Posted on 08/29/2012 10:29:37 AM PDT by Chi-townChief
TAMPA — Here we go again with this business about Barack Obama bringing “Chicago ward politics” to the White House.
John McCain pushed that notion to no effect four years ago, and one of my counterparts has never let up.
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie has now adopted it as part of his standup shtick, as if the Garden State was some sort of oasis of ethical government, though thankfully he dropped the theme from Tuesday’s keynote attack-dog speech.
It’s an easy hit. Our city’s politics are dirty, undeniably so. Obama emerged from our political system, therefore, Obama must be dirty.
May I just point out that you can’t even get elected mayor of Chicago any more on the basis of ward politics, not to mention U.S. senator, let alone president of the United States.
On the television over my shoulder here in the press center at the Republican National Convention, I just heard one of the speakers decrying the “Obama apologists in the mainstream media.”
I hate to rise to the bait, proud member of the “liberal news media” that I am, if only to avoid being too predictable.
The economy stinks. Obama has had four years to take a crack at it. If you want to try somebody else at the helm, I get it.
I even understand why Republicans are all worked up about the “you didn’t build that” business, a most unfortunate choice of words, even if they’re being taken out of context. In truth, the context doesn’t entirely repair the damage.
But I still can’t sit back while others pretend that Barack Obama is just another ward hack who miraculously rose above his station — or that he’s “Daley’s boy.”
When this emerged as a campaign theme four years ago, here’s what I wrote:
“We have lots of prominent politicians in Illinois who were ‘born of the corrupt Chicago political machine,’ as the new John McCain campaign commercial so ominously puts it.
“Some have the DNA to prove it. Others worked their way up through the patronage ranks.
“Barack Obama isn’t one of them.”
I stand by that.
I stand by that — not having forgotten that Obama’s first two White House chiefs of staff were Rahm Emanuel (who, yes, first got elected to Congress with some help from Don Tomczak’s troops, but hardly owed the election to them) and Bill Daley, brother to former Chicago Mayor Rich Daley (who dismantled the traditional ward political apparatus because it only got in his way.) In the most important election of Obama’s life, the Democratic primary for the U.S. Senate, the mayor was on the sidelines.
Nor have I forgotten Obama’s strange real estate deal with the now-convicted Tony Rezko, his first big campaign donor. I’m still troubled by their friendship, and still waiting for the day we hear the whole story.
I’ve never tried to tell anybody that Obama was a reformer. He was no crusader in the state Legislature, although nobody ever mistook him for just another hack either. It’s obvious he was always trying foremost to protect his options for pursuing higher office.
The story of Barack Obama is that of a politician who figured out he didn’t have to wait his turn, who didn’t have to pay his dues, who could take on the Machine boys and beat them at their own game — with the help of a shrewd campaign strategist and image-maker to sell him on television.
In Obama’s case, the image fit. He was somebody new, somebody different. He represented change, despite the fact that he hasn’t been able to achieve the changes he promised.
It may well be that American voters will soon be sending Barack Obama back to us. None of them should do so while laboring under the impression that he will find a new home with the Cook County Democratic Central Committee.
CHICAGOLAND PING (my list is probably a little old)
Looks like Team Obama is very busy creating fake bloggers and posts. I hope that many of the young voters won’t fall for that fake crap again.
Since the electorate has become increasingly suburban over the past 60 years, the term “ward hack” probably does not carry the weight it once did.
Obama was the protege of Emil Jones, Jr., the king of patronage in the Illinois Senate.
And the author downplays the influence of Rezko, Emanuel, and the Daleys - anyone who knows anything about Chicago politics (and Illinois politics for that matter) knows that the worse of the corruption is either built into the system (often as old-fashioned patronage) or insulated by various level of “cutouts” who end up taking the fall if any illegal practices get exposed.
Thick as thieves is as apt a description of Obama and the Chicago machine as any, aided by the fact that Obama operated best as a figurehead, silently going along with all these slime even while keeping his reputation as much above them as he could.
Whether it was Wright, Ayers, Davis, Rezko, or Blagojevich, the story is always the same - he barely knew them, and he certainly was never influenced by them. It’s just a coincidence that in his Chicago days he was consistently in contact with the worst of the political trash in the city.
Oh...and what about that big bux feather bed phony job that MIcheel was given...hmmm?
That's true. If he loses he will be marked lousy, and will be exceptionally high profile. If I were a Chicago gangster, I wouldn't want him in my crew either.
If he loses, I guess giving speeches will be the only way for Obama to make a living. I'm sure he'll be able to pack in audiences, once he has no powered. Not an empty seat in the house, I wager.
Then again, he could always write another book, deliberately revealing damaging sensitive U.S. information to the world.
Speaking of Axelgrease, did anyone mention “Herman Cain”?
Way to go, Grease Boy. Sayyy.... wasn't it the Sun-Times that published that carrion?
It was the Chiago Tribune that filed suit with the California judiciary to release senatorial candidate Jack Ryan’s divorce papers.
And it was the actual release of those files that tanked Ryan’s candidacy and gave the Seante seat to Obama.
Oh, and by the way, David Axelrod worked for the Trib for eight years before becoming Obama’s handler. But that’s just another coincidence, of course.
IIRC , both Valleri and Mooch worked for Daley .
Tony Rezko.
Tony Rezko.
Tony Rezko.
Tony Rezko.
What a bunch of crap.
FMCDH(BITS)
I wouldn’t exactly call that damage control. He seems to agree with most of us.
Yeah, not NOW he won’t be embraced in the Chicago Dem circles, but only because he has made them look so bad, and his usefulness has been exhausted - the guy’s a HAS-BEEN and he hasn’t even left office yet.
As for “ward politics”, that would only be true if he wasn’t already above all of that due to his connections with Ayers, Wright, Jackson, Rezko, etc... etc...
To try to pretend there is nothing strange going on in regards to Obama and his connections with Chicago is to ignore MANY of the serious problems in this campaign — one of them hardly ANYONE has touched on would be the deal with the Sinaloa Cartel, and the gangs on the South and West Sides. There is a reason that the gang wars have picked up with Emmanuel at the helm and the changes he has made to the way police respond.
This idiot must not pay much attention to reality in Chicago, or he’s getting a handsome paycheck from the Obama campaign.
I didn’t realize Axelrod worked at the Trib. Thanks for mentioning that. Whatever happened to the Tribune being the more “conservative” paper - was I mistaken back when I grew up and lived there, or has it changed that much??? I always thought it was the Sun-Times that was the more “liberal” paper in Chicago.
In the case Jack Ryan, Obama’s general elecgtion opponent (for a couple months), the repeated mis-statement of fact does not make it so. It was an alleged conservative Republican campaign consultant who spread the Jack Ryan scandal. That campaign consultant had told me he does nothing unless he is paid to do it. So who paid him? Axelrod? I doubt it. Only if you can show that the grand conspiracy went from Axelrod through Kjellander/Cellini can you link Jack Ryan’s problems to Obama.
On the way up, Obama’s machine mentor was State Senate President Cecil Partee. Obama was willing to provide a popularity path for the machine that did not go through JJ. The machine needed that. Obama’s ACORN type alliances were rivals of PUSH with a lot of bad blood that still exists between them. Axelrod was smart. He saw the potential in Obama and carefully crafted Obama.
For example, go back and get the WLS tape of St Sen Obama on Tom Roeser’s Sunday night fastest hour in radio which was about pre-911 as I recall it, long before his 2004 speech at the DNC. The way Obama talked with Tom Roeser was clearly an attempt to craft an image, the same image that Kirk Dillard furthered with his ad for Obama.
Politics has strange bedfellows.
The Tribune was decidedly conservative in the ‘60’s before I moved away from the city; when I moved back several decades later, it had drifted markedly to the left (I believe it was in the ‘80’s that Axelrod worked as one of their editors).
I cancelled my subscription right after Obama’s election - the paper was clearly in the tank for him, while all but ignoring most of the Democrat corruption under Blagojevich until the smell had gotten so bad it began to attract the feds.
The political correctness at the paper today is so bad they seldom mention many of the worst cases of random violence in the Loop, North Michigan Ave and Gold Coast areas, and if they do, they usually carefully avoid saying anything about the race of the perps in those incidents (which are becoming more and more numerous).
Axelgrease is good, but I prefer Assholerod. It’s kinda like a butt plug, only bigger.
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