Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/01/30/back-marie-newman.html
…
3 Likes
The fact that this guy can run as a “Democratic” party candidate shows everything wrong with the Democratic Party. They really need to clean house if they intend to have any long-term impact.
27 Likes
Ok, I’m going to need to know more about what this means exactly, and then some questions about the legality. Total bait and switch, or partial bait and switch?
8 Likes
Sadly he probably knows too much for the democrats to throw him out. He knows where too many bodies are buried. Can’t really afford to piss someone like that off. It would be a different thing if he was a republican, then his low-life stunts would be strong points in his favor.
2 Likes
Lipinski, your days are numbered.
2 Likes
Check out his gerrymandered district, clearly drawn for some very specific purpose.
My congresscritter, ladies and gentlemen.
In Illinois, when a person wins the primary but then doesn’t compete in the general election (be it because of retirement, death, or what have you), the state party committee chooses the replacement.
Here, when Bill Lipinski stepped down from Congress after winning the primary, he nonetheless kept his other elected position, as Chicago’s 23rd Ward Committeeman for the Democratic Party (the 23rd Ward of Chicago is co-terminous with the Chicago part of IL-3). His influence on the state party from that position all but assured the state party would choose whatever successor Bill Lipinski wanted. In this case, it was his son.
EDITED: And, of course, the district was a safe Democratic district, so there was no chance a GOP candidate would beat Dan Lipinski in that first election.
7 Likes
Illinois District 1 is pretty ridiculously drawn as well. Seems to me that nobody in Congress has any incentive to end gerrymandering.
1 Like
Chicago loves their political dynasties. Daleys, Simons, Madigans, Hynes, etc.
3 Likes
Whether we’re discussing the notoriously corrupt local party or the hapless national party, don’t hold your breath. See Act II here:
2 Likes
I once heard that there is one ward of Chicago that’s been represented by the same family as Alderman – passed between grandfathers and grandsons and nephews and what not – for 100 years. This is a fact that’s “too good to check” – but one guy has been on the City Council for almost 50 years (Edward Burke) which just seems nuts to me – who would want that job, or really any job for 50 years?
2 Likes
The Cullertons. The last one stepped down two years ago, after the family had held the seat for 125 years.
4 Likes
Holy hell look at the guy. What’s wrong with him?
Poor Charisma roll.
2 Likes
As automation further captures the labor market, it will become painfully clear that the true minimum wage remains zero units of currency per any unit of time.
1 Like
Well, these days, “cleaning house” means other people need to run for office. I don’t know that the party can just declare him not a Democrat. Can it? He should be, and apparently is about to be, challenged in a primary.
Yes, the party should withhold funding from him and give whole-hearted support to a challenger, but if he wins elections, that would be hard to argue for.
1 Like
Wikipedia notes he won the 2006 and 2008 primaries. Maybe his district is just pretty conservative. Don’t imagine that support for Sanders makes you automatically progressive. Maybe you just hate Clinton. His father was active against Bill Clinton.
The District has been described as “ancestrally Democratic, culturally conservative, multiethnic and viscerally patriotic.”[18] It earned a reputation as being home to Reagan Democrats when in the 1980 presidential election it was one of only two Chicago districts (out of nine) to be won by Republican Ronald Reagan, along with the 6th District (an almost entirely suburban district which also included Chicago’s O’Hare Airport); the district simultaneously reelected Democratic congressman Marty Russo with nearly 69% of the vote.[19] The Reagan Democrat description became even more appropriate when Reagan received 65% of the vote here in 1984, as Russo again won with 64%.[20] Redistricting for the 1990s shifted the district into more reliably Democratic territory, but Bill Clinton won the district in 1992 by just a 41%-39% margin despite receiving at least 65% of the vote in four other south side districts; he won the district with 53% in 1996 although his totals in the other south side districts were all between 80-85%. George W. Bush received 41% of the vote here in both 2000 and 2004 despite not exceeding 21% in any of the other four south side districts; it was his best performance in any district located primarily within Cook County. Much of the district’s current suburban territory was in the 4th District from the 1950s to the 1970s, when that was a solidly Republican suburban district represented by Ed Derwinski; more recently, Lyons, Palos and Riverside Townships, which together approximately correspond with the district’s western half, all voted for Bush in 2000.[21] Over the last eight presidential elections, the Democratic nominee for Congress has run an average of 20 points ahead of the party’s nominee for president in the district.[22]
It’d be nice if Newman wins but I wouldn’t count on it.
The reason why those districts look so weird is because of Chicago. Chicago has massively more population density than the surrounding area. Thus a lot of these districts are basically ‘vast swathe of empty land, plus a slice of Chicago’.
There’s not really much of a way around it. Going for more ‘sensible’ geographic maps would lead to even less competitive districts, because you’d have a lot of districts that are 100% Chicago and a few giant rural districts. In that case the Dems will always win the former and the GOP will always win the latter, and well, why bother voting.
