"Boooooo!" Will governor listen, or just write it off as a batch of cranks?

It shouldn’t be a surprise to anybody that Gov. Bruce Rauner received a negative response when he showed up at Chicago State University on Thursday.
 

RAUNER: Chanting 'Bruuuuce'? Not likely!

For Thursday was Commencement Day. Some 650 students at the South Side-based state college graduated. They had their moment in cap and gown, their chance to walk across a stage and be handed a diploma. Their ability to saw for now and forever that they are college graduates.

SO WHAT DID they think when they saw that the governor was on the program? That he was to make some opening remarks – which lasted just under two minutes.

He was boo’ed. He was taunted by the crowd at the urban-oriented university. If one goes to the Internet and watches many of the videos that people felt compelled to shoot with their personal devices, then post publicly, one can hear choice obscenities being shouted out at the Bruce who will NEVER be mistaken for Springsteen.

I found one Internet commenter who posted a statement saying she wished the student body had not been so vocally disrespectful. She would have preferred that everybody stand up and turn their backs on the governor while he spoke; similar to what happened earlier this week to Education Secretary Betsy DeVos when she gave a commencement speech at Bethune-Cookman University in Daytona Beach, Fla.

Which to me sounds like a lame gesture of pretending not to listen – about as lame as those Chicago Cubs fans who think they’re somehow making a point when they throw back baseballs hit into the Wrigley Field bleachers for home runs by visiting team players.

BUT IT SHOULDN’T shock anybody that people at Chicago State feel contempt for the governor whom they perceive as playing politics with the state funding for their education just to try to undermine the impact that labor unions have within state government.

It probably is true that many of the newly-minted college graduates would love to get some sort of job where they could have the benefits of one of those unions.

Plus there’s the fact that Chicago State’s financial situation is more precarious than any of the other state universities across Illinois whose future status is uncertain due to the budgetary stalemate that has lasted for nearly two state fiscal years and could continue indefinitely.

In 150 years of existence, one heckled governor

Chicago State is the college that caters to the urban segment of Chicago and does have an overwhelming African-American enrollment (which is why black politicos often pay special attention to the school and take anything negative as a personal slight).

CHICAGO STATE IS the school that had to lay off several hundred faculty and staff and where there was speculation at one point that they might not be able to complete the 2016-17 academic year.

Which means in one regard, it ought to be regarded as an accomplishment that the school year is now complete and the students got their assorted degrees. It would have been a serious blow if they had paid several years of tuition monies only to have the end result be “no degree.”

If that had happened, a few “boos” would have been the least of hostilities that Rauner would have deservedly received.

In fact, it’s a wonder that Rauner doesn’t get boo’ed and heckled more often whenever he sets foot in places across Illinois – particularly the Chicago-area, where Rauner seems more than willing to engage in tactics meant to stir up resentment in the rest of Illinois to the two-thirds of the state population that calls the Second City and its suburbs home.

SO YES, I feel compelled to say at this time some 30 years after I had my collegiate graduate ritual to offer some congratulations to the newly-minted grads of Chicago State; who at the very least can now say they accomplished something by finishing the process of getting a degree.

In fact, Rauner in his brief comments may have said it best by stating, “It doesn’t matter who you are, where you came from, what your interests are – if you have a strong education, there is no limit to what you can do.”

I’m sure some conservative ideologues are going to be anxious to bad-mouth those students for their disrespect.

But perhaps Camp Rauner ought to give some thought to trying to figure out why the newly-minted Cougar alumni felt so upset as to taunt the governor, rather than just silently sitting through a dry ritual while awaiting that night’s graduation party!

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The Yanks are coming? Will A-Rod be with them? Or will we settle for “C.J.”

The Rodriguez fans despise

The arrival of the New York Yankees in Chicago each season is always a moment of excitement – sometimes the highlight of a baseball season.

Yet it has been just over a decade (the Yankees' first ball game after the World Trade Towers incident of 
Sept. 11, 2001 was in Chicago against the White Sox) since anyone nationally was paying attention to the activity at U.S. Cellular Field just because of the presence of the Bronx Bombers.

THE YANKEES ARE in town this week for a three-game series beginning Monday against the Chicago White Sox. Our city’s Sox are struggling to avoid 100 losses, while the Yanks are coping with severe injuries to so many key players that it’s a wonder they have a winning record these days.

The Rodriguez fans used to love

But the reason the Yankees’ arrival in town is a big deal is because of the third baseman Alex Rodriguez – who has been one of the injured. He has yet to play a single game for the Yankees this season. Although in recent days, he has been undergoing minor league therapy in Trenton, N.J., and theoretically could play his first major league game on Monday.

Which could mean the White Sox faithful (along with the Midwestern-based Yankees fans who make their one visit to “the Cell” when they come to town) will get to see Rodriguez – and heckle him unmercifully.

Do Yankees fans want to crop him out?

We could be treated to the spectacle this week (my brother, Chris, and I will be at the stadium for Tuesday’s game) of Chicago showing its contempt for Rodriguez at its most intense level.

THEN AGAIN, MAYBE we won’t.

Because Rodriguez is one of a few ballplayers who are suspected of using certain chemical substances to enhance their strength and make themselves appear to be better ballplayers than they would otherwise be.

But officials say that Rodriguez’ involvement, and efforts to cover up, may be at a higher level. Which is why the speculation is that Rodriguez will be suspended on Monday for the remainder of 2013 and the entire 2014 season.

The beginning of the big-money era

If it turns out that Rodriguez is able to play on Monday (the speculation Sunday is that he will appeal his penalty, and will be allowed to play while the appeal is pending), he’s in for a hellish experience. Although I suspect even if he’s not able to play, the fans who turn out on Monday (and to lesser levels Tuesday and Wednesday) will make their level of contempt known.

THERE’S NO WAY to shut up a sports fan who feels compelled to boo and razz someone!

I’ll be honest. When I’m at the ballgame, I’m probably going to be more focused on the level of intensity expressed against Rodriguez than I will be on the game itself.

The Yankees may be able to boost their quality of play this month and next and still qualify for a playoff spot (that’s more likely than the White Sox being able to turn 2013 into a season with a winning record). But it likely is a “lost” season for both ball clubs.

The heckling level will be more memorable than the game itself. Although considering it will be the first ballgame I’ve made it out to this season, it will still be a pleasurable experience just for being live baseball.

SO THE YANKS are coming. Oft-injured shortstop Derek Jeter is likely to be in the lineup on Monday – after having sat out a weekend series against the San Diego Padres. We’ll get to see former Chicago Cub Alfonso Soriano, who is trying to show that his Cub-like quality of play was a fluke. A victory or two this week would be the highlight of the White Sox'  season!

Coming back to the old neighborhood

Although the most memorable thing may well be center fielder Curtis “C.J.” Granderson – a Chicago-area native who plays for New York, but plans to spend some time this week with kids in suburban Lansing and Lynwood just to promote their interest in baseball as a game.

Considering how much of the contempt level felt by baseball fans for Rodriguez is because of his record-setting contract, it is nice to see at least one ballplayer who hasn’t forgotten where he comes from and is willing to give something back to his home community.

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Too many people trying to translate heckles about a distant election

Excuse me for not being impressed with the people who are trying to interpret Friday’s Grant Park rally for the Chicago Blackhawks as evidence of how much we can’t stand Gov. Pat Quinn.

QUINN: Do we hate him, or all pols?

Yes, it’s true! The governor -- who shouldn't have gotten any more involved than placing a bet with the Massachusetts governor -- was given a chance to say a few words while also being seen wearing some sort of red-and-black garb (including a Blackhawks cap) to give him a moment of glory with the Stanley Cup trophy.

AND YES, IT’S true that the people at the rally (perhaps as many as 2 million) behaved like Homer Simpson in thinking he had “the right, no the duty, to make a complete ass of myself” while in a large sports-related crowd.

It’s a good thing they didn’t follow the other Homer Simpson rule about sports; “It’s not whether you win or lose, it’s how drunk you get.”

The bottom line is that any political person who shows up at a sports event is going to get booed. Only part of it is an expression of political opposition.

Much of it is the fact that the people on hand want to see a ballgame. Or on Friday, cheer on a championship team. Anyone who doesn’t actually play for the Blackhawks was going to get booed.

THE LAST THING anybody wanted to see or hear was a government official.

EMANUEL: Slipped in, and out, of rally unscathed

Which is why I couldn’t help but notice the fact that the Capital Fax newsletter pointed out the fact that when Mayor Rahm Emanuel made his brief comments at the rally, he just went up to the microphone and spoke.

Unlike Quinn, who received an introduction to the Grant Park masses!

Considering how far most of those people attending the rally were from the stage, I suspect most people had no clue that Rahm was Rahm – at least not until after it was too late to boo and any heckling would have seemed to have been directed at a professional athlete.

WHICH ON FRIDAY would have appeared to be downright uncouth!

MADIGAN: Will he stay, or will he go

It’s just one of those unwritten rules about when it is appropriate to heckle a political person. In fact, about the only time I can ever recall a politician NOT being booed at a sports-related rally was last autumn when Emanuel appeared at Mount Carmel High School to help celebrate the Woodlawn neighborhood school’s state championship in high school football.

Although I suspect it was more the presence of Catholic brothers who would have cracked down on any students who misbehaved. Perhaps that was what Quinn needed to prevent himself from being heckled – some clergy from his own alma mater, Fenwick High School, to provide crowd “control.”

Not that Quinn’s appearance was the only prognosticating on Friday. The Chicago Sun-Times came up with a pair of stories attempting to downplay the chances of potential Quinn challenger Lisa Madigan of being successful in next year’s gubernatorial primary.

DALEY: Benefits if Quinn and Madigan fail

LONG-TIME POLITICAL OPERATIVE David Axelrod told the City Club of Chicago that he thinks it will be an obstacle to her campaign if her father, Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago, refuses to step aside from his long-time (three decades-plus) post.

Which is what another candidate, William Daley, wanted us to think when he made public his own poll results earlier this month that said people would not vote for her because of her father.

I kind of admired the Illinois attorney general’s response to all this – telling the Sun-Times at an EMILY’s List event in Chicago that she’s NOT going to be the one to tell her father that it’s time to leave the Legislature. “I’m not going to give my father political advice,” she told the newspaper.

MADIGAN: Not about to tell father, 'it's time to go'

All of this makes me suspicious of the people who want us to believe. They’re too eager to campaign for something we’re not going to be asked to vote for until March of next year.

IT MAKES ME want to dig out the earplugs to try to avoid all the rancid rhetoric we’re going to get in coming months.

Too many people are trying to put this thought into our heads – as though we’re supposed to dismiss her before the campaign gets seriously underway. Just like the same kind of people who want us to discredit Quinn because he got booed.

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