Governor tries to break the mold by John Kass

Governor tries to break the mold
by John Kass
Copyright © 2009, Chicago Tribune
September 6, 2009
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-kass-06-sep06,0,1636193.column

The man I called Gov. Jell-O in last week's column was sitting across from me at breakfast, ordering.

"I'll have the corn flakes with banana," said Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn. "And some of your banana bread."

Then it was my turn. The moment of truth. If a sportscaster were calling the play-by-play, he'd have said, "And now, it all ... comes down ... to this."

"And you, sir?" asked the waiter.

A little voice in my head was telling me not to do it. But I didn't listen. Then my wife's voice walked around in there. She just loves Gov. Quinn, but I didn't listen to her, either. Sorry, honey.

"Sir?" asked the waiter again, pen poised over his pad.

"Oh, all right. Do you have any Jell-O? A bowl of Jell-O might be nice," I said.

Quinn groaned and gave me a look, but he's not mean enough for a withering stare. As there was no Jell-O to be had, we began talking politics over bowls of corn flakes.

"I've only been governor for seven months," Quinn said. "That's all. If you do your best, you'll make mistakes, but if people think you're doing your best and you're an honest person and you're addressing the issues, I think people give you a pretty wide berth."

Quinn has been given a wide berth. He's a decent guy and likable, with no scandals or history of insider politics. He's always talking about citizens taking power from the bosses through referendums. But that wide berth is shrinking, with a challenger, Illinois Comptroller Dan Hynes, hammering the idea that Quinn is too indecisive to lead. Quinn encouraged the Gov. Jell-O thing all by himself.

He mishandled the University of Illinois admissions scandal issue. And he hurt himself by negotiating away reform measures with the legislature, just so the Illinois Democratic Party wouldn't make an endorsement in the gubernatorial race. Hynes seized on that last week.

"It's complete fiction," Quinn said. "I've been against slatemaking by the Democratic Party since I got out of college in 1972. My view is: In primaries, voters should have a choice, not the so-called party bigwigs.

"But in the case of Dan Hynes, he was slated. His dad [former Cook County Assessor Tom Hynes] lined things up for him, and he was slated by the party for comptroller."

As Hynes frames Quinn as the weak governor by happenstance, independent Quinn is framing Hynes as the calculating, bloodless princeling of the Chicago machine. They both like taxes. It should be an interesting Democratic campaign, and it's not even Labor Day.

Political writers say voters don't begin focusing until September, but I figure they're so sick of politics, they'll block it out for as long as possible. That could help Quinn.

The governor figures the voters will understand what he was facing when he took over the office last January, as former Gov. Dead Meat was kicked out. And he thinks Hynes is vulnerable.

"I wouldn't want somebody as governor who didn't participate in the tough struggles of this year," Quinn said. "Illinois' darkest hour was Jan. 29. Nobody came in, in a tougher time than I did. Dan Hynes did not want to help then or any day since. He wanted to campaign for attorney general, but then switched his focus to me."

Quinn has lost political writers and insiders who view him as a gadfly. But he has a chance to repair his image if he'd just show a willingness to fight, rather than appease.

He backed down from his promise to oust all University of Illinois trustees when the two African-American trustees threatened to fight it out. But on Friday he made the final appointments for a mostly new U. of I. board.

They'll soon be waltzing the university's chancellor and president over to the political guillotine.

So, governor, when will the board act?

"Promptly, promptly," he said. "It won't be the first meeting, but it will be very prompt."

And once those heads thunk and begin rolling, Quinn will get the credit, and voters may forget his earlier indecision.

He'll also start thwacking Hynes on the comptroller's role in regulating the cemetery industry, after graves in Burr Oak Cemetery were desecrated in an alleged scheme for cash. Hynes doesn't have all that much power over cemeteries, but he did make an issue of watchdogging the "death industry" years ago, and Quinn will stick him with it.

"There's never been a governor of Illinois least picked by 'the powers that be' of either party than me," Quinn said. "I think I can beat any Democrat. I think I can beat any Republican who's thinking about running for governor."

That doesn't sound like Jell-O to me, but then, it'll be a long campaign and we'll see how much backbone each man has.