The bleeping gift that keeps giving
TOM BURGUM
Contributing Columnist
burgum@lbknews.com
‘Tis the season to be jolly but there is precious little to be jolly about this year. Economic news has become the Grinch who threatens to steal Christmas.
News of an imploding housing market is followed by news of the demise of another Wall Street firm. GM, Ford and Chrysler are near bankruptcy and the government seems ready to sink $15 or $20 or $50 billion in bridge loans to help our stalwart auto industry.
Then, when it seems there isn’t any relief from the bleeping bad news, the bleeping Blagojevich (Blago) scandal in Chicago breaks through the economic gloom like a divine shaft of light from the heavens. It is as if Mike Royko, the revered muckraking columnist from Chicago, had appeared as the Ghost of Christmas Past.
Jonah Goldberg saw the blessed light and wrote, “For the more historically minded, it’s time for nostalgia. The past comes alive as Chicago’s grand tradition of corruption is sustained for another generation. As the Chicago Tribune once wrote, ‘corruption has been as much a part of the landscape as corn, soybeans and skyscrapers.’ According to the Chicago Sun-Times, as of 2006, when Blago’s predecessor, George Ryan, was sent to prison for racketeering, 79 elected officials had been convicted of corruption in the past 30 years. Among the perps: 27 aldermen, 19 judges, 15 state legislators, three governors, two congressmen, one mayor, two turtledoves and a partridge in a stolen pear tree.” Then, on a sentimental note, Goldberg notes, “Especially in this holiday season, it’s so very important to keep traditions alive for the kids. In a sense, Blago did it for the children.”
The cast of characters is rich in the Chicago tradition of theft, sleaze and smut. Blago’s wife, the not quite esteemed first lady of Illinois, appears to have dropped more f−bombs on FBI tapes than the real kind were dropped on Iraq by B-52s. Who can’t love a first lady whose prose has more bleeps than verbs?
Obama can’t be given much credit for helping keep the Chicago tradition alive, at least in this case. Blago seriously beeped Obama for offering nothing but “appreciation” in return for offering to award the Senate seat to Obama’s Valerie Jarrett, Obama’s friend and former staff member. Whatever you think of this, it is certainly neither criminal nor unusual for politicians to promote talented friends.
Congressman Jessie Jackson Jr. is not the least of the Damon Runyon-type cast in the latest scandal. It is alleged that Jackson, son of a famous race-baiter and shake down artist, either personally or through an emissary, offered Blago $500,000 for Obama’s senate seat. Jackson denies any such dealing but, if it is true, he is being faithful to the pedigree of the congressional seat he currently occupies.
According to Goldberg, “Jackson replaced former Rep. Mel Reynolds, who went to jail for getting jiggy with a 16-year-old campaign staffer and stayed in jail because of various fraud convictions. Reynolds, in turn, was the ‘reformer’ who had replaced Rep. Gus Savage, the thug-congressman who groped a Peace Corps volunteer in Zaire while on a ‘fact-finding’ trip. Savage held off Reynolds’ attempts to replace him for several years by claiming Reynolds was financed by ‘racist Jews.’”
None of this is new. In 1967, Mike Royko captured Chicago and its politics in a column written about the unveiling of a Picasso statue called, “I Will.” It was a major cultural event and anyone who was anyone attended the ceremony.
Picasso’s statue was, according to Royko, a crushing disappointment to the crowd but not to Royko. He felt that “from thousands of miles away, Picasso had captured Chicago.”
In his column he describes Picasso’s work, “as a big ugly thing with a long stupid face and eyes that are merciless and cold.” He wrote, “Its eyes are like the eyes of every slum owner who made a buck off the small and weak. And of every building inspector who took a wad from a slum owner to make it all possible. Any big-time real estate operator will be able to look into the face of the Picasso and see the spirit that makes the city’s rebuilding possible and profitable. It has the look of the corporate executive who comes face to face with the reality of how much water pollutions his company is responsible for and then thinks of the profit and loss and of his salary. It is all there in that Picasso thing the ‘I Will’ spirit. The I will get you before you will get me spirit. Picasso has never been here, they say. You’d think he’s been riding the L all his life.”
Royko was describing the bleeping Chicago of 1967; Blagojevich is the bleeping Chicago of 2008. Obviously it hasn’t changed, which shouldn’t be a surprise. Politics in the Windy City remain the same because people remain the same. There is no new politics or old politics, there is simply politics. To understand more fully, see “Original Sin, Doctrine of.”
Happy Hanukkah and Merry Christmas to all — especially to the denizens of Chicago who give us the gift that keeps giving.
