On the Way to Work This Morning 2/3/15

In Chicago, snowstorms and politics intertwine, especially just a few weeks ahead of an election.

It's been that way at least since 1979, when a blizzard slammed the city and the city, in response, did a truly terrible job of clearing the main streets. And the side streets? Unless you had cross-country skis or a snowmobile, you weren't going anywhere.

Three weeks later, Chicago held its primary for mayor. In what was then a substantial shock, the incumbent, Michael Bilandic--a former alderman who'd been selected by the city council to fill out the remainder of the term of Richard J. Daley, who died of a heart attack just before Christmas in 1976--was handily defeated by Jane Byrne, a relative newcomer who used the city's incompetent response to the blizzard against Bilandic. (Her campaign commercial, shot outdoors while a light flurry fell in the background, was wonderfully subtle--and effective.)

The city's response this time around was better: The mains stayed relatively clear throughout the storm, which finally wound down in the wee hours of Monday morning. Side streets, however, remained a mess--and, in some cases, impassible--well into Monday evening.

Will some voters blame the current mayor, Rahm Emanuel, for this? Sure will. Then again, he's not all that popular in Chicago for a host of other reasons, most especially for the closure of 50 public schools, most located on the south and west sides (which, by coincidence, are predominantly African-Ameican) and for his outright hostility to unions, some of which endorsed him for re-election (go figure).

But on a purely physical level, the storm has an effect on the primary, if only because candidate signage (such as the sign pictured above for 33rd Ward aldermanic candidate Tim Meegan) has been covered in several feet of snow.

On the Way to Work This Morning 11/4/14

While Watching TV Last Night...

He looks rather pleased with the election results. The Neptunian behind him, however, had no comment.

On the Way to Work This Morning

I voted. Did you?

Every Picture Tells a Story 11/6/12

So go vote, already.

City Hall

I may be suitably appalled at the shenanigans that take place in this building on any given day, but there's no denying that the building itself is a honey.

Sharks in the Water

News trucks line Sunnyside Avenue, their antennas and dishes all tuned to transmit glimpses of newly convicted former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich. Or maybe his wife. Or their children. Even a family pet would do.

Election Day

I voted today. Did you? If not, then I don't want you complaining about the machinations in Washington. Or the shenanigans in Springfield. Or any damn thing relating to politics. You want the right to bitch? Then don't give up your right to vote. You don't like the way things are? Do something to try and change things. Your vote matters, no matter whom you vote for, no matter whether you're motivated by the economy or social issues or the relative quality of the candidates. Your vote matters. Get out there and cast it.

GQ Q&A with AMC (with a question from yours truly!)

The wickedly smart and devastatingly cute Ana Marie Cox answers questions submitted via GQ's website and Twitter regarding the upcoming midterm elections--including one from me! (The whole piece is worth watching, but my question comes up around the 3:16 mark.) You can view the Q&A here.

"Change We Can Believe..." Hey...Wait...

Yesterday was the one-year anniversary of Barack Obama's inauguration as the 44th President of the United States. Last night, as I sat in La Casa del Terror, Olivia curled up at my side, the remnants of a tasty Italian sausage dinner scattered across my plate, I pondered all the changes that have happened over the past year.

Like the closing of the Guantanamo Bay prison camp...no, wait. Gitmo is still open.

And our exit from both of the wars started by the previous administration...except we not only still have troops in Iraq and Afganistan, we're sending even more.

And the end of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell"...but the gays and lesbians who want to fight for their country still have to stay in the closet or be thrown out of the military.

Ot the end to partisan bickering in Washington...er, that's pretty much worse than ever, really. Democrats spent so much time and energy bickering amongst themselves and trying to appease the more conservative members of their party that health care reform stalled, even when they (briefly) had a fillibuster-proof majority in the Senate. And Republicans? If Democrats say "Day," Republicans say "Night"--opposing merely for the sake of opposition.

And...oh, why go on? Little has changed in the intervening 365 days. Much promised. Little delivered. Same old same old.

If we'd elected John McCain, we'd have gotten roughly the same results.

The Least Surprising News Stories of 2010 (So Far)

1. Sarah Palin goes to work for Fox News.

2. Mark McGwire admits that he used steroids.

3. "Jersey Shore" cast member gets in fistfight with (fill in the blank).

4. Mariah Carey says something really, really incoherent.

5. Rod Blagojevich says something really, really stupid.

6. "Jay Leno Show" a colossal flop.

7. Sun rises in east, sets in west.

Political Miscellania

A Taxing Issue (update): The Cook County Board of Commissioners once again failed to overturn the odious, economically crippling 1% sales tax pushed through by County Board President Todd Stroger. This time, the effort to override Stroger's veto of the rollback was defeated because one commissioner, Deborah Sims, who had voted in favor of the repeal the last time it came up, changed her vote at the last minute. (Bet her constituents just love that.) I just hope the voters of Cook County remember all this--how Stroger and his enablers raised our taxes while not making necessary cuts in our bloated county government. They are stealing from us. The voters need to stop helping them do so.

Oprah-Sized Traffic Jam: On behalf of the many people (including several coworkers) who will be inconvenienced by the massive traffic entanglement to be caused by the taping of the season premiere of The Oprah Winfrey Show, for which the city is closing several blocks of the ordinarily very busy Michigan Avenue for two days, I'd like to thank Oprah for not caring how much she inconveniences the average people just trying to get their hourly wage. (Couldn't you have just had your premiere in a park? Or a theater? Or on the South or West Sides, which could badly use some attention from someone, anyone?) I'd also like to thank Mayor Richard M. Daley for telling everyone what a great idea he thinks this is, how he wishes we could do stuff like this more often and how he's sure the people understand why this is necessary. Uh huh.

Olympics Decision Day: Speaking of our mayor, he can't be too thrilled with the latest poll results regarding his bid for the 2016 Summer Olympics, which will be approved or denied in a matter of weeks. According to the latest Chicago Tribune poll, respondents were nearly evenly split on whether they wanted the Olympics here or not--hardly a ringing civic endorsement for the idea--and they clearly don't want taxpayers to foot the bill for it (by an 80-20 margin). We don't have the money. We don't have the transportation. We don't have the infrastructure. Recent city endeavors, like Millennium Park (which is beautiful, but ran four years and hundreds of millions of dollars over what it should have) and the massively screwed-up parking meter lease deal. So, naturally, the mayor thinks it's a GREAT idea! (And we keep re-electing this guy why, exactly?)

A Taxing Issue: Update

Please remember these names: William Beavers. Jerry Butler. Joseph Mario Moreno. Deborah Sims. Earlean Collins. Robert Steele.

There are the Cook County Commissioners who either voted against overriding Country Board President Todd Stroger's veto of the repeal of the 1% increase in the county sales tax--a repeal voted for by 12 out of the 15 County Commissioners present at the previous board meeting--or who merely voted "present." (If you're not going to vote on a highly controversial matter such as this, why bother showing up at all? Stay home. Do some yard work. Go grocery shopping. Any of these would be more useful than voting "present.")

By upholding President Stroger's veto, these six commissioners have voted to uphold the wasteful, bloated government Stroger has presided since being elected in 2006--a government Stroger promised to trim of waste and bloat during his election campaign, but has refused to touch in any meaningful way since, instead hiring relatives and friends for high-paying county jobs at a time when increasing numbers of his constituents are out of work.

They have voted to uphold the economic burden this tax places on their communities, many of which are poor and lack the resources (transportation to other counties/states or Internet access) to work around this odious tax.

They have voted in favor of fiscal and political irresponsibility of the highest (or lowest, depending on your perspective) order.

They have voted to keep stealing dollars from their constituents, making sizable piles out of said dollars and burning them as often as please without even a hint of consequence or responsibility.

Look at those names again: William Beavers. Jerry Butler. Joseph Mario Moreno. Deborah Sims. Earlean Collins. Robert Steele.

Remember them. And, when they come up for re-election next year? If you should happen to live in a district represented by one of these "public servants," please engage in an act of genuine public service and vote them out of office.

If they won't act responsibly, we, the voters of Cook County, must act responsibly in their stead.

The Comedy Stylings of Richard M. Daley

At a news conference today, Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley was asked why he was not actively supporting the efforts of Illinois state legislators to pass stronger ethics legislation in the wake of the inditement of now-former Governor Rod Blagojevich.

This was Daley's response:

We've done everything here. We're leading the way with our inspector general, office of compliance, all the things we've done. We're more transparent than any other government. Look at it. We're doing a tremendous job here, we lead by example.

He was being funny, right?

It's not remotely possible that Richard M. Daley--the chief executive in charge of a city administration that had yielded numerous corruption convictions and insider deals--could have made the statement above with a straight face. He must have giggled when he said it. Or smirked, at least.

I mean, he couldn't possibly have meant for us to take him seriously...right?

A Taxing Issue

Last year, the county I live in, at the urging of its board president, Todd Stroger, raised its sales tax so much that Chicago now has the highest sales tax in the whole friggin' country. This lead me, like many other Cook County residents to do even more of their shopping online or out of state.

Last week, the county board voted overwhelmingly (12-3) to repeal the tax increase. At first, Stroger said he would veto the repeal, then, when public sentiment appeared to be overwhelmingly in favor of the repeal, seemed to waffle on the point.

Today, Todd Stroger announced that he would indeed veto the repeal of the sales tax.

Today, Todd Stroger's reelection chances went from "slim" to "none."

One Question

There are several questions I could ask of the conservative Americans who turned out to protest on Income Tax Day, such as why you some of you thought it was cool to compare President Barack Obama to Hitler (a comparison Republicans rightly howled at when applied to George W. Bush); to continue questioning the legitimacy of Obama's presidency (still asking about his birth certificate? really?); or, most astonishingly, to openly encouraged advocates of the secession of the state of Texas from America (this from pundits who questioned the patriotism of anyone who disagreed with them).

Those questions, however, would be digressions from the one question I really do want to ask:

Where were you the last eight years, when the Bush administration took the budget surplus left to them in 2000 and turned it into a crushing debt by 2008? Your voices should have been heard then, too.

Paving the Way

On my walk to work from the train station every morning, I spend much of my time with my head down. It's not because of the harsh winds blowing off of Lake Michigan, nor because the daily trudge to the job is particularly depressing, though both of those can be contributing factors on any given day.

No. My head is down because I have to watch out for potholes as I cross the downtown streets, lest I land in one and sprain or even break an ankle.

I wish I were engaging in hyperbole, but I'm not. Even the crosswalks a block away from City Hall are so pitted and rough that removing the asphalt entirely would make it easier and safer to get around. And if that's how bad the streets in the Loop are, just imagine what it's like out in the neighborhoods, especially the poorer neighborhoods on the west and south sides--areas that, by sheer coincidence, I'm sure, happen to have the city's greatest concentrations of people of color, most especially African-Americans.

But you don't have to imagine it, do you? You've walked or driven the streets and alleys. You know how bad it is out there.

The City of Chicago knows how bad it is too, but they've said that there's not much they can do about it. This past winter was unusually harsh, opening up potholes faster than the city can fill them, and with the economy being as bad as it is, they couldn't afford to fill them anyway.

Why, then, after saying the city doesn't have the scratch to repair and repave roads, is the city repaving the streets surrounding Washington Park on the city's south side?

Because that's where Mayor Richard M. Daley wants to hold the Olympics in 2016, and a team from the International Olympic Committee just happens to be visiting the site in April.

It doesn't matter that, of all of the people I've talked to about the possibility of having the 2016 Olympics in Chicago, not one of them is enthusiastic about the prospect--most, if fact, can't stand the idea. Too much additional traffic (both public and automotive) in a city that can't seem to handle the traffic it has now, not to mention the elevated security threats the city would face.

It doesn't matter that Mayor Daley and his lieutenants have pledged over and over again that the taxpaying public won't get stuck with the bill for the Olympics, that most of the costs for building the facilities and upgrading city services like public transportation will be taken care of by combination of federal grants and private donations.

It doesn't matter that there are many, many more stretches of road in this city that are used by the people who live and die and work and spend here every day of the year that are in far worse shape.

It doesn't matter that there are far more pressing concerns in Chicago, like the expanding tax rates for just about everything, contracting salaries and job market, and skyrocketing number of children being gunned down on those same pothole-pocked avenues and boulevards.

All that matters is that company's a'comin', and Mayor Daley wants to spruce up the joint--at taxpayer expense.

Your needs? Your opinion? Don't matter a damn.

Sometimes, Endorsements Have the Opposite Effect

The election of Barack Obama as President of the United States has caused seismic rumblings through the political landscape of his home state, Illinois.

It's difficult to blame him directly, though. It's not his fault that, because his election opened up his senate seat, the governor of our fair state, Rod Blagojevich, wound up allegedly saying stuff that sounded an awful lot like he was auctioning the seat off to the highest bidder.

There's also there's Blagojevich's appointed replacement for Obama's senate seat, Roland Burris, who apparently (if the published transcripts of his testimony before the Illinois House Impeachment Committee are to be believed) was far less than forthcoming when it comes to which members of Blagojevich's circle of influence he spoke to before he was offered said seat. (A lie of omission is nonetheless a lie, Senator Burris.)

Then there's the open seat in the Fifth Congressional district of Illinois--the one most recently occupied by Rahm Emanuel, the man Obama chose to be his Chief of Staff. The special election to replace Emanuel is set for March 3--less than two weeks away--and has turned into a full-on rugby scrum, with more than 20 candidates vying for the seat.

These days, my mailbox is full to overflowing with junk mail from many of the candidates, but most of it has come from two in particular: Cook County Board member Mike Quigley, and State Representative John Fritchey. Quigley has a reputation as an independent thinker and, in the promotional materials, says he's been called "the greenest politician in Illinois." (Why, then, are you killing so many trees to send me advertisements, Mike?) Fritchey has more of a "Regular Chicago Democrat" rep--inoffensive at most.

One piece of Fritchey's junk mail particularly caught my eye--the one prominently displaying the endorsement of Fritchey by Chicago Alderman Richard "Dick" Mell.

You may have heard of Dick Mell. He's been an alderman in Chicago for quite some time--he was first elected in 1975--and is pretty powerful. He's got a solid political base and an army of foot soldiers to throw at any election. No doubt he'll be flinging them into this fray.

He's also known for promoting the political careers of those around him. Like, for example, his son-in-law, whom Mell pushed first for State Representative, then for the U.S. House of Representatives, then the governor's office.

You may have heard of Mell's son-in-law--Rod Blagojevich.

You may also have heard of Mell's daughter, Patti Blagojevich, who is also under investigation.

You may also have heard of Mell's other daughter, Deb Mell, who was recently elected as a State representative--and was the sole State Representative to vote against impeaching her brother-in-law, Rod Blagojevich.

Now Mell is proudly endorsing John Fritchey, and Fritchey is proudly enbracing that endorsement.

Mr. Quigley? You have my vote, sir.

At This Moment...

Most of the employees in my workplace are clustered around a large-screen TV in the break room--the first time I've seen such a gathering since 9/11. Just tells you how momentous most people feel this day is.

Inauguration Day

It's cold in Chicago today--not bitter and brutal like it was last week, when we stayed under zero from Wednesday night to Friday morning, but the temperature is in the teens and lake-effect flurries are scything their way across the shoreline communities.

I don't think anyone here has taken much notice of the cold, though. Our eyes are turned east. To Washington, D.C. To the inauguration. To Barack Obama.

It's not just that Obama is a Chicagoan, though there's certainly a great deal of pride in that. And it's not just that he is the first African-American elected to the highest office in our land, though that is a momentous achievement long overdue in "the land of the free and the home of the brave." And it's not just that he represents change from the previous administration--one could argue that any change from George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, even the tag team of McCain/Palin, would represent progress.

It's more than that. It's about hope.

Hope that the economy steadies out. Hope that our men and women in the armed services can be moved out of harm's way sooner rather than later. Hope that America's international reputation can be repaired. Hope that the next four years will be better than the last eight.

This is a day of jubilation for many Americans, and rightly so, though I wish our government and the Obama team weren't dropping so much cash on the inaugural balls and hoohah at a time when millions find themselves out of work or, if employed, living from paycheck to paycheck. This is still a great day.

There's a lot of work to do, though--a lot of messes to be cleaned up from the previous tenant of the White House. Few presidents have come into office with more problems to solve, challenges to face, uncertainty to dissipate. President Obama looks ready to roll up his sleeves and get to it. Let's help him as much as we can. Whatever your political affiliation--liberal, conservative or middle of the pothole-pocked road--it's in your best interest, as Americans, for this president to succeed. We have to hope he does (and hold him accountable in the next election if he doesn't--if "change" translates to "more of the same partisan bitching that's clogged our governmental arteries for the past couple of decades").

But there's that word again--hope. In times like these, it's just about all we've got.