Free Republic

Well, this is disappointing news. The Washington Post reported Thursday that “the national Democratic Party has said it will support Biden’s reelection, and it has no plans to sponsor primary debates.” It’s understandable: the Dems have a president, of sorts, and so they’re counting on the power of incumbency to help their superannuated kleptocrat get over the top again. However, it’s also immensely disappointing, because after years and years of Democratic presidential debates being dreary displays of candidates trying to out-socialist one another, 2024 Democratic primary debates would have actually had something to offer. Biden has two challengers, Robert F....

Most of you know her as Nancy Pelosi. When I first met my one-time neighbor, she was daughter to one Mayor of Baltimore, Tommy D’Alesandro, Jr., and sister to Tommy, III, who’d later become Mayor. Some of the stories about her, as she prepares to become Speaker of the House, have mentioned her past, but not honestly. At most, the glowing stories refer to the Baltimore City politics she grew up in as “rough and tumble.” Politics there and then were much more than rough and tumble. They were crooked as a dog’s hind leg. I know. I grew up...

For decades, Illinois House speaker Michael Madigan dominated the state’s political system, corrupting it to his own ends. What should we make of his ouster? The Chicago machine turned out some of the most notorious names in American public corruption, including Anton Cermak, Richard J. Daley, and Ed Kelly. The machine also turned out Mike Madigan, who ruled over Illinois politics for 50 years, 36 of which he spent calling the shots as House speaker. Most people thought Madigan would only leave office in handcuffs or a casket. Most people were wrong. For the first time since 1970, “the Velvet...

Bill Daley leaving the Obama administration was big news for ten minutes. But as my friend Streetwise Professor and I discussed on Twitter after the news broke, this really signals a big change in direction on how Obama will campaign. It’s going to get really ugly. How ugly? Think of the election cycle from 1796-1804. It will be that ugly. The culmination of those election cycles was a duel by Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr, with Hamilton losing his life after the gun battle.Both Hamilton and Jefferson manipulated the press of that time to scandalize the other side. Character assassination...

The only question left to answer in the Chicago mayor's race is will Rahm Emanuel surpass 50% of the vote and avoid a runoff with whoever finishes second. The major opponents in the race are hoping to force a runoff. Gery Chico, former head of the Chicago school board, greeted commuters both at stations and on trains as he rode throughout the city. City clerk Miguel del Valle rallied volunteers who were trying to get out the vote. Braun held a news conference near Emanuel's restaurant stop trying to portray herself as the true representative of working people. Emanuel has...

There has been no lack of writing about the influence of Marxist Saul Alinsky on Barack Obama's political ideology. But what appears to have escaped notice is the influence of the political culture of Chicago on Barack Obama. These influences, of course, are not the same. Alinsky was a formidable opponent of the Chicago Democratic Machine. Obama was, when necessary, a consummate machine insider. Alinsky for all his flaws would never have gotten into bed with the likes of Tony Rezko or joined a law firm that represented slum lords. If you want to understand the political agenda of Barack...

A “What If”.. Currently, our Elected Elite get to set the salaries and benefit packages of “office holders”. Those that get elected MUST draw all that salary, get all those benefits, and full pensions. What would our Elected Governments {local, State & Federal} look like IF the candidates were required to state their “salary, benefit & pension requirements” on the Ballots? It could be Expressed as percentages of the Legislated maximum packages. In Every Other non-union shop, the Salary and Benefit Demands of the qualified applicants are considered , before selecting the next New Hire. Each Candidate's demands could be...

Dan Zanoza, Executive Director of RFFM.org, interviews Carl Segvich, a Republican Committeeman in the 11th Ward--the ancestral home base of Mayor Richard M. Daley. Segvich discusses what it's like to be a member of the GOP in the city of Chicago, Chicago-style politics, the Chicago way and "pay to play". It is an insightful look into one-party, big city liberal politics which sould be an eye-opener for those wanting to learn more about President Barack Obama's political roots. Q. During the last election, it was reported there were some election irregularities in your Ward. Can you elaborate about this for...

So the Chicago Way hauled off and slapped the U.S. Senate in the face—one of those backhands with the knuckles to unsuspecting lips—and guess who blinked? It wasn't Chicago. It was the Senate. Get used to it, America. And it won't be the last time either. Roland "Tombstone" Burris, the amiable Illinois Democratic political hack who is being called eminently qualified by the national Democrats—perhaps because he's from Illinois and he hasn't been indicted—has almost reached his goal of being addressed as "Yes, sir, Senator." Now Tombstone has President-elect Barack Obama behind him, muscling Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid in...

Chicago public school bureaucrats skirted public competitive bidding rules to buy 30 cappuccino/espresso machines for $67,000, with most of the machines going unused because the schools they were ordered for had not asked for them, according to a report by the CPS Office of Inspector General. That was just one example of questionable CPS actions detailed in the inspector general's 2008 annual report. Others included high school staffers changing grades to pump up transcripts of student athletes and workers at a restricted-enrollment grade school falsifying addresses to get relatives admitted. In the case of the cappuccino machines, central office administrators...

Congressman Rahm Emanuel will resign his congressional seat on Friday in anticipation of joining President-elect Barack Obama's administration. Emanuel delivered the news in an automated call to constituents on Monday. "This is Congressman Rahm Emanuel. As you may have heard, President-elect Obama has asked me to be his new chief of staff and I have accepted this offer. Therefore, in the near future, I will be resigning from Congress. ... I also want you to know, it has been a privilege and an honor to serve as your representative for the last six years," he says in the taped call.

CHICAGO – Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich says he is not guilty of any criminal wrongdoing and plans to stay on the job. In his first official statement since his arrest on corruption charges last week, Blagojevich (blah-GOY'-Uh-vich) says he will fight until he takes his "last breath." ... The Democratic governor says he intends to "answer every allegation in a court of law."

Will the Blagojevich scandal damage the incoming Obama administration? Given Rod Blagojevich’s profane railings against Barack Obama, revealed on federal wiretaps, few observers believe — although none know for sure — that the Obama camp engaged in any pay-for-play dealings with the governor, and therefore few see any legal problems for Team Obama resulting from the criminal investigation. But that’s not the only way the incoming administration might be caught up in the Blagojevich affair. The probe is being conducted, after all, by U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, the man who prosecuted one of the most intensely investigated and politically-charged perjury-and-false-statements...

Blagojevich refuses to budge NBC Nightly News VIDEO: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032619/vp/28200681#28200681&gt1=43001

Extorting Children's Hospital is a new political low. Chicagoans and Illinoisans love political scandal the way that Milanese love opera. We trade recollections, like baseball cards, about the secretary of state (Paul Powell) who stashed money in shoeboxes, and the Chicago mayor (Harold Washington) whose birthday was April 15 but never filed his income tax return. Rod Blagojevich stands a chance to be the fourth Illinois governor in recent history, and the second in a row, to wind up in prison. This run suggests that Illinoisans are indifferent to political corruption, and it's hard to argue with such an impressive...

CHICAGO: For Jeff Makowski, a 47-year-old house painter, it had been fun lately to boast to out-of-town friends about Chicago as the home of President-elect Barack Obama. Now the phone calls are coming the other way, and they are often sarcastic. "We're a national laughingstock," said Makowski, who was drinking a beer with a work pal on Wednesday afternoon after finishing work on a North Side condominium. "They call up and say, 'What's going on in Illinois? How can you elect these people?"' Last month, Chicago erected huge banners along Michigan Avenue bearing the image of its hometown hero, Obama,...

America wanted change and we sure got it. We elected a politician who looked and sounded fresh and new and different (and don't forget "clean" as Senator Biden once remarked), and promised that magic word "change." Aren't we lucky? It appears that the change we got is that we've moved Chicago machine-style politics into the White House. We found out on Tuesday what that business model consists of- the good Governor of Illinois was arrested for allegedly trying to sell Barack Obama's United States Senate seat. Yes, I said sell Obama's seat to the highest bidder. It's nice to know...

<p>President-elect Barack Obama’s chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, refused to take questions from reporters this morning about whether he was the Obama “advisor” named in the criminal complaint against Gov. Rod Blagojevich.</p> <p>The complaint states Blagojevich wanted a promise of a high-level appointment or some other reward for Blagojevich in exchange for Blagojevich naming Obama’s friend Valerie Jarrett to replace him in the U.S. Senate.</p>

Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich wanted President-elect Barack Obama "to put something together&something big" in exchange for going along with Obama's choice to fill his vacant U.S. Senate seat, according to a FBI affidavit unsealed following the governor's stunning arrest. "I've got this thing and it's f***ing golden, and, uh, uh, I'm just not giving it up for f***in' nothing. I'm not gonna do it. And I can always use it. I can parachute me there," Blagojevich said in a phone call secretly recorded by the FBI on Nov. 5, the day after the election, according to the affidavit. Click here...

<p>A source said today that Gov. Rod Blagojevich was taken into federal custody at his North Side home this morning. The U.S. attorney's office would not confirm the information, and a spokesman for the governor did not immediately return a phone call for comment.</p>