Kentucky vs. Rahm – whose “victory” was likely more predictable?

Which storyline is more likely to be remembered for time to come – the near victory of Notre Dame over Kentucky in the NCAA men’s basketball tourney or the possibility that next week, mayoral challenger Jesus Garcia will come close to beating up on Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Election Day.


I say possibility because we don’t know for sure at this time how Emanuel will do come April 7. Will his political operation turn so many people off to the concept of “Mayor Chuy” that they turn out to vote for Rahm?


OR CAN GARCIA pull off a political upset that would likely be a bigger story than when Harold Washington managed to win the mayoral elections back in 1983?

My gut feeling says it won’t happen, and we’re likely to get “Four more years!” of “Mayor Emanuel,” just like in the end it was totally predictable that Kentucky (the number 1-ranked school in the tourney) beat the Fighting Irish squad that some people want to believe had no business being on the court Saturday night against the Wildcats.

But if Notre Dame had managed to hold on to the lead they had in the second half, or for that matter had not managed to let Kentucky take the lead with just a few seconds left (it was 66-66) – you just know there are Fighting Irish sports fans who will dream forevermore about “What could have been” if Notre Dame had won, and advanced to the Final Four of the NCAA Division I tournament.

Somehow, I suspect that following next week’s Election Day, Garcia will slink back to his post on the Cook County Board (his current term runs through 2018) and only the hardest-core of political geeks will bother to remember his mayoral bid.

PART OF WHAT discourages me about the idea of a Garcia bid succeeding – even though I don’t doubt the sincerity of the segment of Chicago’s population that absolutely detests Emanuel – is the sight of 2^nd Ward Alderman Robert Fioretti feeling the need to endorse Hizzoner.

This comes following four years of Fioretti being the most outspoken critic of Emanuel on the City Council. This man spent the past four years finding just about every excuse he could think of to trash Emanuel’s professional reputation.

But the thought of Garcia as mayor supposedly is what it takes to make Fioretti think twice about Rahm and come to the conclusion that maybe he’s “ready and able to take on the tough financial challenges this city faces.”

It plays off the idea that, somehow, Garcia just isn’t capable of overseeing municipal government. Even though he is a former alderman (just like Fioretti) and, state senator, along with current county board member, none of those three decades of public service have taught him much of anything.

NOW I’M NOT going to come out and say this is some sort of ethnic hang-up; as though would-be voters simply think a “foreign” (born in Mexico, but lived the bulk of his life right here in Chicago) guy is naturally less qualified. But it does seem to be an element of the debate.

There is something about the tone of these claims that Chuy isn’t up to the task that seems reminiscent of the way certain people used to talk about why they didn’t like the idea of “Mayor Harold Washington” – but didn’t want it attributed to “racial” hang-ups.

He just didn’t have the kind of background they desired, even though Washington was just as much a part of the Chicago political organization as anybody else. Just as is Garcia!

Of course, there’s also the fact that the Democratic Party is (has been for a couple of decades, since the days of President Bill Clinton) in its own fight for its character. It’s the ‘60s activists grown older versus the activists grown up – as in having outgrown their cantankerous character and now expressing a desire to be the establishment.

THAT IS A good part of why the retirement in two years of Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., will result in Number Two Democrat Richard Durbin, D-Ill., (he who bad-mouthed Walgreen’s) being passed over for the leadership post for Charles Schumer, D-N.Y. – who is perceived as being more sympathetic to “Wall Street” types.

Just as I’m sure those who say Garcia isn’t qualified to be mayor are really saying they define “qualifications” as being more like Emanuel. It is why it is likely that a Garcia near-victory next week will be written off as nothing more than a loss to soon be forgotten and the masses will go back to thinking that “Chewy” is a Star Wars character.

Unlike the Notre Dame near-victory that some people will never want to forget about. After all, just think of how crushed country singer Ashley Judd (a prominent Kentucky basketball fan) would have been if the Fighting Irish had actually won?

I can’t envision anyone (not even Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis, an outspoken Rahm-basher) getting that worked up if Emanuel wins.

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It’s finally here

We won’t get the president, but we may wind up getting two of his top aides.

For on the day before the scheduled beginning Thursday of the criminal trial of former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, his attorneys showed that they are continuing to think of this political corruption trial as an excuse to put the government itself on trial.

WHY ELSE WOULD the news related to Blagojevich focus on the fact that he had subpoenas issued to White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel and presidential senior advisor Valerie Jarrett?

That adds to the names of prominent political people who may wind up being called upon to testify during the criminal trial – including Sen. Richard Durbin and Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr., both D-Ill., along with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.

If Blagojevich could have had his way, we’d also be getting the sight of President Barack Obama raising his hand in the air and promising to tell the “truth, whole truth and nothing but the truth” during the trial.

Of course, U.S. District Judge James Zagel had previously rejected the idea of Obama having to testify at some point during the next few months. But we’re most likely going to get subjected to either Emanuel or Jarrett having to take the stand.

SOME PEOPLE, PARTICULARLY those of an ideological bent that is determined to view the Democratic Party in the worst possible light, want to view this as a “hit list” that will take down the GOP opposition. I think that is wishful thinking.

But we’re also not going to get the effect desired by Blagojevich – who wants a whole lot of people to claim, unmder oath, that they never did anything proper. By association, Blagojevich’s attorneys will argue, that means their client could not possibly have done anything that ought to be considered criminal or illegal.

If Rod Blagojevich could have his way, these would be the two key figures in his defense. We might still get the sight of Rahm Emanuel on the witness stand this summer.

Blagojevich’s attorney literally told the Chicago Sun-Times that Emanuel is a “critical” witness. “He’s the supposed victim of an extortion.”

But if Emanuel says under oath that he was not extorted, then where (Blagojevich’s attorneys will ask) is the crime?

THE PROBLEM WITH this theory is that it reeks of wishful thinking. It rarely works.

Most people just come off learning that their government officials are bumbling and human, which may be a good thing if we stop thinking of them as being either inately corrupt or saintly.

I still remember the government corruption trial held just over a decade ago in Springfield, Ill., of executives with a company, MSI, that was found guilty of criminal behavior in the way they negotiated contracts with state government.

Federal prosecutors in that case claimed that the company was overpaid so much for its work that it was criminal. Some state Public Aid officials who helped negotiate that contract also faced criminal charges for approving such a deal.

THE DEFENSE THOSE Management Services of Illinois executives put up relied heavily on the same approach Blagojevich is thinking of trying – claiming that government officials were not truly victimized, so therefore no crime took place.

That was the trial that put high-ranking aides to the state Senate and Illinois House of Representatives leadership on the stand, along with then-Gov. Jim Edgar himself.

They all claimed to have done nothing illegal. But jurors ultimately thought their testimony was irrelevant to the behavior of the men on trial.

I suspect that will be the same reaction to the sight of Emanuel or Jackson taking the stand. Blagojevich has the potential to show to an international audience how much his overbloated ego made him a complete pain in the butt toward the political people who allegedly were his colleagues – even though Blagojevich in his most pompous moments has made statements implying he thinks he’s going to “take down” those colleagues by “exposing” their own corrupt acts.

ONLY THE POLITICAL geeks will care about the little insider-ish details that come out of their time on the witness stand. I suspect real people, to the degree that they pay any attention, will merely get the view reinforced that Blagojevich is smarmy and pompous, and that the other politicos reek of self-importance.

If anything, that is the reason why I am dreading this upcoming trial. It has all the potential to be filled with minutia and irrelevance about the workings of our government. Perfect material for those people who want to put together nasty campaign advertisements in the future, yet little that would be of use toward actually trying to find solutions to the problems that confront our society – and which is the reason why we supposedly elect these officials to represent us in the first place.

Which is why I personally think the trial of Rod Blagojevich ultimately is overbloated, and something I will be pleased to see come to an end about October.

Just one final thought. Is Milorod miffed this morning, upon learning the news that former Bolingbrook cop Drew Peterson got a nearly-month-long delay in the beginning of his criminal trial in Will County Circuit Court, while the former governor's trial will begin as scheduled?

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Reid sounds like Biden, while Blagojevich comes off as a bitter and jealous pol

I can remember back a couple of years ago when political pundits seriously debated whether Barack Obama was “black enough” to attract the votes of African-American people.

Despite some initial reservation, Obama seems to have overcome the view that he’s not a real black man, when it comes to “black” people. But it would seem that white people still have the hang-up that Obama is somehow not legitimate enough – does he need to have grown up in a South Side public housing project in order to qualify?

IN RECENT DAYS, both Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and now-impeached Gov. Rod Blagojevich have had to issue public apologies for comments they made with regards to the public perception of biracial Obama’s racial background.

Not that either man said anything recently.

Reid got caught for comments he made more than a year ago during the presidential campaign. A new book by a pair of Washington Post reporters told us what Reid thought. Meanwhile, Esquire magazine told us they are going to publish a story about Blagojevich in their next issue, one in which he says he thinks Obama’s liberal credentials are somehow phony.

By comparison, he implies that he was the true liberal who looked out for the people.

FOR THE RECORD, Reid said Obama was, “a light-skinned” African-American man “with no Negro dialect unless he wanted to have one.” Reid made the comment in the context of explaining to a reporter-type why many white people were willing to support Obama.

What struck me as interesting about the comment is how similar in idea it was to the remarks made by then-Sen. (and now Vice President) Joe Biden of Delaware, who early in the campaign season put his foot in his own mouth by saying, “you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy. That’s storybook, man.”

Considering that Reid supposedly made his comment months after Biden got himself in the political doghouse, one would think he would know better than to say something so trivial.

Because that is what such thoughts ultimately are. Wanting to believe that “real” black people are “too ghetto” to be taken seriously politically is a petty way of viewing life.

BUT THEN AGAIN, maybe he saw that Biden ultimately got that V-P slot, putting him in line to be the 45th president should some “accident” befall Obama, and figured that all would be forgiven for saying something stupid.

If anything, I consider the Blagojevich comments to be more offensive – although I sent an e-mail on Monday responding to someone who asked what I thought by saying it probably didn’t even make the Top 10 list of dumb things expressed by Milorod during his life in public service.

Because while Reid, and Biden last year, were trying to offer lame, trivial praise to Obama, Blagojevich was showing that he still is bitter that Barack surpassed him as the golden child from Illinois when it comes to good government-type politics.

“I’m blacker than Barack Obama. I shined shoes. I grew up in a five-room apartment,” Blagojevich told Esquire. “My father had a little laundromat in a black community not far from where we lived.

“I SAW IT all growing up,” Blagojevich said.

Of course, Blagojevich and his followers expressing the belief that they are somehow more in touch with “the people” is not a new theme.

I still remember the day when Blagojevich got elected governor, and we got to hear now-former First Lady Patti Blagojevich try to explain her husband’s appeal by saying they were the kind of people who celebrated by “drinking a beer” rather than sipping some wine.

So I guess in their minds, Patti’s drinking a beer while her husband is a black man. It just comes off as too much self-pity for people who want to believe that they somehow ought to be where Obama is now – although I can remember even back in 2002 thinking it ridiculous whenever anyone speculated that Blagojevich was a serious contender to someday be U.S. president.

ALL OF WHICH gives Republican political operatives material with which to play as they work their way through the 2010 campaign season. I’d like to think the American people have enough sense to dismiss that rhetoric for the act of poltiical misdirection (from GOP gaffes) that it truly is.

Which probably means the first negative campaign ads feeding off this material will start airing this afternoon.

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EDITOR’S NOTES: Barack Obama might not be a political populist, but he still has (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/03/magazine/03FOB-WWLN-t.html?ref=magazine) significant liberal credentials. One should think Adlai Stevenson, not Huey Long.

I could have done without knowing that the former Illinois first family’s new dog is named “Skittles.” (http://www.esquire.com/features/people-who-matter-2010/rod-blagojevich-interview-0210?click=pp).

Republican politicos have said things about racial issues far worse than anything that might have slipped (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/01/11/reid-says-used-better-choice-words-describing-obama/) from Harry Reid’s mouth, which is why people with sense are dismissing the GOP Chairman Michael Steele’s tactics of recent days as politically partisan nonsense.

Does Reid feel foolish these days?

Watching the opening sketch of Saturday Night Live this weekend made it clear that some people want to peddle the notion of Roland Burris and Rod Blagojevich as a couple of nincompoops (with the latter being a potty mouth as well).

Yet I can’t help but wonder if the list of political fools these days ought to include the senator from Nevada who also happens to be leader of the U.S. Senate. Every time that Harry Reid tries to take a firm stance on the whole issue of replacing Barack Obama, circumstances force him to back down.

IS REID REALLY so clueless? Or does he merely act too impulsively, rather than think things through rationally?

Friday was a particularly bad day for Reid, who tried to use the fact that the Illinois House of Representatives proceeded with plans to impeach Blagojevich to change his stance on Burris back to his original view – that anyone associated with Gov. Milorod is too tainted to be in the same legislative chamber that once held Ted Stevens and John Edwards.

How else does he go from saying on Wednesday that it is very likely Burris will be accepted into the ranks of the Senate to having Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., say for him on Friday afternoon that senators will now take a hard-line stance on Burris’ political fate.

But before the day could end, that stance got dumped on. Durbin claimed that the Illinois secretary of state’s refusal to certify the paperwork from Blagojevich that made Burris a senator was so legitimate that the Senate was prepared to be a stickler about the existence of a state seal.

WHITE, WHO WAS getting tired of being used as the excuse for rejecting Burris in the Senate, went ahead and provided some paperwork that Burris allies believe shows his support.

So unless Reid is prepared to take up this issue as a personal crusade, using all of his influence to dump on Roland Burris, he’s going to have to accept the fact that the political powers that be in Illinois are inclined to accept (or at the very least, tolerate) the idea of “Roland, Roland, Roland” for two years.

Unless one wants to accept the idea that a slightly conservative senator from Nevada should be able to overrule the view of people from Illinois as to who the junior senator should be, then one has to accept the concept of Burris on Capitol Hill (and not, as Saturday Night Live portrayed him, using a fake mustache and glasses as a disguise to try to sneak into the Capitol).

Regardless of how this situation turns out, Reid has managed to ensure that he will be the one who winds up looking ridiculous.

AFTER ALL, HIS original change in stance from Tuesday (when he said “no” to the idea of Burris and Capitol police escorted Roland from the Senate chambers) to Wednesday had a measure of face-saving included in it, because it included talk of conditions that Burris would have to meet in order to be seated in the Senate.

So it could have been argued that Burris had to make some concessions in order to get Reid to back down from his opposition.

But those conditions (including Burris’ cooperation with the Illinois House panel that recommended impeachment for Blagojevich, a favorable ruling from the Supreme Court of Illinois and a change in stance from Secretary of State Jesse White) appear to have been met.

The real significance of Durbin’s appearance Sunday on the CBS weekend interview program “Face the Nation” was to see how the Senate Democrats led by Reid would try to justify once again changing their mind, without coming across as completely clueless.

REID HAD DURBIN on Friday saying that the U.S. Senate was prepared to wait out the Illinois Senate to remove Blagojevich from office so that a new governor (Pat Quinn) could pick a new senator.

Yet Durbin on Sunday said what anyone with common sense realized on Friday, on Tuesday of last week, or even a month ago back when federal prosecutors in Chicago sought a criminal complaint against Blagojevich – waiting out impeachment and removal proceedings will take way too much time, leaving Illinois short-staffed in its political representation in Washington for the interim.

So now, the Senate’s staffers who actually comprehend the legalese that makes up many bills will have to look at the paperwork that White signed on Friday to see if it truly is the same as having a letter from the governor with the state seal affixed, and also will read through transcripts of Burris’ testimony that was meant to say as little as possible while not catching himself in any kind of lie.

It would be nice to think these documents are getting straightforward readings so as to make Reid and his top Senate aides understanding of Burris’ legal situation.

FOR IF IT turns out that Reid and his gang are merely looking for another technical trap that could be used to allow them to change their minds once again and revert to a hard-line stance against Roland, they will wind up making themselves look ridiculous.

In fact, that could wind up being the historical legacy of Rod Blagojevich, a middling, intellectual lightweight who became governor of Illinois and managed to reduce everyone he came into contact with to his level of half-wit thought – even the high-and-mighty Senate Majority Leader.

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EDITOR’S NOTES: After going from “no” to “yes” back to “no,” Harry Reid had (http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/01/11/politics/politicalhotsheet/entry4712919.shtml) Dick Durbin come up with some political rhetoric that implies the answer to the question, “Will Roland Burris ever become a U.S. senator” may actually be “yes.”
Rod Blagojevich’s “appointment” of Burris to the Senate has made the Senate look as foolish (http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/blagojevich/1372391,w-democrat-burris-blagojevich-011109.article) as Blagojevich himself.

Saturday Night Live’s sketch that attempted to parody Burris and Blagojevich struck me (http://www.nbc.com/Saturday_Night_Live/video/clips/roland-burris-cold-open/926143/) as being more notable for its incredibly awful impersonation of MSNBC news anchor Rachel Maddow.

Reid ought to get the Burris situation behind him (http://reid.senate.gov/) so that the Senate can shift focus on trying to put together an economic recovery package that actually can work.

EXTRA: It will be “U.S. Sen. Roland Burris, D-Ill.,” by some time next week

When was the last time Roland Burris made Page One, above the fold, of the New York Times?

That is my prediction for how the whole fiasco surrounding Illinois’ second seat in the U.S. Senate will be resolved, now that Roland Burris and Harry Reid have had their sit-down.

For those of you who care (and a recent Gallup Organization survey indicates 59 percent of the American population is following the Burris mess), you know by now that the Senate majority leader from Nevada said earlier Wednesday he would be willing to support Burris in the Senate if the one-time Illinois attorney general can get Secretary of State Jesse White to affix the state seal to the gubernatorial proclamation that makes Burris the man who gets to finish off Barack Obama’s two remaining years in the Senate.

YOU LIKELY ALSO have heard that White is upset that his actions are being portrayed as interfering with the Senate.

So it is likely that White is looking for an excuse to get that gubernatorial proclamation back so he can have his staff affix the seal. That would then allow Burris his time in the Senate.

My guess (and this is purely a guess) is that some court will rule favorably on Burris’ legal actions, and White will use that as the “face-saving” act allowing him to certify the Blagojevich paperwork naming Burris to the Senate. It could happen by mid-week of next week, which would put the issue to rest before the inauguration on Jan. 20.

Many political pundits have made much of the thought that Burris will have to promise not to seek election to his own six-year term come the 2010 elections in Illinois. I would be surprised if Burris gets the Democratic nomination for the Senate seat.

YET I ALSO won’t be surprised if this becomes one of those unspoken deals. Burris may have to eat dirt, so to speak, by accepting that he only gets one-third of a U.S. Senate term. But he’s likely never going to have to come out and say anything in advance.

His inability to get his own Senate term will be staged in such a way that Burris will get to blame it on his age (or perhaps say that spouse Burlean wants him back in Chicago in their golden years).

Then we will get the chance to see Lisa Madigan or Jan Schakowsky or Jesse Jackson Jr. or Tammy Duckworth (or anyone else with enough ego to think they’re worthy of the U.S. Senate) fight it out amongst themselves to see who gets the Democratic party nomination (and will have to deal with the millstone of the name “Blagojevich” dangling from their neck).

By that point, Blagojevich will be gone.

I EXPECT THE Illinois Legislature will now put the rush on political maneuvers to impeach him, then try and convict him so he can be removed from office. The fact that Blagojevich so clearly has “won” the political fight over the Senate seat will intensify the disgust with which many legislators regard him.

So when he’s out of office, and possibly serving time as an inmate at the federal correctional center near Oxford, Wis., there will be the perception that Blagojevich won the fight but “lost” the war.

But this could literally turn into one of those circumstances in which history will be the final judge. Because I can’t help but wonder if the General Assembly’s handling of impeachment and the whole Senate replacement process was so poor that they will become the ones who look like nitwits some 50 or so years from now.

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EDITOR’S NOTES: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is now willing to say nice things (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/07/AR2009010701813.html) about the record of Roland Burris.

A conservative-oriented legal group filed a lawsuit to force the acceptance of Burris as a (http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/01/07/politics/politicalhotsheet/entry4705004.shtml) member of the Senate, likely so they can try to use him as the butt of negative campaigning come 2010. That presumes the Illinois GOP won’t nominate someone so incompetent himself that Burris (or any other Democrat) looks superior by comparison.

Burris may learn his long-term fate in the Senate by the end of Wednesday

I happened to be talking to someone on the telephone Tuesday morning when the cable news channels decided the best way to serve the public good was to give us “live” pictures of Roland Burris approaching the Capitol building, only to be turned away when he tried to enter the Senate chambers.

“It’s so fascinating,” she told me, finding interest in the ludicrous entourage that surrounded Burris as he went through the motions of trying to claim his seat as junior senator from Illinois. But because his credentials from Gov. Rod Blagojevich do not contain the official state seal (controlled by Secretary of State Jesse White), the Senate bureaucrats refused to let him in.

“FASCINATING” IS NOT the word I would have used to describe that moment. “Predictable” and “pointless” more accurately describe the show that took place on Tuesday.

For those people with interest in figuring out who will actually wind up representing Illinois along with Richard Durbin in the U.S. Senate for the next two years, Wednesday’s activity is much more important.

For today is the day that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., (the man whom Blagojevich tried to portray as anti-black when it comes to picking a replacement senator) is scheduled to meet with Burris.

Wednesday is the day that the two will quit posturing and engaging in political role-playing. They will have to talk to each other to see if Burris will go along with some procedural move that will allow Reid to “save face.”

TECHNICALLY, REID HAS engaged in rhetoric in recent weeks that would forbid Burris from getting the Senate appointment under any circumstances. Allowing Roland to become Sen. Roland Burris, D-Ill., would have the potential to be humiliating for Reid, since it would show he either did not understand legal procedure for political replacements or just didn’t care.

In short, Burris is probably going to have to agree to some conditions that will constitute him backing down from the rhetoric that Blagojevich has every right – until the moment he is both impeached and convicted – to make whatever appointments he chooses.

Some have speculated as I originally suspected; that Burris is going to have to accept the fact that all he gets is two years in the U.S. Senate. He’s not going to be the Democratic candidate for the post come the 2010 elections.

And when his two years on Capitol Hill are over, Burris will have to return to his home in the Gresham neighborhood (that mini-mansion once owned by gospel singer Mahalia Jackson) with the knowledge that his days in public service are complete.

NO MORE POLITICAL comebacks. No more token bids for Illinois governor or Chicago mayor or anything else.

One would think this is a small concession for Burris to make, since at age 71 he really isn’t in a position to guarantee he would still be alive at the end of a six-year Senate term. And even if he was, he could wind up becoming an Illinois version of what Strom Thurmond of South Carolina was during his last couple of terms in the Senate.

But Burris, the first black person elected to a statewide Illinois government post, has his ego.

Having to make such concessions might appear to be a public humiliation for him. He may want something that allows him to decide in the future that retirement from politics has finally arrived (even though the reality of things is that he has been “retired” for the past 14 years. In some ways, Jane Byrne would be just as logical a choice for the U.S. Senate seat as Burris).

MY POINT IN making this diatribe is to say that all the activity on Tuesday was rehearsed. Everybody went along with their lines, and the outcome was known way back when Blagojevich delivered his “Drop Dead!” to everybody in sight when making the Burris appointment last week.

Wednesday’s meeting is where we really don’t know whether either Reid or Burris will “give” a little. Or will they both remain stubborn?

If they do, then Burris might as well return to Chicago immediately thereafter. His continued presence in the District of Columbia would make him a pathetic figure (and I don’t want to hear wisecracks about him already achieving that status).

Of course, Burris accepting the ability to enter the Senate chamber with restrictions on his powers and with a Senate Rules and Administration committee taking its sweet time to investigate Burris’ status out of hopes that a future governor would pick a different replacement for Barack Obama in the U.S. Senate might be equally pathetic – except that such a scenario could make the Senate itself seem as petty and pathetic as the Illinois Legislature has been in recent weeks with its eagerness to impeach.

THAT’S THE HARD part for Blagojevich bashers to accept.

If one follows the letter of the law, then they have to accept the fact that the rules were followed and that the Burris appointment to the Senate is legitimate.

There’s also the fact that Democrats in Minnesota appear to have successfully put their candidate, entertainer and pundit Al Franken, in the Senate by the slimmest of vote margins. But Republicans are not going to give up on their candidate without a court battle or two.

To allow Franken entrance to the Senate while taking such a hard-line on Burris could wind up making the Democratic caucus of the U.S. Senate look even more ridiculous. In short, to be able to have a former writer for Saturday Night Live in the U.S. Senate, they may have to also accept the concept of “Roland, Roland, Roland” ridin’ his way into their ranks for a spell.

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EDITOR’S NOTES: Al Franken also likely will get a meeting with Harry Reid, although no sessions (http://www.cqpolitics.com/wmspage.cfm?docID=news-000003002988) have yet been scheduled beyond Wednesday’s one-on-one with Roland Burris.

Tuesday’s activity with Burris on Capitol Hill was preferred by television “newscasts” because it (http://voices.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2009/01/06/senate_rejects_burris_in_spect.html?wprss=the-trail) was entirely predictable. In short, none of it was “news.”

Burris, as perceived in South Africa (http://www.news24.com/News24/World/News/0,,2-10-1462_2449378,00.html) and in mainland China (http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-01/07/content_10614945.htm), just to name a couple of places around the world.

A DAY IN THE LIFE (of Chicago): Cardinals’ win reminiscent of ‘47 champs

I can’t help but notice the rhetorical hype used in sports stories all weekend reporting the fact that that Arizona Cardinals football team managed Saturday to win their first home field “playoff” game since 1947.

What it really means is that the Cardinals have been so awful during their time in the greater Phoenix area that this is their first playoff victory at home ever. For that 1947 game constantly referred to wasn’t really a playoff game.

IT WAS A National Football League championship game when the Cardinals franchise (one of the oldest in the NFL) won its only league title ever. And those were back in the days when the White Sox weren’t the only team that “marketed” itself as representing Chicago’s South Side.

It was Dec. 28, 1947, when the Chicago Cardinals beat the Philadelphia Eagles 28-21, with Cardinals players wearing tennis shoes to help them cope with the frozen and tattered turf of Comiskey Park – the same site that now provides parking for White Sox fans attending games at U.S. Cellular Field.

All four Cardinals touchdowns came on long runs of 44, 70, 70 and 75 yards.

I wonder at times if people remember that Chicago used to be a two-team town in the NFL, or if they think it is the natural order of things for us to get “stupid” for the Bears. The Cardinals were one of the league’s original teams and were in Chicago for four decades.

OF COURSE, DURING that time span, they only won that one championship in 1947. They’re the football equivalent of the St. Louis Browns, the major league baseball team whose only league title came in 1944 during the Second World War. Only the Cardinals never employed the equivalent of a dwarf or a one-armed outfielder, like the Browns did.

Compared to the nine championships the Chicago Bears took during those same years, it was no wonder that the Cardinals suffered from attendance deficits that caused their owners to eventually look to other cities – St. Louis, then the Phoenix area.

Not that the old owners ever gave up the team. The Bidwell family that continues to own Sportsmans’ Park ran the team back in that championship year of ’47, and still has the football team to this day, where it plays in a new stadium in Glendale, Ariz., the same city where the White Sox plan to shift their spring training operations for future years.

What else was noteworthy about the news in recent days?

WHO’S PLAYING WHAT GAME WITH RACE?: Is the U.S. Senate really in the hands of a man who thinks black people are unelectable? That is the impression the Chicago Sun-Times tried to create with its Sunday paper editions illustrated with a doctored photograph of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., holding up a list of names, with those of black people crossed out.

Or is Gov. Rod Blagojevich giving reporter-types an overly selective interpretation of the conversations the two men had last week about what (if anything) Blagojevich should do to try to fill the Senate vacancy created by Barack Obama’s rise to president.

The odd part is that I have no problem believing both interpretations, even though Reid used a "Meet the Press" appearance Sunday to backpedal from such statements. It certainly wouldn’t be out of character for Blagojevich to twist the conversation the two had by telephone into a tall tale meant to make him appear sympathetic. Ever since the criminal complaint issued nearly a month ago, Rod needs all the “love” he can find.

Yet the fact that some would automatically look at a list of Illinois political people and presume the Anglos on the list are more appealing to the state’s electorate is not out of character. It is evidence that we as a society are not yet at the point where race ceases to be a factor – despite those who want to believe the election of Obama is the end of the civil rights battle.

REPLACING THE REPLACEMENT SYSTEM: Rep.-elect Debbie D. Halvorson, D-Ill., is leaving the Illinois Senate, and the local party bigwigs in the south suburbs down to Kankakee will gather Monday to pick her legislative replacement.

Among those in the running for the post in Springfield are Halvorson’s former chief of staff and a member of the Will County board. This replacement is about as close as we will come to filling any political vacancies these days.

We’re still waiting for dates to be scheduled for special elections to pick a replacement for Rep. Rahm Emanuel, D-Ill., who became President-elect Barack Obama’s chief of staff. Then, there’s always the need for a replacement for Obama himself in the U.S. Senate. According to Illinois law, the governor addresses those issues.

But Rod Blagojevich still has people worked up with his attempt to replace Obama, and I don’t know how would-be Sen. Roland Burris, D-Ill., will actually be received in Washington when he shows up this week. The only thing I know for sure is that the public will have another outcry of disgust if Blagojevich proceeds with his duties to schedule election dates. So we’re going to have quite a few vacancies in this state for some time.

“SOUTH SIDE” CELEBRATION FOR D.C. EVENT: The banquet hall that has been the site of many wedding receptions and other public events will be the site for celebration for those who want to bask in the glow of Barack Obama becoming president, yet are too cheap to travel to Washington for the inauguration.

Coordinators of the Jan. 20 evening event at the Alsip-based Condesa del Mar say they expect about 1,000 people to show up for their Chicago-area Inauguration Night party.

Don’t expect to be able to just wander in off the street. Tickets are being sold, with the cheapest “seats” going for $90. And for that price, there’s no guarantee that you’ll be able to see anything on the video screens being erected that are meant to give people a sense of what is happening in Washington while they’re partying (http://www.obamachicagoball.com/) in suburban Chicago.

And yes, there will be vendors peddling all the Obama-related merchandise one could want – for a fee.

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