Mayor’s Row……by Ned Mitchell
Try as hard as I could finding a good way to sum up the two candidates the Democrats and Republicans have put forth this fall, I still kept coming up short. That was until I was reading a Chicago newspaper recently and a columnist up that way described Governor Rod Blagojevich the Democrat and Treasurer Judy Barr Topinka, the Republican as being like two horns on the head of the same goat. John Kass, the columnist, then went on to apologize to all of the goats in Illinois!
Traveling around Southern Illinois and talking to friends of both major political parties in Springfield and Chicago I am finding a huge amount of discontent in the governor’s race. I have had life long democrats tell me they are embarrassed to say so but they are going to stick with Blagojevich simply because even though they think he will eventually be indicted at least the Lt. Governor, Pat Quinn is a democrat. I have had life long Republicans tell me there is no way they will vote for Topinka and they will just not vote in that race. Then I have had Democrats and Republicans tell me they are so disgruntled with their lack of choice they will move to the Green Party and vote for Carbondale attorney Rich Whitney.
My personal thoughts on the matter as I have written about before are that I do not believe that Speaker Mike Madigan and Chicago Mayor Richard Daley want Blagojevich in office for another term. The federal heat is on Blagojevich and more so now that his close friend and advisor Antoin Redko has been indicted. My guess is there will be two more waves of indictments forthcoming real soon, one involving campaign manager Christopher Kelly and the other involving Joe Cini and others being investigated for hiring fraud. This promises to be the Goorge Ryan scandal for the Democrats if they stay on the same page in this election. My guess is this all interferes with Attorney General Lisa Madigan’s future plans for governor four years from now. Speaker Madigan and Mayor Daley will not publicly do this, they are much too slick for that. They will be behind the scenes and will not deliver the vote in the city in November. I suspect their troops will not be working the vineyards on Election Day like they usually do. That suppresses the vote in the Democratic city and helps Topinka.
Personally I have close friends who work for the Governor and they of course will be there working as hard as they can to re elect him, after all their job is on the line. I have close friends who are Democrats to the point that no matter what is going on, they are voting Democrat this fall and that is it. Republican friends on the other hand smell the blood in the water and would like to have the Governor’s office back so they are working overtime to elect Topinka. I also have close Republican friends who will vote Republican this fall for no reason other than they are Republicans. Thankfully I am in neither category this fall and can vote my conscience and do what I feel is best.
One thing that is turning people off this fall is the growing tradition of negative campaigning by both sides. People are getting sick of all the commercials that just blast their opponent for every thing they have ever done. I don’t know how many more election cycles we can go through before we catch on but I think that day is just around the corner. What would be wrong with candidates putting commercials together and telling us what they are going to do to make our lives better instead of dragging their opponent through the mud? That will only happen when you and I start letting our elected officials know that if they run negative campaigns, we will not vote for them. We can control this conduct and a phone call or letter to the campaign headquarters of those who insult our intelligence with this type of a campaign will eventually take hold. Until we decide to get personally involved this will continue.
Several people have been involved for the past two years or so in attempting to get a doctor in Sesser. That appears to be about to happen as the Christopher Rural Health organization has announced plans for building a new clinic that will house doctor’s offices, a dentist office, and also an in house pharmacy. Several years ago former Sesser resident Keith Kirkpatrick spoke to our annual Chamber of Commerce dinner and outlined several things we need to provide the quality of life our residents want. We have been working behind the scenes on these concepts and pretty well have everything in place except medical facilities. At the time of this writing details are sketchy but as I understand it a new building will be built Anyhow a few interested Sesser residents began to look for a doctor some time ago and we set out in many directions in hopes that we would be able to attract a doctor or two. We personally talked to hospitals in Mt. Vernon, Benton, and Pinckneyville hoping one of them would see fit to open a clinic in Sesser. I met with officials of the Rea Clinic in Christopher and they agreed to look into the matter. I suggested they contact Senator Gary Forby and run the idea by him. Senator Forby was interested and took the ball and ran with it. The result is that Forby secured a one million dollar grant to make this dream a reality for us here in Sesser and for that we are thankful. I am sure by the time this column is published the details will be released and we will know the when and where concerning this great event for Sesser. This is the final piece of the puzzle for us here in Sesser and we are happy and thankful for those who are assisting us in this venture. Special thanks to Kim Mitroka and her staff at the Christopher Rural Health organization. We look forward to becoming partners with them as we provide medical help for our residents.
We are all very saddened by the news of the sudden and untimely death of Appellate Court Justice Terry Hopkins of Mt. Vernon. Terry was a great statesman and a great Democrat. I have followed his career from attorney to Franklin County State’s Attorney to Circuit Judge to Appellate Court Justice. I always had hopes that he would end up on the Illinois Supreme Court, he was that brilliant. Justice Hopkins took the lead this year in the race for the Appellate Court and announced several weeks ago that he personally was going to be watching the conduct of judicial candidates and if any candidate got out of line and started running a negative campaign, he was going to intervene. Terry also was a great stage performer and was on stage at the Sesser Opera House starring in stage productions from time to time. He will be sadly missed by those of us who knew him well enough to call him a friend.
Special birthday wishes go out to Josephine Goessman who turned 82 last Saturday. The special day was celebrated on Sunday with a family dinner hosted by son Dean and wife Margaret.
Bob Kirkpatrick is home after a brief stay in a St. Louis hospital. Randy Whittington is home from treatments at a Houston, Texas hospital.
As a final note we were treated to a special event last Sunday as we attended a music recital at Benton’s First Christian Church. The event was special to us as we watched granddaughter Johnel perform her very first violin recital under the direction of Karen King. King is a fantastic musician in her own right and does an outstanding job in passing along her gift to young students and that my friends is impressive. Often we are all caught up in the sports mania that overwhelms us at all levels of school and so it is refreshing to watch young musicians perform and showcase their talents. Others performing were; Bethany Cottle, Ashley Campbell, Emma Webster, Sophi Johnson, Nicholas Hoffman, Cassidy Neal, Jacob Vanwey, Olivia Vanwey, Sidney Hart, Christian Hoffman, Maria Hoffman, Lauren Lollis, and Jade Neal accompanied by Kevin Webster.
If you need us give us a call at 625-3611 or 625-5322 or write nedmitchell@verizon.net or www.sesser.org .
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