Re: Former POW Borling Runs for Senate

Date: February 04, 2004

"Five candidates coming to dinner

Five of the Republican candidates for the U.S. Senate seat from Illinois will be guests at the Lincoln Day Dinner in Pontiac, based on responses received as of Wednesday.

The Livingston County Republican Central Committee will hold the annual dinner on Monday, Feb. 9, at the Pontiac Elks Lodge. A reception begins at 5:30 p.m. and the dinner at 6.

State Sen. Dan Rutherford, Chenoa, (R-53rd), will serve as moderator for a forum among the Senate candidates. As of today, Senate candidates who have accepted invitations to attend the event are John Borling, Andy McKenna, Jonathan Wright, state Sen. Steve Rauschenberger and Andy Martin.

Attendance of one candidate, Jack Ryan, was uncertain as of today; one candidate, James Oberweis, has declined his invitation.

Following are brief profiles of the candidates who have said they will attend the dinner and participate in the forum:

* John Borling, of Rockford, is a retired major general who spent 37 years in the Air Force. He was a prisoner of war in Vietnam for more than six years. During his Air Force career, Borling's assignments included head of operations for Strategic Air Command responsible for SAC'S support of hostilities in the Gulf War and Panama; head of CHECKMATE, a war-fighting think tank at the Pentagon; commander of a fighter and support base in Germany; working for the commander and chief of staff at NATO'S Supreme Headquarters in Belgium; and chief of staff of NATO'S Headquarters North and senior U.S. officer in Scandinavia. Borling is chairman of Performance Consulting Group, an energy services company. A native of Chicago and a graduate of the Air Force Academy, Borling and his wife, Myrna, are the parents of two daughters.
* Andy McKenna is president of Schwarz Paper Co. in Morton Grove. He began his business career in 1980 at Kraft Foods and in 1981 left Kraft to work at Schwarz Paper, a national paper packaging and distributing business. He was named to his current position of president in 1996. He has served as director of civic and charitable organizations, including the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce, Rebuilding Together, a national organization dedicated to building homes for underprivileged families; and the Field Museum. He received a bachelor's degree in business administration from the University of Notre Dame in 1979 and a master's degree in manufacturing management from Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management in 1980. McKenna and his wife, Mary, have been married 23 years. They live in Glenview and have four children.
* Jonathan Wright, assistant state's attorney for Logan County, lives in Lincoln. Wright was state representative for the former 90th District in Illinois from June 2001 to January 2003. He has also been an attorney in private practice in Monmouth, Pekin and Lincoln, and has worked in the Springfield office of the Illinois attorney general. A graduate of Monmouth College in 1989 and of Chicago-Kent College of Law in 1992, Wright is on the boards of directors of the Logan County Paramedics Association, the Abraham Lincoln Memorial Hospital Foundation and of St. Clara's Manor Nursing Home in Lincoln, and is a member of the advisory board for the Salvation Army in Lincoln. He and his wife, Melanie, have four children.
* Sen. Steve Rauschenberger, of Elgin, has served as Illinois Senate Appropriations Committee chairman. A former furniture retailer, he was first elected to the state senate in 1992. He is a member of the Senate committees on Environment and Energy, Public Health and Welfare, and Illinois Growth Task Force (chairman). He also serves on two committees for the National Conference of State Legislatures and on the Illinois JCAR Committee. Rauschenberger, a 1978 graduate of William and Mary with a bachelor's degree in accounting, and his wife, Betty, have two sons.
* Andy Martin, of Chicago, holds bachelor's and law degrees from the University of Illinois. He has been a public interest lawyer for 36 years at the national and state levels. He has managed both radio and television stations and produced television programming and commercials in Illinois. Martin has been involved in advertising sales and in-house advertising agency management, and has been a television field producer. He currently is a national columnist for Out2.com and has served as Baghdad (Iraq) Bureau Chief since April, 2003. From 1985 to 1987 he was an adjunct professor of law for the City University of New York, at LaGuardia Community College. He was an assistant to Sen. Paul H. Douglas in Washington in 1966.

Other Republicans seeking the Senate nomination are Chirinjeev Kathuria and Norm Hill.

Tickets for the Lincoln Day Dinner are $25 per person or two for $40, and may be obtained from any precinct committeeman, or by calling 844-3984 or 844-2245."