CHICAGO’S DAY FOR THE JACKIE ROBINSON WEST LITTLE LEAGUE: HAVE THE POLS ANY SHAME?

8/27/14

Today was a glorious day in Chicago, the day when my home town honored the U.S. Little League champion Jackie Robinson West kids with a parade and other festivities.  The parade kicked off at Jackie Robinson Park on 105^th and Morgan and proceeded north on Halsted Street, passed Comiskey Park (er, sorry, U.S. Cellular Field), turned east on 35^th to Indiana and eventually made its way over to Michigan Avenue and Millennium Park.   It was supposed to be a glorious day and, for the most part it has been, except…

At the kickoff of the parade, at 105^th and Morgan, an observer, casual or otherwise, could not be faulted for wondering who was being honored by the event.   The kids made a cameo appearance, as did their parents.  But who was there, front and center, seizing the limelight?    This is Chicago, Illinois, so you know the answer…the politicians.

There they were, a cast of blowhards that is drawn to such events like hungry dogs to prime steak…Governor Pat Quinn, Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Attorney General Lisa Madigan, County Board President Toni Preckwinkle, Congressperson Robin Kelly, Alderman Carrie Austin, et. al…the usual suspects, turning what should have been a great day honoring some great kids into yet another occasion for self-aggrandizement.

Have these people no shame?  

They have spent our state and our city into bankruptcy.  They have made careers of shaking down the (admittedly, in many instances, not all that uncooperative or put upon) private sector for their nefarious ends.  They have been largely responsible for our city and state having become less and less livable.  They have ruined what was perhaps one of our nation’s greatest states, which combined the bustling, vital, and exciting city of Chicago with a downstate that serves as a vital component of the nation’s breadbasket and an exemplar of the type of small town values that made this country what it once was.  They have stolen and pillaged everything that wasn’t, and much of what was, nailed down. And now they have stolen the well earned limelight the citizens of our great city would like to have cast on a much deserving crew of magnificent kids.

How can one describe these poltroonish politicasters?   They are popinjays, professional narcissists, barnacles on the ship of state.   They are empty suits, carnival barkers, entitled, whimpering no-accounts.   Shameless leaches.   Self centered snakes and scalawags.  Benighted bindlestiffs on an endless, undying quest for the next microphone and/or camera.  Bleating, bumptious boors.  Contemptuous caitiffs.  Jejune jackasses.

Seizing the glimmer of glory granted to a group of great kids, not being able to envision anybody but themselves and their fellow professional narcissists getting any glory…is there any depth to which these despicable human beings will not sink?

See my two books, The Chairman, A Novel of Big City Politics and The Chairman’s Challenge, A Continuing Novel of Big City Politics, for further illumination on how things work in Chicago and Illinois politics.