EXTRA: ¿La segunda guerra civil?

It shouldn’t be a shock – our society’s demographics are changing, and some people are determined to ensure that nothing changes.

Let's hope that rallies such as these don't devolve … 

It’s the most obvious explanation for why a certain segment of our society supports Donald Trump, no matter how moronic his behavior as president is or becomes an embarrassment to all of us.

SO THE RESULTS of a series of polls that came out this week shouldn’t be a surprise.

Yes, the growing Latino population of our nation is grossly offended by Trump, and his behavior threatens to cause harm to the political backing they might otherwise have been expected to provide to Republicans, at-large.

Yet it also seems true there are those people who don’t give a rat’s culo about that. They see their continued support for Trump as a way of fighting back against what they would view as a “takeover” of our society.

Take the Morning Consult poll for the Politico newspaper, which found that 51 percent of those surveyed actually approved of the notion of mass raids in large cities across the country to get “those frickin’ foreigners” out of the country.

YES, ONLY 11 percent of those who call themselves Democrats strongly supported the idea, but some 46 percent of those people who refuse to pick a party label also favored the action – which withered away into a nothingness that did little but scare up a segment of our society.

… to gruesome carnage such as this of a century-and-a-half ago?

But then there were the polls done by Miami-based Latino Decisions, which found 51 percent of Latinos think that racism against the Spanish-speaking enclave of our society is a “major” problem, while another 35 percent think it’s “somewhat” of a problem.

And as for the statement, “I am frustrated with how President Trump and his allies treat immigrants and Latinos, and I worry that it will get worse if Trump is re-elected,” only 11 percent of Latinos surveyed did NOT agree.We definitely don’t see eye to eye – the segments of our society whose ethnic origins lie in Latin America and those who are of Irish/Scottish mix but would insist on use of the “real Americans” label to describe themselves.

We definitely don’t see eye to eye – the segments of our society whose ethnic origins lie in Latin America and those who are of Irish/Scottish mix but would insist on use of the “real Americans” label to describe themselves.

The ultimate Trump legacy?

THE FACT IS that the national outcome ultimately will be a “numbers” game – similar to how the original U.S. Civil War outcome ultimately came down to a matter of the Union North having some 20 million people and the Confederate South having only half as many – with some 4 million of those being the slaves whom the South didn’t want to regard as full-fledged human beings.

Considering that many of the people now determined to revere the memory of that Confederacy of old are the same ones eager to embrace Donald Trump, it would seem that some of us haven’t learned. Or are determined to fight the same ol’ battles.

Still peaceful, for now

Which is the real shame befalling us as a society. I’m optimistic enough to think the day will come when those of us who will be the descendants of Trump-ites will wonder how they could ever have been deluded enough to believe such nonsense.

Or how much of our lives were wasted away by our inability to see past our differences?

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A Rauner-like re-do come 2020?

Those of us paying attention will remember the Republican primary for governor in 2018 – the one where incumbent Bruce Rauner narrowly defeated his challenger, state Sen. Jeanne Ives of Wheaton, but was left so weakened that Democrat J.B. Pritzker easily cleaned his clock come the general election.

RAUNER: Will we relive 2018 GOP primary?

Well, guess what! It seems we’re going to get a replay, of sorts, come 2020. Or at least those people who live in the Illinois 6^th Congressional district will.

THOSE ARE THE people of suburban DuPage County who for many years were represented in Congress by Henry Hyde, and whose district was considered the very base of the Republican Party in Illinois.

But as one of the ultimate bits of evidence that the Illinois GOP is not really the “Party of Lincoln” of tradition any longer, the district picked Sean Casten, a Democrat, to be their Congressman in last year’s election.

Which means Republicans are viewing dumping Casten from office as one of their political priorities, and the list of people willing to use the Republican banner to campaign on is developing.

Rauner’s lieutenant governor running mate, Evelyn Sanguinetti, already has expressed interest in the post. She’s a Wheaton native who once served on the City Council, prior to Rauner tapping her as his potential backup – had something happened to him while in office.

IVES: Rehashing Rauner trashing?

WHICH COULD TURN out to be the campaign where Sanguinetti goes out of her way to claim that Rauner was never fully appreciated by Illinoisans – and how her political victory could be a sign of redemption.

So perhaps it is all too appropriate that Sanguinetti has a primary election challenger she will have to beat before she can get to campaigning against Casten.

It’s none other than Jeanne Ives herself – the woman who repeatedly bashed about Rauner and claimed he was way too liberal for Illinois. Even though the bulk of Illinois voters ultimately voted for governor in ways indicating hey thought she was too conservative for our state.

Does this mean the congressional primary next year will wind up as a replay of the Republican gubernatorial primary? Even though now Ives’ operatives are circulating a poll trying to figure out how she’d stand up against Casten in a general election.

SANGUINETTI: Defending her former superior?

ARE WE GOING to hear a defense of The Rauner Years from Sanguinetti, countered with constant repeats of the Rauner bashing that Ives engaged in last year – with constant reminders that Sanguinetti is little more than a Rauner lackey?

Will Ives think that using the 2020 primary to try to beat Rauner’s running mate is a way of rewriting history – creating the perception that SHE was the real winner in the long run?

I’m sure Sanguinetti backers (are their any?) will try to claim she’s an independent persona in her own right. But her lieutenant governorship was very low key – as are most lieutenant governors. She’s not going to have a lot of independent government achievements to tout.

Making it far too easy for her to be dubbed as Rauner-lite by Ives. Who herself will easily be tagged with a label of just another ideological loon who can’t accept the fact that the majority of Illinois thinks she’s wrong!

THERE IS ONE positive to the idea of a Sanguinetti/Ives matchup in the Illinois 6^th Republican primary – this will be limited to the land of DuPage, rather than the entirety of Illinois as was last year’s gubernatorial primary.

CASTEN: An easier-than-expected re-election in 2020?

We won’t all be subjected to the rounds of nonsense rhetoric a second time. Then again, I suspect the overwhelming majority of Cook County (which accounts for nearly half of Illinois’ population) voters focused on the Democratic primary and didn’t pay much attention to Rauner/Ives to begin with.

Which could make Sean Casten, a resident of suburban Downers Grove, the ultimate winner.

The Sanguinetti/Ives primary could get so vicious rhetorically that they beat each other silly. Leaving each other all bloodied politically to the point that Casten doesn’t get anywhere near as intense a challenge for his re-election as Republican political operatives dream of giving him next year.

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'Mayor Lori' versus 'Boss Toni' could be awkward pairing for next four years

Preckwinkle won't disappear just because … 

Just a thought for those people who are thinking of voting for Lori Lightfoot to be mayor out of a belief that such an act will drive the political party boss Toni Preckwinkle into retirement.

Not only does she retain her Cook County Board presidential post if she loses, she also remains as chairwoman of the Cook County Democratic Party.

… Lightfoot manages to become mayor

MEANING IF LIGHTFOOT does manage to prevail in the April 2 run-off election, she’d have to deal with Preckwinkle as competition on two fronts. And with “Boss” Toni as party chair, she’d have to be capable of showing some sort of respect toward her.

Unless she literally wants to have the party hacks all ganging up on her mayorality in ways that would be reminiscent of the Harold Washington era. Because for all the symbolism of being the city’s first black mayor, it could be argued that he didn’t accomplish much of lasting value because of how early into a second term he died.

If anything, the Washington era was historic for the way in which the city got bogged down in partisan (as in racial) politics; it wasn’t a big plus for Chicago.

That doesn’t necessarily mean I’m saying Toni Preckwinkle is going to turn into some version of Edward R. Vrdolyak; going out of his way to thwart anything that Harold Washington tried to accomplish as mayor.

BUT THIS IS partisan politics. Anybody who thinks they’re going to “get tough” with Toni by having a symbolic Lightfoot smack her around ought to accept that she’s just as capable of fighting back.

And not just with her first campaign advertising spot – the one that basically implies she’s a “corporate lawyer” with ties to Republican politicos.

Personally, I’m not sure what to think of Lightfoot. Other than the fact she has been a federal prosecutorial-type and one-time Police Board member, she doesn’t have a government background to run on.

Could we get partisan brawl reminiscent of 80s?

Which allows many of the people currently backing her (including many of the North Lakefront types) capable of defining her to their desires – not necessarily by who she really is.

WE COULD WIND up very surprised by what a Lightfoot mayorality turns into. Whereas I’m inclined to think that a Preckwinkle mayorality is exactly who she has been during her time as an alderman from Hyde Park and as a county board president.

I’m thinking these thoughts based on a recent poll I saw – the results of which say that Lightfoot is leading Preckwinkle by roughly a 2-1 voter margin. As in this election could turn into a butt-whuppin’ of the sorts that Daleys usually administered throughout the years to the people who had the nerve to challenge them.

But it is early in the process. We still have nearly a month for various factors to come into play for people to make up their minds – particularly since the election last week showed two-thirds of those who voted didn’t want either Lightfoot or Preckwinkle as mayor.

Meaning I’m not sure what we should be thinking in terms of which of these two is the front-runner.

THERE ARE THOSE who think that some establishment types, particularly those who wanted William Daley to be in the run-off election running will back Preckwinkle. Because, or so the thinking goes, that one of the people who’d be in the running to replace her as county president would be John Daley.

Could there be a Daley family win?

As in a Daley brother – and another son of the one-time mayor Richard J. – the last person who was both mayor and party chairman simultaneously. The real establishment types would have wanted a “Mayor” Daley, but may settle for having the county board presidency.

Of course, the thought of that happening may well scare some voters into picking Lightfoot just so that the Preckwinkle post doesn’t become vacant for another Daley to have.

Which could result in Chicago politics becoming a Lightfoot/Preckwinkle brawl between mayoral opponents for the next month, and between “Mayor Lori” and “Boss Toni” for the next four years!

  -30-

Election Night could turn out to be an electoral educational experience

I’ll be the first to admit I pay far too much attention to the details by which we elect people to political office. But it still always manages to shock me a bit the degree to which the voters don’t truly comprehend the way our system works.

Signs like these will be in abundance on Tuesday

It takes the off-beat Election Nights in order to get people to see all the ways in which things can go haywire. And then, their usual reaction is to complain about how someone must be behaving corruptly.

IT CAN’T JUST be the complications of counting up all the ballots that the electorate manages to cast – as though they think we’re entitled to have an accurate computation of the ballots within minutes of the polls closing! Anything else must be the result of someone ‘cooking’ the books – most likely to benefit the corrupt ‘Machine’ candidates.

Even though the days of the old “Machine politics” in Chicago really is dead and buried. If things really were that rigidly controlled by the establishment, there’s no way we’d have 14 candidates running for mayor on Tuesday, and the potential for chaos that we could see.

What’s at stake is the fact that we have so many candidates and the likelihood that no one is going to take an overwhelming count of the vote in their favor.

Which means this is an election that will be so close, we’re likely to see absentee ballots – those people who fill out their form at home and send them in through the U.S. Postal Service to the Board of Elections – come into play.

ELECTIONS BOARD OFFICIALS admit some 63,000 such ballots have been requested, with only 26,000 of them having been sent back in by Monday.

That makes for some 37,000 people contemplating filing their ballot by mail, but literally waiting until the absolute last minute before submitting it. Which according to the law, is Tuesday. The ballots have to be put in the mail box in time so they can get a Tuesday, Feb. 26 post mark. Which means they won’t even be received by city officials until week’s end.

Or, if you’re in a particularly sarcastic mode of thought, some time next month – if the Postal Service lives up to its usual standards of pokey delivery time.

A touch of privacy, while ensuring poll watchers can see no illicit activity

Meaning it would be downright irresponsible for anybody to think that the election tallies available to be counted Tuesday night will be the final outcome. There’s bound to be a cluster of candidates crammed at the top of the vote tallies so as to make it unrealistic to say just who the Top Two vote getters will be.

YOU ALSO JUST know that whoever finishes third or fourth is bound to clutch to the belief that all the mail-in ballots will contain enough voter support to push them over the top and into the run-off election to be held April 2.

It’s going to be oh, so strange for those people who tune into a 9 p.m. television newscast Tuesday expecting to learn who won – only to be told it might be too close to call.

They won’t want to understand, because they’ve become too used to expecting Election Night results by then – with candidates making victory or concession speeches during the 9 p.m. hour, and thinking of anyone who refuses to make such a statement by then as being some sort of sore loser who just can’t face reality.

When the reality really is this can be a complex process to ensure that all votes are properly counted. It will take time. That could be the lesson of Election 2019 – just as Election 2000 was the one that made many of us realize just how easily it was for a ballot to be tampered with to the point of being uncountable.

REMEMBER ALL THE talk of “hanging chads?” And how repulsed the "W." Bush people were that they couldn't immediately celebrate their political victory -- trying concoct scenarios in which none-other-than Bill Daley himself was trying to stead a "win" away from them?

I still do, and must admit that what through me for a loop was that many people weren’t more fully aware of this. Just as I’m sure now many really expect all the hundreds of thousands of voters who cast ballots Tuesday can all be fully accounted for within an hour or two.

Just an example of the off-beat locations pressed into polling place duty

There is, however, one plus. If it really takes a couple of weeks before we can be sure exactly who won Tuesday and by how much, it’s going to mean that the run-off election is coming to come up on us right away.

There just won’t be that much time left for the two mayoral finalists to campaign against each other. As far as I’m concerned, that makes for few political cheap-shots and rhetorical attacks against each other – good riddance!

  -30-

Second choice likely to be important in upcoming mayoral campaign

Will April 2 be a runoff between Preckwinkle … 

The 2019 election cycle – the one in which Chicagoans will be asked to pick a new mayor – is truly going to be unique. Because for most would-be voters, it’s going to be more likely that one’s second choice is the one that ultimately will prevail.

The candidate field is now down to 14 people with dreams that they someday will be the one who gets to call themselves “Mr. (or Madame) Mayor.”

… and Mayor Daley III?

WHICH MAKES IT oh so likely that no one will take a majority vote come Feb. 26. It will result in a run-off election between the top two vote getters come April 2.

Heck, a most recent poll by the We Ask America group (and paid for by the Chicago Sun-Times) says no one has more than 13 percent support, and there are several candidates who barely show up at 2 or 3 percent support.

It means that when people go to their polling place at the end of February (or to their early voting center), they’d better have a good idea of a backup candidate. The person they can bring themselves to support even if their fantasy mayoral hopeful winds up being one of the schmoes who finishes too low to qualify for the run-off.

CHICO: Does Gery have momentum?

Which also means the key factor in determining who will prevail may well be which candidates have such intense voter support bases that they’re convinced it has to be their guy (or gal), or nobody at all!

WILL THE KIND of people who want Willie Wilson, the black millionaire, to be mayor (only 9 percent support for a fourth place finish, according to the poll) find the thought of anybody else winning to be so repulsive that they wind up not voting in the April run-off?

WILSON: Will his supporters consider anyone else?

Or go to the other extreme. Are the kind of people who want to envision some law-and-order type candidate who’d cast votes for former police Superintendent Garry McCarthy (3.7 percent for a seventh place finish, the poll says) willing to bother voting at all?

MENDOZA:Can she beat only Toni?

Anything is possible, particularly since there already are a significant number of people who haven’t made up their minds yet who to cast a ballot for.

Literally, the poll shows just over one-quarter of potential voters don’t know yet who they’ll vote for. And they are going to decide the outcome. Because right now, it’s really too close to call.

THIS WE ASK America poll has a 3.88 percent margin of error – with the Toni Preckwinkle and Bill Daley campaigns on top, but with only a 0.6 percent difference between them.

And Gery Chico, along with Wilson, also fall within that margin of error compared to Preckwinkle.

Meaning we essentially have a four-way tie for the top slot, with Illinois Comptroller Susana Mendoza’s mayoral bid being only slightly behind.

The same poll went so far as to say that if a run-off somehow comes down to a Preckwinkle/Mendoza brawl (the one that many political geeks deep down are hoping for), it becomes a Mendoza “victory.

BUT THE LONG-SHOT could be if Mendoza even finishes first or second come Feb. 26.

LIGHTFOOT: Lingering near the bottom

My original guess was that all the infighting that is now taking place will result in candidates knocking each other out of the running – and that we could wind up with a third incarnation of “Mayor Daley” in charge of Chicago municipal government.

Even though Chico, at 9.3 percent and third place, is going around spewing thoughts that he has the momentum that will see him be the guy who ultimately prevails.

Then, there’s Lori Lightfoot, the former Assistant U.S. Attorney and head of the Chicago Police Board, who has tried to claim her candidacy deserves respect because she got in the running way back before Rahm Emanuel decided not to try for re-election. Lightfoot is ninth, with 2.8 percent voter support – which is better than the 0.9 percent support that former Alderman Robert Fioretti is drawing these days.

  -30-

EXTRA: Burke political impact harsher on others rather than on himself?

It would seem that long-time Alderman Edward M. Burke has his share of political backers who will kick in with the most significant kind of help – campaign cash!

BURKE: Hurt on others, not himself

But the possibility that Burke is headed for a criminal indictment by a federal grand jury? It seems that likelihood’s possibility is most likely to hurt other people – as in the ones who all these years thought having Burke on their side was their greatest strength.

ADMITTEDLY, THE SOURCE of this perspective is one with a bias. It seems that mayoral hopeful Toni Preckwinkle (who once was considered to be the mayoral frontrunner for the upcoming elections in February and April) is losing support because it is known that she was Burke’s preference to become the city’s next mayor.

It seems that the pollster working on behalf of mayoral opponent Susana Mendoza (and also worked for new Gov. J.B. Pritzker) says that Preckwinkle’s “favorable” rating dropped from 47 percent in December to 36 percent now.

Meanwhile, her “unfavorable” rating went up 15 percentage points – to 46 percent.

By comparison, the Gallup Organization gives President Donald Trump a 39 percent approval rating these days. Do fewer people like Toni than do The Donald?

PRECKWINKLE: Favorable worse than Trump

COULD IT BE that the one-time front-runner has developed about as much distaste amongst the Chicago public as Trump has amongst the national electorate?

This drop is largely due to the perception that Preckwinkle is too aligned with Burke, and even had to go to the trouble of returning campaign contributions she had received from people who were doing Burke a favor by giving her money.

The same poll that now shows Preckwinkle’s favorability rating on the decline shows her now tied (at 11 percent support each) with Mendoza in the 14-candidate mayoral race. With William Daley close behind at 9 percent, rising slightly.

MENDOZA: Thinks she'll benefit

I find it humorous that Preckwinkle had to return campaign donations that carried the taint of Ed Burke, while Burke himself has a campaign fund so far ahead of his own opponents that he’s going to be able to bury his opposition financially – particularly since it is likely that any indictment won’t be handed down until AFTER the elections are past.

BURKE COULD EASILY be re-elected to the beginning of his second half-century in the City Council by the time we know if he’s actually going to be charged with anything – which will make it easier for him to disregard the issue during the actual election cycle.

How much better off financially is Burke?

Burke went into this month with some $9.7 million on hand and having spent some $3 million already. By comparison, the Latino ethnic challengers to Burke are poverty-stricken. One opponent, Irene Corral, literally has $0.

While Tanya Patino, who’d like to call herself the front-runner of the Latino Burke challengers because she has Rep. Jesus Garcia’s endorsement, only has $16,274 to spend.

I HAVE NO doubt there will be some people living in the Southwest Side neighborhoods of the 14^th Ward that have developed a significant Mexican-American population who will be eager to vote for “one of their own” for alderman.

PATINO: A pauper, next to Burke

But Burke isn’t going to be buried politically because he’s lacking in finances.

There will be those eager to see him maintained as a City Council presence – even though he technically no longer holds the Finance Committee chairman position that was the source of his political influence.

The sad reality could be that Burke gets himself re-elected to the City Council, with people choosing to take out their contempt with Eddie when they cast their vote for mayor.

  -30-

Trump “beating” Lincoln? Well, he wasn’t ever going to take Illinois vote

How over-bloated is the ego of President Donald J. Trump? He’s the guy going around saying he’s the most popular Republican ever – even topping one of the Republican Party’s founders, Abraham Lincoln.

Besmirching the rep of Honest Abe?

Of course, the fact that Trump would say he’s bigger than Honest Abe, so to speak, is predictable. If he really wanted to engage in overbearing egomaniacal rhetoric, he’d claim he’s bigger than Reagan.

EXCEPT THAT THEN, former President Ronald W. Reagan has surviving family members who would immediately rush out to “clean his clock,” so to speak. The Lincoln family line of descendants came to an end several generations ago.

So who’s about to challenge Trump’s nonsensical claim?

For the record, Trump was basing his claim off a poll showing that amongst people inclined to vote Republican, some 90 percent think favorably of The Donald. Which could be true – a recent Gallup Organization poll of Trump’s popularity shows 88 percent of Republicans favor him.

Compared to 37 percent of people who call themselves political independents, and only 9 percent of those who are Democrats. None of this is surprising.

NOT EVEN THE fact that Trump feels compelled to bloat his political significance with this trivial tidbit. Does it really mean much that the people who voted for Trump in the first place support their action of 2016 – or that the people who didn’t want him back then still can’t stand him!

TRUMP: The Man of the Over-bloated Ego

Or that Trump is the kind of guy inclined to believe that only certain people in our society matter. Those who didn’t like Trump in the first place, the hell with them, is probably his honest attitude.

I noticed that CNN felt compelled to do a story about Trump’s claims, saying that just about every Republican who has been president in recent years has had overwhelming favorable approval ratings amongst Republican voters.

And that there is no credible polling data remaining from the 1860 and 1864 election cycles to show us just how popular Lincoln really was amongst the American people.

'Bigger than Reagan' would be a real fight

OF COURSE, CONSIDERING that the election and inauguration of Lincoln as president was so unpopular that it caused officials in 11 southern states to talk of trying to break away and create their own nation (the whole Civil War was about whether such an action was legitimate), it wouldn’t surprise me to learn the noble image of Honest Abe held in Illinois isn’t universal.

Even if Lincoln did ultimately get his image on the penny – and the five-dollar bill. What will Trump ever get; other than his name on a batch of tacky buildings that society as a whole will celebrate when the day comes that they are reduced to rubble!

Considering that many of the kinds of people who now support Trump are the ones who also are determined to look back upon the Civil War as the “War for Southern Independence,” it may well be that amongst Trump supporters, they look more favorably upon him than that of Abraham Lincoln.

Trump may be truthful, but his ridiculous claim goes a long way towards explaining just what is wrong with this Age of Trump our society is now in.

I’VE ALSO NOTICED that some people are bringing to mind that moment from 1966 when John Lennon of the Beatles said he and his co-horts were “more popular than Jesus Christ.”

Is John Lennon more popular than Trump?

Which had an element of truth if you consider many of that era were shallow enough to be more concerned with pop music than religion. Lennon’s statement wasn’t really anything to be taken as a compliment.

So the idea that Trump is more popular than Honest Abe? I suppose it’s not like he said HE’S bigger than Jesus? Although I wonder if the kind of people inclined to support Trump would forgive him for such a blasphemous thought because they’d like how the very notion would offend people of sense.

Such as those of us of Illinois, where Lincoln remains our biggest political name in U.S. history. Ah well, it’s not like Trump was ever going to get Electoral College votes out of Illinois or would be a political asset to any Republican running for office in the Land of Lincoln.

  -30-

Abortion – an issue that won’t go away; even if high court tries to make it so

The commentary with regards to the legitimacy of abortion as a medical procedure has already started up. I’ve come across one train of thought that says President Donald J. Trump will choose a woman to fill a vacancy on the Supreme Court of the United States so that when the high court eventually does away with abortion, it won’t be by an entirely-male group of justices.

I’ve found another commentary that says the Supreme Court won’t have the nerve to want to step into the political mess that would assuredly be created if the court really tries to undo the 1973 ruling of Roe v. Wade – the one that struck down the laws of those states that tried to regard abortion as a criminal act.

THERE ARE A wide range of opinions out there with regards to whether a woman has a right to end a pregnancy – and it’s pretty clear that somebody is going to turn out to be dead wrong in what they’re stating now.

Which also means someone, by the purest of dumb luck, is going to wind up being correct – and will probably go about the rest of their lives boasting of “supreme intelligence” just because they managed to “guess” correctly.

For what it’s worth, the Morning Consult group released a poll saying some 52 percent of us want the high court to maintain abortion as legitimate – with only 29 percent wishing for the repeal of Roe v. Wade.

Of course, it’s a partisan issue – among those who identify as Democrats, 73 percent want abortion to remain protected by law, while 54 percent of those who identify as Republican wish for abortion to go away.

AND IN THIS Age of Trump, we have leadership determined to piddle on the desires of anybody who happens to be either Democrat, or not sufficiently ideological enough to fit their definition of what a Republican ought to be.

Meaning there are a number of people who are going to get all bent out of shape with their prognostications about what will happen once Trump makes his nominee to the Supreme Court known publicly. Which he has hinted could come as soon as Monday.

Then again, Trump has been known to be unpredictable – which is probably the safest thing for anybody to predict about him. Who’s to say what will happen?

Personally, I think Trump will be inclined to pick someone whom he thinks will be a predictable choice to want to “undo” abortion – joining with a solid majority of other ideologically conservative justices to vote against it.

FITTING IN WITH what seems to be his general theory that he’s “the boss” and that the rest of government ought to just do what he tells them. If the majority of us don’t approve – well I doubt he cares!

Because all he has to do is look at the minority of voters who, in 2016, picked him to be president. He probably thinks they’re the only ones who matter – just as I suspect he sees the 29 percent who want Roe v. Wade undone matter more than the rest of us.

Which is why I’m not amongst those getting all worked up over Monday. We have a political structure right now that is rigged against much rational thought – one that is primarily focused with trying to appease the sentiments of the ideologues who want to impose their own ideas upon the bulk of us.

What I’m saying is that the “harm” already has been done. The thought that there’s much anything Trump will do now to suddenly make a difference is a bit of an overstatement.

IF ANYTHING, WE’RE going to have to rely on the unpredictability of justices when it comes to interpreting the law. There have been instances in the past when the ideologues amongst us thought the high court was on the verge of undoing abortion when a majority managed to figure out legal means by which it remained.

Will ideologues want to 'erase' old hedlines showing what court once did?

Those of us who have enough sense to see laws against abortion as meddling in a woman’s physical well-being will have to count on the prevailing of the rule of law.

But then again, in this overly-partisan age we’re now in, it might be asking a bit much to think the Supreme Court of the United States can truly rise above it all.

Meaning we may well have to wait for a future version of the Supreme Court to take it upon itself to undo the harmful actions being imposed upon us by this Age of Trump.

  -30-

Does downstate Illinois really love Quinn now? Or just afraid of unknown?

The Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University came out with its own poll recently for the upcoming primary elections, and there’s little surprising about its conclusion that Gov. Bruce Rauner and Democratic challenger J.B. Pritzker are the favorites for victory come March 20.

Has downstate forgiven Pat Quinn?

But I did find one aspect amusing – the portion that relates to the Illinois attorney general’s office.

ON THE SURFACE, it would indicate that Kwame Raoul, a state senator from the Hyde Park neighborhood, and Erika Harold, of Champaign, would be the favorites – although not by much. In a sense, a University of Chicago vs. University of Illinois election.

On the Republican side, it seems that nearly two-thirds of would-be GOP voters don’t have a clue who either Harold or challenger Gary Grasso are.

For the Democrats, there are eight candidates, but only two of them have any sizable following. As in Raoul and none other than Pat Quinn, our state’s former governor, who’s hoping to use the attorney general post as a way of achieving a political comeback.

According to the poll, Raoul has 22 percent support, compared to 18 percent for Quinn – with none of the others above 10 percent, and some 39 percent undecided.

BUT WHAT INTRIGUES me is the part that tried showing the regional breakdowns – where Raoul has 25 percent support in Chicago and 24 percent support in the suburbs. But Quinn is the leader in downstate Illinois.

Will it wind up being a Raoul vs. ...

The Mighty Quinn has some 25 percent support of downstate voters who will cast ballots in the Democratic primary, compared to 10 percent for Raoul.

“So what!,” you may ask. It might seem obvious that a lowly state legislator with little-to-no name recognition outside of his specific Senate district on the South Side would lag behind a guy who has been a part of the political scene for nearly as long as Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago, himself.

Which is true, since Quinn served on the staff of then-Gov. Dan Walker back in the early 1970s, before going on to other roles – including the “cut back” action that reduced the Illinois House by one-third in the early 1980s.

... Harold brawl following the March 20 primary?

BUT IF ONE remembers back to 2014, the reason that Quinn lost to Rauner is supposedly because he was weak in downstate Illinois.

Actually, despised is more the word that was used to describe why rural voters were willing to back a rich guy from the North Shore suburbs over Quinn. The only county out of Illinois’ 102 that Quinn won was Cook. The rest of the state map from November 2014 was a solid shade of red.

Even in the primary election held in March of that year, there was evidence that Quinn was not the preferred candidate outside of Chicago.

Quinn actually managed to lose the vote in a few counties of Southern Illinois, where the distaste for Quinn was such that they voted for opponent Tio Hardiman – even though I suspect they knew nothing about him, and when they eventually learned of his views on gun control (he’s heavily concerned about urban violence – head of the CeaseFire Illinois group), they wished they could vote for nobody.

HARDIMAN IS ACTUALLY trying again to run for governor this time, and the Simon Institute poll shows him running last out of the six candidates with zero percent in downstate Illinois. Even perpetual fringe candidate Robert Marshall manages with 1 percent support.

How many of Tio's '14 backers still support him for gov?

So what does it say that many of the people eager to dump Quinn back in ’14 now seem to be supporting him? Should we regard that election cycle as a fluke? Or is the fluke the election cycle occurring now?

Is Quinn being forgiven for the misdeeds people constantly accused him of four years ago. Or perhaps it is the sight of what we replaced Quinn with for the past few years that makes some people think perhaps he ought to be given another chance.

Regardless, it will be interesting to see how this eight-way electoral fight manages to turn out, since it will be possible for someone with only about 25 percent support to win the Democratic nomination. Which could wind up being Raoul – although I’ll admit the thought of a Quinn/Harold debate come October is one I’d find amusing.

  -30-

Kennedy wants racial/ethnic vote to turn Dem gubernatorial primary into a two-way campaign w/ Pritzker

Some may dismiss one-time Illinois Senate President Emil Jones as “crass,” but Democratic gubernatorial candidate Chris Kennedy is banking that he can turn the March 20 primary into a one-on-one fight with J.B. Pritzker – the man who has support from much of the Democratic establishment of Illinois.

 

KENNEDY: Can non-Anglo vote make him a winner?

For Kennedy, whom some polls indicate has been caught by third candidate Daniel Biss, is the guy using radio spots featuring the gravelly voice of Jones to appeal to the African-American portion of the electorate.

PRITZKER HAS BEEN ahead in various polls, indicating his self-provided millions have been effective in getting his name recognition out there. But he’s also made his share of gaffes indicating he may have offended potential black voters.

Which has Kennedy going in for the kill.

He’s hoping that becoming the gubernatorial candidate of choice for black people will put him back in the running against Pritzker. Because it could make Biss’ attempt to appeal to a certain segment of white people insufficient to win overall.

For what it’s worth, Jones uses his minute of time in the radio spot to remind an older generation of African-Americans just who Kennedy’s father (Bobby) and uncle (Jack) were.

 

JONES: Obama mentor boost Kennedy?

THE MAN WE recently learned was belittled by Pritzker (in private conversations a decade ago with then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich) tells us how the Kennedys, “fought and struggled and sacrificed alongside Dr. (Martin Luther) King (Jr.) in the civil rights movement,” and also tells us that Chris would continue on in “the Kennedy way.”

Indicating that Kennedy is banking on the black vote to turn out in strong enough force to enable him to overcome those polls of late that say Biss has actually overcome Kennedy to be the serious challenger to Pritzker.

Actually, what the polls say is that there remains a strong-enough share of people who are undecided in the Democratic primary, with Pritzker, Biss and Kennedy all following behind.

 

PRITZKER: Still leading, but can he hold it?

This primary may be just a month in the future, but it is far from settled.

PERHAPS THE KENNEDY campaign is influenced by that PPP poll (conducted for Our Revolution Illinois/Chicago) that shows amongst potential black voters, Kennedy is not only second behind Pritzker (38 percent to 31 percent), Biss is virtually irrelevant (7 percent).

And when it comes to the Latino vote, Kennedy is actually the leader (31 percent to 28 percent), with Biss only at 14 percent.

Perhaps it is the spirit of the Viva Kennedy clubs of old that enabled Chris’ uncle, Jack, to win the 1960 presidential bid, but it may well be a combination of the Latino and black vote that keeps the Kennedy gubernatorial dreams alive.

And ensures that the suburban white segment of the Democratic primary electorate that actually takes Biss seriously never grows into a larger coalition that could actually win the March 20 primary.

IT MAKES ME wonder if this campaign advertising spot (which is airing on the Chicago radio stations appealing to African-American listeners) is going to be the first of many the Kennedy campaign will issue.

 

Can Chris resurrect JFK's 'Viva Kennedy' spirit?

Will we see every ethnic and racial name dredged up to make endorsements in hopes they will sway more non-Anglo voters to turn out for the primary election – hoping they will be the kind of voters who will not easily be swayed by the millions of dollars that Pritzker could put into his own campaign for governor.

Which, to be honest, seems to be the primary factor that wins over the support of his political backers. They like the idea of someone who won’t be constantly hitting them up for more money in order to pay for his campaign.

Although it should be noted that with the dozens of millions of dollars that Gov. Bruce Rauner has committed to campaigns for himself and for allies in the General Assembly, even Pritzker will be grossly outspent in a campaign battle for the Nov. 6 general election.

  -30-