jackconaty's Blog

Barack Obama's chief campaign strategist told reporters Tuesday night that the Obama team "has a lot to celebrate and they (the Clintons) have a lot to think about."  The implication from David Axelrod is clear...the time for "spin control" is over in the Clinton camp.  A parade of network commentators and analysts have declared the race over.  But the TV networks and newspaper columnists aren't calling the shots.  The stunning headline on one of Clinton's hometown newspapers seemed to say it all.  A photo of her and the headline  "Toast"  greeted readers of the New York Post.  A prominent website reports superdelegates are "unavailable" to meet with Hillary Clinton right now.  But all indications from the Clinton camp, including strategist Howard Wolfson, are the campaign will go on.

As we noted on this blog last week, the controversy over the Reverend Jeremiah Wright was handled expertly and the timing of his outburst and Obama's denunciation was as choreographed as an Olympic figure skating event.  Clinton's call for a federal "gas tax holiday" this summer was adroitly played as an example of old style Washington political pandering.  She looked very good on the campaign trail....better than her obviously fatigued opponent.  But it now appears that will play like a ballplayer going four for four while his team gets clobbered.  In American politics, there are no extra points awarded (or delegates for that matter) for good performances when you're campaign is outspent.  Losing is losing.  Clinton was clobbered in North Carolina and barely survived a last minute Obama onslaught in Indiana.  Her options and her money are dwindling quickly.  And to what end?  What is the rationale now to continue?  Is there something she and her husband know about Obama that will make him ultimately unelectable?  Or will the charge of the light brigade continue with a motivation born only of ego and ambition?  Last night in his speech, Obama again hit stride telling the country why he wants to be president.  One major reason is to try and put aside the politics of division.  Is it time for her to get out?  And who, if anyone in the Democratic Party, has the stature to tell her and her husband it's over.   Obama campaign co-chair Bill Daley says no one.  He told "Fox Chicago Sunday" the race will go down to the bitter end in June and only then will it end.

There's no evidence yet he's wrong and no amount of "fuzzy math" in the Clinton campaign will change what has now become the inevitable outcome. 

Did he look angry or sad?  Was he disgusted or hurt?  Should all of this have happened much sooner?

Senator Barack Obama does not speak as fast as some in the media would like.  In TV soundbite form he runs long, complete with pauses and what sometimes appears to be a superior intellect in search of the perfect word.  For far too long, glib has passed for intelligent and there's always that ever shortening attention span that sometimes appears to contracting faster in America than the GNP.  But this time it worked for Obama and it may well become the defining moment of his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination.

The Reverend Jeremiah Wright said Monday that "politicians say what they say and do what they do based on electability, based on sound bites, based on polls."  I think he meant that to be construed as a criticism.  But Wright has the cadences and the myopia of the 1960's.  His anger and his demeanor have been forged in the crucible of the african-american experience of that period.  When he references "liberation theology" he often cites 60's era thinkers and writers.  But for a man so filled with antipathy to the soundbite culture of the 21st century, he clings to that annoying habit that some men of the cloth wear so easily.  He will use one-liners from Jesus lifted from scripture without concern for context or extrapolation.

The Obama campaign knew this confrontation was coming.  They made the decision that Wright would have to explain Wright and not Obama.  While Wright gave every impression of ego-centric narcissim at the podium in the National Press Club in Washington Monday, his appearance there was no accident any more than were his stops before the NAACP in Detroit or with Bill Moyers on PBS.  The results of the exit polls in Pennsylvania were indisputable.  Wright and those oft-played snippets of his fiery sermons were hurting the Obama campaign.  It had to end and it wasn't going to be pretty.  But please don't think that Jeremiah Wright got out of bed on Monday morning determined to end Obama's candidacy.  He had cancelled all of his public appearances when his "sermonettes" became a national controversy late last month.  He could have cancelled all the latest ones too and probably would have if asked.  The Obama campaign disputes this and says Obama really didn't know what Wright said until his aides showed him a video of Wright's seemingly arrogant and ignorant performance on Tuesday morning.  I don't buy that.  Obama goes out and plays basketball,  watches the Wright video and seemingly without breaking stride goes out and holds the most important press conference of his career.  Watch it again carefully.  He knows exactly what he's saying and knows exactly what he wants you to know about why he's saying it.

This isn't about the upcoming votes in North Carolina and Indiana. Not really.  Obama's statements yesterday will probably not change the outcome in either state.  North Carolina will be closer than it should have been though he will most likely win.  I think he will lose in Indiana.  But when it's all said and done he will net a few more delegates than Hillary Clinton.  So yesterday's press conference and comments were aimed at the superdelegates. Most of those who haven't yet commited publicly yet are reportedly leaning towards Obama.  But they were getting nervous about his erosion of support from "angry white males." and worried about what six months of Jeremiah Wright "swift boat" TV ads would look like and the damage it would do to his campaign in the general election.

Remember the first of those ads was set to air in North Carolina on Monday.  Instead Wright took center stage in Washington...Obama took center stage on Tuesday in North Carolina and by Wednesday the "Wright in the pulpit" ad is dated and somewhat anachronistic.  The Obama versus Wright confrontation may have looked like a car wreck but it was as carefully orchestrated as a crash scene in a Hollywood film.  And just like in Hollywood, in the end, no one really gets hurt.

On Fox Chicago Sunday, Obama campaign strategist David Axelrod gave us the politically correct answer.  The Reverend Jeremiah Wright is his own man and he speaks for himself....not the campaign.  Fair enough, but not far enough.  Wright was a part of the campaign on an advisory basis until he became the living embodiment of what many Americans have since learned is called a "sound bite" in the media.  The ten or twenty or thirty second video clips honed from Wright's sermons over the years at the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago have been the way Wright has been defined to millions of voters...but now he's redefining himself.  Axelrod would not say this is a campaign tactic, but I will.  Let Wright explain Wright instead of Obama explaining Wright.

The Reverend Wright says attacks on him are really attacks on the black church in America.  He says the church has a long history of liberating the oppressed by feeding the hungry, treating the addicted and marching for civil rights.  He himself draws the line with Obama calling himself a pastor and Obama a politician.  Wright says he hopes the controversy surrounding him will have a positive outcome by sparking and honest dialogue about race in America.  Obama said at least that much himself in his speech on race in Philadelphia earlier this month.  But in the midst of the dialogue and the dialectic...what happens to Obama's post-racial identity politics campaign theme.  Can it survive?

That is the enormous gamble Obama's advisors are making with this string of public appearances by his former pastor.  Axelrod, one of the most brilliant political strategists in the country, lives by the axiom that "anger doesn't sell on the campaign trail."  The selling of Barack Obama depends in large part on the notion that America can leave the politics of confrontation and embrace the politics of conciliation.  That was the reason some African-American political leaders had a problem with his candidacy right from the start.   "There is no black America or white America" made for a wonderful speech in Boston four years ago, but to find the full text of that speech you still have to look under "dreams."  To millions of Americans, Obama's candidacy does represent an historic opportunity to get beyond the politics of racial division once and for all.  But his challenge now is selling that to the lower-middle class white voters who believe, fairly or unfairly, that they have been asked to pick up the largest tab on racial reparations in America. How well he can do that, or perhaps now, if he can do that, may well determine whether he is a Jack Kennedy or an Adlai Stevenson.  

Watch the complete David Axelrod interview here

It's become increasingly apparent that Senator Barack Obama, barring an unforseen bombshell, will become the Democratic nominee for president.   Polls show the race tightening in Pennsylvania and give hime more than a twenty point lead in North Carolina.

It's also clear that most Democratic party leaders want to end this thing soon.  Were it not for her Rasputin-like political reputation, the media would have foreclosed on the candidacy of Hillary Clinton weeks ago.  Why does it continue?  In part because it's simply a great story lthat has fascinated millions of Americans.  Race, gender and generational change at a time when the country is at war and most probably facing the most serious economic situation the country has faced since the Great Depression.

Odds makers in London put the chances of Obama's winning the presidency at better than 80 per cent.  Enthusiasm for his candidacy is palpable in Germany, France and across Europe.  The slow and steady dissolution of the Clinton candidacy is fasciinating to watch.  The mistakes, the arrogance, the sense of entitlement all combine to give her presidential bid the aura of the fading dominance of the baby boom generation.

Obama's candidacy will have more ups and downs.  But it has taken on an air of inevitability.  If he can finish within a few points of Clinton in Pennsylvania, let alone win, the race is all but over.   The only real question now is who tells Bill?. 

     In recent days there have been a number of articles and blogs that are describing the Obama campaign in terms that would suggest it bears more relationship to a charismatic religious fervor than a nuts and bolts political campaign.  One blog used the term "messiah" to describe Obama and the enthusiasm he is generating on the campaign trail.  One national columnist describes his campaign as "maddeningly vague" and implies that, in the end, it may prove to be a mirage.

     First, a couple of observations.  Obama does have an oratorical style that  would prompt some to see a resemblance to an evangelist.  When he talks about "hope and change" he is tapping into age-old yearnings for redemption and personal growth.  But the message is also grounded in rock-hard, secular politics.  Anger does not sell on the campaign trail.  Americans, at least many Democrats and Independents, are apparently attracted to a poltical message that suggests it is time to change the tone and tenor of the political game in the United States.

     A prominent Democrat from the Chicago area who served in the state legislature with Obama used the term "messiah" to describe him well over a year ago.  It was not meant as a compliment.  It was meant to suggest that the hype and hoopla surrounding the junior senator from Illinois was not justified by his resume or his rhetoric.

     It may well turn out that Obama is unable to jump from "hope" to "how."  It may yet prove to be true that "anything that can make you feel that good can make you feel that bad."  The expectations around him are enormous....the problems facing the next president are too.  But what Obama told me last October may yet prove telling.

     When asked what most surprised him about this presidential race at that point, he said the "superficiality of the national media."  What he meant then was position papers and professorial rountables don't make the evening news...or even most of the national columns....but tears in the eyes of members of the audience do.  The "messiah" analogy is but another example of that superficiality.            

hi everyone.....

the latest fox news chicago rasmussen poll asked a very telling question and got a somewhat ominous answer.   it expresses a deep pessimism about the country other polls have not really caputured.  when asked if "w're just about finished....many people say that america was changed forever by the attacks on september 11, 2001.  has america changed for better or worse?'

hold on.   fifty-nine per cent of those polled say the country has changed for the worse.  fifty-nine per cent.  by contrast only one in five people polled thought it had changed for the better.   people were not asked nor did they give reasons for their response.  the fox pollster says he's not really sure what's driving those results.  the war in iraq, the economy, the current crop of presidential candidates, the current occupant in the white house.  no single factor, it cuold be one of these, or all of these, or something we haven't touched.   the candidates talk about turning the page and the politics of hope...but the american public is not at all certain the page will really change or there is good reason for hope.   after six years, and no further attacks within the united states, one might presume americans feel safer than they did before that tragic day six years ago.

they don't.  at least many of them don't if the fox poll is accurate.  more than sixty per cent replied america is not safer now...or that they simply were not sure where things stand.  all this suggests the current political scene is very volatile and unpredictable....a survey of attitudes like the rasmussen poll doesn't jive with presidential horse races.  americans are dealing with fears the campaigns and the mews media have only begun to detect.  what we find...and what you say...is more important now than ever. 

Labor Daey found Barack Obama on the stump in New Hampshire....drawing big crowds...virtually all white   Obama's advisors believe the presidential campaign will be decided by voters in Iowa and New Hampshire....and they're working very hard to put organizations together that will get out the Obama  vote in both critical venues.

By now, most people, especially here in Illinois, have heard the old refrain "is he black enough?"  Congressman Danny Davis, who describes himself as "black as the ace of spades", says Obama is an authentic African-American candidate with all the right positiions on issues that matter most to that community.  But Davis says it's  not  Obama's style to raise his voice and echo the tradional demands of the 60's ear civil rights movement.

He's from the generation that benefited from it...is aware the rising waters have not carried all boats....and yet knows that anger will never sell on the campaign trail in america.  Some, like respected talk radio host cliff kelly, say Obama's 1984 convention rhetoric about "no black america, no white america" is simply not true.  But Kelly knows Obama must preach the gospel of in clusion....and believe it.

Obama's sell on the campaign trail is that of the Washintgton "outsider"....there just long enough to know it must change.  But he also knows economic deprivation and the perception of diminishing opportunities are indeed color blind.  Obama's campaign manager Robert Gibbs says the issues are iraq, health care, energy and education.

All are economic issues at their core and all can be sold in the small towns, union halls and living rooms of Nashua, New Hampshire and Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

The Obama campaign will not take its eyes off what his advisors believe is the one overwhelming reality in the 2008 campaign.  Pushing up many primaries does not make Iowa and New Hampshire less important.  it makes them more important.  If you don't win there, by the time many African-Americans cast their ballots, the race could be over.

a fox news rasmussen poll of illinois voters has some very bad news for governor rod blagojevich.

more than half of those polled say he's doing a "poor" job in office, and a majority of those polled also believe he is the primary reason the legislature failed to pass a state budget on time.

that has to be married to results indicating four in ten of the likely voters polled see both the economy and the quality of life in illinois getting worse in the next couple of years.

the governor's spokesperson, abby ottenhoff,  says "numbers go up and down, so we don't read a lot into these polls....there's no question it was a long and sometimes frustrating budget process.  what matters in the end is what we got done for people." 

but what the poll appears to indicate is that despite the governor's attempts to portray lawmakers as obstinate, self-centered pols ignoring the "will of the people" many voters see him as the problem.  the gloomy assesment of the state's quality of life and economy over the next couple of years suggest confidence in state government's ability to address problems in illinois is fading.

nothing in this poll suggests or even hints at onpgoing criminal investigations into the governor's admnistration.  bad news from the u.s attorny's office would likely make matters worse.  the governor was re-elected with less than fifty per cent of the vote.

nearly that many people, if the poll is accurate, are already sorry.

the poll was conducted on august 22, 2007.  it was a survery of five hundred likely voters and has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.5%.     

david axelrod will be stopping by to talk about  barack obama's fund raising,  the "obama girl" video (which he isn't crazy about) and why the tony rezko connection really  doesn't matter.

cook county commissioner richard steele talks about board president todd stroger's health....and why stroger had a right to keep it private during the campaign.

and the daughter of one of the most famous mob figures in chicago history gives us her take on the "family secrets trial" and why her father...sam giancana.....was murdered in is oak park home 32 years ago this week.

see you sunday morning.!  

they haven't even started negotiations yet.....but the lines are being drawn for what could be a contentious negotiation this year in the chicago public school systme.  consider the scenario as it stands now.

school chief arne duncan says there is no money for pay increases for chiccago teachers unless the legislature puts more cash in the system.  chicago teachers' union president marilyn stewart says  "a strike is always an option....and our people are not afriad to take that option."  so far in springfield, the governor clings to his corporate tax increase, no one wants to be tyhe first say increase the state income tax, and none of the legislative leaders are really talking to one another.  sound like toouble?

put yourself in the mayor's office.  he has not had to weather a teachers' strike always managing to avoid what is arguably the worst scenario students, parents, teachers and everyone else in the city could face in late summer.  a teachers' stgrike is the fish head of modern politics.   at first, public support lines up soidly against the teachers.   "they make too much now, they're off all summer etc."  but after four or five days the worm turns.

suddenly parents and police and everyone else want the kids back in school, the picket lines dominate the evening news and the city that works suddenly doesn't seem to work so well anymore..   the mayor's father learned this lesson years ago.  this mayor doesn't want a refresher course.

wish them well in springfield...as arne duncan says, if thedemocrats drop the ball on school funding this year it "would be an absolute stain on the legacy of demcoratic leadership" in illinois.   

mayor daley took the oath of office for the sixth time.   nine new alderman took it for the first time....and there was a lot of speculation about a "newly independent council."

don't count on it.   daley still has a fail safe majority in the council and more to say about the future of those nine new council members than any one of them might first care to admit.

the old adage around city hall is "keep your mouth shut and your ears open"....especially for newcomers.  the wise ones....and there are some...already know that.  posturing against the mayor will get you on the late news....but it won't get legislation passed.

will there be another challenge on the controversial "jbig box" ordinance?  possibly, many of the new members are there because of the manpower and money they got from organized labor.  but daley still opposes that idea and warned the council today "i will never stand by while businesses that could come to chicago are allowed to go elsewhere."

translation.....no special rules for large retrailers...no huge advance for organized labor.

new council....same old reality.  welcome to city hall.

hi everyone.....

governor rod blagojevich is working hard to push his gross receipts tax on illinois business.....but here in chicago and in springfield there's a sense its in trouble.

a test vote in the illinois house last week showed a distinct lack of support for the governor's idea.....many democrats in the governor's own party would prefer an income tax hike, a widening of the sales tax and some sort of property tax relief.

all of this is not promising for lawmakers with vacation plans in june.   the govjernor is prepared to hold his ground and veto any tax hike except his own proposal....and he's tied his legacy to universal health care that tax would help finance.

but house speaker mike madigan doesn't care a wit about this governor's legacy....or what blagojevich thinks democrats should stand for.and without madigan's support  it's going to be impossible to get the GRT  passed by the time legislators are supposed to adjourn at the end of this month>  this is shaping up as a brutal legislative battle that could ultimately shut down state government by july.

hello everyone.....

new york senator and democratic presidential candidate hillary clinton finally made a foray into chicago on monday.....and for the first time in years took questions from the local media.  she has an impressive grasp of issues, a keen self-awareness, and a composure that is, for lack of a better word, presidential.

when asked why her personal warmth and charm, the things herr friends so often describe, don't seem to come through on camera or in her public persona....she said simply that she relizes "i'm maybe not the most charismatic person in this race...."

but her qualifications, connections and self-confidence are unique in this race as is her very real chance to become the first female president in united states history.

many people feel they know all about her from her husband's years in the white house but i suspect that assumption is very wrong.  if. scott fitzgerald said "there are no second acts in american life." perhaps.  but if that has changed, hillary clinton will define it.

this campaign is a long way from over.  senator barack obama always treats clinton with respect and admration.  on that he is well advised.   she has her baggage, but the train hasn't left the station yet.   She won't take illinois in a democratic primary, but if she's the eventual nominee she'll own it in the general election.  that's why the mayor met with her.  the daleys are backing obama.....but dare not alienate her.

hello everyone....while tens of thousands of people demonstrated in the streets of chicago demanding immigration reform, legalization and the end of federal raids in hispanic neighborhoods....the cook county board quietly, and without fanfare, killed a resolution that would have prohibited county workers from inquiring about someone's citizenship or legal status when they use or attempt to use county services.

the vote was instructive along a number of lines.  in this, arguably the bluest county in a blue state, commissioner roberto maldanado could not muster nine votes for a watered down resolution that already exempted many health care workers and law enforcement officials from the proposed county "don't ask, don't tell" policy change.

while mayor daley welcomed immigrants to chicago and lauded thier contributions to the chicago skyline....his brother, commissioner john daley, voted against the so called "safe haven" resolution at the county board.  not one african american commissioner, save board president todd stroger, supported maldonado's resolution....some citing concerns for what it could do to the already beleagured county health care system.

there's a disconnect here that is troubling.  they mayor is painfully aware that county services are overextended and taxppayers overtaxed.  he's extending a hand to the hispanic community that continues to wield increasing political and economic power in the city and county.  but his brother's vote on the board concedes the obvious.....that granting cook county "safe haven" status is expensive and politically explosive.

congress appears unable or unwilling to pass comprehensive immigration reform, corporate america doesn't seem to want it.   but polls, including unscientific polls conducted on our newscasts, suggest a vast majority of americans want illegal immigration curbed yesterday.

here in cook county and across the country americans can't have it both ways.

they cannot continue to benefit from the labors of hard working, industrious people looking for a better life and yet ignore the social and security consequences of  unfettered illegal immigration.

if there's a meaningful compromise on the horizon...i'm not sure i see it.  it is both dangerous and counterproductive to allow the illegal immigration issue to fester creating divisions when we need bring americans together.

if you have any thoughts, pass them along.  we'll talk soon. 

hi everyone.....

the city of chicago and the feds have a new deal.   if the mayor follows his own new, stringent rules for city hiring....the feds will get out of the business of monitoring hiring at city hall.....and may even allow more patronage and political hires than are currently allowed.

the mayor can hire about 1,200 shakman free posistions now.....but he wants more and says the city needs to be able to attract the best people possible.

he's probably right.  but what about the federal prosecution of his former patronage chief forclout based hiring?   daley has always felt the  federal prosecutors were over stepping their bounds and criminalizing politics as its always been practiced in this city.  the truth, like the agrement with the feds on shakman today, probably lies somewhere in between.

politicians do have the right to hire the faithful....but should not require all city employes to be faithful in order to get their jobs or secure promotions.   still, you have to chalk this one up as a big victory for the mayor who has been chastened as the conseequence of federal investigations swirled about his administration.

as michael shakman said today "he's got a chance.   if he wants to be out of the federal courthouse, done with me, the federal judge and everything else, he 's got to do it .

ihope he does"......don't we all..

that's if for now.....we'll chat again soon.