Annexation into suburbs historically sound, but more likely to p-o people

Mayoral hopeful Garry McCarthy may have history on his side when he talks about Chicago annexing the suburban communities directly adjacent into the city limits, but I can’t envision an idea that would cause more contempt to be felt all the way around.

Once regarded as a suburb with Chicago far off in distance

There was, once a time when the street now known as Pershing Road was the southernmost boundary of Chicago, with Hyde Park Township stretching south to 138^th Street. It was regarded as a place to escape urban congestion and noise, but it became a full-fledged part of Chicago in 1889 and added the bulk of what we now think of as the South Side.

SO IN THAT sense, McCarthy saying that places like Oak Lawn, Oak Park or Norridge ought to be taken into the city of Chicago proper isn’t outrageous. Although I don’t doubt one bit that the people currently living there will regard it as such.

McCarthy claims this is an easy way for the city to see a population increase, while also adding to the tax base. While officials in these suburban communities are quick to claim they have solid bases of life and aren’t the least bit interested in becoming a part of the city’s ongoing problems.

Personally, I happen to think there are many suburban communities that would benefit from being a part of a larger entity – because the local services they are able to offer on their own are usually miniscule.

I really question if there are 130 distinct municipal identities within Cook County – which is the number of incorporated villages, towns and cities within the county. With Chicago being merely one of them.

THE FACT IS that most of the suburbs’ true identity lies in their proximity to Chicago. Whether their officials want to admit it or not, they’re a part of the area.

There is a sense in which a place like Dolton might as well just be another neighborhood within Chicago; something along the lines of Hegewisch.

I also find it odd that officials in Oak Lawn and Norridge, in particular, are speaking out against McCarthy’s concept. In the case of Norridge, it is an incorporated community surrounded on all sides by Chicago. Once one summer, I lived on the Northwest Side where literally all I had to do was cross the street and I’d be in Norridge.

McCARTHY: Looking to boost city population

Although I suspect anybody driving through the area would have no clue they had departed, then re-entered, the city limits during the few minutes they passed through.

WHILE IN THE case of Oak Lawn, the claim I often hear from people who live there is that their community is different because it’s so close to Chicago. One can actually enjoy an urban lifestyle, unlike the sense some suburbs offer of being so isolated from the rest of the world.

It’s like they want Chicago benefits without being a part of Chicago. Which to my mindset is mere nonsense!

There is one thing I couldn’t help but notice about McCarthy’s plan, which may be the aspect that kills off any chance of it being taken seriously. The communities he rattled off by name – the ones that would boost the city population by about 160,000 people – are ones with predominantly white populations.

It’s as though by taking in those towns, he can bolster the Anglo part of Chicago’s population. Is his real sentiment one that Chicago has too many non-white people living here?

HECK, I GREW up in suburban Calumet City, whose northern boundary bumps up against Chicago’s Far South Side. Yet Calumet City has changed, developing throughout the years a sizable African-American population (about 72 percent, according to the Census Bureau). I don't hear anyone talking of taking in the suburb's roughly 37,000 residents.

Is McCarthy trying to cherry-pick the kind of people he’d want in an expanded Chicago? If he really were serious, he’d talk about annexing all of Cook County – creating a megapolis of some 5 million people. It would bolster the city tax base and would actually fit into the mindset of many downstate Illinois types who tend to think the whole of northeastern Illinois is all Chicago.

Could this someday become a neighborhood, rather than a village, sign?

Do that, and we’d not only crush Houston’s dreams that they’ll someday be bigger than us, while regaining our spot as the “Second City” by topping Los Angeles’ mere 4.03 million.

Instead, we’re destined to be the 2.7 million portion of metro Chicago, which when you add in all the inner and outer suburbs totals out at over 9 million individuals – none of whom want to give up their community name for the sake of progress.

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Does anybody think a 14-candidate forum works – except to create chaos?

I’m usually of the sort when it comes to candidate forums and debates that it’s wrong to think in terms of fringe candidates and paring down the field to only certain political aspirants.

Can we 'decide' amongst mayoral candidates if we don't see them side by side? Or would such a forum be little more than political chaos?

If a candidate manages to get a spot on a ballot and will be an option come Election Day, I say its downright reckless to try to exclude them. People have a right to know exactly who the ding-dongs are whose names are before them when they make choices for political office.

BUT I HAVE to admit; that viewpoint of mine is being tested by the upcoming election cycle for Chicago municipal government – particularly for that of mayor.

I’m talking about the cycle that’s going to ask voters to pick from amongst 14 candidates who managed to make it past the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners’ process for putting together the Feb. 26 ballot.

WFLD-TV (as in Channel 32) is planning a pair of candidate forums they will televise, come Thursday and Friday.

The Thursday program will feature the campaigns of Toni Preckwinkle, Susana Mendoza, Gery Chico, Bill Daley and Willie Wilson. Friday’s forum will be for everybody else – as in the candidates who are not considered as having as strong of support as the Big Five.

OR, AS CANDIDATE Paul Vallas put it, “we get invited to the children’s table.”

It doesn’t surprise me that judgment calls are being made as to which of the 14 candidates ought to be taken seriously and are worthy of news coverage. It would be kind of ridiculous to equate former Alderman Robert Fioretti’s mayoral campaign with that of Preckwinkle.

But it also means feelings are being hurt by the candidates who are finding out they’re not going to be taken as seriously as the Big Five! Both Vallas and Amara Enyia both complained publicly about their exclusion, with Enyia taking the stance that this is the political establishment trying to pre-determine the Election Day outcome. She’d even be correct in saying that the polls showing the Big Five in the lead actually show no one has a ridiculously-large lead and the “children’s table” candidates aren’t that far behind the leaders.

It almost seems like everybody wants to work out of the Fifth Floor office at City Hall for the next four years

Of course, she’s also getting hammered these days by the Chicago Tribune for the moments of ineptitude she has had in her personal finances and in government posts she has held in the suburbs.

IF ANYTHING, IT would be interesting to have a candidate forum of sorts so that we could see Enyia side-by-side with the bigger names so we could see for ourselves just how much she is lacking by comparison. Although I expect the kind of people who back her because she has a rap music star on her side will not care much.

But I’m not optimistic that such a forum could occur.

Mostly because I don’t have a clue how you’d stage such an event. How could you have a credible debate program with 14 people each trying to respond to each other, and come up with smart-aleck retorts to each other’s insults?

Is this the inevitable outcome … 

When you consider that a debate is likely to be an hour-long event – at most – trying to include everybody would most likely result in everybody getting one question. There wouldn’t be enough time to ask anything more and expect everybody to answer.

AND BEFORE YOU say the forum could be lengthened, I’d retort that, “You’ve got to be kidding me!” Trying to stage several hours of political blather (which is what many political debates devolve into) would insure that nobody sits through and sees the whole thing.

… for an April 2 run-off election?

The tedium would cause so many channels to be changed in mid-debate.

It might well be that this freak-show of an election cycle with so many candidates is just the type of thing that makes for bad television. It certainly wouldn’t be possible to do much of a debate – no matter how much political people try to follow the usual conventions to do so.

Unless you’re really that eager to see and hear La Shawn Ford and Jeremiah Joyce exchange retorts, while Daley sighs at the sight of other people trying to seek the political post that certain types of Chicagoans may regard as his birthright.

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We’re No. 1 (for now, at least)!

I can remember being a kid some several decades ago in Chicago – listening to the boasts that the civic-minded of us used to tell about our home city. 

From back in the day when O'Hare really was No. 1!!!

We had both the World’s Tallest Building and the World’s Busiest Airport.

NEITHER OF WHICH is true any longer. Particularly with the “tallest building” claim, as the one-time Sears Tower now bears a non-descript moniker and is surpassed by structures in New York, along with the Middle East.

But as for the “airport” claim, we were sort of able to reclaim that title for O’Hare International Airport. The Federal Aviation Administration this week reported there were 903,000 arrivals and departures that passed through our city’s airport named for the aviation war hero son of an attorney who ultimately cooperated with ‘G-men’ in the busting of gangster Al Capone.

That total is more than the number of people who passed through Atlanta’s Hartsfield International Airport – the facility that has been number one for the past two decades.

Does this mean Chicago has “reclaimed” its “rightful” position atop the nation’s aviation routes? That more people are choosing Chicago instead of that overgrown Southern hick town that hosted the Super Bowl game that left so much of the nation’s football fans in a funk (be honest, nobody with sense roots for New England).

NOT REALLY!

For one thing, this figure is just for the number of flights that used the airport – not the number of people. By that standard, Atlanta still passed Chicago O’Hare in terms of individuals who passed through their facility last year. Some 83.4 million for O’Hare, compared to 104 million through Atlanta.

Plus, there’s also the fact that Chicago’s figures throughout the years that O’Hare was atop the airport rankings were always inflated because of the fact that airlines were creatures of travel habit.

O'HARE: The reason it's not still known as Orchard Field

Just as Chicago was a national transit hub when passenger trains were the common mode of travel and all routes passed through the Second City, the airlines tended to think of Chicago in the same way.

AS IN THEIR flights all converged on Chicago

So many people traveling from one part of the country to another found they had to make a stopover in Chicago before transferring to a connecting flight to take them to the place they really wanted to get to.

Now, with routes determined less by planted train track, other airports have served that same “connecting route” purpose – with the airport for Dallas/Fort Worth in particular taking on much of that “transferring flight” role.

Which is kind of a relief. I’d hate to think there were actually growing numbers of people in our society who felt some need to actually spend some time in Texas. In all honesty, if not for the fact I have an aunt and cousins who live in San Antonio, I doubt I’d give the “Lone Star State” a second thought.

JUST AS I’M sure there are generations past for whom the only time they ever spent in Chicago was during the time they were overcharged at airport concessions while waiting for a connecting flight.

They probably never saw any more of Chicago than the terminal used by whichever airline they chose for their particular flight.

It's still "tallest" in Chicago

Although considering that airlines tack on a fee to the price of tickets to cover the cost of the fees the airports charge for use, it means Chicago gained some tax income from all those travelers who never had the common sense to make Chicago their final destination.

With this 4.2 percent increase for the past year, we in Chicago can once again claim (for however a short a time period until the FAA issues updated statistics) that we’re “Number One!” atop the number of flights. Now if we can only figure out a way to add on a few dozen more stories to the tragically-named Willis Tower, we could go about reclaiming that “tallest building” title for Chicago as well.

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U.S. evolves at differing rates

So what should we think of Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam and the fact that racist imagery – including that of the Ku Klux Klan – turns up in his college yearbook?

The Washington Post made this obscure yearbook page public knowledge. Personally, I'm more offended by Northam's quote than the photo

Personally, I’m not totally shocked.

I REMEMBER back when I was in college (mid-1980s) and looking through the old yearbooks from Illinois Wesleyan University – my alma mater – seeing graphics of Klan nightriders and hooded people being used as illustrations.

Entirely on those pages devoted to the fraternities that existed on campus.

But there is one fact that should be pointed out – these particular yearbooks were from the 1890s. Meaning they already were nearly a century old, and the ideals that may have existed on campus back then had long evolved into something far different from its origins.

I’ve also seen old University of Illinois yearbooks from the early 1900s indicating that the Ku Klux Klan once was regarded as a fully-legitimate fraternity on the Urbana, Ill., campus – although I’ve also seen various accounts indicating the U of I KKK was never an officially-recognized chapter of the Klan.

SO WHAT SHOCKS and appalls me about the Northam situation?

It’s that these Klan-like hooded images were still being considered acceptable as recently as the ‘80s – Northam was a student at Eastern Virginia Medical School, and it was the 1984 yearbook that included the photo of people in blackface and a Klan hood on a page devoted to Northam himself.

As for Northam saying in response that the questionable photograph is not of himself, but that he once remembers dressing up in blackface as part of a Michael Jackson impersonation, I’d think that is something that falls into the category of something stupid he once did that is now embarrassing.

NORTHAM: Same person now as he was in '84?

Largely because it makes many of us question his musical tastes in general. It’s something more silly than offensive. Or offensive in the sense that he could ever have been so ridiculous.

BUT THE REALITY is that this kind of imagery that had long withered away in Illinois was still considered acceptable in Virginia. Just as some people are still willing to fight for Confederate imagery in the form of flags and statues that still linger in parts of the nation.

Personally, I don’t have trouble believing that Northam himself had long forgotten about this imagery attached to his name, and he may well have moved far beyond this type of thought in his own life.

The smart-aleck in me thinks that if Northam still felt such thoughts in his daily existence, he’d be a Republican. Which probably would put him more in line with the bulk of the southern region from which he comes.

He’d probably be doing whatever he could to tie his imagery to that of President Donald Trump and going around wearing one of those red “Make America Great Again” caps – which some openly say is the 21^st Century’s version of wearing a white hood.

SO WHEN REPUBLICAN ideologues go about claiming that Northam is evidence of hypocrisy amongst those of the Democratic Party when it comes to racial issues, I see it more as evidence of trying to distract attention from their own racial hang-ups.

My point is that I’m not quickly jumping on board with those people who are demanding Northam’s resignation on grounds that he’s an embarrassment to his home state. Although I’m also wondering if the pressure is going to rise to such levels that he’ll have no choice BUT to resign!

Are the same people calling for Northam's resignation the same individuals who defend the continued existence of Confederate memorials?

I almost feel like the only people who’d win by denouncing Northam as an unreformed bigot are the unreformed bigots themselves – as though they’d try to claim this as justification for their own ignorant ways of thought.

While also expressing some thoughts indicating that they think we’d be better off going back to the past – such as an era where no one would give a second thought to anything being strange and hostile about the imagery stirred up by Northam’s college yearbook.

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Awaiting anxiously these days for word from the groundhog and the Trumpster. Then again, maybe we shouldn't be!

The Donald or The Groundhog (below), … 

So just what is that gol-danged groundhog going to have to say to us come Saturday about whether springtime is on the way; or if we’re going to have to wait six more weeks for the coming of pleasant weather?

Although a part of me is now wondering even more just what that gosh-darned fool we call a president is going to have to say to us come Tuesday – the date he finally gets to stand before Congress and give the annual State of the Union speech.

… who do you place more faith in?

NOT THAT I expect anything of real significance to come from the lips of The Donald – who at times reminds me of the old Chicago White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf wisecrack about New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner.

Remember. “How can you tell when Steinbrenner is not telling the truth? His lips move!” It sounds like a pretty accurate assessment of Trump – who actually once had his own ties to the Yankees owner and has about as overbloated an ego as the one-time shipping magnate-turned-baseball boss.

The only difference is that Steinbrenner put together teams that achieved their goal of winning World Series. While Trump, for the good of us all, has consistently failed to achieve his goal of building that ridiculous wall along the U.S./Mexico border.

Steinbrenner and Trump -- two of a kind?

Which is what I really suspect Tuesday’s address in the House of Representatives will be about. He’ll harangue Congress for not meekly giving in to his every political desire.

HE’LL TRASH THE Democratic caucuses of Congress for behaving responsibly and standing up to his nonsense desires.

I couldn’t help but notice that yet another Trump e-mail received Friday asked us all to take a five-question “State of the Union” prep survey. Trump wants us to say that Democrats aren’t being blamed sufficiently for the 35-day-long shutdown of federal government, and that we’re being told lies about the conditions along that U.S./Mexico border that Trump probably wishes he could erect an electrified barricade along its 1,900-plus miles.

Punxsutawney Phil will do his act Saturday; will he be more accurate than Trump?

Above all, we’re supposed to say we approve of Trump and are happy with the economy – so that Trump can use all of this as the factual basis of a speech that claims The Donald is being unfairly maligned.

Which will truly be a level of nonsense that I suspect the masses won’t be swayed by in the least. We’ll believe it about as much as we’ll believe the silly little poem that the people of Punxsutawney, Pa., write up as the “words” of their groundhog – who is supposed to tell us Saturday just how close we are to springtime.

YOU KNOW THE drill. The groundhog supposedly knows the date, comes out of hibernation, then flees back into his hovel if he sees his shadow. Which would mean six more weeks of winter weather.

Whereas if that groundhog stays outside and enjoys some fresh air, then spring is nearby! The worst of winter is over!

What I’ve never understood is this; if Saturday is a nice sunny day (as it’s supposed to be in the Chicago area), doesn’t that increase the chances of the rodent-like creature seeing a shadow?

Should we be desperately hoping for a cloudy, overcast day on Saturday so as to increase the likelihood of shadows being invisible?

OR IS IT more likely that the only people who place any faith in the weather-predicting ability of the groundhog are the same ones who fall into the 37 percent (according to the Gallup Organization) who these days still look favorably upon Donald Trump’s performance as president?

More faith in Bill Murray than either!

I’m actually inclined to think that the groundhog and anything Trump has to say as part of his national address will be equally absurd and filled with nothing but pure horse-hockey.

But then again, the concept of Groundhog Day did give is that somewhat entertaining 1993 film by Bill Murray – the one in which every day is Groundhog Day and he has to keep reliving the experience no matter how insipid.

Just suppose that same concept happened to Tuesday and every day we would have to hear Trump give a ridiculous address for the State of the Union? That would be the worst thing that could happen to all of us!

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EXTRA: Ricketts family not a united front. Or are they more than we think?

Call it odd, not that the Ricketts family is one of significant wealth that feels compelled to use their financial power to influence our government.

Ricketts family has its hands … 

But that the family most definitely isn’t one that is united behind any given candidate or cause.

THE PATER FAMILIAS of the Ricketts clan is Joe, who made the family fortune by founding TD Ameritrade. His children serve on the board. The one thing that does unite them is that the family is the primary owner of the Chicago Cubs, with son Tom serving as the ball club’s chairman.

In fact, the ball club is a factor in the family’s politics. They want to bolster the area surrounding Wrigley Field to help enhance the team’s profitability, and have felt that Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Alderman Tom Tunney have been standing in the way.

So it isn’t a surprise that Tom came out with his own endorsement for mayor and offer of some campaign cash ($25,000, for now, for William Daley’s campaign). What should we make of the fact that Tom’s sister (Joe’s daughter) Laura has her own pick?

She’s backing the mayoral bid of Susana Mendoza, while also having made donations to the mayoral aspirations of Mendoza, Toni Precwinkle and Lori Lightfoot. For what it’s worth, Laura Ricketts has a past history of being the family’s Democrat.

… in many different … 

THE IDEA SHE’D be inclined to want to see a woman prevail isn’t surprising. But just how will the two of them co-exist? Or do they just have one of those relationships where politics is off the table for discussion at family gatherings?

Or is Laura used to be the odd-person out amongst the family politically, since she is a supporter of Democrats while the rest of the family has been amongst the financial supporters of President Donald Trump

… and varied political places

With brother Todd, who nearly got a cabinet appointment last year from Trump, serving as Republican National Committee finance chair and being appointed a member of Trump Victory Committee – which is supposed to be the connection between the RNC and the Trump presidential campaign.

So does this make Chicago Cubs baseball the uniting factor between individuals of varying political leanings? Or is it just evidence that White Sox fans are the Chicagoans sane enough in their approach to electoral activity?

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I laugh in his face at the thought of giving Trump any campaign cash

As far as I’m concerned, this week’s horrific arctic-like weather is the ultimate proof of damnation. Hell truly has frozen over!

TRUMP: He wants your cash!

How else to explain that someone, somewhere out there made a decision that I might be inclined to make campaign contributions to support the continuation of President Donald Trump’s political aspirations.

IT’S TRUE. MY load of e-mail messages included, amongst with all the other junk I often receive, pleas in the name of Trump himself and his daughter-in-law Lara – insisting that I respond by Midnight to show my support to The Donald and overcome the hysterical nuttiness of the Hollywood crew.

Whom they insist are trying to raise significant amounts of cash meant to support a serious Democratic Party presidential challenger come the 2020 election cycle.

Obviously, I let that deadline come and go. I was not a part of any attempt by Trump to get people to give his campaign at least $1 million by the FEC reporting deadline that has passed.

Which was so important to the Trumpster because his ego felt the need to make a statement showing that people actually like him. Rather than all the ego-bashing he’s been enduring as the public (the true majority) made it clear we were more than willing to blame him for the federal government shutdown that lasted more than a month – and could theoretically resume in a couple of weeks IF Trump is so inclined.

LARA TRUMP, IN the plea attributed to her (it’s actually the Trump Make America Great Again Committee that’s issuing all this e-mail traffic) says “all the top Democrat contenders for the White House have been raising big money from Hollywood donors to jumpstart their presidential campaigns.”

Which is something I find amusing because Trump, by engaging in such tactics, almost makes it seem like he’s channeling Sally Field and her famed Oscar acceptance speech of “You like me, you really really like me” that she never actually said.

But the man’s ego is such that he feels compelled to make a grandiose gesture. In that regard, he’s like the organization Democrats within Chicago government – who often have trouble accepting the idea that people might legitimately not support them on Election Day and honestly believe near-unanimous voter outcomes are to be expected.

LARA TRUMP: Trying to help father-in-law

I have no doubt on some level that Trump will never truly get over the fact that some 3 million more people voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016 and that he only won due to a glitch within the Electoral College process.

HIS GOAL PROBABLY is to try to get something he can claim to be a majority in 2020. So he can then try to re-write history to erase the facts of Election ’16. Similar to the old Soviet ways of rewriting history to reflect the perception the powers-that-be want to be remembered.

Perhaps that’s the real attraction between the Trump persona and the ways of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Regardless, it is ridiculous that we see the modern trend of electoral politics is that of government officials of significant wealth trying to buy their way to Election Day victory. I suspect they think if they buy their way to office, then no one can tell them what they can or cannot do.

But in Trump’s case, if he does get significant amounts of campaign cash, it’s likely to be from those lower-middle-class people who make up the bulk of the roughly one-third of the American population who still approve of the president’s performance in office.

DALEY: Trump fantasizes of his victory margins

IN SHORT, PEOPLE who really can’t afford to make significant donations. Which is all the more reason Trump touts the gimmick that he can “triple” the amount of money one donates.

A $250 donation becomes a $1,000 payout – all in the name of boosting the ego of Donald John Trump. Which is why I’m sort of offended that Trump’s fund-raising plea began by saying, “We haven’t seen your name…,” as though implying I’m under some sort of investigation that could penalize me for failing to support the Trumpster.

The thought that anybody ever seriously thought I’d support this president financially is laughable – until you realize it means somebody noticed my work and put my name on the potential donors list without seriously reading what I've written.

That, I must admit, is a serious blow to my own ego.

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