Can we dump Trump?

The Washington Post is managing to tick off the sensibilities of many people who are looking forward to the 2020 election cycle with the goal of dumping that orange-tinted buffoon from the White House.

TRUMP: Is four more years really inevitable?

For the commentary by Hugh Hewitt basically implies that this upcoming presidential election is for Donald Trump to take. The 2020 election isn’t going to be close, is what we’re being told.

DESPITE THE FACT that various polls show the Trump presidency has never been popular amongst the masses, and only survives because of the incredibly outspoken level of support it draws from a minority of our society, many of whom do so because The Donald tends to give his backing to their own prejudices.]

As Hewitt feels, the one thing Trump has going in his favor is the economy. In short, it’s not in a recession or headed in that direction.

“Innovation is accelerating, not declining,” Hewitt wrote. “A recession before Election Day looks less and less likely by the day.”

In short, Trump will not be taken down by the very factor that caused many people to back Bill Clinton over incumbent George Bush (the elder) in the 1992 election cycle.

I’M NOT WILLING to totally dismiss this theory, because I happen to have a cousin who leans Republican and is nominally a Trump backer who defends his ideological choices by saying the state of the economy is really the only issue that matters.

All of Trump’s moments of stupidity and ignorance on so many issues that cause offense to the sensibilities of the majority of us? He argues they just won’t matter, in the end.

Which means that the masses of voters come Nov. 3, 2020 will wind up supporting, either enthusiastically or begrudgingly, the notion of a second term in office for Donald Trump.

BUSH: Trump won't lose due to economy

Something that I’m sure the man’s over-bloated ego will construe as evidence that we really, really love him – and that those of us who don’t want the return of Melania as First Lady can just go and “suck it,” so to speak.

NOW I DON’T doubt that Trump can win re-election, although I think the real factor at work is that many people just won’t be able to reach a consensus on who should be the Democratic challenger against Trump.

I actually think the dozens of candidates thinking they’re the only ones who could possibly run a winning campaign will actually result in enough electoral chaos so that none of them would be capable of getting enough voter support to prevail on Election Day.

Too many people who think that we have to have Bernie Sanders, Or Joe Biden. Or Pete Buttigieg. Or it has to be someone who specifically is NOT a white man. While refusing to consider anybody else. Democrats may not be capable of reaching a consensus candidate to challenge Trump.

Which could result in an election cycle that the masses find contemptible. They hate Trump, but can’t stand whoever it is that winds up getting the political nomination to run against him.

OR, WORSE YET. The confusion level is such that the same Electoral College mess that enabled Trump to win the presidency with 3 million fewer votes than Hillary Clinton could kick in yet again. Right now, I'd have to think the odds are too great that Trump will once again get less than 50 percent of the vote.

BIDEN: Leading Dem, for now

Donald Trump could easily wind up as the two-term president who never took a majority of the vote and also was unable to ever get his popularity rating in polls above the 50 percent mark. In short, the man forced upon our society by an outspoken minority determined to force their ideological leanings upon the masses.

Some might think that a “victory,” of sorts. History would record Trump as a president no one wanted. But in reality, it would record him as a two-time victor – and further reinforce the leanings of the ideologues into thinking they’re the only people who really matter.

Some might want to think that the lack of a recession is a Trump accomplishment. But if anything, the fact that Trump has a snowball’s chance in that place ending in double-hockey sticks of winning re-election really ought to be blamed on the political ineptness of those who want to Dump Donald, but can’t quite figure out how to do so.

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We all got to accompany the Bush funeral train, whether desired or not

I happened to be spending the afternoon Thursday watching a grandparent and taking in one of her favorite television programs (It’s “Jeopardy,” by the way), so I got to see just how peeved she became when the popular game show was interrupted for special programming.

George Bush (the elder) being removed from funeral train. Photos by Gregory Tejeda

As in the live broadcast by ABC network news of the funeral train taking the casket containing the remains of former President George Bush (the elder) to College Station, Texas.

WHERE THE PRESIDENTIAL libraries for both Presidents Bush are located, and where George H.W. will have his casket laid to rest. People who are political geeks and fanatics of the Bush presidencies will forevermore be able to pay their respects with a visit to the Texas A&M University.

Similar, I suppose, to all those Elvis fanatics who stop by his gravesite whenever they visit Graceland.

Now I point out the grandmother disdain for Thursday’s interruption, because I wonder how many others felt similar thoughts.

Bush family on hand for the burial.

Seeing the broadcasts earlier in the week of the formal funeral service at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., was one thing. There may well have been people intrigued by the site of onetime Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole standing from his wheelchair to salute the presidential casket, although I was amused by how President Donald Trump’s very presence made so many feel uncomfortable.

BUT SEEING CONTINUED live broadcasting of the Bush death-related events just seemed like overkill.

Personally, I thought the sight of the funeral train working its way through Texas was weak, and its’ arrival in College Station was way too much.

The flag-draped presidential casket on board the funeral train.

It’s a good thing the Bush family did the actual burial in private, or else I’ve got to wonder if we literally would have been given the chance to see the casket lowered into the ground and sextons dumping dirt atop it for the burial.

There are some things I just question the value of, and perhaps it is the reason I still rely on newspapers (and their affiliated websites) for much of the reporting I read.

I DO HAVE to admit to getting something of a chuckle when I saw the ABC coverage of the funeral train proceedings anchored by George Stephanopoulos – the one-time political operative who, when working for Bill Clinton back in 1992, was a big part of the team that undid the George Bush presidency.

Would he ever back then have envisioned himself in such a public role watching over the Bush funeral? I suppose it’s the ultimate evidence that life isn’t pre-ordained in any role, and any outcome is possible.

But wouldn’t we have been equally, and adequately, informed if Thursday’s activities had been summarized into a minute-long report that was merely included in the network evening newscasts?

Seriously, I don’t remember as much hoopla over the deaths of Ronald Reagan in 2004 or Richard Nixon a decade earlier as we’ve seen this week for George H.W. Bush.

I ALSO EXPECT that when the time comes for Jimmy Carter (he turned 94 back in October), his eventual funeral ritual in Plains, Ga., will also be something simpler and more laid back.

One memory of 2005 World Series was seeing the Bushes in front-row seats watching the ballgames the White Sox played in Houston

Although I suspect things could have been more drawn out. Considering that George Bush was the first former president whose funeral rituals included a train ride since Dwight Eisenhower in 1969, it also made me think of the first president to get such treatment.

As in Abraham Lincoln, whose death in 1865 resulted in a two-week trip to take the body back from Washington to Springfield, Ill. – where he remains interred at Oak Ridge Cemetery to this day.

Modern technology reduced the train trip to a single day. Just envision if it had been a weeks-long event with multiple stops along the way (as was done for Lincoln, who once served as an attorney for the Illinois Central railroad). We’d probably have all the people who didn’t vote for Bush for president back in 1988 and in 1992 rising up in great anger at the very sight.

  -30-

Are we destined for “President Pence?” Should that scare us more than Trump?

Spending time as I do working as a reporter-type person on the other side of State Line Road, I have found a group of Democrats to whom the concept of the upcoming presidency of Donald J. Trump is not the most terrifying thought.
 

PENCE: From Indiana to U.S.A., could it happen?

For them to really get a jolt of fear down their political spines, it is the thought of “President Michael R. Pence,” their state’s former governor, ascending to the top post of the United States government.

PENCE GAINED HIS national infamy back when Indiana gave us a version of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act that went so far over the top, even the conservative elements that govern the Hoosier State (which is truly a Bizarro-world take on what we have here in Illinois) felt compelled to scale it back.

But it was the measure that would have put the law on the side of those people who wanted to cite their religious beliefs as the reason to discriminate against people who weren’t like themselves.

Particularly when it comes to those who differ based on sexual orientation issues. But it gave Pence a national reputation – one that helped bolster Trump’s chances of getting elected back when the conservative ideologues weren’t sure if they could trust the rich to be president.

Now, Trump is the president-elect, and Pence moves up to the position of being one step down from becoming U.S. president – should something happen that would prevent Trump from being capable of finishing his term.

WHICH IN THIS political environment may well be a real concept – and just because at age 70, Trump is one of the oldest men ever elected president of this country.

There are those who speculate how unlikely it is that Trump will finish out the four years of the term to which he was elected last month and which will begin in January.

Of course, there are different reasons for their speculations.

 

TRUMP: Will he finish what he starts?

Some believe Trump is just too much of a political amateur to realize what he has got himself into, and will either become frustrated or bored when he finally realizes that image of himself as being the guy who bellows “You’re Fired!” at everybody who displeases him just doesn’t work in government.

HE COULD EASILY turn out to be like Sarah Palin – whose government credentials prior to her 2008 vice presidential bid were being governor of Alaska. But she didn’t even finish out that one term – making it only about two years into it before using her newfound VP nominee status to justify moving on to more visible ventures.

Which in her case amount to being a political loudmouth who spews her thoughts to whomever will listen (and usually winds up giving the real majority of us a good laugh).

Would Trump quit when he realizes life in the White House and on Air Force One isn’t garish and gaudy enough to live up to his tastes?

Or there’s the more extreme option – one that says Trump will do something severe enough to warrant his impeachment. I can’t envision what it would be, but anything is possible in this unpredictable political climate.

I COULD ENVISION a scenario in which his alleged Republican allies, some of whom were never thrilled with his presence instead of a more-reliable GOPer, turn on him. Or it could be the ideologues who banded together to give him that likely Electoral College victory next week decide that he’s not keeping his word to impose all those tyrannical measures that Trump talked about during his campaign that THEY TRULY DESIRE!

 

CLINTON: We can only dream of her presidency

Saying he’s not likely to move to prosecute one-time Secretary of State Hillary Clinton like he said he would during the campaign is a serious broken promise – along the lines of “Read my lips, no new taxes” is to more rational people when discussing the legacy of the first President George Bush.

I state it in that sarcastic manner because on a serious level, the only “crime” that Clinton committed was having the unmitigated gall to think she had any right to seek the presidency in the first place.

People who think like that could easily turn on their guy, particularly if they think they have a more stable and reliable conservative voice in place in the form of Pence – of which the thought of him in the Oval Office does give shudders down the back of the progressive majority peeved that the Electoral College didn’t reflect their reality in this particular election cycle.

  -30-

Keeping Trump quiet? Or they really just despise the thought of Hillary?

Remember back to March when Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump made derogatory remarks about the Ricketts family; implying they ought to keep their opposition to his candidacy quiet lest he start revealing their “dirty laundry” so to speak?
 

TRUMP: Trying to unite Republicans

Well, it appears the family that founded TD Ameritrade and whose members now own the Chicago Cubs are heeding Trump’s advice. Because they’re showing support for Trump in the clearest way possible.

THEY’RE GIVING HIM money.

As in $1 million being donated by family head J. Joe Ricketts to a political action committee that is backing the Trump campaign, according to the Wall Street Journal.

What better way for them to indicate support than to give campaign cash to the guy who theoretically is as capable of self-funding a serious presidential bid as anyone in this country? In fact, to a guy like Trump, cold hard cash probably is the only form of "respect" he appreciates!

Of course, it can be argued that Ricketts is not making the donation to Trump himself. Rather, it is to a political group that will benefit Trump’s presidential aspirations by expressing its belief that we ought to have anybody EXCEPT Hillary Clinton as president resulting from the Nov. 8 elections. So much for Cubs ownership showing its appreciation for one of their most prominent (even if she has claimed New York Yankees fandom during her residency out east) fans.

WHICH IS PROBABLY the best way to describe what the Ricketts family may feel about this election cycle. They probably still don’t think much of the man, but are willing to put their money where their mouth is – so to speak – by expressing opposition for the opponent.

 

RICKETTS: Tom's family in line behind Trump?

In short, the Ricketts answer to “Who do you hate the most?” is Clinton herself.

Either that, or there really are some serious Ricketts family secrets that Trump could have unveiled – which is what he hinted at when the Ricketts family members started making too much noise in his opposition back during the primary election cycle this year.

Of course, Trump tried to play the thing for a laugh by then by saying he’d be airing campaign advertising spots reminding us of Chicago Cubs ineptitude throughout the years and tagging it to the Ricketts family.

 

CLINTON: Cubs fan can't say Cubs owners in her bloc?

WHICH WOULD WIND up being ridiculous these days in light of the fact the Cubs actually were the first team to qualify this season for a playoff spot on the path to the World Series. Although that doesn’t rule out the possibility the Cubs could blow it in the playoffs, thereby creating more ineptitude that can be laid in the Ricketts’ family lap.

Not that the Cubs are really a factor in this political equation. It’s more about the confusion caused by the fact that many people who usually lean Republican don’t have a clue what to do about the garishness that is the Trump persona.

Take former President George H.W. Bush (as in father of “Dubya,”), for whom it became publicly known this week that he will cast his ballot for Clinton. The man who is about as Republican establishment as you can get is just that displeased with the notion of The Donald as The President.

Although I found it amusing that the reason this tip got out was because of a Kennedy family member (about as establishment Democrat as the Bushes are GOPers) let the word leak publicly, according to Politico.

WHICH IS TO say that I doubt Bush himself would ever have said anything aloud, and probably regards the tidbit about his ballot to be as gauche as Trump himself.

It will be intriguing to see how many Republican types Trump can actually keep on board his campaign. Too many defections ensure loss to Clinton come Election Day.

I’m sure there will be many people rationalizing their reasons for voting the way they do. Take the National Rifle Association, which the Washington Post reports says is fully in line with Trump because they’re concerned about the Supreme Court – which they want to remain as a judicial body with conservative political leanings. They want the court biased in their favor.

Although there are just as many other people who are eager to vote for Clinton solely because they want the shift in the high court’s leanings. Which is to say that anybody who says they know now how this election cycle will turn out is seriously stretching the truth.

  -30-

What gives; Jeb Bush and Ben Carson think they’re too good for Chicago?

The presidential dreamers will gather once again on Tuesday in Milwaukee for yet another presidential debate and a chance to convince the voting public that their dreams deserve a chance to become reality.

KASICH: A Billy Goat burger?

Yet for two of the candidates, the warm-up act on Monday was in Illinois. Ohio Gov. John Kasich literally was in Chicago, trying to persuade voters within the media market (those within the city proper are going overwhelmingly for whoever wins the Democratic nomination) to take him seriously.

CONSIDERING THE MEDIA market accounts for about three-quarters of Illinois’ population, it is a significant (and long-overdue) campaign stop.

While New York real estate developer Donald Trump made his visit to Springfield – which, for what it’s worth, was the same place where Barack Obama began his serious presidential campaigning in the ’08 election cycle.

But while Obama used the old state capitol building that Abraham Lincoln would have known and walked the halls of (the current capitol building dates to the 1870s), Trump wanted a differing image.

The local political bigwigs arranged for the Prairie Capital Convention Center, which is an arena that has been used for inauguration ceremonies in the past – in addition to other sports (the Urbana and Springfield campuses of the University of Illinois played basketball there against each other Sunday) and large-scale events.

TRUMP WANTED THE sight and sound of stands packed to capacity chanting “Trump, Trump, Trump” as he walked across a stage and made his usual vapid remarks with regards to why his personal wealth somehow qualified him to be president of the United States.

Yes, I wrote this copy prior to the event, because the actual happenings of the event were so predictable. Tickets for the Springfield, Ill.-based rally were given away free, first-come, first-served. They went quick.

TRUMP: Trying a horseshoe?

The spectacle was destined to be packed with true believers – or at the very least a crowd lacking of individuals who’d have been inclined to say anything negative about the man who’d likely look at the Springfield skyline and have as his initial reaction how lame it looks without some gaudy tower bearing his name.

Considering that Springfield’s only significant tall structures are the current Capitol and the tower-like Hilton Hotel, it might be one place where he wouldn’t be blatantly wrong.

THEN, WE CAME to Chicago, where Kasich spent the day in the city with awe-inspiring architecture and a definitely-mediocre building named for Trump.

BUSH: Beat Kasich to Billy Goat

Kasich’s campaign activity centered around an afternoon rally held in the shadow of tower Trump – Chicago-style. Below ground, actually.

For the Kasich people, who in Illinois include a significant segment of the Republican political establishment, were at the Billy Goat Tavern for a send-off rally to make the governor feel more peppy about doing verbal battle with the just over a dozen presidential dreamers that the GOP side has given us.

No word on whether Kasich actually consumed one of those cheeseburgers the bar cooks up to try to absorb all the alcohol that is otherwise consumed by customers on the premises.

ALTHOUGH IT REMINDS me of an event some decades ago when then-President George Bush (the elder) decided to try to appear to be a regular-guy Chicagoan by making a Billy Goat appearance – one that legendary newspaper columnist Mike Royko mocked by saying he didn’t go because he’d rather watch the cable TV news (one of those ‘90s ‘Crime of the Century’-type trials was taking place).

I doubt that Kasich’s play-acting at being a regular guy was any more legit than that of Bush.

RAUNER: Not taking sides?

It also intrigued me to see Gov. Bruce Rauner’s public schedule for Monday – no events whatsoever. What does it say for the GOP candidates that the Republican governor felt no need to advertise his presence at their events?

And when will the other Republican presidential dreamers feel compelled to visit us in Chicago to make the long-shot attempt at courting our votes?

  -30-

EXTRA: Talk can be cheap

Read my lips, No new taxes
-- Republican presidential nominee George H.W. Bush at the Republican National Convention, Aug. 18, 1988.

I further pledge that I will not seek to run as an independent or write-in candidate nor will I seek or accept the nomination for president of any other party

-- The pledge that presidential dreamer Donald Trump was asked by Republican Party officials to sign on Thursday.

  -0-

TRUMP: Will he regret Thursday

Democratic political partisans like to say that former President George Bush (the elder) made the biggest broken political promise in history when he claimed he wouldn’t raise taxes, then did so during 1990 and 1991.

Personally, I’d wonder if Trump will top that by claiming he will show loyalty to the Republican Party primary process.

BUSH: Would Jeb make a similar pledge?

IT JUST SEEMS Trump will let his ego dictate his actions, rather than any pledge he signs on Thursday. Particularly since the pledge is not a legally-binding document. Nobody's going to sue him if he runs regardless of the voters' will.

He may decide that the public “needs” him in the White House so much that he MUST continue to run for office – even if the naïve fools of the GOP pick someone else to be their nominee. And those polls out now that show Hillary Clinton winning a general election with most people voting for either Jeb Bush OR Trump outnumbering her support wind up being very accurate.

Which means that whatever Trump does publicly later Thursday at his New York offices may not be worth the paper it’s written on.

  -30-

War’s over! Where’s all the celebration? Or do we see Part Three forthcoming?

He is going to be restrained by the economy (the federal government can’t afford to do many of the things Obama dreams of) and an ongoing war in Iraq (whether we like it or not, we’re stuck in it. I wouldn’t be surprised if U.S. troops remained there on Inauguration Day in January 2013).

Chicago Argus, Nov. 5, 2008

  -0-



Part 3 someday? Image from Indymedia Ireland

Perhaps it goes to show you just how little I know at times.

Because it seems this prediction that I published in this weblog on the “Day After” Election Day in 2008 when Barack Obama woke up realizing he had managed to beat John McCain and become president-elect turned out to be inaccurate.

FOR THIS WEEKEND, the Iraq War that began back in the presidency of George W. Bush officially came to an end. History will record that the last U.S. troops left the country on Sunday, although because of the time difference it was actually late Saturday in Chicago at the moment those troops crossed over the border into Kuwait – the nation whose invasion back in the early 1990s by Saddam Hussein triggered the whole notion that we were “at war” in Iraq.

And just out of a sense of disclosure, I have a cousin, Carlos, who was in the Army back in the late 1980s and early 1990s and wound up spending a year of his service fighting to “liberate” Kuwait.

But back to the present. Weekend news broadcasts were filled with lots of feature stories showing us soldiers in their tan fatigues (the famed “chocolate chips”) saying how pleased they were to know that they survived the war and that it truly is over.

OBAMA: Ended this Iraq war. Who begins the next?

These men likely will tell stories for the rest of their lives about how they were the absolute last U.S. troops to leave the Middle Eastern nation – for now.

BECAUSE I WON’T be surprised if conditions arise in future years that cause our military to think that U.S. troops will have to return. In fact, it may well turn out that what we’re calling the second Iraq War is really just the latest chapter of tensions that have been ongoing in that part of the world for centuries, and will continue for long after this weekend.

It makes me think that the idea of considering this war “over” is a little bit short-sighted. That very mentality was running through my mind back when Obama got elected president in large part by appealing to the people who always despised the notion that U.S. troops were located anywhere in the Middle East.

But for now, I will give Obama some credit (even though I’m sure the ideologues of our society will not want to do so). He brought this military conflict to an end. For now, the body count ceases to rise.

The point I tried to make all those years ago was that anybody who voted for Obama expecting there to be an immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops truly was being naïve. I knew all those years ago that a withdrawal from Iraq would take years to complete – and even then only if absolutely nothing went wrong.

THAT IS WHY I implied that the process might still be taking place in January 2013 as Obama either prepares to take a second oath to serve a four-year term as president – or tries to hold back a look of anguish as one of the GOP dreamers actually manages to take that oath while Obama looks on – just before getting the final plane ride on Air Force One that brings him back home to Chicago.

Instead, it seems to be over. All combat troops left Iraq by this weekend, and all U.S. troops are supposed to be out of the country by Dec. 31. The soldiers will be returning home in streams – and we’re likely to see countless accounts of soldiers in fatigues being mobbed by family and friends, along with some cute wife or child at the center of the mix for them.

Yet for the life of me, I’m not sure what was really accomplished by this military action of the past few years. The reports already are cropping up of political “crisis” and tensions arising. I literally won’t be surprised if Iraq War Three crops up in the next decade.

The only real question is whether it will be a “President Obama” who has to start it in a second term, or if it will be some future chief executive who gets the credit/blame for the military mess.

YES, YOU PROBABLY out early from the tone of this commentary that I was never a proponent of this particular “war,” which as far as I was concerned was declared because of the feeling by the most recent President Bush to take on “unfinished business” from the administration of George Bush, the elder.

When George W. Bush got elected president in that mess of political maneuvering that passed for an election cycle in 2000, I knew that circumstances would arise that would be used to justify an Iraq War. Even if no such airplanes had ever struck the World Trade Center or Pentagon some 10 years ago, I believe the end result would have been similar in terms of military involvement in Iraq.

So because I “expected” it, I wasn’t shocked or offended when it occurred. And as far as getting out, it always struck me that the “war” was the equivalent of a “break it and buy it” policy.

We “broke” it by getting involved with military force. I want to believe (in fact, I desperately hope) that we have fixed it well enough to justify calling this military conflict over.

BUT SOMEHOW, I suspect (and fear) that the quickie glue job that we did to repair this symbolic artifact will soon some undone.

Is somebody bound to pick this “artifact” up off the shelf and notice that it is all chipped on the side that we turned toward the wall and face away from the potential customer?

  -30-

Obama caught in the act of being honest

OBAMA: Speaking the truth?

Perhaps it is something about setting foot in the Chicago metropolitan area that brings out the ability of political people to just say what’s on their mind.

I still remember the moment from a decade ago when then-candidate George W. Bush got caught on a microphone referring to a New York Times reporter who showed up for that year’s End of Summer event in Naperville (heaven forbid they celebrate Labor Day like everybody else) as a “major league asshole.”

TO WHICH RUNNING mate (and later Vice President) Dick Cheney responded, “yeah, big time.”

Was anyone really shocked that Bush would not be pleased with someone who could see through the veneer of competence he tried putting up to overcome his callow nature?

If anything, it is in that same context that I view the latest political gaffe of someone saying something that got caught on a microphone. President Barack Obama, while in Chicago for his fundraising efforts, went on a little diatribe that made it clear he IS disgusted with the people whose politically partisan games are aimed squarely at him.

I’d be concerned if Obama really was as mellow as the public persona he always tries to put forward. It was nice to see that on some level, the political tactics being used against him are registering. Despite what the conservative ideologues want to believe about a radical president, I was starting to wonder if Obama was too willing to compromise his beliefs to be an effective leader.

IT SEEMS THAT what has Obama miffed is the fact that Republican partisans want to undo the reform of health care that was a major part of his work during his first two years in office. Not that it’s going to happen – the Democrat-controlled Senate would stand in the way of anything the GOP-run House of Representatives would try to pass.

Plus, Obama himself still has that “veto” power to stop bad things from getting pushed into law by a partisan Congress. (As Mel Brooks used to say, “It’s good to be the king!”)



BUSH: The potty mouth?



As captured by CBS News, Obama said privately to people near him Thursday night, “I said, ‘you want to repeal health care? Go at it. We’ll have that debate. You’re not going to be able to do that by nickel-and-diming me in the budget. You think we’re stupid?”

He also was upset about the fact that Republican partisans in the House tried to take out their ideological opposition to a woman being able to abort a pregnancy by trying to disguise it as financial matters and budgetary concerns.

OBAMA ALSO WAS critical of Rep. Paul Ryan, a budget committee chair who has led much of the rhetoric during the stalemates that nearly resulted in a shutdown of the federal government (which some ideologues were more than willing to do because they were desperate to believe that people would blame Obama for their own stubborn streak).

As Obama described Ryan in what he thought was private, “this is the same guy that voted for two wars that were unpaid for, voted for the Bush tax cuts that were unpaid for, voted for the prescription drug bill that cost as much as my health care bill, but wasn’t paid for.”

Now I’m sure that some ideologues are going to claim that it is disrespectful for Obama to talk negatively about their ideals and to mention Ryan by name. I’m sure there are some people who are going to say that Thursday night in Chicago was some sort of significant moment that exposes Obama for what he truly is.

You know what. They’d be correct.

WHEN OUR PRESIDENT gets p’o-ed and says what he really thinks, he thinks in detail about specific policies and criticizes a specific official for his actions. Can anyone really say that Ryan didn’t do the things that Obama said he did?

RYAN: Will he arrogantly demand an apology?

We can argue whether or not it was appropriate for Ryan to act in such a way. But I don’t read anything coming out of his mouth that he’d actually have to apologize for – unless you believe that the ideologues of the world are entitled to complete deference, which is about as un-American thought as one could express.

It’s certainly on a higher level than George Bush showing us his mind resorts to profanity when he sees someone who has been less than deferential to him (and that was the reaction of the right back in 2000 when Bush spoke – they tried claiming that his critics deserved to be thought of in such a manner).

Obama certainly didn’t give us a one-liner that deserves to be remembered in the microphone gaffe “Hall of Fame.”

IN FACT, IF not for the fact that the ideologues are going to want to make something of this moment, it would be the ultimate non-issue.

Unless you believe that a politician who speaks the truth is such a rarity that we ought to treat every such utterance as an historic occasion.

  -30-

Bush ‘pardon list’ doesn’t mean former gov Ryan passed over, not yet at least

On the same day that President George W. Bush signed the Wilbur Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act with much ritual, he also granted clemency to 20 people in a very low-key manner. Photograph provided by the White House.

I could almost sense the glee that likely popped into the hearts and minds of a segment of the Illinois population when they learned that President George W. Bush granted clemency to 20 people – and former Gov. George Ryan wasn’t one of them.

None of the people to whom Bush showed sympathy on Tuesday were involved in anything resembling high-profile crimes. Many were for federal drug-related crimes for which the people in question had already served their prison terms.

THE ONLY CASE that comes close to being a Chicago incident is the pardon granted to James Won Hee Kang of South Barrington, who was sentenced in U.S. District Court in Chicago back in 1985 to one year of probation and a $5,000 fine on a conviction of trafficking in counterfeit goods.

The purpose of seeking clemency at this point is so that their criminal convictions will not forevermore haunt them in what remains of their lives. It is common for such clemency to be granted in cases where the felon has shown serious signs of remorse and rehabilitation.

In short, hardly anyone is getting out of a punishment by Bush’s actions. Only one of the cases involved a commutation of a prison sentence, and that particular inmate still has to serve an extensive period of supervised release outside of a federal correctional center.

But the thing to keep in mind is that this is the annual tradition of a Christmas “gift” of sorts to people who might be deserving of a bit of clemency. It is NOT the other presidential “tradition” of granting some form of clemency to people whose high-profile cases are so controversial that the very thought of sympathy will offend those parts of the public who secretly wish for life prison terms for everybody who disagrees with them.

THAT IS THE group in which Ryan’s case will come up, and it likely will be the final (or next to final) act of the Bush administration occurring in the morning hours of Jan. 20 – Barack Obama becomes president at noon of that date.

Now I have written it before, and I will repeat myself. I don’t believe Bush will be inclined to show Ryan any sympathy. Not a pardon (which would offer legal “forgiveness” for his conviction), nor a commutation of sentence (which would leave his conviction in place, but get him out of serving the remaining 5 years of his prison term).

Ryan’s biggest critics are those conservative Republicans of Illinois who think that the former governor’s conduct in office gave too much to Democrats and left them in their weakened state (if only they’d look at their own behavior and stubborn ideological beliefs, they’d see the real reason the Illinois GOP is struggling).

There is also the fact that Ryan’s desires to reform the death penalty in Illinois reflected poorly upon Bush, who when he was Texas governor presided over a process that used to see two or three executions per month, compared to about one or two per year in Illinois during the 1990s – before Ryan put in place the moratorium that brought executions here to a halt.

THOSE PEOPLE WHO are bothered by this are also the people who still think favorably of George W. Bush’s presidency, and that last-minute round of clemency will go to the people who need a legal break so as to uphold Bush’s legacy.

Part of Bush’s legacy is also going to be the fact that he has been stingier about granting clemency than other presidents. Thus far, he has only given 191 pardons and nine commutations of sentences – or about half the total of other recent two-term presidents such as Ronald Reagan or Bill Clinton.

This isn’t a man who is inclined to think it his place to go against a ruling by a jury and a sentence imposed by a judge. It would take exceptional instances to get him to do anything in a case.

That is why I think anyone connected with Abu Ghraib and the torture that took place there by U.S. military personnel will be the most likely to get a break from Bush, along with I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby – the former vice-presidential aide who previously got a commutation of sentence so he wouldn’t have to serve prison time, but still has a criminal conviction in place for his involvement in the covering up of who leaked the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame.

BY BUSH’S WAY of thinking, why should he “waste” clemency on George Ryan when those others are more deserving on ideological grounds?

So when the Chicago Sun-Times (or to be more accurate, http://www.suntimes.com/) publishes the headline “Former Illinois Gov. George Ryan not on Bush pardon and commutation list,” those of you who are out for the former governor’s scalp should not start high-fiving each other and declaring “Victory!”

That moment will come when the rest of the country is caught up in the ceremonial pomp and circumstance of the Obama inauguration. You will be the ones getting all worked up at the thought of a 74-year-old man having to spend a few more years in a minimum-security work camp.

Because by the time that a President Obama would be in a position to consider clemency for Ryan, he will be close enough to having served his whole prison term (tentative release date, July 4, 2013) that it will be a moot point.

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EDITOR’S NOTES: The Department of Justice identified 20 one-time or current federal felons (http://www.usdoj.gov/opa/pr/2008/December/08-crm-1148.html) who got a Day-Before-Christmas legal break from President George W. Bush.

Bush granted a pardon to a deceased man whose “crime” was helping to provide arms (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/23/AR2008122301601.html) to Jewish people just before the creation of a nation of Israel. Does this mean George Ryan has a chance at a pardon after he dies?

This is the Internet posting that likely got Ryan critics all worked up, at least until they realized (http://blogs.suntimes.com/sweet/2008/12/former_illinois_gov_george_rya.html) Bush still has just under a month to act on the Ryan family’s pleas for clemency.

Not everybody thinks a presidential pardon for Scooter Libby would be an injustice (http://www.usnews.com/blogs/barone/2008/12/23/george-bush-should-pardon-scooter-libby.html).

Whether expressed then or now, an “I’m sorry” from Ryan doesn’t mean much

How desperate is George Ryan to get out of the federal prison at Terre Haute, Ind.? He is so desperate that he finally did Friday what he had refused to do for all these years – he apologized.

Ryan, with the support of his son, George Jr., wrote a three-paragraph statement that was meant to be a mea culpa for all the criminal acts people think he did during his time as governor (even though the criminal charges against him relate to activity during his time as Illinois Secretary of State).

AND THAT STATEMENT was sent from Terre Haute to Chicago, where another former Illinois governor, James R. Thompson, read it to reporter-types at his downtown Chicago law office in hopes that it will bolster the chances that soon-to-be-former President George W. Bush will look favorably upon Ryan’s request for clemency.

Ryan has served just over one year of a 6 ½-year prison term, and has to serve just over four more years before he could be eligible for early release. Considering that Ryan is already 74, there’s a good chance that he might not live that long.

So Thompson is putting his legal reputation on the line in supporting Ryan’s request to Bush for a commutation of sentence, which would leave Ryan’s criminal record intact but would let him return home to Kankakee, where wife Lura Lynn is struggling financially to survive.

Just what effect will an apology have now? I don’t think it will mean much, since I am inclined to believe that Bush is not the type of person who will look sympathetically at Ryan’s plight.

BESIDES, HE HAS his own crowd of allies who have committed acts in recent years (think Abu Ghraib) that will require presidential clemency to spare them prison time. Why should Bush waste clemency on Ryan when there are others who, in his mind, deserve it more?

And based on various Internet sites that offer people a chance to comment on various issues, it is clear that nobody wants to hear an apology from George Ryan. They want to see him rot away in prison.

Think I’m kidding? Take this comment – “Sorry Ryan, rot in prison. No mercy” – from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch website, posted just after Thompson read the statement, which was broadcast le on several Chicago television newscasts. Or, take this statement attached to a Chicago Sun-Times story posted on the Internet:

“It would only be poetic justice if governors Ryan and Blagojevich were forced to share … the same cell at the federal prison at Terre Haute, Ind.”

THAT SENTIMENT (THE notion that Ryan and Blagojevich are somehow equal in status) is about the only reason I can think of in which an apology from Ryan makes any sense.

George Ryan wants to establish the thought in our minds that he’s the public official who is apologetic about his actions. He’s sorry, and wishes he could take it back.

When compared to Blagojevich’s actions the same day – meeting with ministers at his home and telling them how he intends to beat the rap because he didn’t do anything illegal – George comes off looking downright contrite.

Ryan wants us to think of him as the “good” convicted politico, while thinking of Blagojevich as the “bad” politico facing criminal charges.

YET ONLY IN that context does George Ryan come off looking good. By any other standard, the apology offered Friday doesn’t mean much. All too many Illinoisans are willing to think of Ryan and Blagojevich as political twins – which even Thompson concedes, he has said publicly that the incumbent governor’s legal predicament harms his chances of getting presidential clemency for Ryan.

Keep in mind that this thought about Ryan’s activity on Friday is being expressed by someone who has always thought much of the criticism against Ryan throughout the years is absurd.

An apology in the earliest days of this political saga (meaning, several years ago) might have been listened to. Now, it comes off as insincere rhetoric from a political person who can’t handle the mental stress of prison life (even though Thompson said on Friday that Ryan’s change of heart was due to his year of incarceration giving him the chance to reflect upon his life’s actions).

Even then, many of Ryan’s activities as governor (particularly his efforts to reform the death penalty in Illinois that culminated with him providing varying forms of clemency for the just over 160 inmates on death row at the time of Ryan’s departure from politics in early 2003) would have motivated Ryan’s critics to refuse to listen to anything he had to say.

THOMPSON DID MAKE one legitimate point, in saying that it would not have been realistic to expect Ryan to say anything that resembled an apology prior to now, because he had court proceedings, then legal appeals, pending before him.

Which means he had a legal responsibility to shut up and let the court activity run its course.

But now? Ryan says his, “goal is to do the right thing, no matter how tardy or flawed.”

Somehow, I don’t see the president or the public at-large buying it. For Ryan’s sake, I only hope he survives long enough to see Independence Day of 2013 – which is the date he is tentatively scheduled for release from prison.

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EDITOR’S NOTES: Some people think that showing any sympathy for George Ryan is a sign (http://www.suntimes.com/news/commentary/1322545,editorial-ryan-no-commute-sentence-121008.article) that Rod Blagojevich may also get undeserved sympathy some day.

He’s sorry. (http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?section=news/local&id=6553141) He’s really, really sorry.

Ryan’s so-called allies among conservatives and Republicans have always been his most-outspoken (http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/12/10/opinion/main4660712.shtml) critics when it comes to the long-shot concept of George W. Bush granting him some form of clemency.

What will “43” do about “16627-424?”

It is amazing to me to see the sheer number of Illinois political people who are piling on the list of people who don’t want George Bush to do a thing that could be perceived as sympathy for former Gov. George Ryan.

Much has been made of the fact that Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill., sent a letter to the outgoing president asking that he consider a commutation of Ryan’s prison sentence from 6 ½ years to the just over one year that he has already served. Gov. Rod Blagojevich has also said he would not be offended if Ryan were to be set free.

YET THOSE TWO are about the only public officials who are willing to consider the concept that Ryan may have suffered enough for his offense – which amounted to trying to ignore the fact that his staffers in the motor vehicles department were shaking down truck drivers for bribes.

For all the people who want to keep screaming “Willis family” and “dead kids,” we have to accept the reality that the truck driver who got his commercial driver’s license by paying a bribe acted at a level that was so far removed from Ryan. People who want to imply that George Ryan personally killed those kids (a line of rhetoric I have often heard from Ryan critics) need to consider how ridiculous they sound.

Yet the vehemence of those Ryan critics is making many people afraid to get on board a Ryan bandwagon.

Who seriously believes George W. Bush, whose record shows him to be stingy when it comes to granting clemency, will consider early release for George Ryan. Photograph provided by the White House.

In recent days, we’ve heard from the Illinois attorney general, and just about every member of Congress (including the newly elected Rep. Debbie Halvorson, D-Ill., who is the representative whose district includes Ryan’s hometown of Kankakee).

WE’VE EVEN HEARD from the chairman of the Illinois Republican Party, urging that Ryan not get any sympathy. Rep. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., has also been a particularly outspoken GOP critic of commutation for Ryan, as has DuPage County State’s Attorney Joe Birkett – who is likely to be at the top of the GOP ticket in the 2010 elections.

In fact, I can’t help but wonder what it says that the only officials willing to back Ryan are Democrats, while Ryan’s so-called political allies in the Republican Party have all turned against him.

It is the reason I will always be convinced that the reason many people are really ticked off about Ryan is because of his activities as governor related to the death penalty, which were done because the General Assembly back then tried to ignore the issue – even though it was clear that the system in Illinois was a mess.

Many of his critics really wish they could have him in prison for “freeing criminals” (which is how they perceive his commutations of death row inmate sentences, even though most of them remain in prison to this day). They are willing to play politics with labels such as “Willis family” if it means he can be punished.

IT’S PROBABLY CLEAR that I think (as I have written previously) it would not be an abomination if Ryan were to be released from prison in the near future. I honestly believe he has been broken as low as one can go.

For those people who need Ryan to suffer a death in prison to feel a sense of justice, that kind of thought just strikes me as being ghoulish and a twisted notion of what constitutes justice.

Yet the outspoken nature of Ryan’s critics has many political people scared to the point where they seem to be racing each other to see who can make the first, and most fiery, condemnation of Illinois’ one-time governor.

Ultimately, the reason all of this strikes me as overkill is that I am convinced George W. Bush will NEVER seriously consider granting commutation (although I have noticed that many people who oppose positive activity for Ryan insist on calling it a pardon).

IN FACT, BUSH’S spokeswoman earlier this week (who once was a reporter intern at the Statehouse in Springfield, Ill., with the CBS affiliate in Champaign) confirmed that Durbin’s letter to the president had been received, and that he would consider activity on pardons before leaving office next month – even though Durbin never asked for a pardon (which clears a record, commutation merely releases him from prison) for Ryan.

Could this be similar to prosecutors in death penalty cases who try to scare juries into approving a death sentence by implying that the defendant could someday be free – even though in death penalty cases, the options are death or life without parole?

That actually has been seen as legitimate cause to overturn a death sentence on appeal. I can’t help but think the fact that some people are trying to scare Bush by implying a pardon is being sought ought to be taken into account in Ryan’s favor.

But like I wrote before, I don’t think Bush will grant a pardon, commutation or anything else. I think he will leave the governor who tried to make an issue out of the death penalty (a measure used to massive overkill while Bush was a Texas governor) in prison.

KEEP IN MIND that Ryan’s activities caused national embarrassment for his GOP colleagues (as did his visits to Cuba to meet with Fidel Castro to talk about trade). Why else would only a few Democrats be willing to show sympathy for Ryan?

George W. Bush will have his own controversy with regard to pardons and clemency when he tries to use his final days in office to show compassion to political allies. I don’t think he’s going to be willing to take on criticism by dealing with Ryan, when he’s going to get his share of abuse for showing sympathy to people like Michael Milken and the people who might someday face criminal charges for their military activity (including torture) at Abu Ghraib.

Insofar as the concept that the next president might look more favorably upon Ryan, I don’t think that would happen.

Not only has President-elect Barack Obama refused to say anything about this issue (which is correct, since clemency is a personal issue and Bush should be allowed to set his own terms for granting it), but by the time a President Obama would be in a position to consider clemency for Ryan, the former governor would have virtually finished completion of his prison term.

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EDITOR’S NOTES: I don’t know if I agree with this columnist, who seems to believe (http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/columnists.nsf/patgauen/story/E8015292AD2182538625751500107E21?OpenDocument) that George Ryan could be released from prison just before Inauguration Day.

Dick Durbin seems to be about the only member of Illinois’ delegation on Capitol Hill who has a nice word (http://www.southtownstar.com/news/1315434,120508ryan.article) about the former governor.

People trying seriously to figure out to whom George W. Bush might show a last-minute (http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&refer=columnist_woolner&sid=a5d6rDFL9ILk) dose of clemency aren’t wasting much time thinking about Ryan.

Without a jolt of presidential clemency, Ryan is looking to be released from prison on (http://tinyurl.com/5olmfw) on Independence Day, 2013.