Former President Bill Clinton’s ‘get out the vote’ rally for Democrats at a downtown Chicago hotel was the most unenthusiastic WLS veteran political reporter Bill Cameron has ever witnessed.
Clinton was an hour late for the Tuesday afternoon rally at the Palmer House and droned on for another hour, sending dozens of the few hundred Democrats in attendance for the exits.
The “few hundred” turnout number appears to be way off. I talked to a reporter who was there who said at least a thousand people showed up. The official number given by the Quinn campaign was 1,300, and the Sun-Times used that figure.
After taking the stage almost an hour behind scheudule, Bill Clinton fired up the crowd of more than 1,000 inside the historic Palmer House Hilton saying, “We are all here. Now the question is, what are we going to do?”
“Fired up” does not sound to me like “most unenthusiastic rally ever.” According to my reporter friend, Clinton did indeed “drone on” for a long time. WBEZ said the speech sounded “more like a college professor’s lecture than a rallying cry for Democrats.” A sample…
“You can win every race represented on this stage,” Clinton told 1,300 cheering Democrats at the Palmer House Hilton.
“You could also lose every single one of them. It depends on how bad you want this and whether you know what to say to the people who are not here.”
I’m told the crowd reaction was strong. Also, my friend said, only a few people actually walked out. That’s normal for an event which started an hour late because of the big storm.
The Brady campaign e-mailed WLS’ story probably hoping to gin something up. But I think WLS’ coverage may be a better angle. They pushed that totally goofy “Greek draft dodger” story every hour on the hour during their news programs yesterday.
It would be a real shame if the attitude of the station’s right-leaning infotainment jocks has now overtaken WLS’ news desk. That used to be a great station.
When the former president began his speech, the Palmer House ballroom was half filled with enthusiastic Democratic Party workers. By the time Clinton finished, the candidates he promoted had been standing behind him for nearly an hour and the room was at best a third filled.
* Some suburban [and, according to commenters, Downstate] residents received a curious looking direct mailer the other day. I apologize for the quality. It was scanned and e-mailed to me by a friend. Here’s the front…
Venture inside and you’ll see this…
Libertarian Mike Labno has the money for mail? And he’s using it to blast Mark Kirk?…
But it isn’t from Labno. Check out the return address…
And there’s a pro-Giannoulias message as well, which kinda defeats the whole purpose…
* The idea here, obviously, is to peel off a few conservative votes from Kirk and send them to Labno. But I just don’t see this working since it’s paid for by the Democrats and features a big pic of Giannoulias. Not many “true” conservatives will fall for that.
…Adding… A commenter rightly notes that the vast majority of people will only see the cover of this mailer. That’s why I wasn’t as harsh as I could’ve been about the piece. You get a few seconds between the time they see it and the time they pitch it in the garbage can. Also, from a trusted politico…
I seriously doubt they are sending only a single piece. That’s not how mail guys work. They send waves. So, you’re probably seeing the first of 2 or 3 which says Labano is pro life and pro gun and Kirk isn’t
* Roundup…
* Clinton exhorts Democrats to turn back Republican tide: “They have relentlessly, in a uniform and unified way” played on people’s anger, Clinton said. But he said that anger should be focused on Republicans. “We only get hired as Democrats, really, when things are messed up,” he said. He urged Democrats to ensure that President Barack Obama, who returns to Chicago this weekend for his own rally, gets the continued support of a Democratic Congress.
* A new Fox News poll left out one the candidates’ names (Libertarian Lex Green), which is just ridiculous. But “Some other candidate” took 1 percent, which is about in line with other recent polling.
The poll of 1,000 likely voters taken October 23rd has Bill Brady leading Gov. Pat Quinn 44-39. Independent Scott Lee Cohen has 6 percent and Green Party nominee Rich Whitney has 4 percent.
According to the poll, Quinn leads among women voters just a single point. He has just 64 percent of the “non-white” vote, while Brady has 12, Whitney has 6 and Cohen has 5. Quinn has just 74 percent support among Democrats, but Brady has 87 percent backing among Republicans. Independents break heavily 45-27 to Brady. All those numbers are pretty much right in line with other recent polling.
Among those who have already voted, 58 percent said they cast their ballot for Quinn, while 37 percent were with Brady. That could help put some of these early voting stories into context.
43 percent said the policies of the Obama administration have hurt Illinois’ economy, while just 31 percent said it helped and 23 percent said it made no difference. Just 44 percent said Obama’s policies will help the country in the long run, while 47 percent said they’ll hurt. 45 percent strongly or somewhat support the tea party, while 43 percent oppose it. 11 percent were neutral. 49 percent of women opposed it, while 37 percent supported it.
When is a tea party-sponsored event for Republican governor nominee Bill Brady not a tea party-sponsored event? When Brady is the one promoting it, apparently.
Brady’s campaign today sent out an e-mail promoting the “final stop on Brady’s suburban ‘Clean Break Express’ tour” on Wednesday in southwest suburban Homer Glen. Appearing with Brady will be Govs. Haley Barbour of Mississippi, Bobby Jindal of Louisiana and Bob McDonnell of Virginia.
But in promoting the event, dubbed “Crunch Time 2010,” Brady’s campaign made no mention of the fact that the Will County Tea Party Alliance is hosting the event. The tea party group and a variety of conservative groups are promoting attendance by saying, “Tea Partiers, Independents, Republicans, Conservatives, and Libertarians will gather together in Homer Glen to prepare for the final drive to victory.”
A top White House official blamed “extraneous factors” for Democrats’ troubles this fall in President Obama’s home state.
White House senior adviser David Axelrod blamed the political fallout from former Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s (D) time in office for some of the difficulties now facing Alexi Giannoulias (D) in his race for the president’s old Senate seat and Gov. Pat Quinn’s (D) bid for reelection.
“There were some extraneous factors in Illinois this year,” Axelrod said on MSNBC, “including a lot of contretemps about how the president was replaced.”
* The Fox News pollster only included two names in its US Senate poll, so I’m not reporting the results here. Go see it for yourself.
As of Monday 52,900 city residents had cast ballots, according to the Board of Elections. That’s less than one-third of the early vote in the extraordinary Barack Obama year of 2008, but more than twice the 2006 total of 24,800. The early polls remain open until Thursday evening.
Some folks who watch these numbers say they indicate that overall city turnout now is headed well above 50% — absolutely critical if the Ds are to give GOP gubernatorial nominee Bill Brady and U.S. Senate hopeful Mark Kirk a competitive race.
Early turnout in the city now is approaching the 55,000 total in suburban Cook County, the latter number from County Clerk David Orr. But while the city already has more than doubled its final 2006 number, the county still is a bit shy of that mark; 33,000 voted early then. […]
Meanwhile, the Lake County Clerk’s Office reports 24,885 early voters as of Tuesday morning, somewhat above the 18,437 who voted early in 2006, and under a third of the final 2008 figure of 83,000.
Totals are softer in DuPage County. According to the clerk’s office 21,400 have voted as of Tuesday morning. That about matches the final 2006 number of 21,232 and is under a quarter of the final 2008 number of 96,000.
In addition to early voting, remember that people can vote absentee without an excuse this year.
A Republican operative with access to number crunching came up with a wider view of what’s occurring — and a different spin.
According to that source, while 55,000 Chicagoans so far have voted early and roughly 36,000 in sububan Cook, 82,000 have done so in the fiive suburban collar counties and 67,000 Downstate.
The turnout this year may double that of 2006, a release from [Cook County Clerk David Orr’s] office said. “We anticipate at least doubling the 33,000 early voting ballots cast in the 2006 gubernatorial election,” Orr said. “Twenty of our 43 locations have served 1,000 voters or more and the busiest days may still be ahead.”
The Orland Park Village Hall, (3,981), Wheeling Township Hall (3,681), Northbrook Village Hall (3,034) and Centennial Park in Wilmette (2,458) are the busiest sites after two weeks, the release said.
Many election experts expected up to 10 percent of voters to vote early. But with only a few days left before early voting closes, many of the state’s larger counties have fallen short of that number.
In Sangamon County, Stacey Kern, director of the election office, said she has seen less than 3 percent of registered voters show up for early voting. […]
Georgia Volm, County Clerk of Adams County, said she has seen less than 5 percent of registered voters show up to vote early.
Farther north in Rock Island County, Dianna Ruhl, Acting County Clerk, said she has seen a little less than 7 percent turnout for early voting.
Pamela McCullough, County Clerk for Boone County, said this fall has had heavy turnout for both early voting and absentee voting in the county. She said her office has seen 391 early voters since Oct. 18 out of 33,679 registered voters.< /blockquote>
A federal judge will hear testimony Tuesday on a Republican bid to widen the scope of an agreement giving six Illinois counties more time to count military and overseas ballots.
Under terms of a pact inked Friday between the state and the U.S. Department of Justice, three counties -Boone, Jersey and St. Clair -have until Nov. 18 to count ballots that are returned from overseas voters. Schuyler, Massac and Hancock counties have until Nov. 19.
All other counties and election authorities - even those that were late in sending out some of the military ballots - will have to count returned ballots by Nov. 16. In all, nearly a third of Illinois election authorities missed a Sept. 18 deadline to send out the military ballots.
* Unions labor to rally rank and file for elections - Democrats are counting on an intense get-out-the-vote effort to help their chances in key states.
There were 278 home sales in the Springfield area during September, a 24.3 percent decrease from the 367 homes sold in Sept. 2009, according to the Capital Area Association of Realtors.
The drop-off year-to-date isn’t as precipitous, with 2,664 homes sold through Sept. in 2010 and 2,773 home sales over the same period last year. That’s a 3.9 percent decrease.
The Chicago Tribune’s Sunday circulation dropped 4.4% to 768,073 papers, while weekday circulation slipped 5.2% to 441,508.
Rival Sun-Times’ Sunday circulation declined 5.5% to 237,367 papers. Weekday circulation fell 9% to 250,747.
The 47-year-old Beal was placed on paid leave from his $160,000-per-year job on Oct. 18 after an independent audit found a discrepancy that showed a “significant amount” of money unaccounted for in the agency’s financial records, according to SWANCC officials.
While officials won’t confirm how much money is unaccounted for, sources have said it could be as much as $400,000.
The new Chicago to Quad-Cities to Iowa City route would provide two daily round-trips. The project is expected to create 588 jobs per year for the four years of design and construction. The completed line is expected to increase business activity by $25 million per year, according to a release from Sen. Durbin’s office.
* Selection process opens for FutureGen carbon project
Communities have until next Monday to declare their intentions and until Nov. 15 to submit formal bids. An informational meeting for potential bidders, followed by a public open house, has been scheduled for Thursday in Springfield.
This new approach has been used for up to 15 years in dozens of cities, including Boston, Cincinnati and Indianapolis. For now, Chicago is using its Violence Reduction Strategy only in the Harrison District on the West Side.
The concepts are the same in each city, said David Kennedy, the criminologist who designed the idea.
Gangs are responsible for most shootings and homicides, violence that is promoted and expected within the gang, Kennedy said. Yet much of the violence is not committed to protect the gang’s business — it’s often personal disputes and vendettas, he said. And if the entire gang has to endure an investigation every time there is a shooting, behavior changes, he said.
* Judge rules Chicago principal should be reinstated
Other neighborhoods where rat sightings were prominent include the South Loop, Lakeview/Wrigleyville, Lincoln Park and West Loop. At the bottom of the list of 21 Chicago neighborhoods in the survey were North Center and Lincoln Square.
WQAD-TV Thursday night reported on its website that state officers are investigating allegations against Mr. Terronez, including one that he purchased alcohol for minors. The information was attributed to a “source close to the investigation.”
Additionally, Mr. Terronez was edited out of a television commercial supporting Illinois Supreme Court Justice Tom Kilbride, who is up for retention this year. According to a spokesman for Justice Kilbride,the decision was made because of the reports of a state police investigation of the prosecutor.
* My intern Barton Lorimor asked me late last night if I’d heard about the cyclone heading for Chicago. I hadn’t, but I looked it up on the Interwebtubes and discovered the media was reporting that ALL CHICAGOANS ARE GOING TO DIE!!! OK, let’s hope nobody gets hurt. Seriously. I don’t want anything bad to happen to anyone.
Anyway, here is a very small portion of our subsequent online instant messaging. Much of it, as you might imagine, was unprintable…
BARTON: I’m sure Mark Kirk has some combat experience that could save us all
RICH: Pat Quinn will give the storm a capital project to settle it down
BARTON: Only if Vaught goes with
RICH: Brady will cut the storm’s strength by ten percent
RICH: But he’ll actually have to cut it by 40 percent, so he’ll raise taxes instead
BARTON: Bobby Schilling says it doesn’t believe in the Constitution
RICH: Steve Brown, of course, will say that the storm is “under review”
BARTON: Ramey says this wouldn’t have happened if we had just dealt with the state’s immigration policy
RICH: Rich Whitney will protest that the storm didn’t invite him
BARTON: Bill Black can’t understand why we’re talking about this and not the budget
RICH: And then resign. AGAIN
BARTON: Will Burns just introduced the cyclone hair braiding permit bill
RICH: My interns will videotape it and die
BARTON: Meh, send Dan
Your turn.
And keep it clean, campers. I don’t have time to police your every word today. Plus, I was up late joking with Barton last night. I’m tired.
Plummer found himself immediately on the defensive as he struggled to answer why he refused to release his income tax returns when quizzed by moderator Phil Ponce on WTTW-TV’s “Chicago Tonight.”
“It’s not a leadership issue,” said Plummer, who is the running mate of Bill Brady, the Republican candidate for governor. “It’s just, I think, a privacy issue.”
Plummer tried to dismiss the question, saying he won’t let Simon or her running mate, Gov. Pat Quinn, distract voters with “these silly issues.”
“That’s not an issue that’s ever come up with the voters,” Plummer said.
The two differed starkly over a host of issues, including rights to carry hidden weapons. Plummer said it should be allowed as long as a gun owner meets key requirements. Simon said flatly that it shouldn’t be permitted.
Creation was another point of dissension. Plummer said he believed in a Biblical version of creation, although he said local districts should decide whether it was appropriate to teach that in schools.
But he paused and declined to answer directly about whether he thought the earth was created in six days and is a mere 10,000 years old
“My faith is my faith,” he said. “But that that’s not an issue voters are talking about.”
* And Green Party nominee Rich Whitney protested outside WTTW with some high school kids…
* There just isn’t any good news for Gov. Pat Quinn in the Tribune’s new poll. For instance…
Among independent voters, Brady’s backing improved 10 percentage points in the new survey while Quinn’s support remained about the same.
Brady’s now leading 47-28 among independents. If this poll is correct then they’re breaking hard his way.
* More bad news for Quinn…
Indeed, Brady now has the support of 85 percent of voters who call themselves Republican, up from 79 percent four weeks ago. Quinn’s support among self-identified Democrats has increased from 71 percent to 75 percent during the same time period. […]
Slightly more than half of black voters viewed Quinn favorably, just two-thirds supported him and more than a quarter are undecided or backing a third-party candidate. Among women statewide, Quinn has a narrow 43 percent to 38 percent advantage over Brady. Among white suburban women, the two men are statistically even at about 40 percent support.
Tied among white suburban women. Nice job, governor. Better roll out that puppy ad.
* And this is just bizarre when you think about how much money has been spent attempting to define Brady…
The poll indicates a sizable chunk of voters — nearly one in three — still have no opinion of Brady despite a year of campaigning for the state’s highest office. That Brady now has a slight lead in the poll indicates a willingness among many voters to seek change during a time of economic uncertainty and go with an unfamiliar candidate rather than a better-known commodity like Quinn.
Scott Lee Cohen was at 5 percent, Rich Whitney was at 4 and Lex Green was at 2. Another 6 percent are undecided.
* The poll also found that Bill Brady has increased his support in the collar counties by 11 points, while Gov. Quinn fell by 8. The tally there now is 50-38. But the last Tribune poll had the two tied in the collars, which nobody really believed. The new number seems much closer to reality and indicates that the paper’s previous poll (which had Quinn leading Brady 39-38) could’ve been an outlier.
The only possibly good news for Quinn is that since the poll was taken Monday through Friday, much of these results are a week or almost a week old. It’s possible that he’s moved up since then. Then again, he could’ve also moved down.
* Meanwhile, most of the down-ballot statewide races are blowouts, which is no surprise. The only close contest is for treasurer…
Republican state Sen. Dan Rutherford held a 42 percent to 38 percent edge over Democrat Robin Kelly, a former south suburban lawmaker and current chief of staff to Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias. The poll’s error margin is plus or minus 3.7 percentage points.
Rutherford, who lost a run for secretary of state four years ago, held a 3-to-1 cash advantage. He launched broadcast TV ads in the Chicago area in mid-October.
Kelly did best among Chicago voters, with 61 percent to Rutherford’s 11 percent. Rutherford led Kelly in the collar counties, 53 percent to 31 percent, and downstate, 51 percent to 29 percent. Both candidates had 41 percent support in suburban Cook County.
Independent voters broke toward Rutherford, who had 46 percent to Kelly’s 25 percent.
Judy Baar Topinka is creaming David Miller 57-26. Lisa Madigan is crushing her opponent 69-21. And Jesse White is absolutely trouncing his Republican opponent 72-18.
