Bruckner challenges Boland

THOMSON -- Lawrence Bruckner, the Carroll County GOP committee vice chairman knows his opponent, Rep. Mike Boland, D-East Moline, will prove a tough opponent in the race for Illinois House District 71. That is why the Carroll County native is trying to draw as many connections as possible between Boland and Rod Blagojevich, whose 13-percent approval rating, according to pollster Ipsos, is the lowest of any governor in the country. Bruckner, a Thomson resident who practices law in Dixon, kicked off his campaign Thursday morning at the Thomson House Cafe, a diner he started a few hundred yards from the $143-million Thomson Correctional Center when it was built in 2001. He sold it when the Illinois Department of Corrections left the prison's 1