Chicago Cubs legend Ernie Banks’ perpetual lament was “wait until next year.” Allies of embattled Chicago Mayor Rich Daley are utilizing a similar argument: “Wait until 2015.” They say: Don’t oppose the mayor in 2011. Instead, wait to run in 2015, when Daley will retire.

Hence, the legion of mayoral wannabes are in a quandary: Is Daley beatable in 2011? Is it worth the risk to oppose him?
If Daley commits to run in 2011 and to quit in 2015, then it behooves the politically astute contenders to take a …

PARIS–I’ve spent the past couple of weeks puttering around Paris taking care of some unpleasant but important business, all the while getting calls and e-mail queries from all kinds of media—mainstream to miniblogs.
What’s happened here during my stay? Well, Greece is going broke and Portugal and others are teetering on the edge. An unpronounceable volcano in Iceland belched enough ash into the air to bring world airline traffic to a dead halt.

The right-wing party of French President Nicholas Sarkozy lost virtually everywhere in the country during the recent mid-term elections, …

As it stands now the Democrats stand to lose at least a half dozen senate seats in November and could even lose their wobbly nine-seat majority if the wobbly independent Joe Lieberman wobbles more to the right.

Losing Ted Kennedy’s Massachusetts seat—granted because of a miserable candidate—showed that everything is up for grabs in this anti-incumbent, anti-politician, anti-everything year. The bluest states could turn blood-red—New York with an ill-chosen appointee to replace Hillary Clinton, Delaware with no Biden of any generation to shore up the faithful and, yes, Illinois with a …

After the Chicago Sun-Times gossip columnist Mike Sneed reported a cute item last week that Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan was at the White House and had taken home to her daughters “two boxes of presidential M&M candy,” I wondered if Obama aides Rahm Emanuel and/or David Alexrod had attempted to persuade Madigan that she should replace Alexi Giannoulias, the deeply flawed Democratic candidate for Barack Obama’s Senate seat–assuming that they could somehow elbow Alexi out for the good of his basketball buddy Obama and the party.

Read more at the Huffington …

Now that the 12th day of Christmas is over and Ephiphany too, its time for Illinois citizens to think about participating in the Republican, Democratic or Green Party primary elections on Tuesday, February 2. (You can only vote in one party primary.)

There are those who say “it doesn’t matter who we elect, they’re all the same”, or even worse, “they’re all crooks.” I would suggest that these two thoughts are literally destructive to democracy. I have made mistakes in supporting candidates in the past. I have also …

Lisa.

Attorney General Lisa Madigan will run for the U. S. Senate against incumbent Roland Burris (who is seen as a sure loser). Why when Lisa and her family have long felt that the governorship is in her destiny? Four reasons: (1) The gubernatorial situation has become so tumultuous with Pat Quinn that even Lisa will have a tough time getting a united party behind her even if she beats Quinn for the nomination. (2) The Dems have a lot of goo-goo’s who want higher taxes to pay for social needs …

<object width=”425″ height=”344″><param name=”movie” value=”http://www.youtube.com/v/D8ktvG9h7jc&hl=en&fs=1&”></param><param name=”allowFullScreen” value=”true”></param><param name=”allowscriptaccess” value=”always”></param><embed src=”http://www.youtube.com/v/D8ktvG9h7jc&hl=en&fs=1&” type=”application/x-shockwave-flash” allowscriptaccess=”always” allowfullscreen=”true” width=”425″ height=”344″></embed></object>

Jack Frank’s a nice guy and a friend but he can’t convince me that Mike Madigan screwed up Pat Quinn’s session by not raising taxes because he lost the power to convince his troops. Not anyone of Madigan’s leadership stripe. Tax hikes are not anathema to Dems as they are to Republicans or the general public. Madigan gave his step-daughter a golden opportunity for the nomination in 2010 and the general in November. There’s a thought that if Madigan wanted to harm Quinn he’d pass the tax hike-but in the …

The idealistic news media, covering the closure of the legislative session, are weeping bitter tears. I have been studying these sensitive, hope-filled people since 1953 as a journalist, while covering the Minnesota legislature, as a congressional aide and press secretary to a governor, then assistant commerce secretary, foreign service officer, corporate executive, adjunct university teacher and now, as an octogenarian, as a part-time talk show host and blogger. Believe me, they are all of the same stripe: they are fated to fall in love with Democratic politicians and each time …