Truly offended? Or just candidates in desperate need of attention?

Jeanne Ives, the Republican state senator from Wheaton who wants to run for governor as the candidate who will impose conservative ideologue thoughts upon all of Illinois, is managing to play off so many stereotypes in her latest campaign advertisement that is drawing far more attention than it deserves.

You know, the ad that features a transvestite, a black union member, a non-citizen who shouldn’t be in the U.S. anyway and a slutty liberal woman who keeps needing abortions to terminate her pregnancies – all of whom “thank” Bruce Rauner for his policies since becoming governor early in 2015.

IMPLYING THAT NONE of these kinds of people would be supportive of an Ives governorship, and do you really want to be among these freaks of nature come Election Day?

This ad is bound to offend, although I’m sure the Ives camp views it as one where the people offended most are the ones who never would have considered casting a ballot for her in the first place.

Which is why I have found it interesting to see a few political candidates of the Republican persuasion who felt compelled to issue a public statement lambasting Ives.

Specifically, GOP attorney general candidate Erika Harold and state treasurer hopeful Jim Dodge are the ones speaking out when most establishment Republican types are keeping their mouths shut!

HAROLD: Crown not enough to win?

AND WHO, QUITE frankly, are among the fringe candidates that show how weak the Illinois Republican Party has become in this century. Surely, none of these people would have been taken seriously by the GOP of 1994 – the year that Jim Edgar got re-elected overwhelmingly and every single Republican running for state office also won.

Honestly, the only reason either Harold or Dodge will still be alive politically beyond March 20 is because they’re running unopposed in the Republican primary.

Now, they’re issuing statements condemning the Ives campaign’s bigotry – largely because it would seem they don’t want to get their unopposed candidacies dragged down in the muck of racial, gender or immigration politics before they even get started in their campaigning for the actual election come Nov. 6.

 

DODGE: Needs to break ties to GOP far-right?

It’s noble, but I suspect they wish they could get away with saying nothing. But unlike other candidates who have enough of a track record politically, they have to speak out now.

FOR WHAT IT’S worth, Harold is the one-time Miss America (2003) who has run for congressional posts from central Illinois (she’s an Urbana native), but has never won in her own primary.

While Dodge is a long-time official within municipal government in suburban Orland Park – a government I once covered back in my early late-1980’s days as a reporter-type person.

He tried running for Illinois comptroller in 2010, but failed. Like Harold, he’s only succeeding in this year’s primary because he’s unopposed.

Honestly, it’s not like Orland Park government is a path to higher office. I still remember when then-Mayor Dan McLaughlin tried running for state treasurer in 1998, only to lose to Judy Baar Topinka. McLaughlin went back to being mayor until losing his bid for re-election last year to a seventh term.

MAYBE DODGE THINKS being a suburban Republican (instead of a Democrat like McLaughlin) makes a difference. Although it could mean he gets caught up in all the ideologue nonsense that’s likely to hurt Republican candidates in general outside of the most rural parts of Illinois. Which makes their comment on such a campaign ad all the more essential.

 

IVES: How long until she's nobody?

The people who probably will see the Ives spot, focus on that frizzy-haired dame in the Chicago Teachers Union t-shirt and be particularly offended. Or maybe they’ll be most bothered by the masked-dude without the valid visa.

Although some have pointed out that the guy who appears in the mask is so clearly a white guy – possibly an Irishman of sorts. Could it be that no Latino actor could be found who would appear in such a tacky campaign ad?

Which will make it all the better if the Ives campaign withers away after the March 20 primary and becomes a soon-to-be forgotten memory – in large part because of campaign ads such as this.

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