Peoria Pundit

Chicago Tribune political curmudgeon John Kass Kass doesn’t think too highly of Congressman Ray:

Mr. Kass, re: Gov. Big Hairovich, this may be premature, but do you think it would be useful to begin pondering publicly who can be trusted as governor? Maybe someone outside of Chicago? Or is that a fantasy? Joe M., Belleville

Dear Joe—It’s not premature, not with all the sleaze in this state. If the candidate is a Democrat from Illinois, they’ll be on bended knee to Mayor Shortshanks at Chicago’s City Hall or House Speaker Michael Madigan (D-Lisa’s Daddy) or State Sen. James DeLeo (D-How You Doin?). And if they’re Republican, they’ll bow to the indicted party boss Big Bill Cellini or his enabler, Big Jim Thompson, or the Republican establishment that dares criticize President-elect Barack Obama for his connections to sleazy politics, yet applauds Obama’s appointment of a Cellini guy, U.S. Rep. Ray LaHood (R-Combine) as secretary of transportation. [emphasis mine] That’s change we can believe in. How about we ban all current Illinois politicians from the list of prospective governors? There must be someone other than U.S. Atty. Patrick Fitzgerald who has served the public interest without picking the public pocket. We need Fitzgerald where he is, in Chicago. But are there any others who’ve fought Illinois political corruption and the Chicago Outfit and who’d be interested in running for office? There might be one out there.

Cellini’s name has popped up on occasion in the pages of Peoria Pundit. One of the complaints I’ve had about the local media is how it perpetrated the folksy “Congressman Ray” image, while pretty ignoring his connections to some of the corrupt politicians that big city newspapers were hammering away at on an almost daily basis. Kass goes overboard sometimes, but he has a point.

So if you’re shocked to see “Congressman Ray” described as a “Cellini guy,” blame the local news media.

For an education, read the Sun-Times article on Cellini.

Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass is considered by many to be the closest that newspaper has come to replacing legendary curmudgeon and political gadfly Mike Royko. Kass isn’t worthy of rinsing out Royko’s bear glass. Sure, Kass has done some great work on the corrupt administration of Mayor Richard M. Daley. It resembles the work Royko did on Daley’s father, the legendary “Boss” Richard J. Daley. But the resemblance is superficial. Royko didn’t pick sides. He didn’t consider it his job to protect Daley’s foes. Kass, by contrast, once wrote a column castigating downstate voters for preferring John Schmidt over Lisa Madigan in the Democratic primary race for Illinois attorney general. Sure, Lisa is the daughter of Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan. It doesn’t matter that Madigan has been pulling strings to get his daughter elected over a man with tons of legal experience. These silly fools, Kass said, don’t realize that Schmidt is backed the evil Daley administration, and Madigan is Daley’s rival for power. Anyone who gets in Daley way can’t be all bad.

Kass seems to using his column to do Lisa Madigan’s dirty work.

Let’s look at one story that has come out about Lisa Madigan and her father in recent months. It was revealed that the sons of a judge who got favors from Madigan wrote large checks to the Lisa Madigan campaign. One of these sons is a producer of “white power” music. Kass, the Trib’s page 2 columnist, did not write about this page one story. Royko would have been all over it.

On Friday, Kass’s column (printer friendly version) was about the role of Lisa Madigan’s Republican opponent, Joe Birkett, in the Rolando Cruz prosecution, and Birkett’s support of attorneys charged with obstruction of justice and conspiracy. For those who don’t know, Cruz was tried three times the 1983 murder of 10-year-old Jeanine Nicarico of Naperville, Ill. While Cruz was on death row, another man confessed to doing the crime alone and DNA evidence backed up that confession. Birkett fought to keep Cruse on death row despite the overwhelming evidence of another man’s guilt.

There is nothing wrong about writing about Birkett’s behavior. I question why Kass writes about Birkett’s dirty laundry, but not about the fascinating stuff happening in the Lisa Madigan campaign. It’s a sin of omission.

I find it amazing that Kass gets away with this unethical and obvious favoritism, but Bob Greene got shown the door because of his sex life. Which hurts readers more, columnists carrying water for the politicians they favor, or a columnist having consensual sex with a non-politician they wrote about exactly once?

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