2008's Bob Ney

Yeah, all the elements are there: Over-whelming GOP-leaning District, connection to Jack Abramoff, and a multi-term Congressman too stubborn to read the writing on the wall.

I give you, Rep. John Doolittle (R) of California.

Rep. John Doolittle defiantly declared Friday that he will not retire from Congress despite increasing Republican concern that if he runs for a 10th term next year, the seat could fall to Democratic challenger Charlie Brown.

"I will not step aside," Doolittle said in a telephone news conference. "I am running again. Period."

Doolittle was upbeat , even jubilant in the 20-minute session despite a week in which Republican pollster Chris Wilson said the Roseville congressman was trailing Brown by double-digit numbers months before the November 2008 general election. Also, a federal grand jury heard testimony this week from three of Doolittle's aides subpoenaed in connection with the investigation of his connection to jailed lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

But Doolittle dismissed his Republican doubters - three of whom have said they either will or think they might run against him in the Republican primary next June - as "weasels."

[...]

As for the grand jury investigation, Doolittle would say only that the three-year investigation of the relationship he and his wife, Julie, had with Abramoff is dragging on so long that it is "bordering on harassment."

A federal grand jury subpoenaed Doolittle's chief of staff, Ron Rogers, deputy chief of staff Dan Blankenburg and scheduler Alisha Perkins to testify in the probe.

When you're calling in the scheduler, usually a pretty low-ranking position in the office, you know it's serious. If he lives through a primary, that'd be a shocker.

As a side note, you couldn't come up with better names for these candidates in a political thriller. Doolittle, Charlie Brown, man those are great names.