Patti Takes Manhattan.

What a great picture, from the Chicago Tribune. Aren't they the perfect reality-TV couple?

In case you don't know, that's ex-governor of Illinois Rod Blagojevich and his wife, Patti, in Manhattan to promote Rod's new book. Both Rod and Patti are the creations of long-time Chicago Alderman Dick Mell, who made Rod politically and made Patti the old-fashioned way (she's his daughter). Rod's downfall began when he crossed his father-in-law.

Because they are so made-for-TV, I wonder if their act is actually selling? Do people believe them or, like me, just enjoy the show?

Another Dubious Achievement for Illinois.

I've been meaning to write something about liquor taxes, especially since Illinois (where I live) has decided to lead the nation in yet another dubious capacity, this time with the highest liquor taxes.

Instead of writing about it myself, I'll refer you to this excellent piece by Sonja Kassebaum who is, among other things, a small distiller here in the Chicago area.

As Kassebaum points out, higher liquor taxes take a toll on the hospitality industry: bars, restaurants, and the people they employ. I've also read an analysis that shows how, because liquor taxes are so high already, higher taxes that supress demand can actually be counter-productive, in that if the higher rates are offset by weaker sales, tax revenues can actually decline.

But that's for another day.

Seven Down, Two To Go.

The number may change again before morning, but as I write this four University of Illinois Trustees resigned today. They are Kenneth Schmidt, David Dorris, Robert Vickrey and Devon Bruce. Three others had already resigned: Board Chairman Niranjan Shah; Lawrence Eppley, the former chairman; and Edward McMillan. The hold-outs are James Montgomery and Frances Carroll.

At least somewhere in Illinois there are consequences for corruption, although the apparent confusion among the individual trustees about the right thing to do is more evidence that the whole edifice is rotten.

So U of I is to be commended for doing something. I'm reminded of the three legislative leaders who simply demurred when asked to testify before the Mikva Commission. They are House Speaker Michael Madigan, Senate President John Cullerton, and House Republican Leader Tom Cross. That's how the Illinois General Assembly deals with corruption. By doing nothing.

Reporters covering the Soviet Union frequently remarked on how the whole system ran on favors given and favors owed. It's like the people who defend the rich because they hope to be rich themselves someday. Rather than demanding a clean system, the cloutless simply aspire to attain it.

U of I Leadership Should Go.

Once again, Pat Quinn looks like the only straight shooter on the Illinois political scene. (I first wrote about this here.)

Three University of Illinois trustees resigned before the Mikva Commission's report was released, including the Board chairman. All three suggested the rest should join them. They didn't. Then, based on the Mikva Commission's recommendation, Quinn asked the six remaining members to resign. They haven't and probably won't.

The Chicago Tribune reports that one of the hold-outs, Trustee James Montgomery, is defiant. He told Quinn's general counsel, "If the governor has a legal basis for forcing me out of the trusteeship, he is going to have to access that avenue and I will defend against that."

The commission's report said Montgomery once intervened on behalf of a rejected student who was related to his daughter's boyfriend.

The university's president and chancellor have a slightly more defensible reason for not resigning. They want the Board of Trustees to decide their fate.

Sure, Quinn is a politician who wants to put his loyalists anywhere he can, but he also recognizes that the current board has zero credibility. If they don't go, one way or another (Quinn can fire them), clout will have won and reform will have died aborning yet again.

Reforming Illinois Politics: Where To Begin?

An essential element of any corrupt enterprise is that participants in it cannot trust each other until all of them have been compromised. All of them. That is fundamental.

Since our city government, state government and premier state university have all been shown to be corrupt enterprises, we should assume that all of the participants, at least all who were or should have been aware of the corrupt practices, are compromised. If anyone is serious about reforming any of these institutions, the crucial first step is to consider all current participants culpable. Until they are removed and replaced—all of them—reform will be illusory.

The recently-adopted ethics reforms you are hearing about are cynical frauds touted by cynical frauds.

Pat Quinn may be the qualified exception. He is shaping up as the last honest politician in Illinois, at least on the Democratic side. (Republicans aren’t excluded because they’re more honest, but because they scarcely matter. That might change.)

The best evidence that Quinn is honest is the way the rest of them are going after him. Part of their strategy is to paint him as dishonest. In psychology, that’s called ‘projection.’ They also say he stood by while Blagojevich made a hash of things. What exactly did comptroller and presumed Quinn primary opponent Dan Hynes, also a constitutional officer, do that Quinn did not to check the governor?

Is that the best argument they have? For that matter, is Hynes the best candidate they have? Does nominating a hereditary politician really say, “we get it about business as usual?” Of course it doesn’t, because they don’t.

Last week, House Speaker Michael Madigan, Senate President John Cullerton and House Republican Leader Tom Cross all declined to testify before Quinn’s Illinois Admissions Review Commission, which is investigating the corrupt practices at U of I. Madigan’s spokesperson said the Speaker “has little to contribute to the probe” because “he was only responding to constituent requests.” Some elaboration on that right there would surely interest the Mikva Commmission.

By snubbing the commission, they’re telling Quinn he has no juice.

Whatever else Lawrence Eppley may have done, he did the right thing today by resigning and calling out both his fellow trustees and top university officials. He might just as well have mentioned every legislator who ever put in a good word for an applicant. It is a corrupt system and they are all part of it.

Eppley testified to the Mikva Commission that he wasn’t Blagojevich's go-between, even though he forwarded admissions requests from the governor's office. According to the Chicago Tribune, which has been vilified for reporting the U of I clout story, Eppley told the commission he didn't expect that passing along student names would give applicants special treatment.

Presumably, he said this with a straight face.

The 48th Ward Democrats Summer Picnic is Thursday, August 6, from 6 PM to 8 PM, at 4921 N. Marine Dr. near the Margate Park field house. New County Commissioner Bridget Gainer will be there, so will Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky. It is being hosted by Alderman Mary Ann Smith, State Representative Harry Osterman, State Senator Heather Steans, and the aforementioned Gainer and Schakowsky. The invitation came from Steans’ predecessor, current 48th Ward Committeeman Carol Ronen, whose eight weeks in the Blagojevich administration got her a $38,000 pension bump. (That whole sordid tale is here.)

So, yes, it is all of them.

Enough With The Alcohol Taxes Already.

Kentucky isn’t the only state that wants to balance its budget on the backs of drinkers. Illinois lawmakers are currently looking at sales tax hikes too, maybe on beer and wine, but certainly on distilled spirits.

Alcoholic beverages are always an inviting target They are seen as non-essential and some people favor high taxes to deter consumption. Even the language—-‘sin tax,’ ‘hard liquor’—-is loaded.

Some regard Kentucky as a unique case because it is a major producer, primarily of bourbon whiskey. Fewer people, even here in Illinois, know that our state is one of the top producers of grain neutral spirits, the basis for vodka, gin and many other distilled spirits products.

In addition to threatening those manufacturing jobs, higher taxes on alcohol have a negative impact on every business that sells liquor of any kind. Whether you’re talking about bars, restaurants, hotels, stores, or sports venues, the alcohol they sell is usually more profitable than just about anything else, so if higher prices caused by higher taxes hurt alcohol sales, the bottom line suffers more than it would from just about any other cost increase.

Few people realize how much drinkers already pay in taxes. If you drink, smoke and gamble, you probably should get some kind of citizenship award.

With distilled spirits, taxes cost more than the product! Here is the rundown, courtesy of the Distilled Spirits Council (DISCUS).

The retail price of a typical 750ml bottle of 80 proof distilled spirits is about $12. Of that, about $7—-nearly 60 percent-—is taxes and fees. Out of that $12, the producer, distributor and retailer split $5 among them. That $5 pays the farmer who grows the grain, the distiller who makes the product, the bottle manufacturer and label maker, the wholesaler, the retailer, and all of their employees and suppliers.

Out of the $7, the federal government takes about $2.15. state and local taxes account for another $2.40. Those are the extraordinary taxes that are there just because it’s alcohol. The rest, about $2.45, represents the normal tax burden on the various businesses involved and their employees.

One way to look at it is as a 60/40 split, with the government taking the lion’s share. Another way to look at it is as a 140% mark-up that makes a product which should cost $5 cost $12 instead.

No other consumer product, except perhaps tobacco, carries such a heavy tax burden.

Just as there is no such thing as a free lunch, there are no painless taxes. By fostering the illusion that there are in order to collect as much as possible, politicians try to pit taxpayer groups against one another. I’m a soft touch for taxes on gambling and tobacco, because those aren’t my vices. Alcohol is.

When the United States was just formed, its only taxes were import duties. Imported goods were viewed as luxuries, non-essential. It was even argued that taxes on imports were good because they encouraged domestic production. When they didn’t produce enough revenue, the government turned to taxes on distilled spirits. Distilled spirits consumers have paid more than their fair share ever since.

Arguably, those high taxes on distilled spirits have been a good thing. They have raised a lot of needed tax revenue and people probably would drink more if it cost less. But let’s be realistic. There is such a thing as killing the golden goose and it doesn’t say much for us as a society if we increasingly fund our government by exploiting our own weaknesses.

Yes, In Fact, They Are All That Bad.

One very unintended side effect of Barak Obama's election has been the national attention Illinois is getting about the sorry state of our politics and politicians.

It was kismet last night that I accidentally switched on CSPAN just as Roland Burris was beginning his speech yesterday at Chicago's City Club. They weren't showing it live, but at the stroke of midnight.

Like the train wreck it was, I couldn’t look away.

If Rod Blagojevich is an extreme example of the type, RoRo "The Real Roland" Burris is more typical, a mediocre hack politician and what passes, in Illinois, for an honest one. The room was full of them. Sweet Eddie Burke introduced Burris and Mean Paul Green was the MC. RoRo did some shout-outs. It was a real rogue’s gallery.

Burris had this bad speech, which he read badly, about what he has "learned" in his five weeks in the Senate. About two-thirds in he went off-notes, launched into some spirited shout-outs, hit a couple of his mausoleum highlights, then launched into his self-defense, all in the old black preacher-politician cadences of the sixties. As he always does these days, he invoked his civil rights era bona fides, seemingly unaware that they are not protecting him and he is debasing those accomplishments by using them in this tawdry affair.

"You know the real Roland." That was a good laugh line, but this one was better. "I will continue to be transparent." He is all of that.

May I suggest, to paraphrase Denny Green: "I am who I thought I was."

It was pitiful.

Then as a kind of coda, he went back to reading, poorly, his prepared speech, even though it continued along the self-defense lines. He said he would no longer discuss the controversy surrounding his appointment with reporters.

After that came the Q&A, audience questions read by Paul Green. It was funny because Green just dropped in questions about RoRo’s "issues," sprinkled in among the bland inquiries about public policy, ending it with one that Burris refused to answer.

Burris is in over his head. His colleague, Senator Durbin, on a fact-finding trip to Greece and Turkey, and after consulting the Oracle of Delphi, made a short statement. In it, he urged Burris to get some professional advice, as Burris is so clueless.

Things are breaking bad for Durbin too, when he should be giddy as the new president's main man in the Senate. Instead, Burris has become Durbin's special ball and chain.

Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky (my U.S. Rep) is another one. Now she has some hair-brained idea that new Gov. Quinn can pull Burris and call a special election under the 17th Amendment. She wants the Senate job herself, but shouldn't, as the spotlight will spin onto her and she will have to talk about her convicted felon husband.

They're all from the same nest and considered good government types by Illinois standards, so they're genuinely surprised by how unflattering the national spotlight can be.

My fondest hope is that Durbin, Schakowsky, and every other Illinois office holder (yes, you, Heather) will feel that their jobs are in jeopardy and they need to take extraordinary steps to gain the public’s trust. ("Re-gain" seems to assume too much.)

I propose a Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Isn't confession supposed to be cleansing or healing or something? Who wants to go first?

Lincoln, A Politician, Played Both Sides Of Alcohol Issue

Abraham Lincoln, who was born 200 years ago tomorrow, was an abolitionist and most abolitionists were prohibitionists too.

But Lincoln, who was also a masterful politician, had it both ways on alcohol. (Truth be told, he had it both ways on slavery too and was not, technically, an abolitionist.)

As a young man, Lincoln had been a licensed whiskey retailer, first as a hired clerk, then as a business owner, in the tiny frontier hamlet of New Salem, Illinois. The stores all failed and left him burdened with debt, so he found a government job, studied law, and got into politics.

Times and attitudes were changing, and what was considered a respectable and useful occupation in the 1830s was made to appear scandalous just a few years later, just as today selling whiskey is respectable but being an Illinois politician is not.

Lincoln’s roots in the whiskey trade were deep. His father had been a distillery hand in Kentucky and when Thomas Lincoln sold his farm there, part of the payment was in whiskey, a common occurrence. Before New Salem, Abe had worked as a flat boat hand, transporting whiskey to New Orleans for sale.

In Lincoln’s campaigns, both sides spun the facts. Lincoln partisans downplayed that he ever sold whiskey. Most accounts describe his stores as "groceries," a term that sounds innocent enough unless you know that, at the time, it was a common euphemism for a makeshift rural saloon.

Though embarrassing, these facts about Lincoln’s past did not gain much traction with voters. For one thing, Lincoln had made many friends in New Salem, in part from chatting people up in his ‘groceries.’ Even in his first, unsuccessful try at elective office he swept the local precinct.

Meanwhile, the forces that eventually brought nationwide Prohibition to America early in the 20th century were gathering steam. In 1842, Lincoln spoke to the local Temperance Society. In his address, he noted that the use of intoxicating drinks was "as old as the world itself," "used by every body, and repudiated by nobody," and "a respectable article of manufacture and of merchandize."

But he also praised the Temperance Society for its good and valuable work.

The gist of his message was love the sinner, hate the sin, and don’t blame the inanimate object.

After Lincoln’s heroic presidency, Kentucky’s whiskey makers were anxious to claim him as their own, even though he was only seven when his family left for Indiana. The Boone family, who had owned the distillery where Thomas Lincoln worked, reported that their forefathers had been so impressed by the lad that they declared, "that boy is bound to make a great man no matter what trade he follows and if he goes into the whiskey business, he will be the best distiller in the land."

The Lincoln farm and Boone distillery were both located on Knob Creek. The place is called Athertonville today. Distilleries operated there until 1972. Today’s Knob Creek Bourbon is made at a different distillery a few miles up the road.

You can visit the Lincoln family’s Knob Creek farm. Within living memory, the log building that is now the park’s visitor’s center was a roadhouse whose patrons included workers from the nearby distilleries. It was notorious in part because jazz was played there and it was racially integrated, which makes a certain kind of sense on ground where Lincoln once walked.

Is Ten High No Longer A Bourbon?

First Blagojevich, now this. How much humiliation can Illinois take?

Ten High Straight Bourbon Whiskey has been demoted to a blend, at least in some markets.

Hiram Walker’s Ten High Bourbon was, in its heyday, a proud product of Peoria, Illinois. It was made there at the largest whiskey distillery in the world. Peoria, Pekin and other Illinois towns had significant whiskey industries on both sides of Prohibition.

Ten High was popular as one of the better cheap bourbons. The name refers to a barrel storage location at least ten ricks high, as barrels in the upper part of the aging warehouse mature faster. It was always just a name, never an actual barrel location promise, but it was meant to communicate quality.

Hiram Walker was the Detroit grocer who created Canadian Club whiskey in the 19th century, at his distillery across the border in Canada. When Prohibition ended in 1933, Hiram Walker and Sons, Inc., then owned by a guy named Harry Hatch, decided to reenter the newly-legal U.S. market in a big way. Their Peoria distillery made Walker’s DeLuxe and Ten High, both straight bourbons; Imperial Whiskey, a popular blend; and other Hiram Walker products.

Peoria paid off for about 35 years, until the American whiskey market suddenly tanked in the late 60s. The distillery closed in 1981. (Today it makes ethanol for ADM.)

They had actually stopped distilling there several years before and then slowly emptied the warehouses as the whiskey in them matured. Ten High production then shifted to Kentucky. Eventually, Hiram Walker was sold for parts and Ten High was acquired by Chicago’s Barton Brands, whose obituary I wrote a few weeks ago.

Recently a friend of mine in upstate New York bought a bottle of Ten High and, when he got it home, discovered that instead of "Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey," the label said, "Bourbon Whiskey - a Blend."

Straight bourbon is all whiskey. A bourbon blend is about half whiskey, half vodka.

Some people like that sort of thing, but since vodka isn’t aged, blends are much cheaper to make.

My friend was told by his whiskey monger that the straight has been discontinued. He wondered if this was some depredation by the brand's new owner, but I assured him it can't be Sazerac's fault, as that deal won't even close for another month or so.

The Constellation Spirits web site still shows the only available expression of Ten High as being the 80-proof straight bourbon. So does the Binny’s web site.

The bourbon is still one of your better cheap whiskeys. I can’t speak for the new blend.

What Are The Chances For Real Change In Illinois?

It has been noted that, despite the reputation of Illinois for political corruption, this is the state’s first gubernatorial impeachment.

It should also be noted that while many Illinois public officials, including several governors, have been tried and convicted for criminal offenses, no major public corruption case has ever been brought by an Illinois prosecutor. They have all been federal, investigated by the FBI and prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney’s office.

Like this one.

The Illinois General Assembly has done its duty by removing Rod Blagojevich, but it needs to do much more. Everyone involved in Illinois government must concede what they all know. Corruption here is routine and Governor Blagojevich’s offense was one of scale, not of type.

Even in corrupt systems, there are sometimes limits. The guys behind the guys set those limits. Exceed them and you threaten the entire, corrupt edifice. Therefore, any person who goes off the reservation like Blagojevich did must be removed. It always goes down the same way. Federal authorities mysteriously receive enough evidence to begin an investigation. In time, they receive enough evidence to convict the targeted individual, and perhaps some co-conspirators, but never those at the center of the web.

Look at the Michael Segal, Near North Insurance case (2002-2004). One day he was favored, friend to the great and near great, then he was a goat. What changed? Did the feds just happen to discover his crimes or had he outlived his usefulness? Who made that decision?

It is likely that the prosecutions of Tony Rezko, Stuart Levine and Ali Ata were probably meant to send a message to Blagojevich, to get with the program or he would be next. He didn't and he was.

What does it say that not one of these guys has sung? Not one has told the tale and really laid out how it all works and who calls the shots. Once convicted, they quietly do their time. Levine sang, of course, which netted Rezko and others, but he has probably told all he knows. Segal, Ryan, and Sorich (Mayor Daley's patronage guy) have all been mum. Not one of them has told the whole story. Why is that?

It is hard to discuss the corruption of government in Illinois without reference to Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass. He calls it "the combine." Its members consist of corrupt political leaders, both public office-holders and private citizens, Democrats and Republicans. The third leg is organized crime.

Because they are all part of a criminal enterprise, they value secrecy and eschew publicity. Anyone who calls too much attention to themselves has to be removed. Periodic demonstrations of this fact, including evidence that even a governor is not immune, serve their purpose. In itself, the removal, conviction and imprisonment of Rod Blagojevich does nothing to change the system.

Only when crime doesn’t pay will it cease.

We Won't Forget You, Heather.

Today the Chicago Tribune editorial page--the same editorial page Illinois Governor Blagojevich is accused of trying to suppress--provided a useful history lesson.

Although it seems like a lifetime ago, it was only last spring that Governor Blagojevich enjoyed enough support in the Illinois Senate to defeat a House-sponsored recall bill. Had it passed, we probably would be voting right now to remove him. Back then, Emil Jones was Senate President and Rod's buddy. The Trib today lists all the Senators who defeated one recall proposal and kept another one from coming to a vote.

One of those faithfully lined up behind Jones back then was my own state Senator, representing the 7th District, Heather Steans. She was even trotted out at the time to carry the governor's water on Chicago Tonight and elsewhere, ironically arguing against the recall but for a measure that would reform (i.e., increase) the state's income tax.

It was a sorry spectacle, as I told her in a letter I shared with you blog readers here.

The surprise retirement of Jones back in August may have been the beginning of the end for Blago. Or maybe it was the Rezko conviction in June. The feds were clearly getting close, the guys behind the guys were cutting their losses, and the front men and women were scrambling for cover. It's hard for somebody like Steans, used to following orders, to know whose orders to follow when everything is falling apart. Her most recent constituent report described at length, but bloodlessly, the impeachment process and how the all-important U. S. Senate seat at the center of it all might be filled. It was distributed on December 17, before the Burris appointment. Here is the closest she came to taking a position or even expressing an opinion about any of it, but even with all of her careful weasel-wording, she got it so very wrong.

She wrote:

Harry Reid, the majority leader of the Senate, has indicated he will not seat anyone who the Governor appoints, and the Governor's legal defense attorney has stated that the Governor will not act to fill this seat. Thus the threat of the Governor trying to fill this vacancy no longer exists. We have some time over the holidays to see if the Governor resigns or steps aside before the U.S. Senate reconvenes in the new year. There is no perfect solution for filling the vacant Senate seat. I continue to prefer conducting a special election despite its downsides, but there is no consensus on this in Springfield.

(Emphasis mine.)

As the citizens of Illinois pour their outrage onto Rod Blagojevich, we should not forget his many enablers, including what the Tribune today called "The Blagojevich 26."

Voters have notoriously short memories so I won't speak for anyone but myself. I won't forget you, Senator Steans. I won't forget how you got your seat, nor what you did with it, no matter how many food drives for the needy you promote.

If the News from Illinois Makes No Sense to You, Maybe This Will Help.

Because of who the president-elect is, just about everything that happens in Illinois these days is national news. I feel that we who live here owe a duty to our brothers and sisters in the rest of the nation to explain Illinois politics as well as it can be explained. Happily, I don't have to explain it personally because Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass does it better than I ever could. His latest is here.

Thanks also to NBC's Chuck Todd, who explained that Harry Reid's goal is not to prevent Burris from being seated, just to delay it. Ideally, Blago will be ousted soon, and the new governor can rescind Roland's appointment. That probably is legal if Blago's appointee hasn't been seated.

What Roland Burris, who is pretty clueless generally, doesn't get is that he has just seriously tainted his previously untainted rep. Typical.

Obama and the Chicago Machine.

The McCain campaign is pretty proud of its new ad that attempts to tie Obama to the Chicago Machine. It's smart political advertising and well timed, and if they can influence anyone's votes with it, well, that's the point.

So I'm not here even to say it's a cheap shot, because it's not. If there's anything strategically wrong with it, it's that some people may actually like Obama more because if they think he's too soft or cerebral, they might warm to the idea of him as a tough, Chicago streetfighter.

My purpose in posting is just to share a little bit of what I know from living here.

Mayor Daley bristles whenever anyone talks about the Chicago Machine. In one sense, I agree with him, because his is not his father's Chicago Machine and the image most people have when they hear the words "Chicago Machine" would apply to Daley senior's Chicago, but Daley junior's not so much.

(Some people refer to them as Richard I and Richard II, but I prefer Big Dick and Little Dick.)

The son's machine is, if I can mix my metaphors, a big tent machine. Yes, the Cook County Democratic Party controls just about everything that happens politically in Chicago and Cook County, and the Daley family controls the Cook County Democratic Party, but part of how they do that is by letting 1,000 flowers bloom. The price of admission is loyalty to the party, but loyalty mainly means helping the Party retain its grip on everything. Within the party, on matters of policy, things are generally pretty democratic. That's how someone like Obama can be acceptable to the machine without being in any way "dirty." Illinois Democratic U.S. Senators are rarely true machine insiders. Sending guys like Obama, who could become troublesome, to Washington is one of their favorite gambits.

So here are the people the ad ties him to, in order.

Bill Daley, the mayor's brother, and generally considered the clan's brightest bulb, is at least Obama's economic advisor and probably even more important than that behind the scenes of the campaign. Are the Daley boys inside the Obama campaign big time? Absolutely.

Tony Rezko is a perfect foil for the ad, because he's a recently convicted felon, but there's nothing about his connection with Obama that wasn't thoroughly reported in the Chicago Tribune during Obama's Senate campaign in 2004, or shortly thereafter. I understand why he's in the ad, but to us that's old news. Obama showed poor judgment in the one transaction they did together, and said so explicitly years ago. Nothing in Rezko's trial touched Obama in any way, which cannot be said for Governor Blagojevich, whose corruption was Topic A throughout.

Emil Jones, who is a State Senator from Chicago and the Senate's President, was not initially Obama's sponsor. He definitely didn't get Obama elected to the State Senate in the first place but as time went on, he took the younger man under his wing and showed him the ropes. Obama approached Jones to support his U.S. Senate bid, and it took some persuading, but eventually Jones did support him. If Jones has any serious legal problems, we haven't heard much about them here. He's considered a savvy political operator and nobody's fool, but he's probably one of the less scandal-plagued Illinois politicians.

Finally, they try to link Obama to Governor Rod Blagojevich, and that is a stretch. Although Jones has been a Blagojevich ally, Obama never supported or promoted Blago and he never supported or promoted Obama. Blagojevich is a true wild card, in that nobody can seem to figure out what he's up to, what his game is. Whatever it is, you really can't pin Blagojevich to Obama. That dog won't hunt.

Finally, the name they didn't mention: David Axelrod. From the beginning, Axelrod has been by Obama's side and if someone besides the candidate is speaking for the campaign, that someone is usually him. Axelrod is another example of the big tent. He's a genuinely progressive guy but he is also a Daley insider, who has worked for Daley and a long list of Daley-approved candidates.

So, that's what I know.

A Gift that Keeps on Giving.

Former Illinois Governor George Ryan and his co-defendant, Larry Warner, lost another one today, their last one, to the U.S. Supreme Court, which without comment declined to hear their appeal. (They do that a lot.) The only way Ryan and Warner can get out now is a presidential pardon, and George H. surely no longer has that kind of juice with George W.

The imprisonment of George Ryan is a gift that keeps on giving. Is it wrong to gloat about the incarceration of a 74-year-old man who may live all or most of his remaining years behind bars? One can’t help but feel a little pity on a purely human basis, but it passes. To those who say he did nothing that dozens of other government officials have not also done and are still doing, I say lock them all up, every one, and if the prisons get too full of them, we’ll build more.

When people steal from me, I take it personally. When they do it repeatedly, right under my nose, it really pisses me off. They should rot in hell for what they did to me, to all of us.

George Ryan liked the finer things in life; a thick steak, a fat cigar, and a sporting roll of the dice. He especially liked never picking up a tab. But he made sure his buddies got their tickets punched in other ways. In Illinois there are no Republicans or Democrats, only Kleptocrats.

U.S. Atty. Patrick J. Fitzgerald put an apple in the pig’s mouth, saying in a statement, "Mr. Ryan has exhausted every legal avenue and argument afforded him, but the verdict stands that he was guilty of corrupting the highest office in the state."

Ryan and Warner were convicted in April of 2006. Ryan has been in the Federal cooler in Oxford, Wisconsin, since November but recently was transferred to Terra Haute, Indiana, for medical reasons. He’s not supposed to get out until 2013. Warner has been in Colorado. He is in until 2010.