Might Barney Frank actually lose his re-election to Congress?

If even Reuters notices that Frank could lose, my guess is that this seeming long shot is possible.

Massachusetts has already been the scene of one of the year's biggest upsets, when Republican Scott Brown won a special election for the U.S. Senate seat held for almost five decades by a Democratic Party pillar, the late Edward Kennedy.

"If Barney Frank loses, it would be as significant as Scott Brown's win. You would really begin to see the depths of this anti-government sentiment," said Marc Landy, professor of political science at Boston College. . . .

American voters are in a surly mood over the weak economy, unemployment near 10 percent and the state of the housing market as banks face scrutiny over how they handled the paperwork in home foreclosures across the country.

Frank, 70, has been chairman of the powerful House Financial Services Committee for almost four years.

He helped to broker the $700 billion fund to bail out banks at the height of the financial crisis and he promoted legislation to slow foreclosures and keep afloat Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the federally controlled companies that own or guarantee more than half of the $11 trillion in U.S. mortgages. . . .