CAM-PAINS: Playing to the “fanatics”

It is that time of the campaign season when serious candidates make the rounds of various newspapers, not so much because they care about “making nice” with the reporter-types and their editors but because they are interested in endorsements.

Candidate Bill Brady

That means submitting to a session with various editors and reporters to answer questions about where one stands on issues.

IT ALSO USUALLY means the newspaper in question will write up an account of the meeting, so as to make itself feel all important that it got an “exclusive” interview with the candidate in question. Just like those newspapers that go so far as to commission their own polls, it’s all about self-promotion.

But it also gives the candidates a chance to play to their base – hoping that the voters who are ideologically inclined to back them will read those accounts and realize the “wisdom” of their choice.

At least that was the impression I got after reading accounts of the meeting that Gov. Pat Quinn had with the Daily Herald newspaper of suburban Arlington Heights, while Republican challenger William Brady had his get-together with the Chicago Sun-Times.

According to the Herald, Quinn is offering up a Christmas present, of sorts. He told those people interested in having the legal benefits of marriage extended to gay couples that the Illinois Legislature will act upon something this fall – making it possible for him to sign something into law by December.

BUT THE SUN-TIMES tells us that Brady specifically opposed that concept, and also had to let himself get lured into a debate over the differences between evolution and creationism.

Specifically, Brady told the Chicago newspaper that he thinks public school districts should be allowed for themselves to determine whether or not creationism should be taught in their curriculums.



Gov. Pat Quinn

I’m sure Brady, the state senator from Bloomington, knows full well how that will tick off the locals. But I’m also sure he knows he’s not getting their votes anyway.

So what he is counting on is the fact that word will spread of what the Sun-Times wrote, and that accounts will be published in newspapers elsewhere and will turn up on the Internet.

WHICH MEANS THE people who are inclined to want more religious influence within our schools will learn about it, and will be pleased. Heck, some of them might even perceive it as Brady telling those twisted Chicagoans right to their face what he’s going to do.

Even though if one reads exactly what Brady said, he’s not going to do anything. He says he would let school officials decide – even though this is one issue where there probably should be some consistency from school district to school district (which is why the Illinois State Board of Education would be involved).

This is about appealing to the base – the conservatives and rural people of Illinois who are more inclined to take such creationist talk seriously. Even if the individuals aren’t as hung up on religion as others are, the fact that Brady comes off as being supportive makes him seem more like  one of them.

Which is why I’m not about to get bent out of shape about this particular issue. I’d be more concerned about a gubernatorial candidate who – at a time when unemployment is high and people are fearing for their jobs – wants to talk about lowering the minimum wage and who thinks that “right to work” status for Illinois is something to be seriously considered.

BOTH OF THOSE are stances that Brady has taken during this campaign season, which implies to me that he blames the employees for problems facing business, rather than the businesses creating their own problems.

But those are other issues. On the social ones, Brady wants to keep that rural base that is perceiving this particular election cycle as a chance to knock down the heavy Chicago influence that has developed in the past decade over Illinois state government.

While Quinn is trying to appeal to those who realize where the bulk of the people of this state actually live – the urban portions, which have significant numbers of people who are inclined to take the whole gay marriage issue seriously.

Even if they’re not gay themselves, chances are they know someone who is and they’re not as inclined to view the whole concept in such a hostile manner.

BRADY, WHO ACTUALLY comes from one of the few central Illinois cities that has policies that make it clear gay people are not a species to be dreaded, is appealing to those voters who want to view marriage as something “traditional” and gay people as something opposite of tradition.

While Quinn, in speaking with the Herald, tried to take the opposite stance. He wants to be the candidate who gets the support of gay people and those who are not hostile toward gay people – which in today’s larger society is a growing segment.

Which means I’m not prepared to expect Quinn to keep his promise that civil unions – the concept that is considered a compromise to marriage for gay people – will be in place in Illinois by December.

We ought to hold him to his word, except that his promise specifically means he doesn’t have to act upon it until after the Nov. 2 elections. If he wins, Quinn has plenty of time to take some sort of positive action.

AND IF HE loses, I would think the last thing anybody would want is Quinn signing anything into law – even though he’d remain governor until early January and would have one more go-around with the Illinois Legislature this autumn.

Quinn may call himself a “strong advocate on civil unions,” but the reason he’s opening his mouth is that he wants your vote, just as Brady talking about creationism at this point is a blatant appeal for the votes of people who say “Hell, No!” to Quinn’s vote appeal.

Which reduces all of this to just more blather that we, the people, have to endure during the campaign season. Where’s the Tylenol? I’ve got a headache.

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Freaky week for Chicago Public Schools

All within the confines of a single business day, the Chicago Public Schools learned earlier this week they were the losers in a legal dispute against their teachers union, while also having to engage in totalitarian tactics against parents who want to think of themselves as trying to preserve their neighborhood school.

In short, the public schools system had a freaky Monday.

IT WAS ON that day that a U.S. District Judge ruled that the school district blew it when they tried to lay off more than 700 teachers – all of whom had been with the schools long enough to qualify for that unique educational job protection known as tenure.

The Chicago Public Schools had laid off 1,300 teachers, about 700 of whom had tenure – which should have protected their jobs from such cuts. School officials have said the district’s financial situation is so severe that the cuts are necessary.

U.S. District Judge David Coar disagreed. His ruling gives the schools 30 days to work with the Chicago Teachers Union to come up with a process by which those tenured teachers can be rehired.

Although it should be noted that the Chicago Tribune reports that the schools had managed to find ways to rehire some of those teachers – even before the federal court ruling. Of the tenured teachers who had lost their jobs, 417 of them had already been rehired for different jobs within the Chicago Public Schools system.

OF COURSE, THAT is not stopping the school district from considering an appeal of Coar’s ruling. It’s not like they don’t want the tenured teachers back. They don’t want a court ruling that says they did something wrong. They want to be able to portray any re-hires as something they’re doing from the goodness of their collective heart – not because they have to.

This seems to be a procedural question. Attorneys for the teachers union have argued that the problem lies with the way the school district handled the layoffs. They were just dumped. There were no hearings that theoretically would give them a chance to argue the merits of keeping them on the payroll. There was no “due process.”

There also were questions over severance pay, which public schools officials argued was not necessary in this case because the cuts were being made for economic reasons.

There also was the fact that Chicago Public Schools officials had argued that some of the layoffs were due to bad performance on the job, although it was never made clear which teachers were being let go for job flaws and which for budgetary reasons.

COAR, WHO HEARD arguments last month from attorneys for both sides, issued his ruling in favor of the teachers union earlier this week, and included a segment in his written ruling saying that many of the teachers who were let go from their jobs actually had never received unsatisfactory reviews of their on-the-job performance.

It would be nice if this could be settled within the next few weeks. But this is likely to be an issue that will linger in the courts for far too long, and likely will increase the amount of tension that exists within the administration of the Chicago Public Schools.

I’d like to think it was not that “tension” being put on display when schools officials gave the order to cut off heat to the field house of an old school building in the Pilsen neighborhood that is being occupied these days by area residents.

Whittier Elementary School, near Wolcott and 23^rd streets, has been the site of a sit-in since mid-September. People want the field house structure preserved and converted into a library. School officials say they don’t have the money to do anything with the structure – except tear it down.

WHICH THEY ARGUE is necessary on the grounds that the structure is no longer safe. They argue the land could then be turned into a park or some other form of “green space” that area children would be able to use.

The same school officials who that day had lost in court against their teachers claim they’re not being vindictive against the parents who are refusing to leave the field house. They say having Peoples Gas cut off the heat is a precautionary measure so that inspectors can make one last inspection of the structure before they begin demolition.

But the Chicago Sun-Times reports that the parents in the building see this as an attempt to freeze them out – particularly since the overnight temperatures were dropping to as low as the mid-40 degrees.

For what it is worth, there haven’t been individuals holed up in the old field house every single moment since the sit-in began on Sept. 15. The parents are working in shifts, giving each other relief while ensuring that someone is in the building at all times so as to create an obstacle – should someone actually try to proceed with demolition,.

THOSE PEOPLE ARE managing to cope with the autumn temperatures by using electric heaters – which has me concerned more than anything else because I, as a reporter-type person, have written (and heard) way too many stories throughout the years of people suffering carbon-monoxide poisoning or of fires starting because of heater accidents. I only hope this sit-in situation does not take on tragic overtones.

But I do get my chuckle over the studies that have been done of the field house’s structural integrity. The Chicago Public Schools has an engineering firm that says the building must come down, while the parents came up with their own engineering study that says the roof could be rebuilt to allow the structure to survive.

So how does 25^th Ward Alderman Danny Solis respond to this? Perhaps with the ultimate political solution.

He wants to hire a third engineering firm to study the structure – thereby adding to the amount of time in which this field house remains an issue, which might ultimately make losing in the federal courts the least of the problems experienced this week by the Chicago Public Schools.

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Does Rahm live in Ravenswood?

Ultimately, the question of whether or not Rahm Emanuel legitimately lives in Chicago will come down to the whim of a Cook County judge, and how loosely that justice is willing to interpret the criteria that defines a city resident for political purposes.



Ravenswood resident?

For the one part of the law that is crystal clear is that a candidate for city government office, including mayor, must have lived within the city limits for the one full year prior to assuming the political post.

IN EMANUEL’S CASE, his opponents are claiming that he moved from Chicago at the end of 2008, and is only now this week returning to the city – which they say means he isn’t anywhere near close to that “one full year” requirement if he wants to run for mayor in the 2011 municipal elections.

Of course, Emanuel claims that he leased his house in the Ravenswood neighborhood (the same neighborhood where now-former Gov. Rod Blagojevich lives), which means he still owns it.

The Chicago Sun-Times reported that Emanuel also could argue that he uses that address for his driver’s license issued by the Illinois secretary of state’s office, and has remained registered to vote there – using an absentee ballot to cast his votes in the elections that were held (admittedly, not many) during his stint as White House chief of staff.

In short, Emanuel claims to be like many another Washington resident – merely a transitory one who intends to return to his “real” home when his job in D.C. is done.

PERHAPS IT IS because I fully comprehend the transitory nature of many federal government employees who work in Washington – nobody should have been surprised that Emanuel always intended to return to Chicago.

Which is why he never sold the house, instead subletting it to a man who now refuses to leave any earlier than his lease with Emanuel requires him to.

That man may have a fully-legitimate claim to not wanting to be kicked out of his rented residence prematurely. But I am not sure that he is sufficient evidence that Emanuel no longer lives there – even though some attorneys claim it is.

The Sun-Times, in their report published Monday, dug up one of Chicago’s pre-eminent experts on election law, who said that any challenge to an Emanuel campaign based on residency requirements is, “not a hard case” to prove.

THEN AGAIN, THE newspaper also points out that attorney Burt Odelson has done work on behalf of Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart and Rev./state Sen. James Meeks, D-Chicago – both of whom are among Emanuel’s more significant challengers for next year’s mayoral election.

Both of those campaigns would experience a significant boost by having a much easier time of campaigning if they do not have to worry about Rahm going all out against them and using his financial advantages to try to bury them before they can even get started.

So of course he wants to believe it is an open-and-shut case.

Ultimately, it is going to come down to which judge winds up hearing the legal challenge to an Emanuel campaign. The simple fact of the rule of law is that it is meant to be interpreted by judges to figure out how it fits specific circumstances.

SO IT COULD be possible that a judge would interpret the measure so strictly as to deny Emanuel a spot in the mayoral campaign – which would really turn an already-absurd process completely upside down.

Then again, he might get a judge who is inclined to view the circumstances similar to how I do – which is that since he has maintained his address and conducted it for personal business, it should count. I am swayed by the fact that he never gave up his address for purposes of casting a ballot.

If he really had intended to become a denizen of the District of Columbia, he would have shifted his registration. It would have been easier, and more practical. Instead, he decided to keep his personal political choice in Chicago.

Which to me means that for political purposes, there is not a break in time for his stint as a city resident.

OF COURSE, I am not a judge in the Cook County court system. So my just-stated opinion doesn’t mean squat. Although it is as legitimate as any opinion stated by any other electoral observer or political gas-bag.

If it reads like I’m writing that Emanuel should not be kicked off the ballot for this technicality, you’d be correct. I’d rather see the mayoral campaign get settled on the streets, with the voters deciding whether or not they want Rahm or Tom or James or Miguel (as in del Valle) to be Chicago’s next mayor.

But I’m not an idealist.

So I’m fully aware that the week of Nov. 29 (one week after the deadline for submitting nominating petitions to get on the ballot), someone is going to file an Emanuel challenge with the Chicago Board of Elections.

IF THAT BODY is so inclined to give Rahm the boot, then it will work its way into the court system – possibly as high as the Illinois Supreme Court if the lawyers are so inclined.

Which means it could be sometime around the beginning of the new year that we Chicago voters will learn whether or not the Emanuel for Mayor campaign will fight it out for voter support, or if it is dead before beginning.

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Joe Berrios to turn to Latino vote to beat back goo-goo backing for Claypool

I have been wondering how long it would be before Democratic county assessor nominee Joe Berrios would turn himself into Josè.

Not that he literally has gone through the process of changing his name. But the candidate who seems to be the focus this election cycle of all the hostility by good-government types toward establishment politicians seems to be evolving himself into the Latino candidate – in hopes that the significant Latino population of Chicago will provide him with a solid base that will result in his election come Nov. 2.

BERRIOS ON MONDAY is planning an event by which he will claim the endorsements of just about every significant Latino politico – including Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., state Sen. Iris Martinez, D-Chicago (the first Latina to serve in the Illinois Senate) and 31^st Ward Alderman Ray Suarez.

They will be gathering at the politically old-school Hotel Allegro (which I still think of as the Bismarck Hotel) to try to create the impression that Latinos in Chicago (who comprise just over one-quarter of the city’s population) want “one of our own” running the office that handles tax collection for Cook County.

I don’t know if this tactic will work.

It could well be that a significant share of Latinos also have problems with the notion of yet another political hack being elected assessor. And it’s not like any of the Berrios opponents – not even the independent candidacy of Forrest Claypool – has any significant appeal to Latinos.

BUT WHAT I have noticed about the Berrios campaign in this election cycle is that it has barely touched on his ethnic background. At least not until now, when it looks like Claypool may make some dents in the voter turnout.

That shouldn’t be a surprise. Berrios, after all, is the chairman of the Cook County Democratic Party. As in the whole party. Theoretically, people should be coming to him seeking help getting themselves elected to various political posts.

Instead, it is Berrios himself who needs help, and he is turning to his ethnic roots (he’s of Puerto Rican background) to try to get it. Perhaps he figures that Latinos won’t get caught up in “goo-goo” talk. Which is what the Berrios opposition is about.

These activists realize they’re not about to take down all of government in Chicago and Cook County (that Tea Party-type tripe doesn’t play here, where people have a little more sense than those rural communities where such talk might get taken seriously).

SO, THEY’RE FOCUSING on one candidate – which seems to be Berrios. Dump the party chairman for the political post that he wants, and it will be a significant symbolic victory for the cause of good government.

Now if this reads like I’m trying to defend Berrios, I’m not. I will be the first to concede that the county Board of Review, which oversees tax appeals, is as closed a panel as can exist within our local government.

Berrios’ presence within local government is perfect proof that not every ethnic or racial minority who holds office is some sort of radical. Berrios during his 22 years on the board has been as establishment as they come.

That is evidenced by the fact that he also works as a lobbyist to the Illinois Legislature in Springfield, and he has his close ties with the Democratic legislative leaders – both of whom also work as attorneys who specialize in tax law and whose clients often have cases that must appear before the Board of Review.

IF IT SOUNDS like an incestuous relationship, it probably is. Although I doubt that Berrios is the worst practitioner of “Chicago-style” politics.

What inspires the people who want to dump Berrios largely is his challenger. Officially, he has a Republican and a Green to run against – neither of which is worth mentioning by name. If they were the only factors, then Berrios would be a shoo-in for re-election.

Yet we’re talking about Claypool, who caught the imagination of good-government types as a so-called “reformer” when he tried running in 2006 against John Stroger for county board President. Stroger won, only to turn the nomination over to son Todd when it became apparent that father Stroger’s health was declining.

Which is why for four years, all those people who never got over their distaste for Todd Stroger have been thinking of Claypool as the guy who “should have been” county board president. Which means those people are eager to vote him into some political post. If they can take down a political veteran like Berrios in the process, I’m sure they will be very happy on Nov. 3.

I’M NOT ATTACKING Claypool. I understand that as a county board member he has supported some good-government measures. Yet I have a hard time thinking of Claypool as a real live goo-goo, mainly because he has been so allied throughout the years with Richard M. Daley (a mayoral chief of staff and Daley’s pick to run the Chicago Park District, among other ties).

Which is why when Berrios has started making claims that he thinks his ethnicity factors into peoples’ distaste for him, I’m not going to totally dismiss it. Although I figure it is merely one of many factors, and not the sole reason people will vote against him.

I’m not sure how this election will turn out, because I have noticed that many of the establishment candidates in Cook County are making a point of endorsing Berrios (including county board President nominee Toni Preckwinkle, who said that as county Dem chairman, the party has been supportive of the political aspirations of all people – not just white guys).

But I’m presuming that since Berrios himself plans to reach out to the Latino voter bloc, he sees something of a gap in support – one that he intends to plug.

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“Jr.” to take on Isaac Hayes and Rev.

It must be nice to have a name so prominent that one doesn’t even have to use it in order to campaign.

Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr.

Or perhaps this is the way for Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr., D-Ill., to remind people how prominent his name is, considering that he’s running against a candidate whose name is going to draw attention regardless of what he says or what he thinks.

JACKSON, THE SON of the internationally renowned civil rights leader, has as one of his opponents an independent candidacy by a man named Isaac Hayes. Not the singer who gave us the theme from “Shaft” and “Chocolate Salty Balls” from “South Park.”

Could enough people actually vote for Hayes because they think it’s cute he has the same name as the renowned musician? Does Jackson need to go out of his way to remind people of who his father is to draw attention away?

I couldn’t help but think that as I spent time Sunday in the Hegewisch neighborhood and in the adjacent suburb of Calumet City. For while driving along Sibley Boulevard (that’s 147^th Street, for you people who think solely in terms of the Chicago street grid system), I encountered a two-mile stretch of street where – everywhere I turned – there were signs that read “Faithful for Jr.”

At first, I thought they were litter. Then I realized how thoroughly someone had carpeted the street. “Jr.” was everywhere in huge letters that couldn’t be missed – although one literally had to walk right up to one of these campaign signs to see the tiny typeface that read, “Paid for by Jackson for Congress.”

NOW I REALIZE this tactic is not unusual. All of us no matter where we live or work are going to be burdened with campaign signs all over buildings and front lawns. Those of us looking to get away from the campaigning had better be prepared to lock themselves inside their homes, then turn off the televisions and their Internet connections.

Isaac Hayes



Because the campaign season that has 30 more days to go is upon us.

“Jr.” is far from the only candidate who is going t do whatever he can to ensure that his name gets burned in our brain, in hopes that we will cast a ballot accordingly when we go to an early voting center in coming weeks, or to a polling place on Nov. 2 proper.

Yet I have to admit I was surprised to see so much of “Jr.” Because I haven’t been picking up any sense that Jackson is in trouble in terms of getting re-elected to Congress. The salacious and scandalous details about his life may be what prevents him from making a serious campaign for Chicago mayor in next year’s municipal election.

BUT FOR CONGRESS, he is safe. The district is solid Democrat – largely because it is consists of the kinds of communities that many of these Tea Party people fled so many years ago.



Rev. Anthony Williams

I can’t envision the people of Jackson’s far South Side and surrounding suburbs congressional district getting excited about a candidate such as Hayes, who uses his campaign website to advertise the fact that the Republican Party’s “Fire Pelosi” (as in House Speaker Nancy) will be in suburban Matteson on Oct. 15.

As for Jackson’s other opponent, the Rev. Anthony Williams has become the congressman’s perennial challenger who has never been able to convince voters that Jesse Jr. doesn't do anything positive for the South Side. About the only thing that ever differs with Williams is his political party – at various times in his electoral “career,” he has run unsuccessfully for office as a Democrat, a Libertarian, an independent, a Republican, and now, a Green.

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Will Cook County Democrats do to Brady what they did to O’Malley back in ‘96?

Various polls coming out in recent days show that the campaign for Illinois governor has suddenly become a close race. All those people who want to think that Pat Quinn was political pulp are now anxiously wondering if he has a chance to win come Nov. 2.

Gov. Pat Quinn

Quinn himself issued a statement that tells us how Republican opponent William Brady’s early lead has “evaporated,” because people are learning that “Senator Brady is not on their side.” Depending on which poll one wants to believe, Quinn and Brady are either virtually tied, or the governor is actually slightly ahead.

NOW I’M NOT about to get into the merits of debating which pollsters know what they’re talking about and which ones are so tainted by ideology that no one of sense should trust a word they say.

All that is really happening, and since so many different poll-takers are coming up with similar results I am inclined to trust them, is that Chicago is asserting itself. The real question is whether or not the city will assert itself enough come Election Day for Quinn to actually win.

That is something we won’t find out until the early hours of Nov. 3.

It is no surprise to me that polls show Brady to be the overwhelming favorite of voters who live in the parts of Illinois that lie outside of the Chicago metropolitan area. For them, this election cycle is about dumping any government official who has ties to the Chicago area – which is why state Senator Brady of Bloomington does well, and the ideologues of the GOP privately wish they weren’t stuck with Mark Kirk of the North Shore or Judy Baar Topinka of Riverside.

THEIR COOK COUNTY roots are too close to Chicago for ideological comfort.

But I have always believed that if Chicago and the inner suburbs turn out in strength on Election Day, it won’t matter how large a voter margin Brady gets over Quinn in places like McLean, Macoupin or McDonough counties.



state Sen. William Brady



It is that we have a knee-jerk Democrat reaction here in Cook County – the county that comprises about 45 percent of Illinois’ population. If we turn out, our preferred candidate will win. If we don’t turn out, then our candidate loses – and we have no one to blame but ourselves.

It was a lesson I learned back in 1996 from, of all things, the campaign for State’s Attorney of Cook County. In that election cycle, the incumbent was Republican Jack O’Malley, who really hadn’t done anything to infuriate the people of Cook.

I REMEMBER EVERY single poll all the way down to the wire showed O’Malley with a lead over the Democratic challenger, a long-time Daley family loyalist named Richard Devine – who at the time was running the Chicago Park District board.

Devine was portrayed in that first election as some sort of Daley lackey who was mere ballot filler to run a token campaign against the lone Republican who held elective office in Cook County government.

Yet come that Election Day when Bill Clinton easily defeated Bob Dole for president, so many people gave their knee-jerk vote for a Democratic candidate that Devine actually beat O’Malley by a sizable margin. What happened was that many of our local voters who likely had nothing against O’Malley personally and told polls of that fact wound up voting for the Democrat, just because that’s the way things are done in Chicago.

I realize that this is not a presidential election year to help lure people to the polling places. By and large, Quinn himself has to be the attraction for the Democratic candidates. Which means that not only does he need to give us the "scare tactics" against Brady, he also has to give us a good reason why we should vote for him.

BUT IT MAKES me wonder if we’re going to see people doing the exact same thing – telling poll-takers one thing for all these months, but then showing up at the voter booths to automatically vote “Democratic.”

For those people who will try to argue that this is a sad phenomenon, I’d say it is no different than the many people from outside of Chicago who give the same knee-jerk reaction in favor of anything associated with “Republican.”
 

It means those polls of the past that would have you think this was going to be a loss for Quinn of historic proportions were some downstater’s wildest fantasy. They never had any basis in reality. That is what is being reflected in the current round of polls.

This state is heavily influenced by Chicago and its suburbs (which comprise about two-thirds of the overall population). Which means those people who think this is going to be a political revolution led by people in Chebanse, Towanda and Versailles are a little off.

IF ANYTHING CAUGHT my attention out of the polls, it was the one done for the Chicago Tribune that says Quinn has totally wiped out the lead that Brady once held in the outer suburbs of places like DuPage, Lake and McHenry counties.

I’m not sure I believe that fact (a part of me suspects those people who live on the fringes of metro Chicago would be most likely to side with their rural Illinois counterparts in voting against anything Chicago-oriented).

But if it is true, then perhaps we do have a chance to see Sheila Simon become the first daughter of an Illinois lieutenant governor to become lieutenant governor herself.

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From East Room to Fifth Floor?

Rahm Emanuel would like it if his political journey that starts here Friday ...

Perhaps it is symbolic of how un-Chicago the mayoral campaign of Rahm Emanuel will be.

He is the candidate who on Friday will unofficially start his bid to fulfill his mayoral dream from the East Room of the White House – that’s the room that hosts many official presidential celebrations and has the original of that famed Gilbert Stuart painting of George Washington.

AT LEAST THAT is the plan. President Barack Obama will announce the resignation of his chief of staff, while also saying that he will be replaced for the time being by Pete Rouse – who was Obama’s chief of staff when he was the junior U.S. senator from Illinois and also once worked on the staff of former Majority Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota.

Then, according to the various news reports of recent days that have given us rumor and trivia, Emanuel will return to Chicago to live in an apartment until he can get the man who sub-let his Ravenswood neighborhood house to actually leave.

Emanuel backers also say that the man who once was a Congressman from the Northwest Side plans to hold various meetings in neighborhoods across the city. Their purpose? Rahm wants to show that he can connect with, “the people.”

That is important, because an Emanuel campaign, should it actually occur, will differ from all the other political people who think they can get elected in the free-for-all that will be the municipal elections because he has no local base.

EMANUEL HAS REMNANTS of his old campaign fund from his congressional days that could give him a head start, and he has the ability to twist the arms of political people to get them to have their political bases work on behalf of his mayoral dream.

... ends here on the Fifth Floor next May.

But while most mayoral campaigns will start off with some sort of official announcement in front of their home (if it is bungalow-ish enough) or perhaps some local business in their home neighborhood, the Emanuel campaign is the one that will have the iconic Washington image looking down upon him.

Perhaps, to Emanuel, it is reminiscent of the fact that his boss began actively campaigning for president with the shadow of Abraham Lincoln looming over him – he did it outside the Old State Capitol in Springfield, Ill.

I know the Emanuel people are going to say this is a stretch, because technically the Friday event where his resignation gets announced is not the beginning of the mayoral campaign. He could decide not to run in the 2011 municipal elections.

WHICH IS ABOUT as likely as the Chicago White Sox learning that about a dozen games they lost earlier this season were really victories that will be restored to their record – which would put them back in contention with the Minnesota Twins for a division title.

Emanuel running for mayor is as certain as the White Sox not winning anything this season, which means the campaign saga begins Friday – even if he wishes to think it begins later.

There are some people in this city who would have a hard time deciding which of those facts disgusts them more.

Because I know that for some, Friday is the beginning of a circus that they will wish Chicago would not have to endure. Part of it is a parochial nature on their part. Emanuel may have served a few years in Congress, but the bulk of his political career has been Washington-based.

HE WAS A significant aide to then-President Bill Clinton who also was credited for the Democrats winning back control of Congress in 2006, in addition to being Obama’s chief strategist. To people who think of government in terms of who picks up the trash, all of that is irrelevant.

If there is one person I would like to talk to in depth these days, it would be Nancy Kaszak – who back in 2002 was Emanuel’s opponent for that Congressional seat. Their campaign against each other wound up being one of the most expensive in city electoral history, which is what makes Emanuel's financial edge such a big factor.

Kaszak was a former state legislator from the neighborhood who also was chief attorney for the Chicago Park District. In short, she was the typical kind of candidate who runs for such a political post, and she tried to create the image of a “nice Polish girl from the neighborhood” running against outsider Emanuel.

It didn’t work that year, even though there were a significant number of people living in the Illinois 5^th Congressional District (the one that now calls Mike Quigley its U.S. rep.) who expressed the same detest for Emanuel and his image that many people across the city likely will express in coming months.

WHICH MEANS THAT anyone who thinks they can merely label Emanuel an “outsider” likely is thinking too small. It is going to take more than that to defeat him.

I do remember not being among those offended by Emanuel’s victory over Kaszak, in part because I knew his presence in Congress would offend the conservative ideologues who wanted to think that the 2000 election of George W. Bush as president had relegated Emanuel and other Clinton-types to permanent oblivion.

I’m sure some of those same ideologues will be equally appalled at the idea of Emanuel as Chicago mayor, since they want to write a version of history in which Emanuel is to blame for a failed Obama presidency and never recovers.

But I’m also sure there are other voters who will be backing a candidate who happens to come from their neighborhood or represents their interest. In the case of the potential candidacy of Rev. James Meeks, he will have his congregation thinking they’re voting for their preacher to be mayor.

I AM NOT about to predict who is going to win the election next spring, or who will qualify for a likely run-off election.

All I know is that Emanuel has the potential to demand attention in ways other candidates won’t get. Which other candidate will have Washington’s image eyeballing him as he prepares to leave the White House to return to our ranks as Chicagoans?

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