31 Comments - Pot calling kettle - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:14 pm: The first video is a good example of what the Quinn campaign could be doing right now, but they aren’t…it’s as if there is no campaign. - Yellow Dog Democrat - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:14 pm: “Its time to return Illinois and America to John Wayne’s America.” - Sen. Bill Brady - Before the Civil Rights Movement - Before women had the right to vote - Before social security and Medicare Senator Brady, you’re off to a great start. - John Bambenek - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:15 pm: Raoul’s plan is unconstitutional and I will knock it off ballot if he gets it passed. - Small Town Liberal - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:17 pm: YDD - Right on. If he was smart he would have used Chuck Norris instead. - Small Town Liberal - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:20 pm: John Bambenek - Good luck with that John, hopefully you’re as successful as you have been with all of your other grand stunts. - Yellow Dog Democrat - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:23 pm: Also, if Senator Brady is going to point to Indiana as a model, someone needs to point out that Indiana governor Mitch Daniels raised taxes, not cut them, even after selling the Tollway, and Indiana STILL has a 7%, $1 BILLION budget deficit for the current fiscal year and is projected to have a $600 million deficit for the next fiscal year. http://sunshinereview.org/index.php/State_budget_issues,_2009-2010 - Cheryl44 - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:27 pm: If he’s going to attend tea party events, Brady shouldn’t be surprised when moderates take their votes elsewhere. - conda67 - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:27 pm: Have you ever seen what the meat plants do to hogs and cattle, what would be done the dogs will not even compare. - Responsa - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:31 pm: Sen. Brady needs to fix the “pet euthenasia” image problem stat before he has another JBT dancing the polka situation on his hands. (Either by publicly changing his position about the legislation, or by explaining if, or how the charges being made regarding his bill are wrong or are mischaracterizing his position.) He cannot ignore this another day. Poor Alexi looks absolutely beaten down in that press conference vid. He is clearly not enjoying himself. He may, however, come to regret his early pleas to elevate the discussion, because when the discussion *does* become elevated–as it will–Kirk’s decency, intellect and wide ranging knowledge of policy issues, economics, and history will dwarf Alexi. - Brennan - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:35 pm: I’m surprised you subscribe to and publish videos from people you do not know. Do you even bother to determine the source? - Rich Miller - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:36 pm: conda67, while true, dogs and cats are pets and are “part of the family” of many, many people. It’s a powerful message, despite your point. - Small Town Liberal - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:37 pm: - (Either by publicly changing his position about the legislation, or by explaining if, or how the charges being made regarding his bill are wrong or are mischaracterizing his position.) - What would he say? That he didn’t sponsor the bill? That he was too dumb to realize what it meant? Or that he just did it because a contributor asked him to? There is no fix for something like this. - Rich Miller - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:37 pm: Brennan, I’m not sure what you’re talking about here. A video is a video. I watched that euthanasia video and didn’t see any gross inaccuracies. - VanillaMan - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:37 pm: The John Wayne comment demonstrates that Brady speaks a different language with different images. Bashing him for his inability to speak Liberal Democrat is ridiculous. It would be like making fun of Julie Hamos’ accent. Fortunately voters are more intelligent than that. - shore - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:40 pm: that’s a tough ad. it could work. no one likes dog killers. I’ve never been to springfield, but can they still afford lights for those videos? - Responsa - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:47 pm: –There is no fix for something like this– In a campaign, as in real life, there is always a mitigation if not an outright fix for “something like this”. However embarrassing it may be, Brady needs to figure out what that fix is and boldly do it. Quinn’s problems with his double secret prisoner releases could be considered in the same category of miscalculation/stupid. Do you likewise think Quinn is doomed? - John Bambenek - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:49 pm: small town liberal- Read Raoul’s amendment. Note that, for instance, contiguity is not required in legislative districts. That means under the state constitution, one party could simply create a district consisting of “islands”… or more invidiouisly, a district consisting of every house belonging to the minority party in a district with a 90% population of the other. Oh yeah, that’s a GREAT idea. I’d love to get into court, let Lisa Madigan defend it, and then happily give those pleadings to BigGovernment.com to write more expose’ on corrupt Chicago Democrats, brusing up dear daughter the whole time. - fed up - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 12:56 pm: YDD women got the right to vote in 1920 that was a little before the john Wayne era. But never let the facts get in the way - Brennan - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 1:04 pm: Rich: Did you attempt to acquire the production credits for the video? The video is good, but a little too good. So good that a wile vet such as yourself might try to determine the source. - Rich Miller - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 1:08 pm: Brennan, I did not. I simply posted a video that’s pretty darned striking. And I disclosed right up front that I didn’t know who made it. - Chicago Cynic - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 1:48 pm: At least as important as the fact that cows and chickens aren’t pets is that they aren’t cute. People don’t like to see cute animals killed. Whether the Brady supporters like it or not, that ad, or a version of it, can be used to devastating effect to define Bill Brady as outside the mainstream of decency. It’s still the best card Quinn has and it was purely self-inflicted on Brady’s part. But November is a LONG way away. - conda67 - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 2:22 pm: What is the reason for put one dog or cat down to putting 10 dogs or cats down? - jonbtuba - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 2:26 pm: Imagine stumbling on to the following article a day after picking up on the Brady dog video http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/04/13/bill-bradys-most-extreme_n_535973.html I already thought the guy was pretty far right, but geez! I’m somewhat floored between the dog video and this. The amount of disenfranchisement and sexual discrimination he would permit is shocking. - Yellow Dog Democrat - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 2:47 pm: === The John Wayne comment demonstrates that Brady speaks a different language with different images. Bashing him for his inability to speak Liberal Democrat is ridiculous. === === YDD women got the right to vote in 1920 that was a little before the john Wayne era. But never let the facts get in the way === I’m sorry, please translate then for me Vanillaman, since I’m not a Tea Party member from Will County. What exactly does Bill Brady mean when he says we need to return to “John Wayne’s America?” Because unlike fed-up, I was assuming he wasn’t referring to John Wayne’s actual life, but the characters he portrayed on screen, mainly from Westerns. If he was referring to Wayne’s real life, which part? - the prolific drinking? - the lifelong chain-smoking, which led to lung cancer? - His college days as an admitted socialist? - His years avoiding service in WWII to continue his acting career? - His democratic days as a supporter of FDR and Truman? - His anti-communist days supporting McCarthyism? - His vocal support for the Vietnam War and Richard Nixon? or how about this gem, most fitting for a Tea Party rally: “I believe in white supremacy until blacks are educated to a point of responsibility. I don’t believe in giving authority and positions of leadership and judgment to irresponsible people…. The academic community has developed certain tests that determine whether the blacks are sufficiently equipped scholastically…. I don’t feel guilty about the fact that five or ten generations ago these people were slaves. Now I’m not condoning slavery. It’s just a fact of life, like the kid who gets infantile paralysis and can’t play football like the rest of us.” - John Wayne, 1971, Playboy interview - wordslinger63 - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 3:45 pm: It takes a lot of testicular virility, and more than a little ignorance, to bring up John Wayne and hope that folks associate him with you. Besides the fact that he was The Duke, Wayne’s politics, acting and films were a lot more complex than the stereotype Brady’s trading on. Little known facts: Wayne’s best friends in Hollywood were Jimmy Stewart and Henry Fonda. Their politics ranged the gamut of their generation. Before he wrote the book, Larry McMurtry peddled “Lonesome Dove” as a screenplay to star Wayne as Woodrow Call, Stewart as Augustus McCrae and Fonda as Jake Spoon. Stewart and Fonda were ready to go, but Wayne was down a lung working on “The Green Berets.” - Yellow Dog Democrat - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 4:03 pm: Setting aside John Wayne’s racist views, he is the third most popular actor in America today, 30 years after his last film. So, I can’t blame Senator Brady for wanting to make the comparison. But, let’s be clear, John Wayne believed blacks were inferior and supported McCarthyism, Richard Nixon and the Vietnam War. That may be what Brady and the Tea Party want, but that’s not an America I want to return to, nor most Illinoisans. - wordslinger - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 4:17 pm: YDD, Wayne was a man of his times, but I think your characterizations are too simplistic. As far as racism, you could make the same claims of FDR, HST, IKE, JFK, L BJ, Churchill, etc. ad infinitum, based on their writings and public comments. But look at the whole picture. The Tea Partiers wouldn’t go for Nixon. He’d be a Commie to them. He imposed wage and price controls, took us off the Gold Standard, instituted federal revenue sharing — straight out of the old VI Lenin playbook. - Yellow Dog Democrat - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 5:21 pm: @wordslinger John Wayne was a member of the John Birch Society, opposed the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and told Playboy in 1971: ““I believe in white supremacy until blacks are educated to a point of responsibility. I don’t believe in giving authority and positions of leadership and judgment to irresponsible people…. The academic community has developed certain tests that determine whether the blacks are sufficiently equipped scholastically…. I don’t feel guilty about the fact that five or ten generations ago these people were slaves. Now I’m not condoning slavery. It’s just a fact of life, like the kid who gets infantile paralysis and can’t play football like the rest of us.” I don’t think the comparison to JFK or LBJ is a level one, given they supported the civil rights movement. And I’m happy to place is comments in the historical context of 1971. The year my brother was born, not the era of Mark Twain, and they’re still racist. But, and this is the most salient point, Brady said he wants to return to John Wayne’s America. - wordslinger - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 5:41 pm: YDD, John Wayne’s America is actually the title of a book by Garry Wills on Wayne and his role in the American consciousness. It’s not the last word, in my opinion, but it’s a very good place to start. Peter Bogdanovich did extensive interviews with him on his career that were very revealing as to the contradictions within his politics and values. The politics, like I said, it’s complex. Wayne was of a time and place. He was a Taft man who, like the Birchers, thought Ike was a fellow traveler. He said some things in interviews, usually after many cocktails, that he shouldn’t have. But in the business, he he was as cool as anyone to folks of all races and creeds, and he offered to Pres. Carter to punch Gov. Reagan in the nose for the bad things he was saying about the Panama Canal treaties. Wayne’s last public appearance was when kicked the cancer to the side one last time to present the Best Picture Oscar to “Coming Home,” Jane Fonda’s anti-Vietnam film. Later, he said he’d known Jane since she was a baby and couldn’t be more proud of her. See, complex. Brady is calling for a stereotypical John Wayne’s America that never existed. He should call it Roy Rogers America, instead. - Yellow Dog Democrat - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 5:51 pm: And to make things even more clear for you, the reason that the John Birch Society and John Wayne opposed the Civil Rights Act was that they equated it with communism. Its no coincidence that Bill Brady appeared at a Tea Party Rally with a guy waving an American flag with John Wayne’s picture sprawled across it. “John Wayne’s America” is an America without “communists” like Barack Obama, or a Civil Rights Act. Pandering to people with those kinds of views is not wise for someone who wants to be governor of Illinois. - Dnstateanon - Tuesday, Apr 13, 10 @ 9:36 pm: Yellow Dog you sure have a big imagination, too bad none of that has anything to do with what Brady was talking about. Sorry, comments for this post are now closed.