GOP faces some losses in Senate

WASHINGTON -- Resurgent Democrats grabbed Republican Senate seats in Pennsylvania, Ohio and Rhode Island Tuesday in midterm elections shaped by an unpopular war in Iraq and scandal at home.\nIn a comeback unlike any other, Sen. Joe Lieberman won a new term in Connecticut -- dispatching Democrat Ned Lamont and winning when it counted most against the man who prevailed in a summertime primary. Lieberman, a supporter of Bush's war policy, ran as an independent but will side with the Democrats when he returns to Washington.\nSen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania became the first Republican senator to fall to the Democrats, losing his seat after two consecutive terms to Bob Casey Jr., the state treasurer.\nIn Ohio, Sen. Mike DeWine lost to Rep. Sherrod Brown, a liberal seven-term lawmaker.\nLincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, the most liberal Republican in the Senate and an opponent of the war, fell not long afterward to Sheldon Whitehouse, former state attorney general.\nThat left a fistful of heavily contested races uncalled.\nIn Virginia, Republican Sen. George Allen and Democratic challenger Jim Webb were locked in a seesaw race, neither man able to break ahead of the other.\nIn Tennessee, former Chattanooga Mayor Bob Corker held a narrow lead over Democratic Rep. Harold Ford Jr., campaigning to become the first black senator from the South in more than a century.\nIn Missouri, Sen. Jim Talent held a lead over Democratic challenger Claire McCaskill with almost 25 percent of the precincts counted.\nAmong the GOP losers, Santorum and DeWine all won their seats in the Republican landslide of 1994 -- the year the GOP grabbed control of the House and Senate from the Democrats and launched a Republican revolution.\nVoters in Vermont made Rep. Bernie Sanders, an independent, the winner in a Senate race, succeeding retiring Sen. James Jeffords. Sanders is an avowed Socialist who will side with Democrats when he is sworn into office in January.\nDemocrat Amy Klobuchar, a county prosecutor, won the Minnesota Senate race to replace retiring Sen. Mark Dayton, a fellow Democrat.\nIn Maryland, Democratic Rep. Ben Cardin captured an open Senate seat, defeating Lt. Gov. Michael Steele.\nNext door in Ohio, Democratic Rep. Sherrod Brown was defeating Sen. Mike DeWine by a double-digit margin.