Chicago Daily Observer

It ranks with Alderman Pat Levar’s (45th) disastrous bid for Clerk of the Circuit Court in 2000, and county Treasurer Maria Pappas’s fizzled campaign for U.S. Senator in 2004. Add to that Alderman Howard Brookins’ (21st) embarrassingly inept bid for state’s attorney on Feb. 5.

We now have a triumvirate: Dumb, dumber and dumbest.

The 2008 Democratic primary was supposed to be the Big Black Blowout, with black Democrats sweeping every county office in the wake of a Barack Obama lovefest for president. Indeed, Obama crushed Hillary Clinton in Cook County, amassing 708,276 votes (70.7 percent) to her 301,747. But the city and county black vote was not, as expected, monolithic. Brookins garnered an astounding 542,492 fewer votes than did Obama.

“He didn’t show his face,” said one Democratic observer. “He had lots of yard signs – Obama and Brookins. He had lots of ads on black radio. But he ... Read More...

There’s a mad, multi-candidate scramble for the Democratic nomination for Cook county state’s attorney, not only because the office is a giant plum but because its outcome has not always been determined by the Democratic machine.

Running as an independent Dem in 1980, a fellow named Richard M. Daley trounced the “slated” Alderman Ed Burke and went on to upset the two-term Republican incumbent Bernard Carey (yes, a Republican won the office in 1972 in an upset with strong racial ingredients).

Then, when Daley won the 1989 mayoral race he appointed an old-line black politician, Cecil Partee to fill his term. In the 1992 race for a full term, Partee was weakened by a race-based primary battle against a north side alderman and subsequently lost to Republican Jack O’Malley in yet another race-tinged election—the last time the GOP held a countywide office.

O’Malley was later upset by the machine ... Read More...