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Wednesday, Dec 13, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

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Wednesday, Dec 13, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

[Bumped to the top for discussion purposes.]

Carol Marin’s column today is about the hurdles faced by female candidates.

And just Tuesday, Thomas B. Edsall’s New York Times column pointed to what he called “disturbing” Democratic numbers. “In the 42 top-tier ‘Red to Blue’ races selected by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee for intensive financing and support, 25 of the candidates were male and 17 were female,” wrote Edsall. “In those contests, male candidates batted .800: 20 victories to five defeats. The women faced higher barriers: three won and 14 lost, batting .176.”

It’s got to be something that Hillary Clinton is studying. As the Democrats embark on a presidential season that arguably could yield a woman or a person of color like Sen. Barack Obama as its presidential nominee, we are once again asking if the country is ready for either.

We have a long way to go on both fronts.

But it may well be that gender remains the larger liability.

Which is the “larger liability” in American politics today? Gender or race? Explain.

*** UPDATE *** As if on cue, we have some new polling numbers.

CNN just ran results from an Opinion Research Corporation poll that asked two questions:

* Do you think America is ready for a black/African-American president or not?

* Do you think America is ready for a woman president or not?

And here’s the story:

Sixty percent of voters said, “A female president? No problem.'’ Both men and women agree. Do Democrats see a problem? Nope. Seventy percent of Democrats say the country’s ready for a female president. Perhaps they have one in mind.

How about an African-American president? A slightly higher number, 62 percent, see no problem with that either. Whites are a little more confident than blacks that the country is ready for a black president. But a majority of blacks believe the country is ready.

Can those results be trusted? Polls are not always reliable when they ask people about prejudice. As CNN’s polling director, Keating Holland, noted, “Sometimes people will hear a question and give pollsters the answer that they think the pollster wants to hear.'’

The question of electability may be less about prejudice in general and more about this woman and this African-American. Holland said, “Americans may be thinking about these specific people, [New York Sen.] Hillary Clinton and [Illinois Sen.] Barack Obama.'’

I think a much better question to ask would be “Would you rule out voting for a black or female presidential candidate?” and I think there was a poll earlier this year about the female side of that (with quite a few saying “No”) but I haven’t been able to find it yet.

33 Comments

Obamarama

Wednesday, Dec 13, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

Obama appeared yesterday at a public hearing by the Advisory Board on Radiation and Worker Health to push for compensation for poisoned workers, but his mere presence was more interesting to some.

Apologetic for the â€œfussâ€ he was creating at a meeting Tuesday in Naperville, Sen. Barack Obama pleaded the cases of hundreds of Illinois workers who became sick toiling at nuclear weapons plants less than a half century ago.

The prospective Democratic presidential candidate also brought along a crush of media attention.

â€œThis is one of the rare times itâ€™s useful to have this big throng,â€ he said to the more than two dozen media members attending a federal worker health advisory board meeting. â€œThatâ€™s a joke. Donâ€™t hold it against me.â€

He is not concerned that his star power presence at these types of hearings gets in the way of his message.

â€œA lot of you wouldnâ€™t be here today, otherwise,â€ he said. â€œThe whole point of appearing here is to make sure the story is widely disseminated.â€

But this hearing did deal with an important issue.

For the 29 years he worked at a Joliet chemical plant, John Keca thought he was manufacturing detergents.

“He was sick most of his time” at the plant, his widow, Phyllis, 80, said Tuesday.

But in fact, Keca had been exposed to uranium dust while working at the Blockson Chemical Co. Blockson had a government contract to extract uranium from ore between 1952 and 1962.

John Keca died in 1996 of colon cancer, his wife said.

Meanwhile, one of the AP’s top political reporters demonstrated once again why the Beltway media crowd is such an object of derision. Check out this lede:

Sen. Barack Obama had a good first date in New Hampshire this week — he was a little late, but wore a nice suit, had interesting things to say and used a little flattery.

* And Jeff Greenfield, who used to be a decent reporter, has apparently lost his freaking mind. This Greenfield piece for CNN has been making the rounds on the blogs this week.

The senator was in New Hampshire over the weekend, sporting what’s getting to be the classic Obama look. Call it business casual, a jacket, a collared shirt, but no tie.

It is a look the senator seems to favor. And why not? It is dressy enough to suggest seriousness of purpose, but without the stuffiness of a tie, much less a suit. There is a comfort level here that reflects one of Obama’s strongest political assets, a sense that he is comfortable in his own skin, that he knows who he is. […]

But, in the case of Obama, he may be walking around with a sartorial time bomb. Ask yourself, is there any other major public figure who dresses the way he does? Why, yes. It is Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who, unlike most of his predecessors, seems to have skipped through enough copies of “GQ” to find the jacket-and-no-tie look agreeable.

And maybe that’s not the comparison a possible presidential contender really wants to evoke.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, Washington, DC - all of it, from the very tippity top right down to the lowliest janitor who thinks he owns the place - is the problem.

34 Comments

Morning shorts

Wednesday, Dec 13, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

* Don’t forget about tonight’s party

* Hester vs. Hastert

* Fox Lake to drop ComEd service after January deregulation

* Editorial: A bit of advice for governorâ€™s top advisers

* Indiana, Illinois agree to study proposed toll road… More here

* Editorial: State owns homes; it should be able to knock them down

* Report: State faster in investigating abuse, but still too slow

* Editorial: `Willfully ignorant’

* Kadner: Chicago’s security blanket: Richard Daley for mayor

If Mayor Daley needs a theme song for his re-election campaign, I suggest, “Don’t Worry, Be Happy.”

That was the Grammy-winning song of 1989, the year Daley won his first mayoral election.

As the song by Bobby McFerrin says, “In every life we have some trouble, when we worry we make it double. Don’t worry, be happy.”

Jeff Torborg was manager of the Chicago White Sox.

Don Zimmer was skipper of the Cubs.

Ronald Reagan was president of the United States.

Jim Thompson was governor of Illinois.

Michael Jordan had yet to win an NBA championship with the Chicago Bulls.

* Kass: How not to treat your guardian Angelo

* Retail Sales Surge in November

* Sick workers should get paid, Obama says

* Latino community rallies around stricken family - Goal is raise enough to send bodies of Carpentersville family back to Mexico for burial

* Trees for Troops a way to say thanks

9 Comments

Daley does one-on-ones

Wednesday, Dec 13, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

Instead of answering detailed questions at a campaign announcement press conference, Mayor Daley had reporters lining up yesterday for ten minute, one-on-one interviews. Here are some highlights:

* Sun-Times: City casino ‘not on our priority list’

Mayor Daley bobbed and weaved to avoid questions posed by the city hiring scandal Tuesday, even as he made himself available for a parade of 10-minute interviews.

Throughout the day reporters lined up at the mayor’s campaign headquarters for one-on-ones with Daley. But when it came time for answers about the scandal that culminated in the conviction of his former patronage chief and three other high-ranking city officials, Daley was less than forthcoming. […]

On his on-again, off-again quest for a Chicago casino, the mayor said it’s “up to the governor.”

“It’s not on our priority list,” he said.

* The Crain’s interview in full can be downloaded here [mp3 file]

Mayor Richard M. Daley, in a campaign-kickoff interview Tuesday, left the door open for residential development on the doomed A. Finkl & Sons Co. factory site on the cityâ€™s North Side that has been the focus of efforts to preserve industrial jobs in Chicago. […]

[Question] If you’re really for the property tax cap extension, as (Illinois House Speaker) Michael Madigan says he is too, why hasn’t it passed the House?

[Answer] We’re getting closer every vote. We have another vote next month, coming up in January. And we’re going to follow through.

[Question] Are you really going to push for it?

[Answer] Oh, yeah.

* AP: Daley cites “few bad apples'’ for City Hall problems

A relaxed and chatty Daley said he was different from private-sector CEOs who step down when bad things go on under their watch.

“They failed to act,” he said.

Daley said he has taken steps to clean up problems at City Hall. He has said the city would continue retooling its hiring and contracting systems to prevent abuse and had imposed new fundraising rules.

“So far, sure, I think I’ve done enough,” Daley said. He said the city has to meet higher standards than a public company because it operates on taxpayer money.

When Daley was asked if he thought he could be charged as part of the federal investigation, he said: “I wouldn’t even know that.”

* NBC5: Mayor Talks About Corruption, Iraq, Passion For Job [video is here]

Daley was upbeat and frank during the interview, during which Ahern fired off many different topics, ranging from his own son’s embarking on a career in the Army to Daley’s position on corruption within his administration to his unbridled passion for the job.
“I’m the most accessible public official you’ve ever met, and you know that in your own career,” Daley told Ahern with a smile.

* The Tribune story concentrated mostly on the mechanics of the interview process.

Bill Cameron, a reporter for WLS radio, said while he appreciated Daley giving the gift of time, it was clearly an effort by the mayor to deliver a campaign message “that he was fighting corruption and never benefited from any of it.”

“He wouldn’t even concede that he has benefited politically by the work of those who have been prosecuted,” Cameron said. “He not only said to me that he’s not worried about what may be coming to him from the feds, because he did nothing wrong, but that he didn’t know what was going on and he didn’t benefit from any of it. But of course he did.”

But even the most seasoned journalists, recognizing Daley’s availability as more a political tactic than an act of holiday kindness, weren’t about to look a gift mayor in the mouth.

“Everybody’s always happy to get a one-on-one with the mayor,” Cameron said. “But he stayed right on message.”

* CBS2 video

* ABC7’s complete interview

7 Comments

Another big idea with no money

Wednesday, Dec 13, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

Although I’m sure it will take heat from people who think that it’s a cover to help illegals, this seems like a decent idea.

A panel of state agencies wants to create “welcoming centers” for immigrants, allowing them to apply for job training, health care and other services at one location.

The proposed state-funded centers would be based in suburbs and in Downstate towns with recent spikes in immigrants, according to the panel’s report being released Wednesday.

The last four or five small-town, Downstate restaurants I’ve eaten at (far outside Springfield in previously all-Anglo areas) had a surprisingly large number of Latino, Southastern European and even Arabic employees, so just based on that admittedly cursory observation, the help may be needed.

But, as always with this administration, there’s a big announcement with no funding attached.

Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who commissioned the two panels, is endorsing the recommendations but has not yet committed any funding, a spokesman said.

Grace Hou, co-chair of the state agency panel and assistant secretary of the Illinois Department of Human Services, acknowledged that dwindling money in the state budget might make it difficult to secure expanded funding for immigrant integration.

Thoughts?

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