After the last one and one-half weeks, I need the weekend off so I’m out of here.
For those here over the weekend talk amongst yourselves, but play nicely. Next week, with the campaign back to normal levels I’ll cover the Rosemont Casino debacle and the budget. In addition, as some have already started to do in comments, we’ll be talking about the positions Obama and Ryan have taken. I’m especially befuddled by a few Ryan has taken (duh-I’m a Democrat).
Unless a dead prostitute or some arms smuggling comes to light, I think its pretty clear there is no way Ryan–or Jack! to use the local nomenclature–can win this. Where the hell does this guy think he’s running? Enhance Bush’s tax cuts? That is going to be his campaign killer right there. Moderates could swallow the pro-the-war, yay PATRIOT Act stuff, but not “Bush was right about the economy, despite your net loss of over 200,000 jobs, Illinois!” stuff. No way. His hard-line pro-life positions aren’t exactly enhancing his resume, either. The one tiny hope this joker has is his opposition to the death penalty. But that isn’t really a one-issue voter thing. However, the fact that this administration has stomped on the gas against Roe V. Wade will worry lots and lots of people and they’d vote and organize with George Ryan to keep this guy out of the Senate.
He’s charismatic, sure, but in a dopey, awww shucks kind of way; our nominee is charismatic in a racantuer you talk to at a university soiree kind of way, and in a senate race that is much more appealing. Not to mention he can talk without myriad facial tics.
Some “experts,” including Roeser at the S-T, have said that the going will be rougher than expected for our nominee because he is “too liberal.” He can always shift the message to make that secondary or tertiary to his campaign message: Not so for Jack!: Permanent tax cuts, overturn Roe v. Wade, nothing same-sex ever (the guy is practically opposed to two gay guys registering at a Pottery Barn) and his adoration for school vouchers will sink his candidacy early and keep him far, far behind forever until there is no end.
Our nominee will keep saying: “Bush has failed us,” which will force Jack! to say: “I think Bush has done a great job.” And that’ll be poison on voters’ ears. Isn’t it practically a done deal?
I’m thinking Ryan’s hard line on choice is going to tank him with women, including the Republican ladies of the collar counties. Any good will his time as a teacher might buy him with be cancelled out.
..that’s WILL be cancelled out.
Hastert didn’t endorse him in the primary. That doesn’t bode well. He went with the candidates he could safely control. The outgoing Senator wouldn’t play nice and help the Speaker and the Mayor pork out on O’Hare. I think after Fitzgerald self-funded makes both of them nervous. Self-funded means not having to serve the special/monied interests. For a Senator from Illinois that is corporate agriculture and Chicago metro public works projects.
Hastert has committed to oodles of money for O’Hare: the ring toll road, Elgin-O’Hare expressway, Metra and CTA lines plus the western terminal/parking. For all they know Jack! might get the same goo-goo bug that got up Fitzgeralds butt. On the other hand Barack Obama voted Y on this doozy:
HB0721
Deletes everything after the enacting clause. Creates the O’Hare Modernization Act. Contains provisions concerning acquisition of property, condemnation, reimbursement for tax base loss, minority and women-owned businesses and workers, and jurisdiction over airport property. Preempts home rule powers. Amends the Archeological and Paleontological Resources Protection Act, the Human Skeletal Remains Protection Act, the Illinois Municipal Code, the Downstate Forest Preserve District Act, the Illinois Aeronautics Act, the Vital Records Act, and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act to provide that certain provisions of those Acts do not limit the authority of a municipality under the O’Hare Modernization Act. Requires the Department of Transportation to monitor the O’Hare Modernization Program and to report to the General Assembly. Amends the Code of Civil Procedure concerning the venue of certain actions and granting quick-take powers. Makes other changes. Effective immediately.
Hey Dead Mayor, thanks for that bill number I’ve been looking for it.
I think the continuing debate by big-wigs of both parties about the ryan divorce issue points even further to my theories about the issue in general and about Daley’s comments in particular. To review, this is what I am arguing:
1) The release of the divorce records can only be bad news for democrats (not devistating mind you but bad) because one of two possibilities can emerge:
a) There is nothing, in which case Ryan is described as an unfortunate victim in the media and the democrats look bad even though it was a republican attack that brought it about (the press has a shorter memory than the public)
b) It is bad which, given what we already know about the accusations, would almost certainly mean Ryan bows out to save the Gopers an extremely embarassing loss probably effecting lesser races as well as this one. Ryan bowing out would lead the GOP to hand the nomination to a MUCH stronger candidate (see below) I think Obama would still win but it would be a real race.
2) Because the release is bad, not releasing it leaves the issue unresolved which leaves Ryan extremely damaged but still kicking which helps the dems. In this light, daley is protecting his democratic nominee by insisting the records remain close – and by extension continuing to bring up the whole mess by taking this “moral high ground”
Now the latest news – who has been calling for ryan to come clean – Jim Edgar and Judy Baar-Topinka. Who would probably be on the short list to be handed the republican nom. if Ryan bows out? I think the smart money would have to be on Jim Edgar or Judy Baar-Topinka. Neither lost to ryan so they dont have that second choice feel and they both are large vote getters. I know edgar didn’t want it before but he is missing a HUGE part of the crap that candidates have to go through by missing the primary race. For the candidates of both parties the hard part is really over right now.
Anyway I have gone on too long.
Glenn– Not a bad analysis, in my humble opinion. Edgar would probably be a pretty good candidate for the GOP–he is smart, he is charismatic and people (for some inexplicable reason) like him. Perhaps his committment to the GOP is such that he would be willing to be the sacrifical lamb (or as Assyrians say, rub his horns on the butcher’s ax) in this race to save face. But Baar-Topinka would probably be loathe to enter the race, a whole new headache, and deal with an enormous media storm as well as have to start fundraising from scratch. Then again a candidate like Judy would probably attract help and attention from the RNC.
In any case, I don’t think any GOPer has any chance, really. Why go through the ordeal?
I don’t know that Ryan would play ball. That was the critique a lot of party GOPers had of him: that he was kind of a dopey idealist who had no idea how to play ball in Illinois. “William Ogden’s” critique of him is right on: that Republicans don’t trust him, and there’s a reason for that–he doesn’t need them. If those records have to be bilaterally unsealed, Ryan would probably be willing to keep them sealed and plug along in a failing effort.
What a confusing, hilarious mess for the GOP.
The Fitzgerald Lesson: When a candidate is self-funded, you don’t have to raise money for him/her, but you have no control over him/her.
I think Edgar and Baar-Topinka would be glad to see this on play out and send a message to those that would buy a Senate seat that the party prefers loyal members that have worked their way up through the system.
The top of the ticket is going to be an albatross as well. Dubyas undercount in ratio to Republican ballots pulled was 10,000 each in Kane and DuPage, 17,000 in suburban Cook, 5000 in Chicago, 6000 in Lake and 3000 in McHenry. This explains why the RNC wrote the state off after the primary.
Jack! is going to have spend a ton of money and pull an inside straight to win.
“Who would probably be on the short list to be handed the republican nom. if Ryan bows out? I think the smart money would have to be on Jim Edgar or Judy Baar-Topinka. Neither lost to ryan so they dont have that second choice feel and they both are large vote getters. I know edgar didn’t want it before but he is missing a HUGE part of the crap that candidates have to go through by missing the primary race.”
I think that this is true, but don’t forget about Edgar’s relationship with Hollinger Int’l and its multiple lawsuits over possible negligence on the part of the board of directors.
Edgar can’t be certain where that particular investigation will lead, or when it will pop back onto the Tribune’s front page (it will be on the third page of the Sun-Times’ business section). He can be certain that if he ran for the Senate, his role in the board’s possible misdeeds would be central to any subsequent stories about Hollinger.
AM
A JBT run would not go over well inside the party. The “Lincoln County” types don’t like the West Cook contingent. For some reason they think they’re mobbed up and/or Democrat moles.
JBT ally Anthony Peraica is going after Maureen Murphy for The Cook County Republican chair. Not exactly showing party unity with a general election up ahead.
And since judy is a pro-choice pro-gay rights republican from cicero – the odd are she is BOTH mobbed up and a democratic mole 🙂