Liberal darling Robert Redford is planning a new documentary series on Chicago where he will showcase the city in all its glory. He will be filming the start of the freshwater sailing race, “Race to Mackinac,” but perhaps he ought to be training his cameras on a different race, although it’s anything but fresh.
State Representative Deb Mell finally officially announced her desire to be “considered” to replace her father as Alderman in Chicago’s 33rd Ward.
Deb Mell is the daughter of Dick Mell, who has for 37 years “represented” that ward. Dick Mell is the quintessential Chicago pol in every Obamaesque sense; for example, today the Chicago Sun-Times ran a front-page piece about his role as a silent partner with a convicted felon in a Joliet landfill business. Mell denied any involvement in the past.
It’s a race that reeks of the stale old Chicago way, with so many corrupt characters involved that it almost “strains credulity,” as Andrew Breitbart would have said.
Dick Mell’s announcement that he is retiring leaves a vacancy to be filled in the Chicago Way, by a 5-member panel appointed by Mayor Emanuel. Here is the description of the members of Rahm’s panel:
– Felicia Davis, Executive Director, Mayor’s Office of Public Engagement
– John Friedmann, Vice President, North River Commission, Longtime 33rd Ward Resident
– Michelle Harris, City Council President Pro Tempore
– Iliamar Isaac, Community Activist
– Ricardo Trujillo, Principal, Roosevelt High School
Mayor Rahm “Caligulus” Emanuel (thank you, Paul McKinley) waxed poetic about the firsts that Deb Mell would “achieve” as a lesbian and a breast-cancer survivor:
State Rep. Deb Mell is not guaranteed a job in City Council because she would be the first [openly] lesbian [alderman] or because she had breast cancer. But, she’s not excluded because she would be the first lesbian and the first woman, as [far as] I know, that has breast cancer. I remind all of you [that] she was endorsed by both papers when she ran for state rep.
So the person appointing the panel to select the replacement certainly has his preference.
Deb Mell does have more famous connections than just her father. You would be forgiven for not realizing that Deb is actually the sister-in-law of imprisoned former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, currently serving time on corruption convictions. Neither the Chicago Tribune’s piece on the race by John Byrne nor the Sun-Times’s article by Fran Spielman mention the fact. Less surprising: the local left-wing blog “Chicagoist” failed to note the connection in their post by Chuck Sudo.
Deb’s father Dick Mell recently publicly and proudly reminisced about the days when he could buy votes by getting rid of parking tickets. From the Sun-Times:
During a 90-minute swan-song and other farewell interviews, Richard Mell longed for the days when he could non-suit a pile of parking tickets for supporters and place his top precinct captains in cushy bridge tender’s jobs, where they could either sleep or study the night away.
As for Deb’s performance as a member of the Illinois House of Representatives, according to Ballotpedia she received a D- rating from the Illinois Opportunity Project. Perhaps one of the 13 other people who are vying for the Aldermanic spot might be worth considering.
Sounds like good fodder for a series on Chicago, Redford.
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Comments
A cynic would speculate that there hasn’t been a mention because it’s assumed and known, nor would a cynic expect anything more (or is it less) from our elite statist class here in Chicago.
Illustrating Chicago’s Murders, Homicides, Violence and Idiocy at http://www.heyjackass.com
I think that Chicago has to hit rock bottom before anything positive can occur. Unfortunately, they still have some room to drop further before reaching their final destination.
There’s only so much scraping you can do…
Really can’t compete with New York City for Democrat decadence and chutzpah – NYC has Spitzer and his Madame vying for the same office…and Weiner, the weiner-tweeter running for Mayor.
So she is the sister of Obama’s real estate agent who got The historic house for them when Michelle said – ooh got to have that – even though they could not afford it & something to do with selling off an uninhabitable strip of land to a criminal?
Whoosh – at least the good news is I don’t have medium term memory loss yet. This gives me the chance to refresh.
Or is she from the other side – ? They say it is important to keep learning new things.
Spitzer and Weiner (small potatos both) can’t be all bad. They did, after all, win endorsements of Marion Barry.
The Chicago story is a history of cooperation and corruption hand and hand.. Telling the complete story of this city is a target rich environment.. In the interest of full disclosure, I was born and raised in Chicago, but even more to the point, I was raised in the 11th Ward, Mayor Richard J Daley’s neighborhood, and played in his home, with his family…
The Chicago of today is a entirely different place than the city that I recall with fond memories.. Chicago, was a major big city marketplace, braggadocios, bustling, and bold.. The city was and still is to some degree, a dynamic hub in the middle of everything that defined the best and the worse of our country.
Chicago was the embodiment of Middle American values; the true center of the industrial heartland, with skyscrapers and scabs; the breadbasket city, with a heart of gold, and a fighting spirit. But, as with all that glitters . . .
In my years, 1941-1969 Chicago with the best of what doing wrong, was so right.. These years were the pinnacle of the Daley Machine power, and it worked for us.. Mayor Daley was king, not just a king maker.. He reminds me of the perfect bartender, he steals, but leaves enough to overlook his depravity..
He was a unrepentant thief who once admitted providing the secret bidding contract to his son, a part-time insurance agent, with an office that had only a desk and a phone.. The contract was for all insurance of the municipal buildings and vehicles in the city, a multimillion dollar contract..
When confronted with irrefutable evidence that his son won the contract by a single dollar, he proclaimed that it was the lowest bid, and that what else would you do since it was the least he could do for the boy that he all but abandoned the boy and his family to devote his total attention to his constituents, meaning YOU, and that it was a win, win for city and as a father.. NEXT QUESTION..