1. See, kids, this right here is why I love Illinois politics.

a. I thought Illinois had our token this-guy-can't-be-for-real gubernatorial candidate in Andy Martin. Hard to say why I assumed we would have only one of them, as our political echelon has never lacked for characters, crooks, or crazies. I see now that I gave short shrift to Jim Oberweis. Maybe I gave him too much credit because the last time he was running for something, this guy was hogging all the this-guy-can't-be-for-real attention. In any case, I was painfully incorrect:

At the end of a political campaign it's not uncommon for a candidate to grasp at straws, but Jim Oberweis literally proposed drawing straws to decide who should stay in the race for the Republican nomination for governor, two of his rivals said Saturday. . . . Bill Brady and Ron Gidwitz said Oberweis early last week proposed a game of chance to decide which of the three should stay in the race with front-runner Judy Baar Topinka. Brady and Gidwitz said the odds were heavily stacked in Oberweis' favor.

"He wanted 10 straws and Brady and I each would have one straw," Gidwitz said Saturday, before the Elmhurst St. Patrick's Day Parade. He said Oberweis wanted 10 straws "because he's the leader and because neither one of us is, in his mind, in contention." Gidwitz, a Chicago businessman, called the request "absurd" but said Oberweis was "totally serious" about it.

Brady, a state senator from Bloomington and, like Oberweis, a conservative, said he received a similar request to draw straws. "He said, `If God wanted you to be the candidate, it wouldn't matter how many straws you have,'" Brady recalled Oberweis saying. "I said, `Jim, I'm not interested.' It's the dumbest thing I've ever heard. The people of Illinois need to decide who the nominee should be, not straws."

The best part, of course, is his appeal to divine providence, which he obviously believes in so strongly that he rigged the game of "chance" to heavily favor his "odds." I'm sure the Man Upstairs appreciates the assist.

b. And on the off chance you didn't get the idea that this guy lives in a different world than most of us do:

Oberweis also began running a new TV ad over the weekend featuring news footage of Topinka dancing with former Gov. George Ryan, who is awaiting the outcome of jury deliberations following after his trial on federal corruption charges. . . . Oberweis has sought throughout the campaign to link Topinka to Ryan. . . . Oberweis has acknowledged that in 2004, while running in the GOP primary for U.S. Senate, he twice met with Ryan to seek his support. Ryan went on to make calls encouraging support for Oberweis.

"But but but...I didn't know he was a crook at the time, I swear!"


c. Let's see...if you're a big-shot alderman whose son-in-law not only doesn't toe your line but whores around on your daughter, how can you act out your aggressions without, you know, totally destroying your daughter's family?

On the Democratic side, Ald. Richard Mell (33rd) extended his feud with his son-in-law, Democratic Gov. Rod Blagojevich, by featuring primary challenger Edwin Eisendrath at a bingo game of senior citizens in the ward. But Mell stopped short of a formal endorsement.


Mell said Blagojevich's name is on the ward's palm cards being distributed to voters, but added that his powerful ward organization wouldn't be working very hard for his son-in-law on Election Day. "I'm not pushing like I did four years ago," Mell said. "The effort in the 33rd Ward is not like it was. Four years ago, we had 1,000 people in everybody else's ward."

2. And this right here is why I love (and hate) Illinois sports. *snif*