Rottie Refugees

From that bastion of Liberalism that is Cook County, Illinois,  a nugget to be winnowed from the empty husks.

First, a little background. Toni Preckwinkle is the President of the Cook County board.

Preckwinkle has developed a reputation for progressiveness.^[21][22][23]

In her first two aldermanic election attempts for the 4th ward, in 1983 and 1987, Preckwinkle lost to the incumbent, Timothy C. Evans.^[8] Evans was Chicago MayorHarold Washington‘s City Council floor leader and lieutenant.

Evans defeated Preckwinkle by a 77% to 21% margin.^[12] In 1987, although both the Chicago Tribune and Chicago Sun-Times endorsed Evans, they praised Preckwinkle for her numerous qualities, including intelligence and independence, and expressed hopes she would continue in politics.^[3][13] Preckwinkle was endorsed by state Rep.Carol Moseley Braun and also by the Independent Voters of Illinois-Independent Precinct Organization, but not by Harold Washington, who endorsed Evans.

Preckwinkle was re-elected as 4th Ward Democratic committeeman on March 19, 1996, running unopposed on the ballot after her successful challenges to the nominating petitions of Charles S. Williams and her 1995 and 1999 aldermanic challenger Kwame Raoul, who were both just a few dozen signatures short of the number required to earn a place on the ballot.^[57]

*****

According to the New Yorker’s account, Preckwinkle “soon became an Obama loyalist, and she stuck with him in a State Senate campaign that strained or ruptured many friendships but was ultimately successful.” ^[67][68] In 1995, she successfully challenged the signatures of Obama’s opponents in the Democratic Primary for the Illinois Senate, allowing Obama to run unopposed.

According to the New Yorker article, Preckwinkle had since become “disenchanted” with Obama. The article’s author suggested that Preckwinkle’s “grievances” against Obama were motivated by Preckwinkle’s perception that Obama was disloyal.^[68] Notwithstanding any such concerns, Preckwinkle was an Obama delegate at the 2008 Democratic National Convention.

A member of the American Civil Liberties Union and a lifetime member of the NAACP, the semi-retired Pincham lectured and instructed in trial and appellate techniques and advocacy. He received numerous awards for his professional and community service and activism. ^[2]

By 1990, she had become executive director of the Chicago Jobs Council, and become allied with civil rights attorney R. Eugene Pincham.

R. Eugene died of complications from lung and brain cancer.^[3]

The funeral was held in private at the South Side church, and culminated in remarks by Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr.^[4]

The incestuous slough of progressive politics that is Cook County runs a trail all the way to the White House. But that is not why I’m here. Toni Preckwinkle, taking a page out of Dick Durbin’s playbook, is portraying her latest proposal as reasonable and fair.

Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle wants to accelerate efforts to do away with unincorporated areas over the next several years, saying today that the county can no longer afford to provide services for the 98,000 residents that live in those patches.

Instead, Preckwinkle wants nearby towns and villages to annex the county’s 62 square miles of unincorporated land into their borders, leaving those municipalities to pick up the cost for police protection, animal control and other key services.

Preckwinkle acknowledges it’s a controversial idea that will meet resistance from towns that don’t want to shoulder the added costs and residents that fear annexation could force their taxes to go up.

Yes, so reasonable, so fair. There’s only one problem…

Preckwinkle said it’s unclear how much money the county would save in the long run by eliminating unincorporated areas, but said residents would benefit from annexation because they would receive better representation from local government.

If the citizens would be better served by local government then by County government, why not just disband County government?

And why, exactly, would a “progressive” want unincorporated areas to incorporate? I thought they hated evil corporations.

Will the last person to leave kindly turn out the lights?

Also see this.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 1st, 2012 at 6:18 am by Rebel Mope and is filed under Uncategorized . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.