Getting it Good & Hard

John Stroger’s manipulation of the Cook County Board, and of the county itself, has not been hindered by the fact that the man can’t sign his own name to the resignation letter his handlers distributed last week because he remains paralyzed following a stroke in March. Stroger and his political henchmen—including Chicago 7th Ward Alderman William Beavers, Stroger’s son and 8th Ward Alderman Todd Stroger, and Cook County Commissioner Bobbie Steele—have continued to run roughshod over the democratic process, if not Democratic Process, even as the Chicago media have, after months of taking it up the ass, stepped up and begun to seriously question how it is a 77-year-old half-paralyzed stroke victim can claim to be running Cook County government.

More accurately, papers in their editorials and TV news in its stepped up coverage of the opposition, have chafed at the blatant lies being told to them by Stroger’s family, staff members and political supporters. Todd Stroger had a particularly trying two weeks in mid-June during which he had to face skeptical questions from reporters every day about his father’s condition, whether he was back in the hospital, and when he would bow out of the election and resign from the board and the board presidency. Todd Stroger tried as best he could to stonewall the press, but he is a politician with limited skills, and once the tide of public opinion began to turn against him he quickly broke up on the rocks of reporters’ persistent questions.

The low point probably came when Todd Stroger claimed he would not talk any more about his father’s health condition until July, and cited patient confidentiality laws as one reason why. This was seen by many as ridiculous and within two weeks—before the July deadline originally set by Stroger’s family—the announcement came that Stroger would not only not seek re-election but that he would step down from the County Board President position.

Of course the jockeying for John Stroger’s various jobs had already begun months earlier. Todd Stroger had held himself out as one possible candidate, even as the family and Stroger’s staff maintained he would someday be back, and chastised others who expressed interest in the job. Eventually even Todd Stroger was forced to back off lobbying for the job and return to spreading the lie that his father still hoped to return one day to run the county board. Even that wasn’t good enough, though, as various John Stroger staff members, when peppered with questions about who was running the county is John Stroger’s absence, tried to convince reporters that John Stroger was alert and running the county from his bed.

Finally the load of lies became too heavy.

Which brings us pretty much up to speed. There is ongoing speculation about who will take over for John Stroger in his various jobs, including Cook County commissioner, board president and party boss. One school of thought holds that Dems will appoint a caretaker board president —possibly John Daley, Mayor Richard Daley’s brother—to do the dirty work of ramming through what’s sure to be an unpleasant county budget that will include tax hikes to close an estimated $44 million gap. That would leave Todd Stroger to run for county board president, and possibly his father’s commissioner seat, with a clean slate.

It would be, of course, a classic bait-and-switch and if it were to succeed, another black eye for Cook County voters.

The real travesty from the public’s perspective is not that Stroger suffered a stroke, or that he’s paralyzed or even that county board leadership has languished in his absence. The stroke and paralysis are terrible physical issues for anyone to have to deal with. But what’s appalling is the way his family and the Cook County Democratic Machine have treated his positions as some kind of property, to be inherited or bestowed as they see fit. Equally appalling has been the county board’s lack of action in the face of an impending fiscal crisis. Rather than do something that might be “disrespectful” to John Stroger they chose to do nothing. This is about par for the course for Cook County government. You never get the smart ones on the county board; it’s always the wannabes and the hacks, and now we’re all going to pay the price.

This equates to paralysis of a different kind, exemplified by Bobbie Steele, who actually said at a county board meeting when asked about acting to replace Stroger, “July is just around the corner. We waited this long. . . .” What a bumblefuck thing to say. It’s like if Joseph Hazlewood had been awake at the controls of the Exxon Valdez, known he was about to hit the reef and said “Oh fuck it. We’ve gone on this long, may as well ground the bastard.”

Of course, Cook County voters chose Stroger over Forrest Claypool in the primary election, and they knew they were getting an invalid when they did so. They also knew, or certainly should have known, that Stroger’s replacement would be hand-picked by Democratic ward bosses and party hacks following extended back room dealing. That’s exactly what’s happened. Now in order to repudiate these slimy tactics the only recourse is to pull the lever for the wing-nut Republican challenger, Tony Peraica. County Dems are betting most voters won’t be pushed that far. Here’s hoping they’re wrong.