{"id":1217,"date":"2010-03-28T07:34:44","date_gmt":"2010-03-28T12:34:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.progressivefox.com\/?p=1217"},"modified":"2018-08-16T15:52:12","modified_gmt":"2018-08-16T20:52:12","slug":"quinn-simon-it-is-official","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.progressivefox.com\/?p=1217","title":{"rendered":"Quinn-Simon: It is Official"},"content":{"rendered":"

By now most political insiders already know that green yard signs will read, Quinn-Simon for the November 2010 election cycle.\u00a0 My perspective on the selection process might be slightly different from others, so, I decided to pen my own version.\u00a0 I covered the initial\u00a0candidate selection process <\/a>last week.<\/p>\n

Crowds of Turner and \n\t\t

\n\t\t\t \t\n \"quinn_simon\"\n\n \t<\/a>\n\t\t <\/div>\n Krishnamoorthi supporters were shivering in the cool morning air when we arrived at The Inn<\/em> in Springfield around 9:35 a.m. on Saturday morning.\u00a0 These were the only campaigns that seemed to mobilize supporters.\u00a0 In advance of this morning\u2019s event, I only know of three candidates who were working phones up until the last minute to get votes.\u00a0 Sheila Simon and Dirk Enger were calling all committeemen and Raja Krishnamoorthi seems to have invested about six weeks of time calling, e-mailing and snail mailing all of the 38 State Central Committee (SCC) members, was still calling for support.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The Process:<\/strong><\/p>\n

If the first round of \u201cWho Wants to be a Lieutenant Governor\u201d resembled American Idol<\/em>, the second round resembled Survivor<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Each candidate was given an opportunity to make a three minute speech and then the committee could ask each candidate questions (there were no questions asked of any candidate).<\/p>\n

After the presentations, SCC members made nominations for their preferred candidate. The nomination process was followed by an elimination round of voting.\u00a0 Although the nomination came through with one ballot, the process was set up to be more of a process of elimination.\u00a0 Those who received lower vote totals would be dropped and a second round of voting would be used until someone achieved 50% + 1 votes.<\/p>\n

Let the speeches begin:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Before the speeches started, Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr. raised the first question, asking if proxy votes did not violate the \u201cone man, one woman\u201d vote.\u00a0 After a short back and forth, Mike Kasper, the State Central Committee\u2019s legal council, determined that a proxy vote is representative of how that committeeman or committeewoman wanted to vote.\u00a0 Speaker Madigan reassured the committee that the absent SCC members had conveyed their interests to him before granting proxy votes.<\/p>\n

Candidates were allowed to speak in alphabetical order.\u00a0 Senator Susan Garrett and Senator Dave Koehler withdrew before the day began, dropping the number of applicants to fourteen. Of the\u00a0fourteen candidates to speak, I only took notes on the few who struck me as interesting.<\/p>\n

Jennifer and I came supporting the labor candidate, union ironworker, Dirk Enger.\u00a0 Enger’s speech\u00a0was notably interrupted with applause more than the others candidates\u00a0during his eloquent presentation.\u00a0 The same energy, passion and integrity that fills the room when Enger typically speaks was present during his three minute stump speech.<\/p>\n

Also impressive was Lori Koziana, a veteran U.S. Navy Corpsman and a current teacher in the Chicago public school system.\u00a0 Now I know why fellow blogger, Carl Nyberg, was a strong advocate for Koziana.\u00a0 She is truly worthy of serving in a public capacity.\u00a0 Koziana focused her closing remarks on education; using the opportunity to draw attention to the education funding crisis in Illinois.<\/p>\n

Raja Krishnamoorthi is worth mentioning because of his passionate and energizing run that seemed to empower a whole new demographic of political activists.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Raja, who, as a comptroller candidate, opened every speech this past fall by translating the “ancient Asian meaning” of\u00a0Raja Krishnamoorthi to mean, Illinois Comptroller, corrected that\u00a0translation error this morning.\u00a0 He said, \u201cafter further research I have determined that Raja Krishnamoorthi really means Lieutenant Governor, and so I knew that I had to apply for this job.\u201d\u00a0 He focused on his success in the collar counties, his fundraising prowess, his downstate roots in Peoria and the fact that, as the first Asian-American statewide candidate, \u201cyou can make history.\u201d\u00a0 His supporters cheered enthusiastically at his opening and closing \u2013 energized by the prospect of being part of that history.<\/p>\n

Iris Martinez, the only Latino candidate, and Paul Park, perhaps the most intelligent and thoughtful candidate, further filled out the tapestry of the Democratic Party.\u00a0 I give Megan Drilling credit for painting a yard sign image in my mind by closing with the idea that, \u201ca winning ticket means Quinn-Drilling.\u201d\u00a0 I can see the Republicans picking up on running someone with the last name Drilling.<\/p>\n

But, at the end of the day, it came down to a race between Art Turner, the second-largest vote getter on Feb. 2nd, and Sheila Simon, the daughter of the late Senator Paul Simon.\u00a0 Both gave articulate arguments and took more than their allotted\u00a0three minutes of time.\u00a0 Both were well received, earning deserved applause, but at the end of both speeches, I wasn\u2019t left with the impression that either one had a burning desire to serve in this capacity.<\/p>\n

Sheila Simon was greeted with a warm, lengthy, respectful round of applause while Turner\u2019s supporters raised the roof for a full minute before his extended speech.<\/p>\n

Nominations, Votes and Supporters:<\/strong><\/p>\n

There were a total of\u00a0five nominations to include Simon, Turner, Krishnamoorthi, St. Angel and Enger.\u00a0 \n\t\t

\n\t\t\t \t\n \"votes\"\n\n \t<\/a>\n\t\t <\/div>\n With no more motions on the floor, Madigan called for a vote.\u00a0 I scanned the results of that vote into this blog so people can see how every committeeperson voted.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the most telling moment was after Sheila Simon was announced as the Lt. Governor nominee.\u00a0 Turner\u2019s entire half of the room was dead silent, drowned out by the sounds of camera flashes and applause from those who fought side-by-side with Paul throughout his career.\u00a0 It will be interesting to see how this one plays out in the general election.<\/p>\n

Was this a Democratic, bottom-up process or a top-down, back-room deal-making process?<\/strong><\/p>\n

We will never know what made\u00a0Rep. Boland, Sen. Garrett and Sen. Koehler decide to step aside.\u00a0 By getting out of the race, those candidates freed up more votes for Sheila Simon, the eventual winner.\u00a0 We know for a fact that Governor Quinn was making calls on behalf of Sheila Simon.\u00a0 We know for a fact that Speaker Madigan was counting votes for Sheila Simon, or perhaps just counting votes to help determine if he should use his 80,000 votes or just pass (he did officially pass).\u00a0 There was some evidence that members of Senator Durbin\u2019s staff were involved in whipping votes for Simon.\u00a0 With that many players all pulling in the same direction, it would be hard to see how this vote could have turned out any differently.<\/p>\n

So, it is probably safe to say that 8-10 candidates got all dressed up, carefully prepared resumes, and gave a three minute stump speech that fell on deaf ears.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The best-organized candidate won with a lot of help from party insiders who had the connections and experience to give the Governor his desired running mate.\u00a0 I tend to think that Governor Quinn should get to pick his running mate to balance out the ticket, but someone should change the law so we don\u2019t have to go through this again.<\/p>\n

And, as long as we are in Illinois, I feel that we should have a qualified Lt. Governor just in case.\u00a0 After all, this is Illinois; a state that continues to deliver the best and worst that politics has to offer.\u00a0 The open process and end results represent one of the better sides, but I would have been happy with any number of the ones who stepped forward \u2013 happiest with my union brother and respected friend, Dirk Enger.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By now most political insiders already know that green yard signs will read, Quinn-Simon for the November 2010 election cycle.\u00a0 My perspective on the selection process might be slightly different from others, so, I decided to pen my own version.\u00a0 I covered the initial\u00a0candidate selection process last week. Crowds of Turner and Krishnamoorthi supporters were […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[78],"tags":[105,332,325,2869,324,334,321,335,139,45,333,329],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.progressivefox.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1217"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.progressivefox.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.progressivefox.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.progressivefox.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.progressivefox.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1217"}],"version-history":[{"count":34,"href":"http:\/\/www.progressivefox.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1217\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7188,"href":"http:\/\/www.progressivefox.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1217\/revisions\/7188"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.progressivefox.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1217"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.progressivefox.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1217"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.progressivefox.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1217"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}