For the first time in months, GOP strategists had been enjoying a spate of good news and were starting to believe that the upcoming congressional elections may not be the disaster they were all dreading. But now, Ney bursts back into the news with sordid tales of taking thousands of dollars in poker chips from a Syrian businessman while accepting untold free trips, fancy meals and golf junkets from corrupt lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

Just when they need it most, Democrats – courtesy of Ney – have been given a great opportunity to change the subject from national security back to Republican corruption.

There is no indication that, by itself, corruption is an issue that will swing the national mood, but it blunts what had been some GOP momentum. And Ney's decision not to immediately resign his House seat threatens to make matters worse by dragging out the story.

His decision has privately infuriated other Republicans in Ohio. Some of the anger could be seen in Ohio GOP Chairman Robert Bennett's unusually sharp-worded demand that Ney “should resign immediately and begin paying the price for his arrogance and greed.

“He let his state and his country down, and his apology rings hollow in the context of the many months he spent denying his corrupt behavior.”

Bennett also knows that Ney will again be in the news next month when he is sentenced, and that the GOP nominee in the 18th District – State Sen. Joy Padgett, whom Ney encouraged to run when he announced in August that he would not seek re-election – will be pressed to explain why she has not called for Ney's resignation.

Padgett is considered a strong candidate to keep the seat Republican. But she must overcome being tagged as Ney's hand-picked successor. And she will be forced to spend precious time talking about Ney when she would like to be talking about her issues.

“In Ohio this is just one more Republican corruption story reverberating on,” said Charles Cook, editor of the Cook Political Report, a respected nonpartisan newsletter. “This will hurt Republicans in other seats in the state.”

If Republicans are to retain control of the Congress they must protect incumbent Republicans in Ohio. And they must do it despite the deep unpopularity of President Bush there.

Larry Sabato, an expert on political scandals and the director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, expects the biggest impact to land on already-endangered Republicans in Ohio, where Gov. Bob Taft has the lowest approval ratings of any governor in the nation.

“It reinforces the Republican Party's massive problems in Ohio,” said Sabato. “The embarrassment can extend beyond Ney's district and just reinforce the Bush-Taft disaster in the making in Ohio.”

Beyond Ohio, Democrats expressed glee. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, said Ney's plea “confirms what we have long said – the Republican culture of corruption has pervaded Congress.”

Rep. Rahm Emanuel, D-Ill, the chairman of the Democrat's House campaign committee, predicted that “Ohio and all of America is ready to move on from the wave of corruption that has plagued Washington under Republican leadership.”

But there are signs that a Republican scandal in Ohio may get lost nationally when one issue dominates the debate: the Iraq war.

“For Democrats, the corruption issue helped set the table, but I think they rode that horse about as far as they could possibly ride it,” Cook said. “Because Democrats don't have a lot more credibility on corruption than Republicans do. At the end of the day they have only one trump card. It's the war in Iraq.”