Completely Unnecessary

As I mentioned yesterday, turnout is expected to be low for the IL-05 primary, but this is absurd.

I just voted, and, as of 1:30pm (5.5 hours before the polls close), I was the fifth person to vote in my precinct.

If Ward 1 voters aren’t turning out, this election is going to be decided by an extremely small number of people.

If you haven’t voted and are thinking about skipping it - please go out there. There are no lines, so you’ll be in and out.

Think of the voter calculus - I just made sure my candidate got at least 20% of the vote in my precinct (provided no one else votes).

You can diminish my personal power by visiting your polling place. Please do so; it might go to my head.

God, thinking about the amount of money spent on this race for this sort of turnout is sort of appalling.

Thoughts on choosing a ballot - Jeremy might kill me, but if you’re a liberal thinking of pulling a Green ballot, you might want to think twice.

The election for IL-05 will almost certainly be decided by this winner-takes-all Democratic primary.

If you have strong feelings for (or, perhaps more importantly, against) one of the contenders in the Democratic field, you can most effectively wield your vote in the Democratic primary.

You can still vote for the Green in the general, when the Green Party might have a chance of taking down a weaker Democrat in what is sure to be another low-turnout election.

For the record - I’m not suggesting crossing party lines to try to take out another party. I’m suggesting that lefty voters think about using their vote for someone they can live with if the Democrats win the special election. The most progressive candidates in the Democratic field do not have the clout of the three frontrunners, and will be weaker Democrats on April 7th. (They will probably still win, however.)

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Can I just take a moment to say how important it is for voters to turn out for this primary?

Turnout is expected to be very low - and with Fritchey, Feigenholtz and Quigley set to split the Democratic field, economist Charlie Wheelan or labor lawyer Tom Geoghegan could slip in with enough support.

While the fields are not as large in the Republican and Green Party primaries, every vote will definitely count, whichever ballot you choose.

(Speaking of which, there have been some problems in recent elections with Green Party ballots being ‘unavailable’ or placed out of sight/off the judges’ table. If you’re a Green, make sure to get your proper ballot; they should at all polling places.

And all fair-minded voters should have a check to make sure that their judges are providing equal opportunities to all parties. You can ask even if you’re not taking a Green ballot.)

For the record, I’m supporting Charlie Wheelan. He’s a economics and public policy prof down at U of C. As such, he’s a political outsider in Chicago (yay!), as well as one of the most progressive/lefty Democrats in the field.

If you’re still making up your mind, I suggest having a look at his website. If you’ve already made up your mind, great!

Voting info:

Check your registration, Chicago residents and suburban Cook County residents. If your status is ‘Inactive’ call 312.269.7936 to resolve the issue and be prepared to bring your driver’s license to the polling place.

Polls are open tomorrow, March 3rd, from 6am until 7pm. You must vote at your polling place, not at the early voting sites. Your polling place listed on your voter card or you can check online.

If you are in line at 7pm, you must be allowed to vote. Do not be turned away. If your workday spans the entirety of open polling times, your employer must give you two hours off to vote.

Various Chicago voting nonsense: If you have voted in your polling place before and are in the signature book (a white slip with your signature on the left side) - you are not required to show ID. It’s always a good thing to bring along in case of a canvas challenge, but - as a voter - you are allowed to speak to other voters and to question a judge who asks for ID from a voter in the book with a white slip.

During the 2008 election, my judge insisted on seeing ID and then yelled at me when I refused. We had to call the BoE, but the argument continued, with her loudly abusing me the entire time I voted. It was a miserable experience for me, but I know the law and was helped by good BoE employees.

It may sound like a minor issue, but many lower-income and older residents don’t have IDs (and may not return to vote if turned away by ignorant/poorly trained/corrupt election judges). It is illegal for election judges to require white-slip voters to produce ID. If you see abuse, please bring it (politely) to the attention of the judge. If they respond poorly, stick to your guns and call the BoE. It is your right as a voter. And it’s your vote.

While we’re talking about proper voting procedures - this is the proper order of things at the polling place.

1. Your give your name and your application should be located in the book.
2. You sign your application.
3. It is checked against your signature in the book (white slips).
4. Your application is then removed, exchanged for a ballot, and placed on the spindle.

You should NOT be given your application before your signature is checked. You should NOT have to ‘check in’ with a partisan pollwatcher beforehand. Partisan pollwatchers should NOT be sitting at the table with election judges.

Report any and all irregularities to the Board of Elections (312.269.7870/312-269-7900).

Happy voting!

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Here’s the direct mail I got today from Mike Quigley, one of the candidates in the Democratic primary to fill the seat of Honorable Vacancy - IL05.

Um, it just me or does Quigley’s ad seem strikingly (some might say ‘actionably’) similar to Geico’s dollar bill ad?

Except for the quality of the image - Quigley’s ad looks like they took photos of Thin Mints and someone got a bit munchy on the Feigenholtz - I’d say Team Quigley is one googly eye away from a lawsuit.

And see, it sucks that now my attention has been drawn to this ad because I really like Mike Quigley - I think he’s more useful on the Cook County Board, but I like him.

But now, I’ve opened up the advert, so now I have to show you the most redonk photo of Blagojevich ever - not surprisingly directly next to Feigenholtz, Fritchey and Todd Stroger.

The man is many things, but he’s not that orange. Incredibly, my camera has actually improved its color and tone - the original provides a greater jack o’lantern effect.

There are also two missing commas in this sentence:

Sara Feigenholtz and John Fritchey voted for Rod Blagojevich’s sales tax hike that [sic] combined with Todd Stroger’s tax hike [sic] made Chicago’s sales tax the HIGHEST IN THE NATION.

(Yes, yes, I know. Who am I to cast the first grammar stone? But, seriously, I proof things I write for money.)

Given all the political circuses as of late, I, for one, am looking forward to the March 3rd primary.

And - provided Geico is not aggressively litigious - to Mike Quigley’s continued excellent work on the Cook County Board. (Sorry, Mike.)

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You go away for a couple of days and everyone’s all up in your fake-ish Senator demanding explanations about what he did or did not promise to do for your ex-governor.

Jeez, people are pushy! Let’s let the man tell it, shall we?

I mean, can you all imagine what’s going on now, when the secretary of state wouldn’t sign the petition? And we had to try to deal with all that…And (had) to hire all these lawyers. And they were looking at all the law and doing all this research. This is all going on and so we can be prepared to go to court in case they didn’t seat us…So we went out on Jan. 15, and we stayed in Washington because I was sworn in. And guess what? I had to vote that evening. At 4:30 or 5 o’clock, I had to cast my first vote in the Senate.

With all that going on, it would be easy to forget to mention that you’d met with a host of Blagojevich’s fundraisers and tried to raise money for him.

It would be equally easy to imply, under oath, that you’d done no such thing.

It’s clear that Burris’ appointment is a path of least resistance to 2010, when Alexi Giannoulias - currently getting some foreign policy chops with Dick Durbin in Greece - can take over. Madigan gets the statehouse… and scene.

So whilst Harry Reid ‘hope[s Burris] didn’t try to avoid or mislead anyone’, we have renewed sentiment that Burris is unfit for the job, now with editorials calling for his resignation.

God, it’s, like, what’s the point? Illinois can’t afford another special election. And who the hell would even want this albatross of a truncated term? Better to save your pennies and mount a co-Giannoulias challenge to the weakened Burris.

This nonsense made the Kentucky papers today. I sort of thought when I came back to the US people would stop asking me, “Seriously, what is up with your [insert name of political office]?’

So wrong.

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So deep is my loathing of Cook County Board President Todd Stroger that I read this article thinking, ‘Yep, I’d vote for him. Vote for him. Never heard of him, but I’d vote for him.’

Former Chicago Public School CEO Paul Vallas is considering challenging Stroger as a Republican in 2010.

“I really believe that it’s almost impossible to run as an independent or as a reform candidate through the Democratic Party,” Vallas said. “At the end of the day, if you’re going to be a reform candidate, particularly in Cook County…it becomes more realistic and more practical to run as a Republican.”

Well, it seems as though Vallas could consider a third party or running as an independent, but his point about the Democratic Party in the county is well-taken. He does have the name recognition to run on an alternative ticket, though he may benefit from what little structure there is to the CC Republican Party.

It’ll be freaking (though unfathomably) difficult to beat Stroger in the primary because he’s got money and (unbelievable to the point of making me pull my hair out) support from sectors of the city (notably 8th Ward).

Claypool’s pondering another crack at Stroger in the primary, but he’d just about seal his fate as a guy who can’t win elections if he loses the primary a second time.

Here’s what Stroger (largely mediated through the Tribune) had to say about his potential challengers.

Stroger contended Vallas, whose family still lives in Palos Heights, has been working in New Orleans and “doesn’t know any of the things we have done.” He also accused Claypool of being an obstructionist.

Honey, everyone knows the ‘things [you] have done’; everyone hates them.

Ugh, every time I see/hear from him I just want to scream, ‘Exist somewhere else!’

Though, to be fair, since the Tribune is running a countdown until his primary on their Ed page, it’s hard to know if they’re choosing the cringe-worthiest of the quotes.

I went to a forum last night on reforming corruption in Illinois. It’s difficult to know where to start, I know, but getting some of the cash out of this race - in addition to some serious electoral reform - would be one of the top items on my list.

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Throughout the impeachment process, former governor Blagojevich kept hinting that he ‘knew things’ about his colleagues.

There’s no question that there’s plenty of blame (as well as lots of different kinds of blame) to go around in Chicago/Illinois politics.

But I wonder how much of governor Pat Quinn’s promise to ‘fumigate state government’ will be carried out by the state’s ex-governor.

Earlier this week, Blago casually dropped Machine boss (and father-in-law) Dick Mell’s name and the old garbage dump scandal into the same sentence.

And outside his house last night - despite saying he’d only make a statement, he couldn’t help grandstanding and taking some questions from the press - he asked the assembled reporters if they would come back if he had something to say.

Later, claiming that ‘the fix was in’, he casually worked these two sentences into his mixture of ramblings:

I’d like to tell you some of the inside stuff, some of the things they were trying to do, and I’ll talk about that later, if [you in the press are] interested.
…
And as for some of those friends of mine in the state Senate, Dr. King said, that in the end, you remember not the words of your enemies, but the silence of your friends.

Given what Blagojevich has to know - and may possibly mention in a criminal trial/plea bargain - a goodly number of Illinois and Chicago politicians surely broke into a sweat hearing those words.

We’ll have to wait to see if the ex-governor will one up Quinn’s fumigation bomb with a nuclear one.

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If the Senate removes Blago from office, it’s really going to put a damper on my afternoon crazy schedule.

Blagojevich’s latest presser consisted largely of cowboy metaphors, the governor arguing that the Senate impeachment trial was similar to an Old West hanging. (If there’s video up later, I’ll try to post it because you actually need to hear how long and how hard he flogged his simile.)

The main thrust of his prepared (?) remarks was that he was prevented from calling witnesses and from challenging the charges. Blagojevich demanded his ‘constitutional right’ to a fair trial.

If they can do this to a governor, they can do this to any citizen in Illinois.

Except, of course, ‘they’ can’t because his impeachment trial is a political procedure, not a criminal procedure.

Insanely, he took questions and the first one pressed him on exactly that point. Blago ducked and weaved, but didn’t manage to have an answer, except to demand again a fair trial.

He hit his stride late in the question period, claiming that he is being targeted by lawmakers who view him as an impediment to their cynical tax rise on the people of Illinois. He argued that if the people if the state allow him to go down like this, it will have a chilling effect on future governors actions vs the legislature.

Rod is the only thing standing between us and our other elected officials (and their 66% tax hike).

Um.

Oh yeah, he also called upon Illinois newspapers to help his cause for a ‘fair’ trial. He urged the Chicago Tribune, in particular, to lead the charge, citing the Tribune’s Supreme Court case against ‘Minnesota mobsters’ and other crooks.

This man’s irony gauge needs a lot of adjusting.

Speaking of the Tribune, they have some good quotes I didn’t catch all of:

Ending his 43-minute interview, Blagojevich likened the current drama surrounding him “to a 21st Century Frank Capra movie… how the good guy was up against the establishment… But he stood firm for the people. That’s what this is about.”

Obviously.

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Today’s Tribune interview with Senate hopeful Roland Burris sketches out some of the candidate’s bold and nuanced policy positions:

Burris maintained it was unfair to seek substantive answers from him about his goals because he hadn’t taken the oath of office—even though he was interested in the Senate appointment since last summer.

“I want to get my Senate legs under me and make sure I get down all the rules and regulations,” Burris said in the interview…”In the meantime, I will begin to assess the various national issues that are out there in general and the Illinois issues in particular.”

To be fair, the Tribune’s editorial stance in the segment I just clipped seems fairly skeptical of Burris, so perhaps there were more thoughtful-sounding quotes in the interview.

But the fact that he let those words come out of his mouth is telling.

Politicians run for office - at least in theory - because they want to effect some kind of change. Accepting an appointment to an office without clear goals and policy positions is the height of  arrogance.

What is really galling, however, is how happy Burris is to express this sentiment to the media and, by extension, the people of Illinois. It’s an attitude that says, “Get stuffed; I’m going to the Senate.” This also pretty much sums up his appointment, and presumably his tenure in office.

At this point, we just need to seat or not seat this turkey. It would be nice if by Inauguration we could focus on the… horrible everything, rather than the absurdly inflated egos of a couple lame politicians that have proved ineffectual, at best. Let’s leave the limelight for those who actually have substantive contributions to make.

There comes a point in every story about Illinois’ corrupt politics where the citizens just give up fighting and try to make the latest electoral assault as brief and painless as possible.

I don’t know if laying back and thinking of 2010 is the most proactive answer, but it might present the least chance of permanent damage.

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You know who else had a bad week?

Former IL governor and convicted felon George Ryan.

Nothing says, ‘Gee, I’m probably not going to get this sentence commuted after all,” like having the entire country in an uproar over your successor’s all-too-familiar public corruption charges.

I mean, everyone in Illinois was complaining loudly about Durbin asking Bush for the commutation as it was.

My highly unscientific tally of the Tribune’s Letter to the Editor page was about 8 to 1 against - with the rare supporting being like, “Yeah, but remember that death penalty moratorium?”

Yes, that was a good thing to do. But an act of germane public policy (which is, you know, the job of the governor in other states) doesn’t - to me - stand up against ten years of corruption without ever admitting guilt or apologizing to the public.

And… cue public apology:

“I want to make things right in my heart with God, with my family and with those that I have hurt,” said the statement, which was read by former Gov. Jim Thompson at a news conference held at Thompson’s Chicago law offices.

Amazing how total panic over not getting the commutation you thought was in the bag will make a one see the error of his ways.

“I think he is a much-changed man,” Thompson said.

I bet he is, sir.

I bet he is.

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• Patti Blagojevich Painted as Lady Macbeth
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All right, Chicago Tribune. I was going to write about your Patti Blagojevich/Lady Macbeth article anyway, but her appearance on your homepage has hurried it up a few hours.

Look, I know that people are suddenly visiting chicagotribune.com, so you want to keep those pageviews up. But don’t let the twin shocks of bankruptcy and unexpected relevance go to your head.

Because this is inappropriate:

Lady Macbeth, as you will no doubt recall from Mr Johnson’s English Lit class, is the devil woman who convinces her husband to murder the king, paving the way for his own ascension.

Lady Macbeth doesn’t merely profit from her husband’s rise, she actively corrupts him.

Which is not to say that Patti Blagojevich’s hands are clean. It appears that she was in on the criminal conspiracy, and charges should follow if they are merited. I don’t believe she should get a free ride because her husband is (likely) going to jail and they’ve got kids. Do the crime, do the time.

However! Let’s take a quick look at how we’re covering Mrs Blago’s not-even-alleged-at-this-point crimes.

An unflattering portrait depicting Illinois First Lady Patricia Blagojevich as a modern-day Lady Macbeth who plotted against her husband’s perceived enemies and backed his corrupt schemes emerged in court documents connected to the governor’s arrest Tuesday.

It appears that Patti’s ‘crimes’ so far consist of conduct unbecoming a lady. The Tribune article describes her ‘alleged ambitions and brashness‘ and the ‘obscenity-filled tirade‘ she ‘unleashed’ in support of firing Tribune employees.

That ‘obscenity-filled tirade’ consists of saying ‘fuck’ twice and ’shit’ once. Perhaps not language fit for high society, but certainly language I use in my home when I assume the feds aren’t listening. (And, from the transcript, language that appears par for the course in the Blagojevich household.)

But what really stirs my cauldron is the negative depictions of Patti herself.

For Rod, ambition has not been described as the problem, but rather as a motivator for the corruption he (allegedly) perpetrated. For Patti, the mere act of having ambition is modified with ‘alleged’ - as though that were her crime.

And, of course, we have the word ‘brash’, which has been used time and time again to describe the grating brassiness of women who step out of line.

Should the good governor’s wife should have knitted merrily whilst her husband cooked up the schemes?

From a legal standpoint, it appears so! But for the daughter of Chicago political boss, Dick Mell, not [bleeping] likely.

If she deserves it - and it looks as though she does - let’s try Patti Blagojevich in the courts. But let’s not use insulting literary metaphors to punish a woman for her unladylike ambition and language choice.

[Ed. note- I took the wrong spelling of Patricia Blagojevich's nickname. I've fixed it, and regret the (all-too-common) errors in my spelling.]

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