I was a Chicago ward heeler; tearing down posters, packing press kits, and other campaign adventures

Washington Monthly, March, 1988 by John Eisendrath

Eventually, of course, the campaign does get coverage. With 49 other alderman races to write about, as well as a bitter campaign for mayor, all the press has time for is the basic "who's who" piece. One by one the reporters come by the office, which we conveniently over-staff for the occasion, and get down to the business of parachute journalism. Invariably they neither know nor care about the issues. Their interest is strictly money (as in "Aren't you buying the election?") and the mayor's race ("who do you support?"). When pressed about issues, most reporters, in a discouraging chorus, reply: "Do you have a press kit?"

There were several candidates running for mayor, but as far as the press was concerned it was Harold Washington vs. the "regulars." Considering Chicago's political heritage, it's no surprise that the term regular--as in regular Democrat--is synonymous with "hack." It's applied principally to members of Mayor Daley's machine and their political heirs. Politicians who broke ranks with Daley and those allied with him are "independents." It's a sign of Daley's lingering influence that more than ten years after his death local politicians are still judged in relation to the Boss.

The press likes it this way. It makes it easy to categorize candidates and handicap races. Either you're a hack or you're not. In a racially polarized city like Chicago there is an implicit message as well: if you're not with Mayor Washington, you're a racist. Although the mayor made no formal endorsement, everyone knew he supported The Opponent. That made Edwin the regular. It only made matters worse when Edwin suggested such preconceptions were dated. In the Sun-Times's "who's who" piece, Edwin was reviled for insisting he was not a mouthpiece for the machine. To this "boast of independence," the Sun-Times replied that Edwin "fit snugly inside political webs."

Besides running a series of tabloid-style overview pieces (the recurring headline during the runoff: "The battle of the bluebloods"), the media focused primarily on making the candidates look as foolish as possible. Without any proof, the Tribune wondered aloud if The Opponent actually lived in the ward. Edwin, who had lived in the same neighborhood for 23 of his 28 years, was chastised by the paper for having the chutzpah to allege he was a lifelong ward resident. Items like these, which the gossip columnists love, appear in every campaign and rarely, if ever, affect the outcome. Still, they reflect the patronizing attitude of so many political reporters who believe that, on the evolutionary scale, candidates are to used car salesmen what baboons are to the rest of us. Their attitude seems to be: whatever you're selling, we're not buying.

A certain press skepticism is, of course, warranted. Campaigns are wars with each side looking for any advantage; to get it, both sides try to manipulate the press. One week before the run-off, for instancje, I turned on the evening news and was shocked to hear that my favorite deli, an extremely popular spot in the middle of the ward, was going to be torn down in favor of a high rise. Shock turned to panic when The Opponent, his cursed face now getting precious air time, told the reporter he was fighting the fatcat developers who supported Edwin and wanted to make money at the neighborhood's expense.