I Did Try To Warn You

When a handful of Republican media hatchet men, ad makers and pundits showed up at the door of the Democratic party, shocked and shivering, having been run out of the fascist party they helped to create, I thought, "Fine.  Great.  First step, apologize.  You were wrong.  Catastrophically.  We were right.  Be fucking grownups and own up to it.  Then grab a beer and step to the back of the line.  There's plenty of thankless, dirty work that needs doing."

Then I took a short nap, and when I woke up, they weren't at the back of the line.  

They were at the front of the line.

And the line was now closed.  

But the most darkly hilariously part of this entire farce was this: Now that Never Trumpers had become the issuers of indulgences and bouncers at the doors of media acceptability, they started demanding apologies and atonements from any new Republicans who showed up at the door looking for some of that sweet, sweet legacy media spotlight.

They had knocked together a couple of websites where they sounded exactly -- and I mean exactly -- like the Liberal bloggers of yesteryear.  

 The same Liberal bloggers they used to mock as alarmist crackpots.  

But unlike us Liberal bloggers, who were almost universally ignored and shit upon by the legacy media, every one of these recently-former Republicans were suddenly in heavy and glowing media rotation everywhere.  MSNBC was gifting them tens of millions of dollars in free publicity every year.  They were being offered their pick of op-ed gigs at leading publications.  Book deals followed.  A pop-up advertising shop that soaked credulous Liberals for tens of millions of actual dollars and delivered absolutely nothing but scandal after scandal.   And on and on.

And all of these treasures and privileges laid at their feet for literally doing nothing more than, almost overnight, transforming themselves into Brand New Media Creatures, who had no pasts and who spoke and wrote exactly like Liberal bloggers circa 2006.  

Except amid all the posts and podcasts and the blizzard of free promotion from the legacy media, there was never a hint that actual Liberals even existed, much less had been right all along.  Instead, these recently-former Republicans continued using Liberal straw men exactly as they had always done back when Team Evil was paying them: as punching bags and sourced of mockery.  

No apologies were forthcoming for being the co-authors of the ruin which their former party was inflicting in the country.   No acknowledgment that history prior to 2016 existed at all.  Instead, there was a great dealing of moaning and bitching about how they had been right all along, and how awful it was that no one had believed them. 

And while all of this was going on -- while credulous Liberals were enraptured to hear former Republicans calling Donald Trump a naughty bad man -- a few lonely, Liberal voices in the wilderness  were annoying everyone with warnings likes these.  [Note:  Since I left Twitter and deleted my account, none of my original Tweets still exist in their original form.  However, a number of them, such as this one, have been preserved in plain text form since I embedded them in my blog.]

Donald Trump exists to normalize Bill Kristol. After Trump, cable news "debates" will be between Charlie Sykes/Rick Wilson/National Review on one side, Eric Bolling/Hugh Hewitt/Breitbart on the other, "moderated" by Joe Scarborough. Liberals will vanish altogether.

— Driftglass, Guardian of Inconvenient History (@Mr_Electrico) November 15, 2018

Now that the Never Trumper colonization of the media is complete, and actual Liberals have all but vanished, here are a list of major themes that run through the "Liberal" media.

• The major event of George W. Bush's administration was PEPFAR.   There were also a buncha other minors items that aren't even worth mentioning.

• George W. Bush's name is now "myformerbosswhateveryouthinkofhim"

• The major event of Joe Biden's administration was the withdrawal from Afghanistan, which was a terrible idea and ruined America's reputation forever.   There were also a buncha other minors items that aren't even worth mentioning.  Biden is old and he is pretty much entirely responsible for destroying Murrica.  

• Joe Biden's name is now "I know we promised we'd stop hating on Joe Biden but I just hate him so much." or "Joe Biden needs to stop trying to defend his legacy because I hate him so much."

• We'd like to welcome former rabid, hard Right Evangelical gay-bashing, Liberal hater, David French, to the op-ed page of The New York Times.  

• We'd like to welcome former RNC Chair, Michael Steele to our Very Large Never Trump media company.

• We bid a fond farewell to former RNC Chair, Michael Steele, who will be leaving our Very Large Never Trump media company for his own show on MSNBC.

• Our guest once again is once and future political superstar Adam Kinzinger.

• Our guest once again is the American hero who very nearly single-handedly saved the disastrous Harris campaign, Liz Cheney.

[Side note:  Ever wonder how these pinheads got it stuck in their brains that Democrats are evil, baby-murdering monsters?

Oh yeah.  Now I remember.  It was slander like this, repeated over and over, for decades:

Once again, no apologies.  No retractions.  Not even any acknowledgement that Liz Cheney's bloody fingerprints are all over the Republican doomsday machine that eventually spit her out of the party.  

Because apparently that's just too damn much to ask.  

Instead those who were the targets and victims of Cheney's slanders were told to sit down shut up and get over it.  

And for the record, this is the same Liz Cheney who, as a leader of the Republican party, voted against women being able to leave a state to seek reproductive health access elsewhere, voted against a bill that would require reporting white supremacists in the U.S. military, begged Democrats to vote for her in Wyoming and then swore that she would never vote for a Democrat.

End of side note.]

• Next up, highlights from our 565th consecutive focus group of Trump voters who think Democrats are baby-murdering Communists and that Donald Trump built the pyramids...and what Democrats must do to reach out to them!

• If Democrats ever want to win another election they have got to be more Centrist!

In 2007, if you wanted the base to take you seriously, you went to Chicago and walked a gauntlet of raucous, passionate, well-informed bloggers who had serious questions and expected thoughtful answers.  I know.  I was there.  

From The New York Times, August 5, 2007:

Democratic Candidates Spar at ‘Netroots’ Forum

All but one of the party’s candidates took a detour from their summertime routines of Iowa fairs and New Hampshire festivals to appear before the bloggers, a constituency that is rivaling the significance of party activists in early-voting states. The contenders answered questions on stage and adjourned for smaller sessions with the political enthusiasts whose online journals are influencing the race in new, broad ways...

The candidate forum served as the finale to a three-day assembly of the so-called netroots -- Internet meets grassroots -- that carried the feel of a mini-national political convention. Bloggers submitted questions, read by moderators, that included three categories: foreign policy, domestic affairs and philosophy and experience...

“What you have here is a bunch of micro-media outlets that connect to thousands upon thousands of people -- influential people,” said Baratunde Thurston, who writes a political blog in Boston. “The candidates would be foolish to miss out on an opportunity like this.”...

But now, "blogger"? What is "blogger"? 

If a Centrist goon with presidential aspirations like Rahm wants his rep shined up from a trusted source that'll increase his base appeal, he reports to The Bulwark for a flattering round of Wiffle ball.   

This is the state of things today, and I have no reason to believe it will change any time soon.  

However,  I also believe that at least one, lone crackpot alarmist dirty hippy blogger should put it on the record that, if credulous Liberals hadn't been so god damn willing to immediately hand over our hard-won moral authority to a handful of former Republicans who still really, really despise us, Rahm's road to the White House would not involve getting a foot massage from The Bulwark.  Instead, it would require him to field serious questions from the likes of Digby Parton,  Rick Perlstein, Josh Marshall, Brad Friedman, Bob Cesca, Nicole Sandler, Charlie Pierce, Marci Wheeler, Tengrain, Frangela, No More Mr. Nice Blog, Allison Hantschel,  Dan Froomkin, The Field Negro, Bleeding Heartland, Jay Rosen,  Progress Michigan, Hal Sparks, Blue Virginia,  Cliff Schecter, John Amato and the Crooks and Liars crew, my lovely wife, and on and on and on.

We still have an incredibly deep bench of smart, articulate, well-read Liberals, and don't try to tell me that The Rude Pundit putting the screws to Rahm Emanuel wouldn't be Must See Teevee.

Which is not to say that Never Trumpers would not have a place in my Better Universe.  Of course they would.  It'd be crazy to turn away able-bodies volunteers because, in any large organization, there's plenty of scutwork that needs doing and our Big Tent sometimes needs patching and vacuuming.  

For example, I think some of those Never Trumpers would make pretty good sidekicks to the featured Liberal talkers.   In fact, not so very long ago, before the Never Trumpers became a subsidiary of MSNBC and colonized the media, Tim Miller was the "cuck" sidekick of the Pod Save lads.

These days, the Pod Save lads are going out of their way to help repair Glenn Greenwald's image, rehabilitate Chuck Todd's reputation and give Jake Tapper an open mike to pimp his Biden bashing book, and The Bulwark is giving Rahm Fucking Emanuel a glow up.

Funny old world.

I Am The Liberal Media

The Eleventh Lesson of Rahmses

Longtime readers may recall the The Ten Lessons of Rahmses: your handy index to the complete award-consideration-ready series on the 10 Vital Lessons of Chicago politics as they have existed since the dawn of time.

Lesson One: Elections

Lesson Two: Being Da Boss

Lesson Three: Voters

Lesson Four: Budgets (and how to balance them)

Lesson Five: Fighting Legends

Lesson Six: Enemies

Lesson Seven: Job Stress

Lesson Eight: Employee Morale

Lesson Nine: The Banality of Municipal Gummint

Lesson Ten: Public Service in Chicago

And today, as we mark Rahmses' ignominious exit from the Fifth Floor and the honorable Lori Lightfoot takes the Big Chair --

In Historic First, Lori Lightfoot Inaugurated As Chicago's Mayor

Lori Lightfoot, who won a landslide victory in Chicago's runoff election, was sworn in as mayor on Monday.

Lori Lightfoot officially became Chicago's first black female and openly gay mayor on Monday. She immediately laid out a four-point plan for safety, education, stability and integrity during her 40-minute inauguration speech...

-- we put all that we have learned about the media and privilege and clout accountability into the mighty Blender of Impunity and pour out an Eleventh Lesson, which longtime readers will recognize as the most important lesson of all.

From the Chicago Sun-Times:

Rahm Emanuel becomes contributing editor for The Atlantic

Rahm Emanuel kicked off his post-mayoral career Tuesday by announcing that he is now a contributing editor for The Atlantic.

The former Chicago mayor will contribute frequent essays to The Atlantic’s Ideas section, according to a statement from the publication. The announcement comes one day after Lori Lightfoot was sworn in as Chicago’s next mayor...

And after a political lifetime spent catering to the privileged, what was Rahmses' very first article under his brand new title of contributing editor for The Atlantic? (emphasis added)

Since late October 2018, Emanuel has written 12 articles — 13 overall since June 2017 — for The Atlantic. His most recent, “It’s Time to Hold American Elites Accountable for Their Abuses,” was published Tuesday.

And what does this teach us, kids?  (sing it with me now.)

That there is a Club.

And we are not in it.

Behold, a Tip Jar!

Still No Honor Among Thieves

(Mayor Rahm and Governor Kylo Rauner pictured here in happier 

days, just before The Bad Thing Happened)

Longtime readers might remember that before I moved to Central Illinois, I lived in Chicago for +25 years.  While I lived there, I came to know the culture and folkways and deep political weirdness of its charming and exotic people very well and wrote about it often.  So as I watched Mayor Rahm cozy up with his old pal, hedge-fund billionaire and ambulatory Koch Brothers playbook, Bruce Rauner, it was clear to me that Mayor Rahm thought that the rules of political gravity in Illinois somehow still functioned as they did during the high cotton days of Mare Daley -- back when Da Mare operated as a virtual king with a reach that extended all the way to Springfield and who dispensed many different denominations of favors and collected many forms of tributes and loyalties. 

The political currency this system generated was called "clout" -- it was highly fungible and had many uses, not the least of which was a hedge against some unfortunate day when mud was gettin' splashed around, because with enough clout inna bank ain't none'a dat mud gonna splash on da Man on Five at Ciddy Hall.

So having scorched and spent his way to the pinnacle of power in Illinois, when Rahm's fortunes suddenly reversed themselves, it seems clear to me that he expected the rules of the game to remain as they were under Richard the 1st and Richard the 2nd.  One hunkers down, closes ranks and puts up the Clout Signal and eventually some escape plan will emerge from the collective cunning of all the people who are beholden to Hizzoner.

But Mayor Rahm has no ranks to close, no Unsullied army and, as such, no clout.   This goes back to the fact that, as friend-of-this-humble-blog, Rick Perlstein, documented to a fare-thee-well in the New Yorker ("The Sudden But Well-Deserved Fall of Rahm Emanuel") Rahm built his very successful career on 1) glomming on to rich people and hitting them up for money, and 2) bullying and berating everyone else into moving ever further rightward:

But return to Washington in the early nineteen-nineties, when a grateful Clinton awarded his young charge a prominent White House role. There, Emanuel’s prodigious energy, along with his contempt for what he called “liberal theology,” rocketed him higher and higher into the Clinton stratosphere. “He gets things done,” Clinton’s chief of staff, Erskine Bowles, enthused late in 1996, when Emanuel usurped George Stephanopoulos as senior adviser for policy and strategy. Among his special projects was helping to pass the North American Free Trade Agreement and the 1994 crime bill. He also tried to push Clinton to the right on immigration, advising the President, in a memo in November, 1996, to work to “claim and achieve record deportations of criminal aliens.” These all, in the fullness of time, turned out to be mistakes.

As far as my own unscientific assay of his administration goes, the peons below him -- the tens of thousands of working stiffs who make the gears of government go round and round -- would be just as happy to see him sail past their window on his way down to a abrupt and splatty interlude with LaSalle Street.

And as for the Men of Power like Governor Hedgefund whose favor Rahm so assiduously courted?

From the Chicago Sun-Times:

Brown: Rauner endorses recall bill; 'very disappointed' in Rahm

Fresh from a Saharan Desert holiday where he says he and his family rode camels and slept in tents, Gov. Bruce Rauner did nothing Monday to quell the shifting sands beneath Mayor Rahm Emanuel.

Rauner told reporters he would sign a bill allowing Chicago voters to recall their mayor from office if it reaches his desk.

The governor also said he was “very disappointed” in Emanuel and Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez over their handling of Chicago police misconduct cases.

Perhaps more important, Rauner reiterated that he will stand firm against providing increased financial assistance to Chicago Public Schools until Emanuel and Chicago Democrats help him achieve his legislative goals, even as he predicted that financial “disaster” at CPS is now only months away.

...

Ruh Roh.

You may already be familiar with the two unbreakable rules of Chicago politics which were famously codified by Ward Committeeman Bernard Neistein back when dinosaurs walked the Earth:

"Don't Make No Waves and Don't Back No Losers".

Well right at the moment, Mayor Rahm's thrashing is making a lot of waves and he sure as hell looks like a loser.

The Clout Club Never Dies

Anyone surprised by this needs to hike up their Underoos and get back to playing with Tinkertoys:

Report: Rahm Emanuel aides coordinated with 'Chicagoland'

By HADAS GOLD | 4/25/14 10:49 AM EDT

Aides to Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel coordinated scenes with the producers of the CNN series "Chicagoland," emails obtained by the Chicago Tribune show.

More than 700 emails show that the production team, led by executive producer Marc Levin, worked with the mayor's team to develop storylines, arrange specific scenes and review news releases for what was billed as an unscripted documentary series.

In one email asking for more access to Emanuel, Levin wrote they were seeking more time with the mayor not to show his weaknesses "but instead to show the best of who he is and what he is doing."

"I know we still have time to round out the Mayor's story and present him as the star he really is," Levin wrote.

...

By request, I watched the first 1.2 episodes of this series. I even made a buncha notes just in case I was ever inspired to write about it.

I never was.

In Chicago politics, the Press is the Enemy, and to rule Chicago a mayor must know how to subdue an Enemy.  I refer you to Lesson Six of the Ten Lessons of Rahmses:

Enemies:

Keep your friends close, your enemies closer, and the fuckin' consultants jammed face-first right in your crotch every fuckin' minute or they'll bleed you dry.

Also stab anyone who looks at you funny in the fuckin' neck with a fuckin' pencil.

Except for fuckin' Mike Madigan; that bastid's got a neck stabbin' pencil of his own that reaches all the way to Chicago.

Gotta respect that.

Also Lesson Two:

Being Da Boss:

Obey? Moses, Moses, are you fuckin' kidding me?

Bring me a fuckin' pencil so I can fuckin' stab you in the fuckin' neck.

Then say "Thank you, Boss!"

Even though I am a "Chicago writer" of some minor stature, and even though I have written extensively about the grubby, on-the-ground operating realities of Chicago and Illinois politics as they look from inside the Clout Fortress, I was never moved to write anything about "Chicagoland" because from camera placement, to the way each scene was edited, to the way the stories of the main characters were slanted it was painfully obvious to me that it was crafted to be mayoral campaign fodder every bit as much as this much shorter video about a Chicago mayor dealing with schools and gangs and crime:

Unless You Got A Visit From This Guy

During which he casually ticked off every member of your extended family by name, what you had for breakfast and where you stash your mistress, then you probably weren't "threatened" by this White House.

From Matt Ygleias at Slate:

Bob Woodward Trolls The World

By Matthew Yglesias | Posted Thursday, Feb. 28, 2013, at 8:04 AM

Bob Woodward, the legendary Watergate reporter turned reliable chronicler of insider accounts of political events, has made a series of bizarre assertions over the past week.

It started with Woodward's odd weekend assertion that the White House is trying "to move the goalposts" by replacing sequestration with a deficit reduction package that includes tax hikes. The idea of sequestration was always that it was something elected officials were going to want to replace with alternative deficit reduction. Republicans have been trying tio replace it with a package of cuts targeted at income support programs for the poor. Obama's been trying to replace it with a mixture of spending cuts and tax hikes. Either everyone's moving the goalposts (which I think is tendentious but even-handed) or no one is moving them. But it really intensified Wednesday morning when Woodward went on Morning Joe to suggest it's crazy of Obama to be applying the law as written to the military, instead of simply ignoring it.

Things moved into the absurd last night when it was revealed that National Economic Council director Gene Sperling had concluded an email disagreement with Woodward with the observation that in Sperling's view Woodward would come to regret clinging so tenaciously to an untenable position.

...

Still, Woodward's accidental reporting on his own, addled state of mind has served at least one valuable, public service: the completely predictable reaction from the "Emperor Messiah Obummer iz a Chicago thug!!!!" wingnutosphere has reminded anyone who is still listening that, yep, these people are either crazy or trying to selling something to the crazies.

From Steve Benen at The Maddow Blog:

... 

Woodward told the world yesterday that this was the threatening email he received. He took a few words out of context in order to look like a victim of heavy-handed White House pressure, but now that the email itself is available, it's clear there was nothing threatening about Sperling's message and Woodward's efforts to suggest otherwise were deliberately deceptive. Indeed, in case facts still matter, what Sperling argued happened to be true -- Woodward had several key facts wrong. It's no doubt why Sperling wrote, "I know you may not believe this, but as a friend, I think you will regret staking out that claim." 

That's not a threat. That's a White House professional gently trying to encourage a journalist not to publish a mistake. 

Indeed, Woodward himself, after receiving the email he now says included the threat, responded to Sperling:

"You do not ever have to apologize to me. You get wound up because you are making your points and you believe them. This is all part of a serious discussion. I for one welcome a little heat; there should more given the importance. I also welcome your personal advice. I am listening. I know you lived all this. My partial advantage is that I talked extensively with all involved. I am traveling and will try to reach you after 3 pm today. Best, Bob"

Funny, Woodward didn't mention any of this when claiming he'd been threatened.

This would be an ideal time for Woodward to start walking back some of his increasingly bizarre claims, but instead, he's agreed to appear on television tonight -- with Fox News' Sean Hannity. 

No, seriously.

...

Wireless Perversity in Chicago, Ctd.

And the beat

goes on.

I awoke this morning to what seemed at first blush to be startling and uplifting news: after 13 years (no kidding)  of dicking around, the City of Chicago had actually, finally gotten around to providing free, high-speed municipal internet access to its citizens. 

So huzzah sez I!  As  every longtime reader knows, I am a huge supporter of the idea of free/low-cost muni wireless.  It's one of those great good things for which I fought many, futile battles in my civilian life, always losing to some clique of Clout Club insiders who were only too happy to advance themselves by wildly overpromising what could be deliver when in the public eye, and who then quietly chloroformed those same promises once the cameras were turned off.

(My favorite was probably the now-former/then-brand-new director of the City of Chicago's information technology department who got his job at least partially on the basis of promising flat-out, absolutely, no-question-about-it that the entire city would networked with free internet access within one year and who -- once he got the job -- took another look at exactly the same proposition and decided it was impossible.

The reason this example is my favorite?  Because it is (or was) all on the public record! [Clipped from my long essay on the subject, originally posted in 2009]:

March, 2006. (emphasis added)   [Ed Note: The "Midwest Business" publication from which this quote was taken in 2009 has ceased to exist]

"After serving the post of Chicago CIO for six years, Chris O’Brien felt it was his time to move on. Hardik Bhatt, who officially succeeded O’Brien on March 13, said in an interview with ePrairie that he sees a fully Wi-Fied Windy City in 2007.

“We don’t have to be the first city,” Bhatt said about the vision of Chicagoans being able to walk a laptop from Starbucks to their laundromat and to their home without disconnecting from the high-speed Web. “We just have to get there. I see the city being fully interconnected sometime next year.”

 But year and a half later... 

Chicago scraps plans for citywide Wi-Fi 

Officials say it's too costly and too few residents would use it 

CHICAGO - An ambitious plan to blanket the city with wireless broadband Internet will be shelved because it is too costly and too few residents would use it, Chicago officials said Tuesday. 

"We realized — after much consideration — that we needed to reevaluate our approach to provide universal and affordable access to high speed Internet as part of the city's broader digital inclusion efforts," Chicago's chief information officer, Hardik Bhatt, said in a statement.
...

)

So huzzah said I this morning...right up until I funneled some coffee down my mouth hole, put on my glasses and read past the headline:

City plans free Wi-Fi in all parks, public spaces

and into the actual article

The city kicked off its "Chicago Broadband Challenge" by turning on free Wi-Fi in Millennium Park Monday morning.

which is when I started to laugh and laugh and laugh 

"Chicago will be one of the most connected cities in the world," said Mayor Emanuel. "The establishment of a world-class broadband network in Chicago will create thousands of jobs and dramatically improve educational opportunities, economic development, health care services, and general quality of life throughout the city."

Emanuel said the city seek input from Chicagoans via the Chicago Broadband Challenge website to build the network and make sure it is customized for residents and companies.

Any individual, company, student, non-profit organization or community group is welcome to respond to the Broadband challenge, either informally through the website, or as part of formal proposalss the city will be soliciting from companies, universities, and other organizations.

and laugh and laugh and laugh and laugh and laugh.

So, Chicago stuck a handful of WiFi towers in Millennium Park?  

Well good for them!

As to the rest, well, I have heard it all before.  

Many, many times before.

Each time the promises come tarted up in slightly different apparel, but always singing the same siren's song.  Each time the Great Big Wireless Wet Dream exists only long enough to provide some fawning headlines for the City and siphon some cash into some consultant's pockets.  Each time it vanishes like some WiFi Brigadoon, disappearing into the we-know-not-where in a cloud of boondoggle, double-talk, and political moonshine...

...only to rise, rise, rise yet again, once again promising that through the alchemy of "world-class" this and "interconnected" that, that this time there really will be a downpour of jobs, a dramatic improvements in education and, damn it, this time everybody really is gonna get laid!

So, as a public service to those who have made it this far, here is a reprise of my 2009 essay:

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Wireless Perversity In Chicago *


The Power and the Glory

According to his internal political clock (which seems to be synced to the gestation periods of certain types of scorpions for some mysterious reason), about every 18 months or so Da Mare suddenly notices that it has been about 18 months since the ungrateful bastards in the local media have sufficiently praised him for his brilliant technological acumen, at which point he announces that he is going to solve the local "digital divide" problem by throwing pennies at it.

Looks like our 18 months is just about up (from the the Sun Times):

...
The final technology initiative is Daley's plan to bridge the "digital divide" two years after pulling the plug on an $18.5 million wireless Internet access system that would have reached into Chicago's poorest communities.

It calls for four impoverished neighborhoods -- Englewood, Auburn Gresham, Chicago Lawn and Pilsen -- to be declared "digital excellence demonstration communities" that will be flooded with technology to demonstrate the Internet's "transformative power."

Microsoft has agreed to donate $1.1 million worth of software to help 28 non-profit organizations in those neighborhoods. Another $2 million from Microsoft, the MacArthur Foundation, the Local Initiatives Support Corp. and the state will help bring Internet access to schools and public spaces.

Let me be clear: I believe the provision of basic high-speed internet access (and assistance with the wherewithal to use it) is exactly the sort of service a modern municipal government should provide -- especially to its most criminally neglected communities. However, I also know that anyone who has followed the Clown Car Fire and Boat Drill antics of the Daley Administration over the years as it has boldly made -- and then broken -- this same promise would be wise to approach this latest Civicnet Vaporware release party with whatcha might call Olympian levels of incredulity.

For those of you who haven't followed the hilariously fucked-up saga of Wireless Perversity In Chicago, here's a little history to catch you up.

Once upon a time...

February, 1999:

The Chicago Civic Network Project, will create a network providing high-speed telecommunications to every residence, business, and institution in the City.

"I envision the entire City residents, businesses, and institutions using this network to access on-line education programs, video-on-demand services, telecommuting and on-line community organizing," - Mayor Richard Daley, February 8, 1999.

That was CivicNet, which was to be one of those Miracles of Unleashed Private Sector Awesomeness --

When Chicago Mayor Richard Daley two years ago announced a project to build a metropolitan-area network (MAN) called CivicNet, he stressed that Chicago didn't want to get into the telecommunications business. Instead, from the start, Daley wanted to have vendors in the private sector take the lead in building and managing the network.

But Daley knew that for equipment vendors, service providers and project engineering firms to step up to the plate, the city would have to offer something in return. So as part of the deal, Chicago is offering to be the anchor tenant on the network -- a major incentive for private companies because the city spends more than $30 million per year on network and telecommunications services.

-- which so completely ensorcells Da Mare even though he has never actually worked a day in his adult life at anything but a Gummint Job.

Fortunately, Da Mare's brother Bill has plenty of gritty, real-world private sector experience that Hizzoner can lean on if he needs to.

Experience like, say, running a telecommunications company.

In fact, consider what a superwonderful coincidence it was that Da Mare happened to decide that giving away a $30 million municipal telecommunications monopoly was very best way to help the poor, internet-deprived people of Chicago at exactly the same time his brother Bill became the President of SBC? And just at the precise moment that SBC happened to be desperately trying to claw its way out of a hole and into the high-speed internet market.

An Old Politician Moves to the Boardroom
By STEPHEN LABATON
Published: Monday, November 19, 2001

William M. Daley, the campaign chairman of Al Gore's unsuccessful presidential bid, has decided to move down to what was once enemy territory, Texas, to become president of SBC Communications.
...

Mr. Daley's selection comes as SBC is fighting on several financial and regulatory fronts to enter new long-distance and high-speed Internet markets and return to a period of greater profitability.

As many of its customers sought to cope with their own economic troubles by cutting back on telecommunications services, SBC reported last month that its third-quarter profit fell 30 percent and that it would eliminate thousands of jobs. The company also cut back on a $6 billion project, known as Pronto, intended to make fast Web access available to 77 million people by the end of the year.
...

I mean, how incredibly lucky can one city be?

Anyway, for awhile, as long as no one looked too closely at what was actually being accomplished, CivicNet could generate the requisite glowing, tounge-kiss headlines for Da Mare (May, 2001) 

ALTERNATE LINK here:

CivicNet is recognized nationally as one of the most innovative approaches to broadband infrastructure and addressing the digital divide. It was cited in the May issue of Wired magazine as a unique way in which government is using its purchasing power to bring high bandwidth to the city as a whole.

And kick off the usual round of overheated speculations about how rich we were all gonna get by way of Hizzoner's wise, and virtually risk-free investment:  

ALTERNATE LINK here:

CivicNet may boost property values and redevelopment projects?

by Tom LaPorte | June 17, 2002
i-Street Magazine

Even though the city is still months away from awarding the CivicNet contracts, some leaders of the effort are already looking around the next curve on the information superhighway. CivicNet may change more than the speed of neighborhood data connections. It may have an impact on everything from property values to the alignment of suburbs.

CivicNet, of course, is the City of Chicago's strategy for bringing high-speed Internet connections to all the city's neighborhoods. By "bundling" demand across all government agencies, a single provider gets a big contract for voice
and data services. Fast connections are installed in schools, libraries and other government buildings. The result is a wired city.

Scott Goldstein, [vice president for policy and planning for the Metropolitan Planning Council]...also suggested that CivicNet in the city's neighborhoods could hold a key to redevelopment of business districts. Many neighborhoods lost retail trade to regional shopping malls and Walmart-type discount stores. But if a CivicNet strategy results in high-speed connectivity in an older business district, there could be a return migration by businesses needing or wanting high-speed access. In the same way that businesses locate near concrete highways and sources of water, they now will have to consider proximity to a network hub as a factor in their choice of locations.
...

Oh boy! I like money!

It then limped along for a little while (from March, 2004, with emphasis added):

Portions of the network could be built with local government fiber already deployed along roads and Chicago Transit Authority lines. Unfortunately, to the frustration of local business and civic leaders, the city has done very little with the project since its' conception in the late 1990s.

and eventually vanished

Kinks in plan to wire city for speed; Economy, timing strand CivicNet.(News)

Byline: JULIE JOHNSSON

A city-sponsored proposal to lace Chicago with fiber optic lines from 138th to Howard streets is stalled and appears unlikely to be revived.

The telecommunications crash, politics and a city budget crunch have combined to mothball CivicNet, a project that was supposed to put broadband within reach of every business and home in Chicago.
...

without a trace.

There were no survivors, and no one was ever rude enough to mention above a whisper that Da Mare's Big Internet Plan had turned out to be mostly boondoggle, double-talk, and political moonshine.

Then, a few years later...

March, 2006. (emphasis added)   [Ed Note: The "Midwest Business" publication from which this quote was taken in 2009 has ceased to exist]

"After serving the post of Chicago CIO for six years, Chris O’Brien felt it was his time to move on. Hardik Bhatt, who officially succeeded O’Brien on March 13, said in an interview with ePrairie that he sees a fully Wi-Fied Windy City in 2007.

“We don’t have to be the first city,” Bhatt said about the vision of Chicagoans being able to walk a laptop from Starbucks to their laundromat and to their home without disconnecting from the high-speed Web. “We just have to get there. I see the city being fully interconnected sometime next year.”

Yay! I still like money!

June, 2006

Chicago Takes Bids for Citywide Wi-Fi Service

In an effort to bridge the “digital divide,” the City of Chicago is moving forward with plans to offer Internet access to all residents. On May 30, Mayor Richard Daley announced a request for proposals from vendors competing for a 10-year contract to provide wireless Internet access throughout the city.

Wi-Fi - short for Wireless Fidelity - enables mobile communications devices, like laptops and personal digital assistants (PDAs), to connect to the Internet without the use of any wires or cables. A citywide wi-fi system would allow residents to have online access from virtually anywhere in the city.

June, 2007 (Video from the "City That NetWorks" summit, at which the Dukes and Duchesses of the Great City wished real hard and clapped reeeeeal loud, so that Broadband Tinklerbell would live again! I do believe in fairies!! I do! I do!)

However, Eight Weeks Later...

Chicago scraps plans for citywide Wi-Fi
Officials say it's too costly and too few residents would use it

CHICAGO - An ambitious plan to blanket the city with wireless broadband Internet will be shelved because it is too costly and too few residents would use it, Chicago officials said Tuesday.

"We realized — after much consideration — that we needed to reevaluate our approach to provide universal and affordable access to high speed Internet as part of the city's broader digital inclusion efforts," Chicago's chief information officer, Hardik Bhatt, said in a statement.
...

So how could someone go from promising the world to delivering nothing and still keep their job?

One might speculate that very, very lavish flattery might have helped:
 [Ed Note: The "Midwest Business" publication from which this quote was taken in 2009 has ceased to exist]

...
In working with Daley, Bhatt asserts that the mayor bleeds technology. He added: 'In a 15-minute meeting, he always gives me five or 10 points I didn't even think about. He understands very quickly and gives me a good direction. He's on top of a list of all the visionaries I've worked with at Oracle and anywhere.'

Then, a few years later...

July, 2009

Mayor Richard M. Daley today announced new initiatives to help close the “digital divide” in Chicago neighborhoods, guided by a city-commissioned study that says that 25 per cent of Chicagoans are completely offline and that another 15 percent have limited internet access.

“The study tells us that the magnitude of the digital divide separating low-income Chicago neighborhoods is comparable to the rural-urban divide in broadband use,” Daley said in a news conference held at The Resurrection Project, 1814 S. Paulina St.

“If we want to improve the quality of life for everyone, we must work to make sure that every resident and business has access to 21st century technology in their own neighborhoods and homes,” the Mayor said.
...

Yay! Money! And so forth!


Which brings us pretty much up-to-date, except for one little-known fact: that Da Mare's people had a virtually identical proposal for a small, well-reasoned pilot program in their hands five years ago (Full disclosure; I am acquainted with some of the people who contributed to the proposal. They are, to put it mildly, a trifle cranky.) It was designed to do almost exactly what this latest plan is supposed to do: technologically uplift a specific, geographic region, then carefully test and measure the efficacy of providing near-universal high-speed internet access to that area.

It was summarily rejected not because of the price tag, but because it wasn't splashy and spectacular enough. Because it was wouldn't guarantee complete, wall-to-wall coverage of the entire city in one year and at virtually no cost.

In other words, because it didn't promise a big, steaming heap of technological magic and economic voodoo with political miracles sprinkled on top.

And because, as is all too often the case, Da Mare's people were far more interested in headline-generating gimmicks than in real solutions, in the end they went with the nice man who promised them they could have the city "fully interconnected sometime next year”, while the other other plan was sent off to rot on some forgotten library shelf.

Another of the great mysteries about this strange tale is the behavior of Da Mare's people at this critical juncture: that rather than being righteously indignant at being led down the primrose path by someone whose resume would indicate that they damn well should have known better, they instead very generously decided to let that nice man keep his new job and politely ignore the fact that the very lavish promise he made in order to secure that job was yet another cocktail of boondoggle, double-talk, and political moonshine.

Weird, isn't it?

Of course, all Chicagoans of good will should wish City Hall godspeed and good luck with this latest iteration of the Neverending Project, because:

1. This is simply too important to fuck up again, and
2. They are the only game in town.

However if past performance is any indicator of future outcomes, anyone who has watched the last 10 years of promises, excuses, failure, rinse and repeat should now be permanently locked into "Trust, But Verify" mode.

Because the one, clear lesson lesson which can be drawn from the last 10 years is, sadly, pretty simple: If you want to get ahead in City Gummint, when Hizzoner has one of his Special Mayor Moments and suddenly announces that the City's grave financial and structural problems can be fixed by, say, selling all of its parking meters to corporate grifters...

...or blowing hundreds of millions of dollars to sponsor a three-week sports extravaganza seven years from now...

...or, WTF, maybe inducing city pigeons into pooping out 100,000 tiny ingots of gold...

...rather than being one of those annoying, dour, “reality based” buzz-killers and pointing out that his visionary pigeon plan might not be 100% biologically viable, instead reach deeeep into the biggest sack of horseshit you can find and say, with absolute sincerity;

“You know, Mr. Mayor, I sincerely believe wit all my heart dat doze pigeons could shit 200,000 ingots of gold – and piss liquid platinum – if only da right person were to be, y'know, put in charge of managing your brilliant vision.

"On behalf of all da poor children.

"An' hardworkin' mudders.

"An' old people.

"Of da Great City of Chicago.

"Dat we all love so much."

Or, as Evilene eloquently explained 30 years ago in “The Wiz”, if you want to succeed in the viper pit of City Hall office politics, the one thing you never, ever want to do is bring Hizzoner no bad news:

“Don't Nobody Bring Me No Bad News”

When I wake up in the afternoon
Which it pleases me to do
Don't nobody bring me no bad news
'Cause I wake up already negative
And I've wired up my fuse
So don't nobody bring me no bad news

If we're going to be buddies
Better bone up on the rules
'Cause don't nobody bring me no bad news
You can be my best of friends
As opposed to payin' dues
But don't nobody bring me no bad news

No bad news
No bad news
Don't you ever bring me no bad news
'Cause I'll make you an offer, child
That you cannot refuse
So don't nobody bring me no bad news

When you're talking to me
Don't be cryin' the blues
'Cause don't nobody bring me no bad news
You can verbalize and vocalize
But just bring me the clues
But don't nobody bring me no bad news

Bring some message in your head
Or in something you can't lose
But don't you ever bring me no bad news
If you're gonna bring me something
Bring me, something I can use
But don't you bring me no bad news

* (Title respectfully pilfered from this early play by David Mamet, and subsequently abused by me)

The Reign of Rahmses -- Part 3

The kick-em-harder school of Chicago education "reform" seems to have been faced down by the Chicago Teacher's Union.  

For now.

For a little background on the political schticks and mortar on which Chicago is built, here is a reprise of a few selections from my 2010 series, "The Lessons of Rahmses".

Today's lessons...

Voters:

Voters:

Chicago, you will be mine, like my dog, or my horse, or my falcon, or my favorite neck-stabbin' pencil except that I shall love you more - and trust you less.

Background: A primer on just how fast politics and voters in Chicago can turn ugly provided by Kathleen Hall Jamieson from her book, "Dirty Politics: Deception, Distraction":

In 1983, Republican Bernard Epton faced Democrat Harold Washington in the Chicago mayoral contest. Epton was white, Washington black. Among other things, Epton's radio ads falsely accused Washington of being a "convicted felon" and of having been "disbarred." An unsigned leaflet alleged that Washington had once been arrested on a morals charge. Epton's slogan, widely criticized as "racist," was "Before It's Too Late."

On Palm Sunday, Washington and presidential hopeful Walter Mondale went to church services at St. Pascal's Catholic Church on the Northwest side. "When they arrived, they found 'nigger die' spray-painted on a wall and were met by a nasty, jeering crowd of perhaps three dozen, some of whom shouted racial epithets...

Daley tamped down on this shit by using the same strategy the U.S. military is using in Afghanistan: buying peace by throwing money around. Behind all the fine talk, shiny promises, green initiatives and boulevard planters, there was always lots and lots and lots and lots of money.

That money is all gone now, but the deep, tribal divisions in the Chicago electorate -- which have always roiled just below the surface -- remain.

Employee Morale:

Employee Morale:

Neck-stab half the fuckin' staff and throw 'em the fuck out with the trash.

Doesn't matter which half: the ones you neck-stab stop being a problem; the ones you spare will be so grateful you didn't neck-stab 'em that you can work 'em until they drop in their traces.

Anybody has a problem with that, they can fuckin' quit and go sell irregular tube socks on an I-94 on-ramp, 'cause they'll never work a real job in my fuckin' city ever again.

So let it be written. So let it be fuckin' done.

Sadly, the background for this Lesson can be found on all sides and in every Chicago paper, every day...

Here.

Arbitrator OKs CTA layoffs starting Sunday
February 3, 2010 6:09 PM

Labor unions at the CTA lost a challenge to the transit agency's plans to lay off more than 1,100 employees starting Sunday as part of major service cuts to reduce a budget deficit.

An arbitrator's ruling today against the unions means that the cuts -- an 18 percent reduction in bus service and 9 percent for trains -- will be implemented, barring any developments to erase a $95.6 million deficit that remains for 2010, transit officials said.

CTA management has introduced more than $200 million in internal cuts and other cost savings, and it said the unions must agree to salary and other concessions to help erase the rest of the deficit and stave off the service cuts. The unions representing CTA bus and rail workers have so far refused, saying they made concessions in the past.

And here.

Fitch downgrades Chicago bonds

Posted by Greg H. at 10/28/2010 3:48 PM CDT on Chicago Business
Chicago's bond rating has suffered another hit, this one from Fitch Ratings.

The New York-based firm on Thursday lowered its rating on $7 billion in outstanding general-obligation city debt to AA- from AA, particularly citing the city's increasing reliance on one-time revenues to fix its budget.

"While the economy remains broad and diverse, the city's financial position has weakened," Fitch wrote. Revenues have been hurt by high unemployment and above-average home foreclosures, while the city has reduced reserves from around $2 billion a couple of years ago to a projected $790 million by December.

Fitch applauded layoffs and other payroll trims implemented by outgoing Mayor Richard M. Daley, but added, "The ability to make further expenditure cuts to personnel is extremely limited" due to union contracts.

"Rising costs for public safety and the continued slow economic recovery will severely limit the city's ability to achieve structural balance without working (politically difficult) structural solutions," it said.

Here.

Chicago Community College Budget Calls for Hundreds of Layoffs
Alex Keefe Jul. 29, 2010

Hundreds of non-teaching staff members could be laid off under the new budget proposal for Chicago's community college system.

Next year's budget for City Colleges of Chicago could fund 311 fewer positions, some through attrition.

But that could include 225 non-teacher layoffs.

Chancellor Cheryl Hyman they would affect administrators, as the district tries to consolidate some workers from its seven colleges.

And here.

New Chicago Public Schools Budget: Layoffs, Furlough Days, And Larger Class Sizes To Make Ends Meet

Chicago Sun-Times | Fran Spielman | 04/16/09

About 1,200 city school workers will receive layoff notices this week, and principals will begin sharing the budget pain via pay freezes and six furlough days, as Chicago Public Schools officials move today to plug their remaining $370 million deficit.

And here.

Standard & Poor's lowers Chicago bonds

(Crain's) — The city of Chicago's general obligation bonds took a hit by Standard & Poor's, which lowered its long-term debt rating, citing ongoing budget strife.

The ratings agency assigned Chicago's general obligation debt an A+ rating, down one notch from AA-. It gave the same A+ rating — also lowered from AA- — to nearly $804 million in general obligation refunding and taxable project bonds.

S&P said in its report that the new rating "reflects our view of the city's ongoing structural imbalance and heavy reliance on non-recurring revenues to bridge its 2011 budget gap, including the use of most of its remaining reserves from the sale of its parking meters."

And here.

Daley To Union: 1,600 City Lay Offs Unless Concessions Made

Chicago Sun-Times:

Mayor Daley will be forced to lay off up to 1,600 city employees -- none sworn police officers or firefighters -- unless organized labor agrees to another round of givebacks to wipe out a potential $300 million shortfall, union leaders were told this week.

But with all the grim news raining down in from every direction, what transforms the situation from merely Very Bad into Utterly Toxic is when city workers look around them and see that, even as the City cries poormouth and demands ever more work for ever less pay -- hard work, long hours, creativity and competence still have nothing whatsoever to do with who gets the axe and who does not.

That no matter what City Hall public information machine says about drowning in red ink and the desperate need for everyone to pull together for the common good, there is still a fucking club,

and they sure as Hell still ain't in it.

From the Sun-Times:

Connected city worker spared in merger, layoffs
Never knew she had clout, Special Events director says

October 22, 2010

BY FRAN SPIELMAN City Hall Reporter

Clout apparently still counts in City Hall jobs -- despite Mayor Daley's promise to implement a personnel system free of politics in the wake of a hiring scandal that cost taxpayers $12 million to compensate victims of the city's rigged hiring system.

The wife of a former Democratic ward boss -- who also happens to be the daughter-in-law of a former alderman -- has survived a departmental merger that will eliminate 13 jobs and force nine layoffs.

Maureen Volini was a $73,752 administrative services officer for the Mayor's Office of Special Events.

Now that Daley's final budget is merging Special Events with the Department of Cultural Affairs, Volini has avoided the ax with a transfer to the Department of Procurement Services.
...

Tomorrow:  The Toll of Job Stress and Public Service in a post-Daley Chicago

The Reign of Rahmses -- Part 2

Today, David Brooks had many, exciting things to say about Mayor Rahm and his exciting vision for an exciting, new school system that combines the leaned-out, work-til-you-drop-in-the-traces efficiencies of Wal-Mart with the screw-the-unions, private sector fervor of Wal-Mart.

Well, for those of you trying to make sense of where this salami is being cached and why, I am re-releasing a few of my "Lessons of Rahmses" from 2010 to give the newly-arrived a little taste of Chicago's on-the-ground political realities.

Today's lessons...

 Lesson Five: Fighting Legends

Fighting Legends:

(Circa October, 2011) All I fuckin' hear about is fuckin' "Daley". People loved him 'cause he used to throw millions around like nickles. Now I gotta spend all day tellin' those same people "No", "No" and "Fuck no".

I 'm da New Mare, but I cannot fight the power of his Deficits.

Shit. 

I feel like some Liberal retard just stabbed me in the fuckin' neck with a fuckin' pencil.

Background:


More here if you are so inclined.

Lesson Two: Being Da Boss

Being Da Boss:

Obey? Moses, Moses, are you fuckin' kidding me?

Bring me a fuckin' pencil so I can fuckin' stab you in the fuckin' neck.

Then say "Thank you, Boss!"

Background: From this 2005 Sun-Times article, a distillation of Chicago's favorite, unanswered clout-related question: "Who hired Angelo Torres?"

Torres' clout remains a mystery

August 26, 2005

BY FRAN SPIELMAN City Hall Reporter

The Daley administration gave up the ghost Thursday on two priorities stemming from the Hired Truck scandal: privatizing the program and finding out who placed a former gang member in charge of it.

Nineteen months after the Chicago Sun-Times blew the lid off the scandal, City Hall released a pile of documents that track Angelo Torres' personnel history, including three pay raises over a two-month period in 1998 and 14 salary increases over eight years. But the documents shed no light on the identity of Torres' political sponsor.

The closest thing to a smoking gun is the revelation that Torres got his first Shakman-exempt position -- as principal operations research analyst for the Office of Budget and Management on Sept. 1, 1998 -- after sign-off by four city officials.

They are: Victor Reyes, the Hispanic Democratic Organization founder who ran the Mayor's Office of Intergovernmental Affairs at the time; then-Budget Director Barbara Lumpkin; Glenn Carr, the mayor's longtime personnel director who was fired in June, and Robert Sorich, the mayoral patronage chief who was recently indicted in the city hiring scandal.

Observers have long suspected Reyes was responsible for Torres' meteoric rise, citing the Hired Truck czar's past ties to HDO.
...

As much as City Hall wanted to solve the Torres mystery to get a political monkey off Mayor Daley's back, it's not possible, Huberman said. So the question of who put Torres in charge of a program that doled out $38.5 million a year in no-bid trucking business will apparently remain unanswered until the feds choose to solve it.

The Torres case is typical of how, despite a lot of hoo-ha about reform and cleaning up gummint, any genuine accountability and genuine pain is always reserved for lower-level, unprotected flukies. Just like the mob, when it comes to Da Mare, his lieutenants always close ranks to protect him.

Tomorrow, Voters and Employee Morale