Carol Marin is one of the more respected, if not heavily watched, news people in Chicago and she sets out the case against Carol Mosely-Braun.
Some choice graphs:
One example. Before freshmen senators go to work in Washington, there is an orientation program to help them learn the lay of the land. You skipped it. Rather than roll up your sleeves right away and show you were both symbol and substance, you hopped a flight to Nigeria and paid your respects to the dictator of the most populous country in Africa, Gen. Sani Abacha. Despite Abacha’s hideous record on human rights, including the assassination of his enemies, you remained a periodic visitor to the country and you were the lone member of the Senate and the lone member of the Congressional Black Caucus who opposed sanctions against that repressive regime.
Then there was the campaign finance mess. The Criminal Investigation Division of the Internal Revenue Service argued that you and your campaign manager and then-fiance, Kgosie Matthews, spent as much as $270,000 of campaign donations on Armani outfits, jewelry, Jeeps and vacations. Three times IRS investigators tried to impanel a grand jury. But the Justice Department did something experts say it virtually never does in this type of case. Citing "insufficient evidence," it refused to grant the IRS the subpoena power it requested in order to gather the evidence. You dismissed the whole thing as a witch hunt.
That’s all in the past, of course. So what about today? Two words: Bill Shaw. Voters only have to look at this most recent election to scratch their heads and ask, "What were you thinking?" OK, as President Bill Clinton’s ambassador to New Zealand, you’d been away for awhile. But why would you choose the Nov. 5 election to mark your re-entry to Chicago politics with radio and newspaper ads supporting Bill Shaw, of the politically notorious Shaw brothers, over Rev. James Meeks for a seat in the Illinois Senate? This is progressive politics?
Adding to this fine column, let’s not forget when she left her position in Cook County she fired the entire staff on one of the last days and replaced them with political hacks. This was gratuitous even by Chicago Standards.
And the best example of poor policy and strategy analysis was getting the Trib company a big tax break. Why a giant corporation needed it is unclear other than someone was trying to curry favor with the editorial board. But that didn’t work. The Trib blasted her for it.
She is another example of everything I hate about the Republican Party. I’ll post more on this later.