JACKSON -- It is deja vu all over again.

Democratic incumbent Mark Schauer taking on Republican Tim Walberg for the 7th Congressional District of the U.S. House.

The two have met before in 2008, when Schauer wrested the seat from then-incumbent Walberg.

Now the roles have reversed -- and the venom seems to only have increased.

"They will get very negative," Walberg, 59, said Wednesday of the Schauer campaign. "They understand that the American people have awakened; and they understand that the only way to win this election is to go negative."

Schauer, 48, countered that it's Walberg's people going on the offensive.

"They started attacking me from Day 1," said Schauer, who also served in the Michigan Senate from 2003 to 2009. "And what I'm going to do is talk about my vision of what's good for Michigan."

Wednesday the campaigns found themselves just blocks away from each other in Jackson.

Schauer stopped in at the downtown fire station to check out new masks -- made possible by a federal grant that he sponsored.

He made the rounds thanking the city's firefighters and took som time to call Walberg out on his plans to privatize social security.

"I believe that's a promise that was made to senior citizens and to future generations to make sure that seniors won't have to live in poverty," Schauer said. "So it's a very different philosophy."

Over at the Commonwealth Center, House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, stopped in to speak at a fundraiser for Walberg. His security detail whisked him off before we could talk to him, but we did speak with Walberg -- he said his campaign will hinge on just a couple of key issues.

"Jobs and economy," he said matter-of-factly.

And he added his belief that Bush-era policies will help get the economy back on its feet.

"[Voters] see that this approach, having been given a chance, isn't working and is going further down the wrong trail," said Walberg, who served in the Michigan House of Representatives from 1983 to 1998.

Schauer, again, countered.

"I voted to eliminate a tax loophole that rewarded big companies for outsourcing our jobs," he said. "Tim Walberg supports that, so there's a very real difference."

Some early shots in what promises to be a very long, very nasty campaign.