the president’s old Senate seat in Illinois.

The Democratic candidate Alexi Giannoulias is trailing Republican Mark Kirk in opinion polls ahead of November’s election in which Republicans are aiming to erase Democratic majorities in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives.

Giannoulias’s struggles come at a time when Illinois Democrats appear to be in disarray.

Scott Cohen, a pawnbroker-turned-politician who won the Democratic nomination to run for lieutenant governor, is fending off accusations that he brutalized women.

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Still reeling from the loss of the late Edward Kennedy’s Senate seat to Republicans in Massachusetts, Barack Obama’s Democrats now face the prospect of losing the president’s old Senate seat in Illinois.

The Democratic candidate Alexi Giannoulias is trailing Republican Mark Kirk in opinion polls ahead of November’s election in which Republicans are aiming to erase Democratic majorities in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives.

Giannoulias’s struggles come at a time when Illinois Democrats appear to be in disarray.

Scott Cohen, a pawnbroker-turned-politician who won the Democratic nomination to run for lieutenant governor, is fending off accusations that he brutalized women.

CHICAGO, Feb 5 (Reuters) – Still reeling from the loss of the late Edward Kennedy’s Senate seat to Republicans in Massachusetts, Barack Obama’s Democrats now face the prospect of losing the president’s old Senate seat in Illinois.

The Democratic candidate Alexi Giannoulias is trailing Republican Mark Kirk in opinion polls ahead of November’s election in which Republicans are aiming to erase Democratic majorities in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives.

Giannoulias’s struggles come at a time when Illinois Democrats appear to be in disarray.

Scott Cohen, a pawnbroker-turned-politician who won the Democratic nomination to run for lieutenant governor, is fending off accusations that he brutalized women.

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Buoyed by their surprise Senate victory in Massachusetts, Republicans in President Barack Obama’s home state of Illinois sense the Senate seat he left vacant is ripe for their picking come November elections.

Obama’s Democrats have long dominated Illinois politics. But Republicans view their man Scott Brown’s capture in January of the late Edward Kennedy’s seat in Massachusetts as a sign of voter dismay with Democrats in the White House and Congress.

Public opinion polls ahead of Tuesday’s party primaries in Illinois show five-term U.S. Representative Mark Kirk likely to win the Republican nomination easily.

Favored to win the Democratic primary and face off Kirk for the vacant seat is Alexi Giannoulias, Illinois treasurer and Obama’s basketball-playing buddy.

CHICAGO, Jan 31 (Reuters) – Buoyed by their surprise U.S. Senate victory in Massachusetts, Republicans in President Barack Obama’s home state of Illinois sense the Senate seat he left vacant is ripe for their picking come November elections.

Obama’s Democrats have long dominated Illinois politics. But Republicans view their man Scott Brown’s capture in January of the late Edward Kennedy’s seat in Massachusetts as a sign of voter dismay with Democrats in the White House and Congress.

Public opinion polls ahead of Tuesday’s party primaries in Illinois show five-term U.S. Representative Mark Kirk likely to win the Republican nomination easily.

Favored to win the Democratic primary and face off Kirk for the vacant seat is Alexi Giannoulias, Illinois treasurer and Obama’s basketball-playing buddy.

CHICAGO, Jan 20 (Reuters) – A survey of U.S. companies that build highways, buildings and sewers found nine in 10 predicting their business will not rebound in 2010 from depressed levels, a trade group said on Wednesday.

Based on the responses of some 700 contractors across the United States, 88 percent of the firms do not expect overall conditions to improve before 2011 and some will likely go out of business, the Associated General Contractors of America said.

“It means the construction industry is in for another difficult year in 2010,” Stephen Sandherr, the trade group’s chief executive, said in a conference call.

The industry is widely considered a bellwether for the economy as an indicator of spending on infrastructure, rebuilding and business expansion, and it has a ripple effect in terms of purchases of construction materials and equipment.

WASHINGTON/CHICAGO (Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected a request by the state of Michigan for an injunction to force the closing of two Chicago-area waterway locks to keep Asian carp from invading the Great Lakes.

The voracious Bighead and Silver carp are considered a dire threat to the lakes’ $7 billion fisheries.

Michigan last month took the unusual step of asking the high court for an order that would close the two locks and would require authorities to take all other action necessary to keep the carp from entering the lakes.

Michigan asked that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the state of Illinois and Chicago’s sewer authority take more steps to block the carp during flooding and ultimately to separate the Great Lakes from the Mississippi River watershed.

WASHINGTON/CHICAGO, Jan 19 (Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected a request by the state of Michigan for an injunction to force the closing of two Chicago-area waterway locks to keep Asian carp from invading the Great Lakes.

The voracious Bighead and Silver carp are considered a dire threat to the lakes’ $7 billion fisheries.

Michigan last month took the unusual step of asking the high court for an order that would close the two locks and would require authorities to take all other action necessary to keep the carp from entering the lakes.

Michigan asked that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the state of Illinois and Chicago’s sewer authority take more steps to block the carp during flooding and ultimately to separate the Great Lakes from the Mississippi River watershed.

CHICAGO (Reuters) – A leader of a Pakistani militant group was charged on Thursday with helping to plot a revenge attack on a Danish newspaper that published cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammad which angered many Muslims.

The U.S. indictment of Ilyas Kashmiri, a leader of the group Harakat-ul Jihad Islami, accuses him of helping to plot an attack against the Jyllands-Posten newspaper. Kashmiri was described in court documents as being in regular contact with leaders of al Qaeda.

Also formally charged was Pakistani-born Chicago businessman Tahawwur Rana, 48, and Abdur Rehman, a retired Pakistani Army major, both previously named in the investigation.

Court documents filed on Thursday also contained additional details about the planning for a deadly November 2008 assault on Mumbai.

CHICAGO (Reuters) – In a bow to political winds that demand the streets be cleared of snow, plows were out on Wednesday across the U.S. midsection despite the strain on tight state and local government budgets.

A winter storm was forecast to dump as much as a foot (0.3 meter) of snow across the Great Plains and Midwest by the weekend. The storm was expected to bring enough snow to Des Moines, Iowa, to match the city’s normal snowfall total for an entire winter season.

The Iowa capital expects to chew through its $3 million annual snow removal budget soon and will have to take from funds meant for road maintenance.

“We’ll face the difficulty of having less drivable roads in July, when there will be more potholes,” Des Moines Public Works Director Bill Stowe said.