The old Obama Senate seat in Illinois, temporarily held by the frail and meaningless Roland Burrris, now becomes the Jonah seat of the Midwest. The Blagojevich ploy to subpoena POTUS - in order to testify in the corruption trial about selling the very same seat -- is now followed by the collapse and FDIC takeover of the Chicago-based, four-branch Broadway Bank that supports Senate candidate Alexi Giannoulias and his enterprising Greek-origin family. Alexi G is supposed to be the once and future young pol of the state. It is all too plush a melodrama. It needs music. The White House is panicky. Dick Durbin makes much noise when he visits Rahm Emanuel and Val Jarrett to fret about the laughable prospect of the Giannoulias campaign. How about forcing Alex G to swim with the fishes (he is pals with the Outfit in Chicago) and shovel the unhappy Rahm into the Jonah chair? It takes a strong man not to break out in song at the sloppy goofiness of the Chicago way.
Alexi G. Endorsers Soon Seeking Exits from Jonah.
Federal Elected Officials
U.S. Representative Bill Foster
U.S. Representative Luis Gutierrez
U.S. Representative Phil Hare
U.S. Representative Mike Quigley
U.S. Representative Jan Schakowsky
Organized Labor
American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) Council 31Amalgamated Transit Union Local 241
Associated Firefighters of Illinois
Chicago Fire Fighters Union, Local 2
Chicago Teachers Union
Communication Workers of America District 4
CWA - Association of Flight Attendants Council 8
Illinois AFL-CIO
Illinois Federation of Teachers - American Federation of Teachers
Illinois State Association of Letter Carriers
Illinois Pipe Trades Association
International Association of Bridge, Structural, Ornamental and Reinforcing Iron Workers Local 1
International Association of Bridge, Structural, Ornamental and Reinforcing Iron Workers
International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 9
International Union of United Automobile, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers of America (UAW)
International Union of Operating Engineers State Council
International Union of Painters and Allied Trades
IUOE Local 150
IUOE Local 399
IUPAT District Council 14
IUPAT District Council 30
Laborers International Union of North America
Service Employees International Union (SEIU)
Sheet Metal Workers Local 73
Teamsters Joint Council 25
UNITE HERE
United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters
United Food and Commercial Workers International Union
but doesn't rahm aspire to the speakership?
WSJ comments on the Senate contest, Kirk vs Alexi G.:
Bank Tied to Candidate Is Shuttered
By VICTORIA MCGRANE And DOUGLAS BELKIN
Illinois regulators Friday shuttered a Chicago bank closely tied to the Democratic candidate running for President Barack Obama's former U.S. Senate seat.
Broadway Bank is owned by the family of Illinois state Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias, who is locked in a competitive race in this year's elections. His role at the institution has become a central issue in the race.
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. sold the bank's $1.1 billion in deposits and essentially all of its assets to MB Financial Bank of Chicago. The FDIC estimates the bank's failure will cost the deposit-insurance fund $394.3 million. MB Financial and the FDIC entered into an agreement in which the agency will share losses on $878.4 million of Broadway Bank's assets.
Late Friday, Mr. Giannoulias told the Associated Press that the collapse of the bank will inspire him to work harder in his bid to win the Senate race. He said he knows first hand the impact that the economy has had on people and businesses in Illinois.
"There was no bailout for my father's bank. It is an incredibly sad and heartbreaking day for me and for my family. This bank has helped thousands of people when no one else would give them a chance," he said. "What has happened tonight is just a sliver of the hardship which has become endemic in our society only strengthens my resolve."
More than 200 banks have failed since the beginning of 2008, many struck down by bad construction loans and mortgages. Illinois in particular has seen a large number of failures.
Four years ago, Mr. Giannoulias used his position as a top official at the institution as a primary credential in his campaign to become treasurer in 2006. Since the bank has run into problems, his opponent, Republican U.S. Rep. Mark Kirk, has used it as a bludgeon against him in their Senate race.
Mr. Kirk overtook Mr. Giannoulias in several recent polls and now enjoys a single-digit lead. He also has the edge in fund-raising.
Mr. Giannoulias has tried to soften the blow by predicting the bank's demise. He has also repeatedly said that when he left the bank four years ago, it was on solid financial ground.
Still, Mr. Kirk has been relentless on the issue, prompting Mr. Giannoulias, playing off Joe Biden's criticism of Rudy Guliani's repeated mention of 9/11, to quip that every sentence Mr. Kirk utters has three things: a noun, a verb and Broadway Bank.
A Kirk victory would represent a Republican pick-up in the Senate and a potentially embarrassing coda for Mr. Obama's Illinois political caree
Rahm can aspire all he wants to, but I suspect the reality is his ambitions are deader than Judge Carter and about as revivable.
His strategy as DCCC chair gave them with an uncontrollable majority whose many new members are GWTW as suddenly as they arrived. His strategy looked brilliant, but I suggest he had too little experience in elected politics (he's been a career staffer until he squeezed himself in to his Illinois seat) to grasp the pitfalls of his inexperience. Likewise I don't think he understood much if anything about the national electorate, the fleetingness of its anger with Republican incompetence, the massive distrust of government (well documented since at least 1996), and how easy it would be for the chaotic Dems to replace the Stupid Party as the object of voters' fury.
IOW, he's toast for a lot of reasons. I think his only future lies in some cushy Wall Street job where he can become a David Patterson-like figure: incompetent but mildly useful for whom he knows.
John, Illinois is ready for some change, but probably not all the change people think.
The current Blagojevich mess is due to a 3rd party candidate who got 10 percent in the 06 IL Gov race, Rich Whitney, and took a lot of dissatisfied voters who would have voted for GOP moderate Judy Baar Topinka (who is running for IL Comptroller now). Brady, IL Gov GOP 2010, could eke out a win past Quinn unless Brady's very right social positions are brought to bright light, which most upstate Illinois voters will reject. Quinn boldly pushed for a (necessary) tax hike, but shadow governor's John Cullerton, and more importantly Mike Madigan, won't bring that for a vote. Quinn's making some cuts, but not enough. Whitney is running again but is suffering an establishment media blackout (Whitney4Gov.org) and Scott Lee Cohen, booted from IL Dem 2010 Lt Gov, is running as independent.
As for the US SEN race, Alexi is pretty much toast, but its too late in the game to get someone else less the IL Dems run the risk of getting Obama'd (by Kirk) or Keyes'd (by themselves) depending on your take of the 04 IL US SEN race. Kirk shouldn't win because he's all over the map flipping and flopping turning from moderate center GOP Congressman in liberal district to arch-conservative for GOP primary even though he had zero legitimate competition to running back moderate for general. Kirk will probably win, but he won't pass the Peter Fitzgerald test (fighting for firm beliefs) and he'll probably get back-stabbed by the IL GOP which is a mess. However, if and when Kirk wins US SEN race, the RNC and Natl GOP will be showering their new wonderboy.
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