* It’s intensely amusing to me to watch this debate play out over John McCain’s TV ad that claims Barack Obama was born of the Chicago Machine…

ANNCR: Barack Obama. Born of the corrupt Chicago political machine.

BARACK OBAMA: In terms of my toughness, look, first of all, I come from Chicago.

ANNCR: His economic adviser, William Daley. Lobbyist. Mayor’s brother.

His money man, Tony Rezko. Client. Patron. Convicted Felon.

His “political godfather.” Emil Jones. Under ethical cloud.

His governor, Rod Blagojevich. A legacy of federal and state investigations.

With friends like that, Obama is not ready to lead.

* This argument goes way back in Illinois. Does endorsement by and work with Machine leaders mean a candidate can’t be taken seriously as a reformer? As “Objective Dem” noted in comments yesterday…

This issue reminds me of when then Lt. Gov. Paul Simon obtained Mayor Daley’s endorsement for Governor. People thought it was awful and he must not be a true reformer. So they voted for Dan Walker, the true “reformer”

I figure if Paul Simon can work with Richard J. Daley in 1972, it doesn’t bother me that Barack is working with Richard M. Daley now.

* Crank up the Way-Back Machine…

In the 1972 primary, to their surprise and regret, meddling Republicans provided the margin by which Walker scored his big victory over Mayor Richard J. Daley. The United States Supreme Court had legalized crossover voting and countless Republicans, wanting to reduce the margin by which they were certain that Paul Simon, Daley’s candidate, would be nominated, went into the Democratic primary.

* From a review of Simon’s autobiography…

Always ambitious, the young Simon twice sought party endorsement for the U. S. Senate but settled instead, in 1968, for slating as Lieutenant Governor and won his race though Republican Richard Ogilvie took the governorship. From that often inert post Simon energetically functioned as an ombudsman and helped defuse racial tensions in downstate Cairo. Derailed by a narrow loss in the 1972 primary for governor when the resolutely independent Simon could not fend off criticism for accepting Mayor Richard J. Daley’s blessing that year, he rebounded to win election to the U. S. House of Representatives from southern Illinois in 1974. A decade later, Simon beat his party’s endorsed candidate in the Senate primary and then upset three-term Republican incumbent Charles Percy, a national figure, in the Reagan landslide.

* More…

Explaining Simon’s success as a reformer in a machine-politics state and as an unabashed liberal in a mostly conservative era draws attention to his principled defense of controversial stands, his “can-do” pragmatism, his moral earnestness leavened with gentle humor, and his generosity to opponents. Simon is, in a phrase he often uses to describe others, “a class act,” able to rally such bitter foes as Chicago Alderman Edward Vrdolyak and Mayor Harold Washington when he needed both to unseat Charles Percy in 1984. Although he has kind words here for many, including Senator Jesse Helms, columnist Robert Novak, and the first (though not the second) Mayor Daley, Simon can be quite critical and is willing to name names, as he famously did in a 1964 Harper’s article, “The Illinois Legislature: A Study in Corruption.” Simon regrets allowing himself to believe that Illinois Secretary of State Paul Powell had left his bribe-taking days behind, observes that Richard J. Daley only dealt with those who had something to offer him, records U. S. Rep. William Lipinski’s double-cross after endorsing Simon in the 1984 primary, deplores Democratic Senate leader Tom Daschle’s position– changing deference to Robert Byrd over the Balanced Budget Amendment, and laments that Judiciary Committee chair Orrin Hatch is dominated by his staff.

* There are more recent examples, of course. Judy Baar Topinka was one of the most honest, decent politicians I’ve ever met, yet she was made to look like a horrid George Ryan clone in the 2006 governor’s race. Guilt by association.

* Obama did not start out as a Machine guy. He ran for US Senate against Dan Hynes, the organization’s guy, and Blair Hull, the governor’s guy.

The real question is whether Obama has sold his soul over being endorsed by the organization, and endorsing some Machine candidates. To many people, as with Paul Simon in 1972 and JBT in 2006, that’s a deal-breaker. But it completely ignores Illinois political realities. Everybody has to swim in the same tank with the sharks here. The object is to avoid being eaten alive while maintaining their own principles. That ain’t easy. Simon did it. Topinka, I believe, did it. Both paid a heavy price, however.

Whether Obama maintained his principles should be the subject of the debate, not this extraneous stuff like who endorsed whom. It tells us nothing. Is there any doubt whatsoever that Paul Simon would’ve been a much better governor than Dan Walker?