I heard this this AM on NPR: Republican Senator Peter Fitzgerald, whose voting record and stances have been maverick-independent, is not going to seek re-election in Illinois. He's estranged from the local GOP and doesn't want to spend millions of his fortune getting reelected.

I think this may be an opportunity for the Democrats to pick up a Senate seat, though given the wackiness going on in terms of 7-8 candidates jostling for the position, they could hand the seat right back to the Republicans.

Typical Illinois GOP. Here's a guy who often votes on what he believes (even if someone disagrees with him) rather than what the Illinois GOP demands. The Republican Party in Illinois is a mess, thanks to former Governor Lyin' Ryan, among other reasons.

It's the "good ole boys" mentality in this state, sadly. Country Club Republicanism has always been how the Illinois GOP has worked. The idiots will never learn, especially in a state that has been under increasing control of Daley and Chicago Democrats. (Curiously, though, Bush's approval rating has been quite good in the Land of Lincoln.)

(Don't be so surprised at that, either. It is a fact that NO legislation in the General Assembly gets passed without the approval of one person--Mayor Richard M. Daley. He and he alone is the one calling the shots in Springfield, and members of both parties admit this.)

I give Fitzgerald credit for going against his party often enough. Sure, he sometimes might have opened his mouth and had to insert a foot--show me a politician who hasn't--but at least he felt as though he had some principles. I found it amusing that oftentimes, polls showed more Democrats who liked him than Republicans.

Interestingly, the leading candidate is another McCain type: Retired Air Force Major General John Borling has been in discussions with GOP officials about running for office. A war hero and a former POW, his story might play very well in Illinois.

Borling very well may be the candidate and would be formidable, though he'd have to vault past Judy Baar Topinka, Jim Ryan, and the usual GOP suspects.

Your comments about Daley are right on. The man isn't killing people, but his control is Stalinist, to say the least. I mean, he LITERALLY tore up Meigs Field's runways BECAUSE HE COULD! What other mayor in the U.S., especially of such a big city, has that much control? He CRAVES attention, and not just local attention--national attention. He's enraged at Bush and Ridge because they won't take Chicago's security more seriously, but then again, they may just be trying to avoid DEALING with Daley, so on this account, I can't completely fault them. Fitzgerald has tangled with Daley over the airport issue, and I think he realizes that to stay an Illinois Senator, he'd have to keep butting heads with the dictator; there really is no way to avoid Chicago or its suburbs, over which Daley also holds considerable power.

Giuliani wielded something close to Daley's power, but he actually did have opponents in the City Council and among the borough presidents. Daley just appears to run roughshod over the city, and in many cases, over the STATE of Illinois.

W. is popular, but I think if the economy doesn't improve, especially downstate, he would lose Illinois anyway. It's a moderate-to-liberal state (mainly because of Chicago and the middle-class, populous suburbs), but Illinois is in dire straits right now fiscally, and is getting ZERO help from the Feds, even though like many of the northeastern states it subsidizes through federal tax transfers other parts of the country.

The current governor, Rod Blagojevich, strikes me more and more as really not that bright, but you're right that he has as his foils the "George Ryan-tainted" GOP, and he's mastered to some extent PR, because otherwise people would be trying to impeach him by now, I think.

The national Democrats could really use that extra Illinois seat; Durbin isn't going anywhere, he was elected overwhelmingly, and a second Illinois seat would offset possible pickups elsewhere. I think it's safe to say that even with the war in Iraq, the economy is going to make things very tough for Republicans in some parts of the country, especially the West Coast and parts of the northeast.

Fitzgerald would probably be elected without too much trouble unless he ran against a Chicagoland pol with some bucks, but I also think he's just tired of the Senate too. Even the GOP doesn't seem interested in addressing the problems of the country so much as satisfying the needs of its bankrollers and giving W. what he wants.

Actually, until the last election, it was Pate Philip, our own version of John Ashcroft, who had the stranglehold on legislation ... which served the country clubbers you mentioned (especially the DuPage crowd, which likes to pretend there's no sentient life east of York Rd.) quite well.

"Baby Doc" Daley is getting out of hand, however ... maybe he's starting to believe his own hype! eek!

I love this one! "Baby Doc" Daley!!!

Speaking of Fitzgerald, are there any other retirements of major national pols that people know about? I think Hollings ought to consider it, though he's not as far gone as Thurmond was. Byrd's another old coot, but he seems to be one of the few Senate Democrats willing to challenge Bush openly on ANYTHING, and still has an extraordinarily sharp mind. Last time the Republicans had several members step down, including Helms (thank God(dess)!), Thurmond, and Fred Thompson. Who's going to walk off into that lobbying (or ICU) sunset this time around?

I also think Jim Jeffords is up this time through. Will he lose to a Democrat or to a Republican, or will he manage somehow to keep his seat?

Other senators who are up for election: Bayh (probably safe), Bennett (safe), Bond (safe--but I've read he may retire--PLEASE!--a useless Senator), Boxer (safe), Breaux (safe), Brownback (safe), Bunning (probably safe), Campbell (not sure about him), Crapo (safe), Daschle (he could be in trouble), Dodd (safe), Dorgan (probably safe), Edwards (maybe in trouble), Feingold (safe), Graham (safe--he may retire if he doesn't get the VP nod, though, and the seat could go to a Republican, though a Democrat won the last time), Grassley (probably safe, though Iowa's starting to look like Vermont politically--far to the left of the rest of the US), Gregg (safe), Hollings (safe), Inouye (like Hollings, he's been there forever, the machine will put him right back in), Leahy (safe), Lincoln (iffy--she better cast some right-wing votes and go to church; if so, she'll eke out a win), McCain (better be safe!), Mikulski (safe), Miller (switch or go--but safe), Murkowski (if she loses, it'll be to another Republican), Murray (safe), Nickles (safe), Reid (probably safe, not sure though), Schumer (safe), Shelby (safe--I wish he'd quit, though), Specter (safe), Voinovich (safe), and Wyden (safe--if he loses, it could only be to someone even further to the left with a real economic plan--Oregon's economy is in severe trouble these days).

[ April 15, 2003, 02:42 PM: Message edited by: fantomas ]

Specter is not entirely safe. He is being challenged by a right wing congressman, Toomey who has broad appeal in the GOP. The Philadelphia Inquirer had a piece this Sunday on the race. According to the article, Specter is moving to the right and even had lunch recently with (collective gasp) The Reverend Jerry Falwell.

Specter - probably safe but far from certain. Right wing poster boy Rep. Toomey has become the darling of the conservatives who have their knives sharpened for Arlen.

Falwell? Would he have ANY leverage over most right wingers in PENNSYLVANIA? Isn't Cardinal whats-his-name, the anti-gay one in Philadelphia, good enough? Why do charlatans like Falwell always get roped into things? Why can't we all just IGNORE them and send them on their way?

Lately, I have been spending more time in downstate Illinois than I ever thought possible.
I have over heard many comments about Fitzgerald.
Seems like the democrats like him and the downstate repoublicans cant stand him. My guess is that perhpas he could have pulled out a close one.
I hate to admit it but I have some family members that are conservative republicans and think Bush is much too liberal, so you can well imagine what they think of Fitzgerald.
Having said that what people have said about Daley is so true, could not say it better.
My late partner of 18 years worked for some former democratic senators from Illinois. the stories he used to tell me about Daley are unreal.
Some of the stories were from days before he was elected Mayor. Thats a major part of the problem in Illinois politics. The other part being the grossly ultra conservative brand of republicanism in central and downstate Illinois.

Fantomas, your description of Mayor Daley as Stalinist is an understatement, to say the least. I don't think people outside Illinois, or outside Chicagoland, truly understand the power that he has. I'll say it here loud and clear: Mayor Daley is the most powerful mayor in the United States. Moreover, I'd say he has even more power than many state governors. For one thing, he dwarfs Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich in power.

He also has a horrible and vicious mean streak. You do not dare cross him or else. This is not a faint scare tactic; rather, it's reality. The political landscape is littered with the corpses of those who even once got on Daley's bad side.

With respect to Senator Fitzgerald, I grew to like his independent bent. He frequently battled this state's lifeless and stupid GOP by standing up to them and refusing to go along because they told him to. This state is a cesspool of corruption--THE MOST CORRUPT STATE IN THE NATION, and BOTH parties are equally corrupt.

For years the GOP had corruption on the state level (though mainly because of Governor Lyin' Ryan; Jim Edgar and Jim Thompson weren't tainted like Ryan). The Democrats were corrupt at the city and Cook County level. Getting a federal prosecutor to nail these crooks was next to impossible. Why? Because the senator of the president's party got the privilege of giving the president the names of Illinois' 3 U.S. Attorneys, and the president then nominated said individuals for confirmation.

In the 1980's, Republican Senator Charles Percy had Reagan and Bush name folks who didn't go after corruption that much. When he was defeated by Paul Simon and Illinois eventually had two Democratic senators and a Democratic president (Clinton), an ineffective U.S. attorney was at the helm. The Daley regime wouldn't dare stand for one who would go after the big-time pols.

The Republicans looked out for their own; the Democrats for their own. What a truly pathetic state this is for politics.

As the April 16th Chicago Tribune editorial so aptly put it...


Fitzgerald's Three Aces of Trump


Published April 16, 2003

Mother's Day of 2001 was an odd time for a political press conference. But U.S. Sen. Peter Fitzgerald was eager to unveil his candidate for U.S. attorney in Chicago. A few weeks earlier, Fitzgerald had confided in a private conversation that selecting independent federal prosecutors to combat the Illinois culture of political sleaze was his top priority.

He was asked if he was more determined to put corruption-busting prosecutors in place than he was to win re-election to the Senate. His answer shot back as if from a cannon: "Absolutely!"

So on Mother's Day, Peter Fitzgerald introduced his choice for the Chicago job: Patrick Fitzgerald (no relation), a Justice Department prosecutor with no ties to the overly cozy legal circles of Illinois. In the time since, Patrick Fitzgerald's bold record of indictments, subpoenas and grand jury investigations has made clear his intolerance for the chronic public corruption that has long cheated the citizens of Illinois.

Illinois has three U.S. attorneys, one each for the northern, central and southern parts of the state. Peter Fitzgerald filled all three of those slots with top-notch federal prosecutors. Nobody knows who'll be indicted next, but it's safe to say those three high-integrity prosecutors will be Peter Fitzgerald's key legacy. In a political game that's tawdry by any measure, the three--Patrick Fitzgerald, Jan Miller, Miriam Miquelon--are aces of trump.

Peter Fitzgerald's refusal to go along with politics as usual in Illinois infuriates those who do: members of both parties who trade in cronyism, influence peddling, patronage, government legal work and public contracts. Even before Fitzgerald's announcement Tuesday that he won't seek a second term, the insiders eagerly pushed the fiction that he couldn't get re-elected in 2004.

But a much different picture emerges from a new Hill Research Consultants poll, released Friday and sponsored by Fitzgerald and by the GOP's Senate campaign committee. The numbers suggest that voters admire Fitzgerald almost as much as the insiders loathe him.

His statewide approval rating stands at 54 percent, with disapproval at just 19 percent. GOP primary voters give him a 66 percent approval rating. In head-to-head matchups, he leads all six Democrats most often mentioned as Senate candidates. And he leads Andrew McKenna Jr., a possible GOP opponent, by 59 percent to 6 percent among Republican primary voters.

His re-election was key to reviving Republican fortunes in Illinois and to GOP hopes of retaining a majority in the U.S. Senate.

So why won't Fitzgerald run? The senator says the route to re-election that was laid out for him a few days ago by Karl Rove, the White House political guru, called for Fitzgerald to spend much of the next two years on the road campaigning. Fitzgerald doesn't want to neglect his Senate work and doesn't want to miss watching his 10-year-old son grow up. As he said Tuesday, "I could not be a senator and a father during this campaign. I could only be a candidate."

The Tribune at times has differed with Fitzgerald, most strenuously over his opposition to expansion of O'Hare International Airport. He has frustrated business and civic leaders when he has ignored the detail work of representing the state in Washington. But his determination to crush the culture of sleaze in Illinois deserves only the highest praise.


I'm sure most of us here could easily find something on which we disagree with Fitzgerald. I don't think there's a politician with whom I am 100% aligned. I ask, though: Why can't we elect more people like Fitzgerald? Why can't voters be lucky enough to have a politician who isn't afraid to battle his own party when necessary? Can't we elect someone who fights cronyism and the "that's the way it's been done forever" mentality?

Is it any reason that the more things change, the more they stay the same? No wonder why so many are so cynical.

[ April 16, 2003, 11:57 PM: Message edited by: MIB ]