2003

Lotta Irony at the Leader

ArchPundit May 28, 2003 No Comments

First, Lott has gone and gotten himself a blog. I’ll be adding this to the links under funny stuff.

Second, Lott is interviewed in the Illinois Leader with this quote,

Some years ago I was teaching a class that dealt with crime issues. I thought my students would be interested in reading some papers on gun control. I started looking for papers for them to read and was shocked at how poorly done the research was. I decided to do my own study.

I couldn’t make this stuff up folks!

He seems to be getting better at including all of the facts concerning the Appalachian Law School story,

There was a case last year that got a lot of attention, an attack at Appalachian Law School in Virginia (in which three people were killed). When the attack started, two students at the school, who had law enforcement backgrounds, ran to their cars, got their guns, came back, pointed their guns at the attacker and ordered him to drop his gun. When he did so they tackled him and held him until police arrived.

Go read Tim Lambert for lots more on recent Lott happenings.

Mike Kelleher Will Not Be Running For the US Senate

ArchPundit May 28, 2003 2 Comments

In one of two stories today that required some (well, not much) actual reporting, Mike Kelleher confirms that he will not be running for the Illinois Democratic nomination to the US Senate in 2004. While he had not been listed as one of the likely candidates in most places, I had heard persistent rumors and so I asked him.

Kelleher, for those who are not familiar with him, ran a spirited race in the 15th Congressional District in 2000 coming within six points of Republican Tim Johnson who won the open seat vacated by Tom Ewing. While losing a race might not seem like a resume builder, Kelleher ran in what has traditionally been one of the most conservative Congressional Districts in Illinois and actually won McLean County–an amazing feat for Democrat. He then ran with Rod Blagojevich for Lieutenant Governor, but was swamped with Pat Quinn’s name recognition in the primary.

Initially, Kelleher was considering a run in 2002 against Johnson, but he was redistricted into Jerry Weller’s 11th Congressional District which was far less friendly than the 15th. To do this, Bloomington-Normal was split in two right down the middle leaving Kelleher in the 11th by a few blocks.

Johnson is, ummmm…let’s say a character. I’ll leave the fuller explanation for a time when he has done something really dumb. Certainly that is part of the reason Kelleher was able to do so well, as is the changing nature of McLean County. An interesting map I came across indicates McLean has the lowest percentage of individuals without High School Diplomas. With this base, he may have been an early benficiary of the argument made in The Emerging Democratic Majority.

With the crowded field the Senate race would have been a very tough one for Kelleher given the nature of the candidates already in the field. Hull has millions, Hynes has organization and name recognition, Pappas has Name ID, and Obama has organization. Oh, and this Simmons character has millions.

UP DATE: First, the link to the map doesn’t work. However, the two maps are present at the end of the link showing the rate of those with high school education over age 25 and the rate of those without a high school education. Champaign and McLean both have very high rates of high school education and very low rates of those without a high school degree. In a completely inside joke–Fred Walk taught me better.

Second, I indicated that Mike Kelleher was redistricted out of the 15th by a few blocks. I made the mistake of going by memory and was wrong. He was redistricted into the 11th by 1/2 block. He was quoted in the Tribune as saying, "If I go to the end of my driveway, I can through a baseball into the 15th district." I’ll cover the redistricting shenanigans in a later post, but he was not the only one who received such treatment. Luis Gutierrez’s primary opponent in the 2000 election was similarly excluded from Gutierrez’s new district.

Oh where, Oh where is ArchPundit?

ArchPundit May 28, 2003 No Comments

Actually tracking down some news–more on that later. The next few weeks plan to be hectic–about the time that Tom Spencer will be getting back from grading AP exams in Texas , I’ll be heading to Colorado to do the same.

Between now and then I have some deadlines so blogging will be inconsistent, but I have some larger posts in the pipeline so perhaps I’ll offer up some quality over quantity.

As regular readers can tell, I’m still blogging pseudonymously, but that may or may not change in the near future. Either way, I’m less guarded about it with some changes in St. Louis recently. IOW, I’ve pretty much been given the green light to bloviate at will. With Kos becoming public, perhaps it is a trend.

Now if Sid would just admit he is Atrios, all would be good.

Federal Injunction Denied for Meigs

ArchPundit May 23, 2003 No Comments

US District Judge James Moran declined to issue an emergency order barring the City of Chicago from taking further action on Meigs. He went further to suggest he may not have authority over the case,

"I don’t think I have jurisdiction to take any action," Moran said. He noted that if the Federal Aviation Administration is concerned about Meigs’ closing, it can involve the U.S. Attorney’s office. But it has yet to do so.

Jack Ryan Pledges $6 Million to Campaign

ArchPundit May 23, 2003 No Comments

Jack Ryan (nonimations for how to refer to him given the plethora of Ryans are being taken) pledged to spend $6 Million of his own money in a race for the US Senate, but not to entirely self-fund.

Dandy, more millionaires self-funding for their first race at an office and starting at the Senate. Hey–why not the Presidency?

On a serious note, let me address a concern I received yesterday for my comments concerning millionaires. First, those who gain their political clout by accident of birth are not any better and the two most obvious Illinois examples are Lisa Madigan and Dan Hynes. Madigan had at least been in the Legislature, Hynes simply ran for statewide office with no experience on his father’s name. In both cases I was skeptical–but you didn’t get the treat of my complaining about it because they started their runs before this blog. I would argue that Madigan beat one of the strongest candidates for Attorney General ever–in the primary. John Schmidt was uber qualified and a great candidate and the Party should have chosen him. They didn’t.

In both cases, a moderate Republican might have even caught my interest, but Birkett and Lauzen made Madigan and Hynes look like excellent candidates.

My ultimate problem with candidates jumping over many people who have dedicated their lives to public service. Public service in the form of elected office consists of skills that being a businessman or a kid dont’ necessarily teach. Understanding unintended consequences and how to incorporate those ideas from those you disagree with are important skills and I would prefer people learn them at lower levels–whether it be in city government or the state legislature.

Are there some who make the transition well? Yeah. Of course–Hynes and Madigan are good examples and I’m sure some millionaires have done quite well jumping over others. I do have concerns about some including Corzine and Kohl (especially early in his career) who show some deficiencies in how they go about their jobs. And to admit the obvious, long periods of service certainly don’t guarantee a strong performance. Peter Fitzgerald didn’t simply leap to national office, and I aside from ideological differences, he ran his office poorly and was ineffective as a legislator.

In the Senate race and other races around the country, millionaires are starting to treat the Senate as a personal playground. Simmons entered the race today. Oberwies, Hull, Jack Ryan, John Cox,and Andrew McKenna. How many years of elective office do they combined have (and I’m not including precinct captains)—0. Some might be good Senators–Hull probably would be, at worst, okay. McKenna, other than ideology, seems to have the temperment and experience working with government. The others? Who knows. I’d rather seem them play in the farm league first.

This doesn’t even include Corrine Wood who, like Fitzgerald, at least didn’t start at the top. On the other end, Hynes is a legacy, but the other candidates have worked their way up. And even Hynes has had a position for the last 5 years in which he has performed well.

The notion that the US Senate could become a millionaires club full of those who decided to run for it because they could disturbs me. It doesn’t mean every self-funded candidate is bad, but it does mean we should be skeptical of them.

Dog Bites Man II

ArchPundit May 23, 2003 No Comments

So let me get this straight–Powell is for allowing higher degrees of radio and TV consolidation, but is against micro-radio stations.

This issue isn’t really confusing-Clear Channel and the lesser evils are trying to boot out competition with an oligopoly. The only question is why anyone is allowing it other than craven self-interest.

Dog Bites Man

ArchPundit May 23, 2003 No Comments

The Saint Louis Business Journal reports that Missouri and Illinois rank on a measure of lobbyist influence in policy-making.

Um…Duh.

Machine Rumors for the Presidential Candidates

ArchPundit May 23, 2003 No Comments

While the Illinois Democratic Machine is often made out to be a singular body of movement, this is a poor representation of a body that has a variety of factions fighting for the upperhand. Groupthink is probably a better term for way consensus is reached and the groupthink around Presidential candidates is interesting.

People working in politics in Chicago seldom get out right statements about who is good to support, instead leaving little clues about who is favored. So one might say that he is going to an Edwards fundraiser and receive a non-committal nod, sorta like that is interesting. Or one might mention Gephardt and get an approving nod.

And, of course, there are no shortage of rumors who the Machine Leaders think are the best Presidential Candidates such as Daley’s supposed affinity towards Howard Dean, while thinking that Kerry has the best shot in the general election.

Who knew, Da Mayor could write for most national publications.

Dean’s Internet Campaign

ArchPundit May 23, 2003 No Comments

Quickly becoming one of the young stories of the election cycle is Howard Dean’s effective use of the internet. Ryan Lizza covers it mentioning how a piece of his was fisked,

Anyone who writes critically about Dean can expect his copy to be chewed up by this army of zealous Dean Internet scribes. When I wrote a piece recently that contained a few paragraphs about Dean, a member of the Dean2004 blog team filed an almost 2,000-word entry slicing my article up into sections with labels such as "true," "false," "inadvertently true," and "foolish." Not content with this, the Dean blogosphere recently established a rapid-reaction team called the Dean Defense Forces (DDF)?an e-mail list of hard-core Dean supporters who swiftly push back with e-mails, letters to the editor, blog entries, and phone calls against anyone spreading anti-Dean sentiments. "When he gets attacked, we’ll respond," pledges the DDF’s organizer, Matthew Singer, a 20-year-old college student in Montana who once blogged about Dean on his own site, Left in the West.

What is interesting about this is how decentralized the system works not even using campaign resources. Two problems come to my mind, though I’m sure Trippi has thought of them. First, fisking (an unfortunate technique in the first place) isn’t likely to make its way into the larger discussion unless the refutations are made readable and accessible to the uninitiated. The rapid responses have to be done in a highly public way to matter. Given many reporters are obviously reading blogs this problem may be solved.

Second, there is a potential downside–what happens when a supporter goes bonkers? Does a campaign want to be associated with someone with difficult positions? I mean, the whole anti-evolution movement amongst wingnuts in the Republican Party doesn’t hurt them, but what about a blogger who writes stuff that doesn’t jibe with the campaign? Does it start to influence those who read it and confuse the separation of views between supporters and candidates?

I raise the issue because Dean’s blog links to me and I was thinking about it during the Santorum dustups. Dean went after Santorum for equating gay relationships with various forms of disturbing relationships including polygamy. I argue that while polygamy is almost always a problem in practice, the essential issue of religious liberty for marriage is the same as for gay marriage. Could this ultimately hurt a candidate?

I doubt it–at least this early in blogging, but I can imagine such issues becoming important in the future.

Meigs Lawsuit Thrown Out

ArchPundit May 23, 2003 No Comments

The lawsuit to stop the destruction of Meigs Field was thrown out and the restraining order was dissolved.

The judge noted Northerly Island, on which Meigs was sited, was created as parkland. It was turned into an airport in the late 1940s at the urging of Chicago newspaper publisher Merrill Meigs. The airport’s owner is the Chicago Park District.

"The original intended use of the land was as a public park," Maki said.

The judge also rejected the plaintiffs’ allegations the city violated the state’s open meetings law by making a significant public policy decision behind closed doors, and violated state law by making alternations to a runway without first getting approval from the Illinois Department of Public Transportation.

Daley deserves lots of the criticism he gets for being heavy-handed and essentially anti-democratic. In this case, he was right. This lawsuit is nothing more than an attempt to thwart public processes that have been working for nearly 10 years now.

Opponents of closing Meigs continue to sue in federal court and are seeking an emergency injunction.

Hmmmmm…any bulldozer sitings out there?