PAT QUINN VS. BILL DALEY: “THIS GUY DOESN’T THINK THIS IS A SHOW; HE THINKS IT’S A FIGHT!”

7/16/13

Now that Attorney General Lisa Madigan has opted out of the Illinois governor’s race (See today’s other post, LISA MADIGAN WON’TRUN FOR GOVERNOR:  WOULD YOU WANT THE JOB?), we are left, for now, with a one-on-one Democratic primary race featuring Governor Pat Quinn (no relation) and ex-White House Chief of Staff, ex-Commerce Secretary, ex-corporate bigshot, ex-everything Bill Daley, who also happens to be the son and brother of Chicago’s two longest serving mayors.

Mr. Daley’s chances in the upcoming primary have increased markedly, some might say infinitely (See 6/6/13’s “GOVERNOR BILL DALEY…SENATOR BILL DALEY.   THERE JUST WASN’T THE TIME…”), with Lisa Madigan’s exit, which was more or less forced by Mr. Daley’s entry into the race; again, see today’s other post.   While yours truly would certainly not argue that Bill Daley’s chances of becoming governor are a heck of lot better than they were yesterday, I would not count out Governor Quinn.  (See my 7/10/13 piece, PAT QUINN SUSPENDS  LEGISLATORS’ SALARIES:   FOUR MORE YEARS? and the posts to which it will refer you.)   Don’t misunderstand me; I am not predicting a Quinn victory.  I am simply NOT, for a number of reasons, among those who are saying the man has no chance at re-nomination or re-election.

Cousin Pat (not really, but I like saying that more of late) is the incumbent governor.  In the first quarter, he raised more money than either Bill Daley or Lisa Madigan.   Further, he is running a populist campaign that, while loaded with what some might consider silly, or irresponsible, stunts, like suspending legislative salaries, seems to be striking a chord with the typical voter.  Further, if Mr. Quinn can get the appropriate inspector general off the dime and quickly conduct a review, both of which are big “if”s, he can pull another such maneuver by firing the entire Metra board.  (See another post from yesterday, WE ARE SHOCKED…SHOCKED!...TO LEARN OF POLITICAL INFLUENCE AT METRA and the posts to which it will refer you.)   If you think the voters liked suspending legislative salaries, think how they will react to firing the legion of toadies, lackeys, hacks, has-beens, and wannabes that comprises the Metra board.   And Quinn just might to it.

Further, everyone speaks of Bill Daley’s fundraising prowess, but I wonder.  Now that his brother is no longer mayor and thus cannot deliver a near instant return on donors’ investments, is Bill Daley the “prolific fundraiser” that he is made out to be and indeed once was?   One suspects that Mr. Daley would not embark on this race unless he was confident he had the ability to raise a lot of money, so I might be wrong here, but even Mr. Daley has made miscalculations in his career.  Further, people don’t give political donations in this state, or just about anywhere, because they like the candidate or the party to whom they are giving.  They give because they expect a return on their investment, and the return here is not immediately obvious unless the donors are certain Mr. Daley will go to Springfield.  But they can’t be certain of that unless he gets a LOT of money; you can see the chicken and egg problem here.  While this problem is faced by just about all political candidates, it might be especially acute for Mr. Daley, given his background and his reputation as a “prolific fundraiser.”

One person that I have heard nothing about in regard to the governor’s race is the Mayor of Chicago, that idol of the consanguineous media, Rahm Emanuel.  Mr. Emanuel may protest publicly that he is not taking sides in the gubernatorial primary, but, c’mon, Mr. Emanuel staying on the sidelines of any political race?   And if you were Rahm Emanuel, would you want a potentially very strong Bill Daley to be governor?   Wouldn’t you prefer the weaker Pat Quinn?   Don’t try to argue that Mr. Emanuel has, or feel he owes, some sort of loyalty to the Daley family, which went a long way toward making him what he is today on a number of fronts.   Loyalty counts for little for Mr. Emanuel, unless it is to himself.  Ask the Clintons.

So suppose that Mr. Emanuel, secretly or perhaps not so secretly, puts out the word that he would rather not see Bill Daley in the governor’s office.  What will that do to Daley’s ability to raise money?

All that having been said, one can never factor out two things…the electorate’s general level of disappointment with Governor Quinn or the deal making skills of the Daley family.  On the latter, I smell what one might call a rat, or two rats, if I didn’t have some genuine admiration for what some might call underhanded political tactics.  See, for example, chapter 8 of my first book, The Chairman, A Novel of Big City Politics.  What such seemingly malodorous tactics might one be seeing in the upcoming gubernatorial primary?

As of now, the Democratic gubernatorial primary is a two person race.  However, as soon as Lisa Madigan opted out of the race, talk of two other potential candidates started.  The first is state Senator Kwame Raoul of Chicago who is a something of an up and comer among black politicians.   The other is state Senator Dave Koehler, who is from Peoria.  

Hmm…

Pat Quinn’s strongest, most loyal constituency is black voters, primarily in Chicago.   Wouldn’t it be nice for Mr. Daley if Mr. Raoul, who has been known to play political ball, were to enter the race and take at least some, and probably more, of the black vote from Mr. Quinn?

Mr. Quinn is also expected to run well downstate in the primary, not so much because the Governor is so well liked in the “other Illinois” but, rather, because the Daley name is like a pox down there.   Wouldn’t it be nice for Mr. Daley if, say, Mr. Koehler or another downstater were to run and take some of that downstate vote from Mr. Quinn?

I am starting to smell something like current ward of the federal government Rod Blagojevich’s first run for governor in 2002.   His main opponent in the primary, Paul Vallas, had great strength in the black community, largely due to the relatively good job he had done as head of the Chicago Public Schools.   A third candidate, Roland Burris, an at times amiable hack from the south side, emerged to drain Mr. Vallas’ strength in the black community and thus hand the primary to Mr. Blagojevich, who eventually repaid Mr. Burris by appointing him to Barack Obama’s U.S. senate seat when Mr. Blagojevich’s back was against the federal wall, but that is another story.  Did Alderman Dick Mell (See my 7/7/13 and 7/6/13 posts, respectively, DICK MELL USED OUR MONEY TO PAY PEOPLE TO SLEEP: “THEY’RE GONNA SAY…WHAT A GUY!”  and FAREWELL, DICK MELL…SORT OF) have anything to do with Mr. Burris’s entry into the 2002 gubernatorial primary?   Are the White Sox a lousy baseball team?

Similarly, should Mr. Raoul, Mr. Koehler, and/or someone else who is black and/or from downstate enter this race, would Mr. Daley or his minions have had anything to do with his sudden desire to be governor?   Are the Cubs a lousy baseball team?

This is going to be a far more interesting race for governor, even without Lisa Madigan, than most people think.

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. 

LISA MADIGAN IS NOT IN THE RACE, BUT THIS POST IS FAR FROM MOOT.

AS I WAS WRITING THIS, I GOT THE NEWS THAT LISA MADIGAN WILL NOT RUN FOR GOVERNOR, WHICH WOULD HAVE BEEN A SHOCK A MONTH AGO BUT ISN’T NOW.  WHILE SOME MIGHT ARGUE THAT HER ANNOUNCEMENT RENDERS THIS POST MOOT, IT MAY, INSTEAD, RENDER THE POST EVEN MORE INSIGHTFUL, SO READ THIS POST!

NOW WE HAVE A DALEY/QUINN ONE-ON-ONE AND ONE MIGHT REASONABLY SUSPECT THAT JOHN KASS, AND OTHERS, WERE RIGHT IN EARLY JUNE WHEN HE/THEY SPECULATED THAT DALEY SOMEHOW KNEW THAT LISA WAS NOT RUNNING.  WE WILL NEVER KNOW, HOWEVER, AND, AFTER ALL, SOMETIMES A CIGAR IS JUST A CIGAR.

WHY DID LISA DROP OUT, OR NOT DROP IN?  AGAIN, WE DON’T KNOW, BUT I SUSPECT THE “DADDY MADE ME (NOT) DO IT” THEORY, WHICH WILL DOMINATE THE SPECULATION, ISN’T RIGHT; READ THIS POST.

7/15/13

It’s amazing how quickly the conventional wisdom changes.   A month, or even a few weeks, ago, it was understood that Attorney Lisa Madigan was going to run for governor this year.   Now the conventional wisdom seems to be that she won’t run.   Why the change?   A number of plausible reasons have been advanced:   Bill Daley wouldn’t run unless he somehow knew that Lisa Madigan was not going to run (See my 6/6/13 post, “GOVERNOR BILLDALEY…SENATOR BILL DALEY.   THERE JUSTWASN’T THE TIME…”), Mike Madigan’s near absolute power in the state would dissuade voters from backing his daughter (See my 6/19/13 post MIKE AND LISA MADIGAN:   WHAT’S A DAD TO DO?), or that Mr. Madigan’s problems at Metra (See today’s post, WE ARE SHOCKED…SHOCKED!...TO LEARN OF POLITICAL INFLUENCE AT METRA) will make it impossible for his daughter to win.

Unlike much of the punditocracy in this state, I have no idea whether Lisa Madigan will run for governor.  If I had to bet, I would say that, yes, she’s in; she’s raised a lot of money, has made a lot of noises about running, and would look indecisive, at best, if she were to once again silence the sirens of higher office.   But I don’t know Lisa Madigan, Mike Madigan, or anybody remotely close to either of the two.   And even if I did, and they were comfortable enough to share such things with me, I would not repeat things told me in anything remotely resembling confidence; it’s who I am and the way I operate.  So my guess is maybe as good as yours regarding Ms. Madigan’s future.   But a few points are worth making.

First, the very recent revelations about Mr. Madigan’s trying to muscle Metra will have no impact on Lisa Madigan’s decision to run or, if that decision is yes, her chances at becoming our next governor.  Perhaps I am giving the voters of this state far too much credit; re-read my 6/19/13 piece in which I asked/said

 …poll participants had to be reminded that Lisa Madigan’s dad is Mike Madigan?   And these people get to vote?   Remember this the next time someone pontificates on the wonders of democracy,

but one has to assume that most voters know that Mike Madigan is Lisa Madigan’s dad and that most voters are not at all shocked (or even jarred from their figurative sleep) by news that Mr. Madigan is somehow connected to corrupt activities at Metra…or at least I hope, for the future of the state and the Republic, that we can make such an assumption.  In other words, if people were going to vote for Lisa Madigan because they have bought into the mythology surrounding her and/or they make their voting decisions based on 30 second commercials, Mr. Madigan’s machinations at Metra will make minimal, at most, difference.  There is simply nothing new here that would influence her decision or the voters’ opinions regarding her.

Second, the notion that Lisa Madigan and Deb Mell (See my 7/6/13 piece, FAREWELL, DICK MELL…SORTOF) have “daddy problems,” as the press puts it, is preposterous.  Where would either of these two young women be if it weren’t for their fathers?   Yes, they are both talented and would be doing something productive and perhaps lucrative, but Attorney General and Alderman in Waiting?   There are plenty of bright young women and men out there who would be at least as good at either job as either of these two, but never got the chance because their dads weren’t Mike Madigan and Dick Mell.  So to say that either gentleman is somehow a problem for his daughter is incredibly naïve, myopic, and short-sighted.  Again, see my 6/19/13 piece in which I said

“…let’s leave aside for a moment the near fact that if Lisa Madigan were not Mike Madigan’s daughter, she would not have served in the Illinois House and Senate, never been considered for Attorney General, and certainly not now be the governor in waiting.  Let’s instead buy blindly into the silly supposition that Ms. Madigan’s being Mr. Madigan’s daughter actually hurts her.”

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. 

DICK MELL USED OUR MONEY TO PAY PEOPLE TO SLEEP: “THEY’RE GONNA SAY…WHAT A GUY!”

7/7/13

As the reporters who normally would despise someone like retiring Alderman Dick Mell were heaping praise upon the guy as he was heading out the door (See yesterday’s already seminal post FAREWELL, DICK MELL…SORT OF.), Mr. Mell let go with this whopper when asked about the “thousand” patronage jobs he had at his disposal at the height of his power as boss of the 33^rd Ward:

“The jobs that I really thought were great ones were the bridge tender jobs.  At one time we had three people on every bridge.  I put four kids through college as bridge tenders.  I would get them on the second shift from 3 to 11, where they could do their homework.  Or 11 to 7, where they’d sleep, and they were getting electrician’s pay, and it was great.”

Could Mr. Mell, in his efforts to sound like the paterfamilias of his ward, kindly dispensing favors to the hardworking residents who only had to show their gratitude by serving the “community,” in the person of Dick Mell, be so tone deaf?   Doesn’t he realize what he was saying?

I have news for Mr. Mell.  HE did not put any kids, other than his own, through college.  The TAXPAYERS put kids through college by paying them electricians’ wages for doing the work of a bridge tender, which was, most of the time, no work at all.   Further, all those people who put in the hard work necessary to become union electricians so that they could earn the wages that go with acquiring and applying such a skill were made to feel like chumps.  If they had only sucked up to Dick Mell, or one of his colleagues among the Organization’s ward bosses, they could have made those wages for doing nothing. 

Thanks, Dick Mell, for taking our money and handing it out to those who have somehow garnered your favor.  Isn’t it good to know that our tax dollars went toward paying hangers-on and toadies skilled labor wages for doing nothing so that Dick Mell could tell everyone that HE put them through college?

Mr. Mell is only being singled out for criticism here because he happens to be retiring and putting his foot in his mouth in the process.   He is no different from any of the old time ward bosses, whose modus operandi was to condition their constituents to behave like sycophants, to bow and scrape before these estimables, in order to get the services that we paid for...at a substantial premium as consideration to the pols for all that they added to the process of delivering these services.

But we kept electing these guys.   And now we wonder why the city and the state are in such bad financial shape.

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. 

FAREWELL, DICK MELL…SORT OF

7/6/13

Dick Mell announced last week that he will be leaving his post as 33^rd Ward alderman after 38 years on the job.  The Chicago media, generally hostile toward guys like Dick Mell, are, predictably, falling all over themselves with accolades for the City Council’s second longest serving member and something of a living relic of a bygone era, a time depicted in my books, The Chairman and The Chairman’s Challenge.  The press’s apparent hypocrisy, though, is understandable; gentlemanliness, or gentewomanliness, is almost always to be applauded and one of its manifestations is finding something nice to say about people at such milestones in their lives.

As you might guess, yours truly has some thoughts on Dick Mell who, despite being a self-made millionaire even before entering politics and despite running one of the most effective ward machines in this most political of cities will always be known first and foremost as Rod Blagojevich’s father-in-law.  (See my 6/19/13 post MIKE MADIGAN, JOHN CULLERTON, AND PENSIONS:   SOMETIMES A CIGAR IS JUST A CIGAR? for some background on the relationship between Dick Mell and his infamous son-in-law.)

First, Mr. Mell would like his daughter Deb Mell, who is currently a state representative, to replace him.   Mayor Emanuel has instituted new procedures for selecting replacement aldermen that are made to look fair, transparent, and representative.  But one suspects that Mr. Mell would not have left without the fix being in for his daughter, so Ms. Mell will probably have no trouble ascending to the post her father has held since she was seven years old.   She does have at least nominal competition for the job, however, in the person of State Senator Iris Martinez.

Note that I used the verb “ascending” when describing a move by Deb Mell from the state legislature to the city council, and that was no mistake.  Perhaps only in Chicago would a move from state representative or state senator to alderman be considered a promotion.   But this follows a proud tradition.   For example, back in 1973, when Roman Pucinski was effectively moved from the United States Congress to alderman of the 41^st Ward, he, probably rightfully, considered it a promotion and thanked Mayor Daley, and not at all disingenuously, for moving him up the ladder.   We take our aldermen seriously in Chicago.   Sometimes one wonders why, but I digress.

Second, the Chicago Sun-Times should have been more careful in its article about Mell’s retirement (“On way out, Mell talks family ties,” 7/6/13, page 6).   Deep into the story, the Sun-Times says

Mell operated (emphasis mine) one of the strongest ward organizations in Chicago, one that relied on precinct captains even after court rulings loosened the stranglehold the Democratic Machine had on government hiring and weakened other ward organizations.

Even though he is leaving his aldermanic seat, Mr. Mell will remain Democratic committeeman of the 33^rd ward and thus will continue to operate “one of the strongest ward organizations in the city.”   The post of committeeman isn’t what it used to be for a variety of reasons, but a ward’s committeeman controls the party apparatus in that ward.  Mr. Mell is not giving that up, at least not yet.

Third, in his parting comments, Mr. Mell had a few, and one suspects as few as possible, things to say about his infamous son-in-law, to wit…

“People loved him on the campaign trail.  He was phenomenal.   But when it came to actually governing, he was a problem.”

Hear, hear, despite the understatement in the second sentence.

Mr. Mell also said that if he could do it all over again, Blagojevich

“…would have never gotten out of state rep.  He would never have went (sic) to Congress.  He would have been a state rep until he decided to quit or be a lawyer or whatever.”

That’s great sentiment in retrospect.   But you can’t tell me, or anyone remotely sentient, that Mr. Mell only discovered the deep character flaws in his son-in-law only after Blago was elected to Congress and then to the governor’s mansion, both of which would have been impossible without Dick Mell’s help.   Many of us could see what a popinjay Mr. Blagojevich was long before he got to the governor’s office.  (In a later post I will tell you of the time yours truly and then Congressman Blagojevich sparred for an hour on a talk radio program…and will especially note Blago’s parting words to yours truly.  It’s a good story, but not as good as it sounds.)  Dick Mell is no fool and he was far closer to Blago than any of us who followed Blago’s career, so he had to be aware from pretty much the get-go of the poltroonishness of his son-in-law.  Yet Mr. Mell still used all of his powers and all of his abilities to put Blago first in Congress and then in the governor’s office.  For all his hemming and hawing now, and for all his other accomplishments, Mr. Mell’s foisting his son-in-law upon the people of Illinois (And I am by no means absolving our misinformed or simply uninformed, voters; anyone who has read just about anything I’ve written knows that.) will remain his most salient “achievement.”

Fourth, Mr. Mell went out of his way to be not all that uncharacteristically sycophantic toward Mayor Emanuel:

“Of all the mayors I worked with, I really like this guy (Emanuel) because he’ll make a decision based on what he believes is right.”

Mell went on to laud the Mayor’s “courage” in reworking the parking meter deal (See RAHM EMANUEL AND THE PARKING METERS:   “GOT TO MAKE THE BEST OF…A BAD SITUATION”, 4/30/13)…

“You think if I were mayor I would have touched those parking meters?”

It could, of course, be that Mr. Mell genuinely likes Mr. Emanuel and has enjoyed working with him, or at least that he has liked working with nominal north sider Emanuel more than he liked working with south sider Rich Daley.  But one suspects that Mr. Mell is following a not so proud tradition of the supposed tough guy aldermen, committeemen, and other pols around this town:  being shameless suck-ups to whoever happens to be occupying the Fifth Floor at the time. 

Perhaps the esteemed aldermen have no choice.   Beginning with Richard I and continuing with Richard II and Rahm Emanuel, Chicago mayors have almost completely emasculated the ward organizations, so the aldermen have to beg for the crumbs that fall from the Mayor’s table.   In this case, Mr. Mell really needs something from Mr. Emanuel:  the appointment of Deb Mell to the 33^rd ward city council seat.   One wishes, however, that these Chicago pols would stop masquerading as tough guys when, in reality, they have been reduced, and more or less willingly, to lap dogs and lickspittles.

Last, readers of my books, the Chairman and the Chairman’s Challenge, liked to try to guess who Chairman Eamon DeValera Collins is in real life.  When they aren’t guessing Ed Burke, Mike Madigan, Ed Vrdolyak, Bill Banks, or Rich Daley, they are guessing Dick Mell.  People ask me frequently if Collins is one of the aforementioned gentlemen, and Mell’s name comes up a lot.   My answer is the same for Mr. Mell as it has been for any other suggestion:  Chairman Eamon DeValera Collins is nobody in Chicago politics and he is (almost) everybody in Chicago politics.  He is one man who embodies the characteristics of many men.   Collins, as Don Vito Corleone was for the New York Mob of the mid twentieth century, is an amalgam of characters in Chicago politics of the latter part of that century.   Chairman Collins, like Alderman Mell, is an intriguing, enduring character, but, unlike Dick Mell, Eamon Collins is fictional.

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. 

MIKE MADIGAN, JOHN CULLERTON, AND PENSIONS: SOMETIMES A CIGAR IS JUST A CIGAR?

6/19/13

The Chicago Sun-Times today ran a page 6 story, trumpeted on page 1, asking a question I asked back on May 8  (See my post of that date, THE CULLERTON PENSION PLAN:  “THE (PUBLIC EMPLOYEE UNIONS) FAMILY DON’T EVEN HAVE THAT KIND OF MUSCLE ANY MORE”???):  Is the House Speaker Mike Madigan/Senate President John Cullerton disagreement over the solution to Illinois’s public pension problem a genuine “feud,” as the Sun-Times put it, or, as I called it on May 8, “part of some Machiavellian dance to avoid doing anything about our pension problems” in order to somehow give Lisa Madigan a boost in her run for governor?

 

Not knowing either Mike Madigan or John Cullerton, and being quite sure that even those who know either gentleman are not privy to such inner thoughts, I don’t know whether the two legislative leaders genuinely differ on pensions or are trying to pull some sort of elaborate maneuver to discredit Pat Quinn and help Lisa Madigan.  I suspect, however, that the disagreement is genuine.   Mr. Madigan is too smart to try to pull something so likely to backfire in his face and that would seemingly involve too many people (more than one) to keep very far under wraps.  Furthermore, perhaps I am naïve, but I genuinely don’t think that Mr. Madigan is so callous, so uncaring about the direction of the state, and/or so silly that he would further imperil our state’s nearly broke finances in order to hand his daughter an even more hopeless set of circumstances should she run for governor and should he be able to deliver the office for her.

The speculation that the whole Madigan/Cullerton thing is a Potemkin feud, though, gives me the opportunity to tell a story about the last time I thought two Chicago pols were putting on a fake fight worthy of the WWE….

In early 2005, Governor Rod Blagojevich shut down a landfill operated by Frank Schmidt, a cousin of Blago’s mother-in-law, Marge Mell, the wife of Dick Mell, one of Chicago’s then and now most powerful aldermen and committeemen.  The Governor contended that the landfill was taking illegal material while Mr. Schmidt was assuring shady customers who thus violated that law that there would be no trouble because of Mr. Schmidt’s connection to Mr. Mell.  This set off a public feud between Mr. Blagojevich and his father-in-law, and political Godfather, Dick Mell that reached epic proportions.

I suspected that the Mell/Blago feud was an elaborate ruse, designed to distance, for the naïve, the Governor from his father-in-law, whose reputation as a take no prisoners, old time ward boss from Chicago didn’t play well in the suburbs and downstate.   Blago would be running for reelection in 2006 and a charade of a crusading environmentalist young governor standing up to an old time, favor dispensing ward boss at enormous personal and political cost to himself would enhance his chances downstate while not hurting him in the city due to the winks, nods, and “say no mores” that would be part of such a ruse.

However, I started to hear from people who knew and worked with Mell in the 33^rd ward that the father-in-law vs. son-in-law feud was very real.  I sort of brushed off these assurances as part of the play.  One evening shortly after the fireworks started I was at a function at my old high school and heard from a Jesuit priest who was active in politics on the northwest side that the Mell/Blago feud was very real.   While this claim had more credibility, I have long adhered to my trusted formula of not trusting anybody whom I have not known for at least twenty years, and then not completely, and still thought Blago and Mell could be jerking everyone’s chains.

When Dick Mell several weeks later accused his son-in-law’s new best friend, Chris Kelly, a corrupt contractor who ultimately committed suicide at least partially due to the troubles that grew out of his association with Blago, of trading commission appointments for “$50,000 campaign contributions,” we all knew, or soon would know, that Messrs. Blagojevich and Mell were not playing some game of three card monte.   All doubt was removed by Mr. Mell’s comments regarding Mr. Kelly, which Mr. Mell doubtless regretted later and which ultimately led to his son-in-law’s taking up residence in federal housing.

That incident may have nothing at all to do with what some, including the Sun-Times, are labeling the Madigan/Cullerton “feud.”  But that quick, and wrong, presumption of Machiavellian machinations did reinforce for me something I have long known but that the more sensationalist among my fellow Chicago politics aficionados can’t seem to grasp:   sometimes things are as they seem, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar…even in the labyrinthine world of Chicago politics.

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.