After spending all that money, we got the predictable electoral outcome

The people of Illinois have voted and their votes are being tallied.

J.B. couldn't win a majority of Dems

And what’s the outcome of the 2018 primary election cycle, one in which some $120 million was spent on campaign tactics meant to besmirch the opposition?

WE’RE GOING TO get some seven more months of pricey, hostile tactics!

For it seems that the Illinois gubernatorial campaign that will come to a head on Nov. 6 will wind up being a battle of the rich guys.

Bruce Rauner and J.B. Pritzker, both of whom are independently wealthy enough that they can afford to finance their own campaigns for political office, appear to have won their political parties’ respective primary elections.

Both of these guys are in desperate need of a hobby. Instead, they have chosen to satisfy their need to do something worthwhile with their lives by running for political office.

IN THIS CASE, both want to be governor of Illinois.

Rauner already has had four years in office, and he wants four more. Only this time, he wants to not have to deal with the Democratic Party officials led by Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago – whom some can say earned his money the past four years by being the force that prevented Rauner from implementing what he wants to think of as “reform” but really are nothing more than union-busting tactics.

Rauner barely won a majority of GOPers

Pritzker, who for many years has been the rich guy whom Democrats turn to for financial donations in order to raise the money they need to pay for their political campaigns, has decided he’d like to be a political person in his own right.

Perhaps he saw the ego boost his sister, Penny, got from being a government official in her own right (she was U.S. Commerce secretary during the Barack Obama presidency) and thought it would be fun.

OR MAYBE HE just doesn’t want to be outdone politically by his sister? Who’s to say what made J.B. decide he’d like to be a politico.

Can J.B. top his sister, Penny, politically?

It certainly isn’t the money. For the just under $180,000 salary Illinois provides to its governor would be mere pocket change for Pritzker – whose family has an immense fortune that originated from the Hyatt Hotels chain.

Then again, money isn’t what entices Rauner.

This is the guy who’s paying to run a re-election bid AND also to fund several candidates for the General Assembly so that he might have a majority that would actually support him.

Ives sets her political legacy

IT’S NOT WRONG to say that Rauner has practically become the Republican Party in Illinois. A thought that offends the sensibilities of many of those individuals to whom ideology and social issue stances is their motivation for politics.

For Rauner is now a guy who took a significant financial advantage against a primary election opponent who borders on being a right-wing nutcase and barely won his primary by the skin of his teeth.

Jeanne Ives of Wheaton will be remembered for her whacked out stances on issues ranging from abortion to guns to gays and how she nearly won. Which already has many electoral observers saying Rauner ought to be ashamed politically and perhaps ought to begin preparing himself now for the big move out of the Statehouse Scene.

Then again, Pritzker is the guy whose overwhelming victory on Tuesday was less than a majority. Challengers Daniel Biss and Chris Kennedy combined were a majority. Most people who voted in a Democratic primary (myself included) wanted somebody other than J.B. to take on Rauner.

RAUNER’S GREATEST ASSET politically is that sense of apathy – if it lasts, the Democratic challenger will lag behind, while also getting smacked about with all the politically partisan attacks Rauner can come up with.

DAIBER: Couldn't even beat Tio Hardiman

For he has many millions more to spend as this election cycle likely tops 2010 in California as the most expensive gubernatorial campaign ever.

One final thought; I wonder what’s going through Bob Daiber’s mind right now. He’s the one-time Madison County regional schools superintendent who tried being the lone downstate Illinois candidate for governor and thought rural Illinois would turn out for him.

Instead, his 1.2 percent of the vote put him behind Tio Hardiman’s 1.7 percent. Talk about accomplishing nothing!

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There’s a perfectly-good reason they call this time of year the ‘silly season’

We’re one month away from Election Day, as in when we the electorate declare our partisan intentions and decide whom each of the political parties will have on the ballot come the Nov. 6 general elections.

BISS: The $56 man?

Which means we’re already enduring more than our share of stupidity in the name of politics – and we’re going to get 30 more days between now and the primaries.

YOU COULD CUT short the amount of time you have to care about such nonsense if you decide to cast your ballot at an early voting center. March 5 is the day people can start showing up to express themselves early.

Yet we’re enduring all kinds of stunts.

Such as the one by Democratic gubernatorial candidate Daniel Biss – who officially pulled out his checkbook and wrote out a $56 check to his own campaign.

It was supposed to be a mocking of the $7 million more than overly-wealthy opponent J.B. Pritzker gave to himself – bringing his total campaign fund to $56.7 million.

BISS, IN A video snippet he posted on Facebook, said he can’t come close to matching that amount of money. So instead, he coughed up $56 – while asking individuals to also donate $56, in hopes that the overall total will add up to something significant.

PRITZKER: Biss tries to mock his millions

While also trying to make a deeper point that Biss, a one-time mathematics teacher turned state senator from Evanston, is closer to being like everyday people than Pritzker.

Or even the other Democratic challenger, Chris Kennedy, whom Biss claims has given some $1.2 million of his own money to his gubernatorial campaign. Which means that no matter who wins a month from now, there is going to be a lot of self-money wasted on political fantasy.

While also showing that Biss’ own level of support is limited to the point where one could argue a vote cast for him is a vote wasted.

THE ONE THING I do know is that I probably shouldn’t go wearing a “Biss” campaign button on the day I show up at a polling place. I usually don’t give much thought to what I wear for that occasion – other than that I’ll get that sticker reading “I Voted!” to paste on myself that day.

Campaigning by intimidation?

It seems, however, that the Supreme Court of the United States is going to give thought to this issue. A week from Wednesday, the nation’s high court will hear arguments in a case out of Minnesota – where Tea Party-type activists are challenging state laws that required them to cover up the party t-shirts they wanted to wear while voting.

It may be subtle, but I don’t doubt it is intimidation in its own form. Just as I suspect every jackass who insists on wearing one of those ridiculous “Make America Great Again” caps is looking to provoke a reaction from everybody who doesn’t agree with them.

Although it’s not as blunt as a few years ago, when on Election Day, a polling place worker insisted on saying “Don’t Vote for the Son” as he guided us to empty ballot machines – remember Todd Stroger (the son of John) running for Cook County Board president re-election in 2010?

I ALSO GOT my chuckle from a campaign mailing I received from Patricia Joan Murphy – who’s running for the Cook County Board seat her late mother (Joan Patricia Murphy) held for many years.

Thorough instructions

The mailing included postcards I could send in to the county clerk’s office so that I can cast my ballot by mail. I don’t even have to show up at a polling place.

The card is actually an application to Cook County to send me a ballot to fill out at home. And for what it’s worth, Murphy’s postcards are already marked in a way to ensure I’m sent a Democratic Party primary ballot. How thoughtful (heavy sarcasm intended) of her.

It’s almost enough to make me want to pick a Republican ballot. But then I’d have to be confronted with the thought of the worst of evils between Gov. Bruce Rauner and challenger Jeanne Ives. Too nauseating to contemplate.

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Sanders’ stubbornness cosmic payback for Hillary of ’08? Or prep for Trump?

Personally, I’m not surprised to see that would-be presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders is determined to carry out his campaign to the bitter end – and possibly longer!

 

SANDERS: He won't back off!

He’s a stubborn guy. He’s hard-headed and more than willing to argue out a principle even if he has no realistic clue as to how to achieve it. Heck, there are times I think the senator from Vermont is more unfit to be president than Donald Trump.

BESIDES, THE FACT is that the man is not a part of the Democratic Party.

Whether one wants to use the Democratic socialist label to describe him or the Independent tag (as in those news organizations that insist on IDing him as being I-Vt., because they don’t know what to make of someone who isn’t a Democrat or Republican), he’s not a part of the party establishment.

It shouldn’t be any surprise that the man could care less what party officials think about wanting to have an orderly political process in which likely Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton turns her attention to beating up on Trump’s Republican campaign.

Instead, she’s having to fight continued squabbles over Bernie, who just won’t play nice and fade away.

OF COURSE, IT also shouldn’t be any surprise that the Democratic party establishment (or party hacks, if you prefer) have been so solidly opposed to Sanders throughout the primary election cycle to the point where the superdelegates are going to ensure the man has no chance of prevailing come the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.

Since Sanders was never interested in being a Democrat all these years, why should they suddenly decide to want him to be the standard-bearer whose presence atop the ballot will influence the chances of re-election for many party officials in assorted offices across the nation?

 

CLINTON: How progressive is she?

It is why they’re going to go along with the person with whom they feel most comfortable; particularly since to a certain generation of people Hillary IS the voice of liberalism. She IS the one who stands for progressive change.

Even though she really has been moderated by age. And young people probably think it's a tacky joke that she ever was thought of as liberal! She’s still by far the one most likely to support certain ideals for society, particularly when compared to Trump who these days is trying to alter his own image to convince the conservative ideologues of our society that he can be “conservative enough” for them.

 

OBAMA: Was Hillary as stubborn in '08?

AS ONE WHO cast a ballot for Clinton back when my home state had its primary election in March, there is a part of me that is dismayed that Camp Hillary hasn’t been able to wrap this up by now.

It really comes off as a sign of her own political weakness that she can’t crush a little-known senator from Vermont.

Although I also remember back to the 2008 primary election cycle when Clinton carried out her presidential dreams all the way to the end of the cycle. She wouldn’t give up – even when it became clear she couldn’t get the proper number of delegates to be successful at the convention.

Could it be a matter of bad karma that Clinton’s own stubbornness back then will be repaid by her having to endure a harsh political fight?

AND WHAT WILL come of this. Could it be that Hillary will be toughened up for what inevitably will be the classless and tacky cheap shots that the Trump campaign will devolve down to in its own efforts to gain every last vote possible from that segment of society that views Hillary as “that broad” and would do anything possible to ensure she NEVER wins the presidency.

TRUMP: Will beat on Hillary worse than Bernie

Because as much as Trump repulses some in our society, Hillary comes off as harsh and shrill to an equal degree – particularly those who aren’t all that offended by the way Trump treats women in general.

In the end, Sanders’ place in political history is going to be the degree to which he batters on Clinton – giving her enough calluses to blunt the blows she’ll get eventually from Trump?

Or softening her up to the point where Trump could land a lethal blow – which means many people will wind up laying blame on Bernie if we really wind up with a first lady Melania; along with exes Ivana and Marla. It would make for quite the first family holiday card come Christmas!

  -30-

We in Illinois out-voted New York but did anybody really notice turnout?

An interesting point has been brought up on various politically-oriented websites – some 2.6 million people turned out to polling places this week in the New York primaries.

Much is being made of the fact that locals Hillary Clinton (once the state’s U.S. senator) and  Donald Trump (for many years, the state’s garish rube who generates so much copy with his life's gaudiness) got such large vote margins that the Empire State has practically ensured it will be a Clinton/Trump brawl for president come the November general elections.

YET IN ILLINOIS’ primary back in March, some 3.45 million people took the time to vote. Both Clinton and Trump had more people from Illinois cast ballots for them than there were New Yorkers who supported them.

Did anybody get all worked up, excited or bent out of shape over the notion that Illinois had somehow put the two candidates over the top, or clinched their ultimate victories?

Heck no.

Probably because it would have been ridiculous to make such a claim.

STILL, FOR ALL the claim that New Yorkers will try to give you these days that they’re somehow politically savvy and that it will be their New York “values” that somehow sets the tone of the 2016 general election for president, I have to wonder if it is Illinois – with its overtones of good ol’ Chicago politicking – that ought to be considered dominant?

It is kind of odd that New York’s population of 19.7 million people got voter out-turned by Illinois’ 12.7 million.

Particularly since the common perception in Illinois was that our turnout wasn’t all that spectacular. Not record-setting low, but certainly not as intriguing as back in 2008 when Barack Obama’s ballot presence inspired people to turn out in large numbers.

Yet more of our residents felt inspired to cast ballots this time around than the New Yorkers did.

OF COURSE, IT probably wasn’t any real interest in the president that inspired people from Illinois to want to cast ballots. It may well have been our overly-local sense of what is politically important that drove our turnout.

You know, the old sense of “up and out” that federal government is less important than the local crackpots who hang out at City Hall.

We had a state’s attorney election in Cook County where the Democratic primary amounted to the real thing – nobody really thinks Republican Christopher E.K. Pfannkuche is going to win come November.

We had that intriguing primary for Senate where Tammy Duckworth had to battle a bit to win the Democratic nomination to take on Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., come November.

THERE ALSO WERE assorted electoral posts that took on overtones of expressing one’s displeasure either with Mayor Rahm Emanuel or Gov. Bruce Rauner (and the fact that Emanuel prevailed more than Rauner doesn’t really mean we like him all that much).

In New York, people may have been motivated by the desire to pick a presidential candidate right now. In Illinois, we had higher priorities. I wonder how many people figured their presidential pick was an afterthought.

Then again, I also wonder how many New Yorkers are eager to have an all-New York presidential fight – since the potential for one actually existed back in 2008, but fell short.

Remember that could have been the Democrat Hillary versus Republican Rudy Giuliani election, with the potential of Michael Bloomberg running a third-party independent bid for election.

A NEW YORK trio – all of which got washed away by the Chicago influence that swept Obama into the White House for the past eight years.

Which I’ll admit as a political writer will be something I will miss – the idea that White House activity has a Chicago tinge to it.

  -30-

What’s so hard to comprehend about Trump; he’s not winning w/o a majority

There are those people who are inclined to believe that Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump is on to something when he complains about the rigged, disgusting, dirty system” that he says is about to deprive him of the GOP nomination in the November general elections.

TRUMP: Lead w/o majority means delegates pick

Personally, I think it’s just a matter of simple mathematics. Trump didn’t pay attention in school. Either that, or he’s just a whiny little wuss who ought to back out of the campaign sooner, rather than later.

WHAT’S AT STAKE is that the delegates being chosen in the various elections and caucuses held across the country in recent months will gather this summer at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland.

At that time, they will pick the party’s nominee.

Remember back to the time when there were more than a dozen candidates seeking the nomination? Many of those people have backed out so long ago we’ve forgotten they were ever in the running.

But we’re still not down to a head-to-head race between two people. There’s still a split. As of this week, Trump had 743 pledged delegates, but may fall short of the majority 1,237 needed to have a majority.

WHILE IT IS true that Trump, the New York real estate developer who knows little about the ways of electoral politics, has won many primaries and caucuses, he’s winning by plurality.

He’s getting more support than any other one candidate, but all the candidates getting support from people who want Anybody But Trump on the ballot come November out-total Donald’s support.

Now that we really are down to just a few, it seems the powers-that-be who don’t want Trump are willing to take seriously the idea of a Ted Cruz presidential campaign. Even though on the ideological nut-scale he’s more far gone than Trump is.

CRUZ: Won't wither away!

To some people, the proof that the Republican Party has lost touch with real people is the fact that its two most credible candidates at this point are Cruz and Trump. Out of that field of 18 or so that once was in the running, these two ideological loons are the ones who have a chance at actually winning the primaries.

THE POINT IS that if Trump were really as strong as he thinks we all ought to presume he is, he’d have the majority – or be well on his way to having them by the time of the nominating convention.

Because he’ll possibly fall short of that 50 percent-plus-one level of support, we may actually get to see a nominating convention which is more than just a pep rally meant to confirm the election results from across the nation. Those delegates (some of whom we chose directly and some of whom are the superdelegates whom we elected to other political positions) will wind up deciding.

RYAN: He says 'no,' but could he still be picked?

That’s the American Way!

Simple mathematics. Whoever gets majority support. And if Trump is truly the classic dealmaker he envisions himself to be, who’s to say he can’t sway delegates not now on his side to back him?

OR DOES TRUMP acknowledge on some level that he’s a con artist of sorts whom a majority of people in his own political party (along with everybody in the opposition party) wants nothing to do with? If Trump gets the math, he gets the win. If he doesn’t he loses. That’s only fair.

The same argument can be made on the Democratic side, where some people are complaining that Bernie Sanders isn’t making any gains despite his string of primary and caucus victories in recent weeks.

SANDERS: 'The Bern' won't incinerate Hillary?

Hillary Clinton still has more delegates and potential for large numbers of delegates that could push her into the majority that would turn the Democratic Nominating Convention in Philadelphia into a coronation, of sorts. A return of the House of Clinton (and be sure to hide the girls, because it means Bill’s back!).

Because in the end, Trump and Sanders seem to think their personalities ought to overpower the math – which says majority rules. That's the REAL American Way!

  -30-

EDITOR’S NOTE: I’ll admit that back when the Republican field of candidates was 18, the two that stood out in my mind were Donald Trump and Ted Cruz – they were the two who struck me as so far out there. The fact that they have prevailed over more rational candidates makes me realize why I could never be a part of the modern-day Republican Party.