Loyola/Michigan basketball becomes the battle of the deli sandwiches

Just in case anybody had doubts about how significant the Loyola vs. Michigan semi-final game in the NCAA Men’s basketball tourney is to Chicago, we have the latest bit of evidence.

Manny's gets free publicity from latest sporting bet

It’s VERY significant, because the mayors feel compelled to turn it into a sporting bet.

AS IN ONE of those things where the mayor of Chicago feels compelled to defend the honor of the Second City against that of the other city. Which in this case is Ann Arbor, Mich.

And in which case, each of the mayors puts up some food item supposedly significant to the respective city. Somebody supposedly will get to do some good eatin’ depending on who manages to prevail in Saturday’s game that leads up to the NCAA championship game scheduled for Monday.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel is willing to buy corned beef and pastrami from Manny’s Deli and send it off to Ann Arbor IF Loyola’s “Cinderella” surprise team finally meets its match to Big 10 powerhouse Michigan.

But if it turns out that Loyola prevails and winds up playing in the championship game against the winner of Kansas/Villanova, then Ann Arbor Mayor Christopher Taylor will be sending sandwiches to City Hall from Zingerman’s Deli.

SPECIFICALLY, THE GEORGIA Reuben sandwich – which I’m told is turkey, cheese and cole slaw served on rye bread and slathered with Russian dressing.

It doesn’t sound appetizing to me (something about thick, creamy salad dressings is a turnoff), but I’m told by various University of Michigan alumni that it is a big deal – and something many of them crave when they think back to their collegiate days.

Will Chi win piles of Georgia Reubens?

I’ll have to admit to thinking this particular political bet is a little more intriguing than most. Usually, our public officials manage to put up a generic list of food products that they claim is associated with Chicago.

I remember back in the days of Richard M. Daley as mayor, the bets usually produced something resembling a grocery list that only Chicago-oriented geeks would ever think of buying.

TURNING THE WHOLE spectacle into little more than a marketing ploy – free advertising for Chicago-based companies. Rather than something that anybody with a real sporting interest would have put together.

I’m certainly glad to learn that Chicago isn’t offering to send pizzas to some other city so as to show off the superiority of the local product compared to whatever Little Caesar’s-like product the other city thinks is edible.

Largely because too many Chicagoans can’t agree on what a “real” pizza consists of, or how its slices should be cut (party-style into squares, I argue, and certainly not into triangles that one folds over. That’s playing with one’s food, rather than eating it).

Anything we’d send to another city would create a local conflict over whether we truly sent our best representative of pizza. Unless you’re so convinced that the Chicago-oriented ball club will prevail and we won’t have to send anything!

SO WHAT SHOULD we think of this bet? I like the part where the mayors also say they’ll make a contribution to the charity of the winning city’s choice. Which probably says more than the shipping of sandwiches.

Although to get within the spirit of the event, let’s say that Loyola manages to defeat number 3-seeded Michigan (Loyola’s ranked 11^th) and takes on the Kansas/Villanova winner.

Do we get to see our public officials make another bet? I can’t think of anything edible in either of those places. Particularly from anything in and around Lawrence, Kan.

Is this the ultimate Loyola over Villanova prize?

But if it became a matchup between Loyola and Villanova, would we get an Italian beef vs. Philly cheesesteak brawl? If so, we all know the superiority of a “hot, dipped combo” over any gooey mess that becomes a cheesesteak.

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Are voters in places like Bolingbrook really rebelling against the Trumpsters?

The political pundits are desperately trying to analyze the electorate – is it a plus, or a minus, to be perceived as backing Donald Trump.

TRUMP: Is it really all about him?

There were those special elections held this week to fill Congressional vacancies in Georgia and Kansas, and Dem political operatives are eager to see signs of future victory – even though Democratic Party candidates didn’t win in either place.

WE’RE HEARING TALK of strategic victories because they showed Democratic candidates can be competitive in districts that typically lean Republican because there is great uncertainty about the stability of the Trump administration.

In the Georgia election (the Atlanta suburbs, to be exact), the Democrat actually came close to winning outright a bid to replace a Republican congressman who gave up the seat to become a Trump cabinet member. A runoff election will decide the outcome.

While in Kansas, Republican Ron Estes will be sworn in to his new post later this month.

These particular areas are political districts that lean so typically Republican that they’re usually not the kind of places that Democrats spend time trying to win elections. Meaning that areas where Democrats are more competitive are more likely to provide Dem victories in future elections.

OR AT LEAST that’s the analysis the Washington Post gave to the two elections on Wednesday.

Yes, we’re getting the political fantasies of a 2018 election cycle in which the national electorate repudiates Donald J. Trump and sticks him with at least a Democrat-led House of Representatives – if not an entire Dem Congress!

That would be hysterical to watch, because you just know Trump would go ballistic nearly every day if he had a government with the authority to be openly defiant of his absurd whims. As it is, what makes the current government scary is that it is more than willing to indulge Trump’s whims, so long as they reinforce their own authority within the federal government.

But strategic wins aren’t wins unless you actually get more votes!

WHICH MAY BE the lesson we learn from the recent Bolingbrook mayoral election. That’s the suburb in Will County where the mayor, Roger Claar, had to go shooting off his mouth last year about how wonderful Donald Trump was.

He even went so far as to organize a Trump fundraiser for Trump at a time when Illinois Republican political operatives were desperately trying to avoid having anything to do with The Donald. His opponent was a commissioner on the Will County Board, and she used Trump against Claar big-time during her campaign.

Finally, this week, all the provisional ballots were counted and we can now say definitively that Claar won re-election to a ninth term in office with 151 more votes than his challenger.

So is the lesson to be learned here that Claar probably would have had an overwhelming victory (in the past, he has often ran unopposed) if he had only eased up on the Trump talk and kept his support down to merely voting for him?

I KNOW SOME political operatives have tried claiming similar lessons from Claar’s case as they’re now trying to see in the congressional elections – there are significant numbers of voters who feel contempt for the current occupant of the White House who can be used to support candidates who oppose the thought of the Trumpster.

But as noted earlier, we don’t have Democratic victories in Georgia or Kansas. And I’m pretty sure Claar is going to forevermore think of this election cycle as the one in which he had to endure some political harassment, but came out ahead in the end.

Could it be that in the end, people will put aside their distaste for the president and not let it impact their future votes? Or are too apathetic to get that worked up?

It’s all about the spin one wants to put on the issue. Actual truth gets lost in the shuffle.

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Governing by executive order; does it mean ‘Shut up and do what you’re told’

How far removed are we from the old days when we had government officials who seriously tried to reach a consensus amongst the electorate on the great issues of our day?

It seems that everybody is choosing to govern these days by executive order, as in permitting the chief executive to issue orders that impose one’s will – regardless of whether there is a serious opposition to that stance.

NOW I KNOW the ideologues who are conservatively motivated amongst us will claim the chief practitioner of this style is President Barack Obama himself – what with the way he’s trying to force something to be done to address the bureaucratic mess that is our nation’s immigration policy.

He has had to use such powers because the Republican political people in Congress have made it clear they are determined to do nothing on this issue.

But while we technically now have an immigration policy that tries to acknowledge that we shouldn’t be thinking in terms of deporting the roughly 11 million individuals now suspected of living in this country without either citizenship or a valid visa, we need to realize it is fleeting.

As is evidenced by the recent activity in Kansas, where Gov. Sam Brownback issued a pair of executive orders for that state – one of which was solely to rescind the executive order that was imposed eight years ago by then-Gov. Kathleen Sebelius.

THAT WAS THE order extending civil rights protections to state government employees based on sexual orientation. Sebelius wanted to ensure that state employees would not be discriminated against if they were gay.

Brownback wants to ensure to the ideologues who support him politically that they don’t have to take any such attitude into consideration when they act on behalf of state government.

As has been pointed out by some observers, a state university professor who was gay woke up one day with certain legal protections, and by the time he went home from work that day, the protections were gone!

Brownback, in his statement, made a point of saying only the Legislature should be able to enact such changes, similar to the ideologues who are claiming only the now-Republican Congress can act in a lasting manner on immigration matters.

WHICH IS VERY realistic to say. Because the reality is that political partisanship is a cyclical matter. It is only a matter of time before a different president comes into power and decides to instantly eliminate the immigration protections that Obama has provided for certain newcomers to our country.

Because the Senate currently is stuck in a mode by which certain members of the GOP majority there are determined to make a stink about immigration. Protections provided by executive order are just too insufficient to amount to anything.

What gay people in Kansas now are going through is going to be the status of immigration across the country if lasting change isn’t made.

All of this is relevant in Illinois as well, because of the way in which new Gov. Bruce Rauner has issued several executive orders this week to impose many ideas he knows are going to be politically unpopular.

MOST RECENTLY, THERE was his desire for government “consolidation” that he says is inspired by DuPage County Chairman Dan Cronin – as in cutting government agencies and positions currently filled by people who might be politically opposed to his ideas – much of which are meant to bolster the interests of big business over those of the people.


He also is trying to use executive order powers to inhibit the finances of labor unions representing state employees, although the people who oppose that concept surely are happy that Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan has already said the governor can't tamper with the union dues withheld from worker salaries and state Comptroller Leslie Munger has said she will follow Madigan's legal advice.


These are two of among 15 orders he’s already managed to issue during his month in office. It will be intriguing to see how the Democratic-controlled General Assembly responds, and if we get the same type of tactics that Congress is usingto try to undo Obama’s immigration desires. Or will there simply be a waiting game for a future date when a new governor can instantly erase everything Rauner is doing now with a few swipes of the “executive order” pen?

Regardless of how one views the issues, you have to admit that this level of instability and lack of any lasting public policy IS the real problem our governments face today!

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