BGA's Andy Shaw Clouted His Kids into Magnet Schools, But NOW it's a Scandal. Scandalous, Shocking and Oh, So Progressive.

Beachwood Reporter's publisher, editor and scalpel sharp wit, Steve Rhodes, a rock-ribbed Liberal of the Old School, plucked this gem out of the same old manure that passes for Chicago Journalism:

By Steve Rhodes

Mayor Daley recently half-joked that the burgeoning CPS clout scandal at least showed that some Chicago schools had become so desirable during his tenure that parents and politicians were willing to cheat to get their kids admitted into them.

But Marj Halperin's 1988 Chicago magazine article called "The Lottery" - which she recently shared with District 299 blogger Alexander Russo - shows that clout admissions and the controversial "principal picks" now under federal investigation pre-date the Richard M. Daley era.

Here's how Halperin opened her piece:

"Governor Thompson got his kid in. So did state representatives Ellis Levin and Al Ronan. You'll find the daughter of Alderman Patrick O'Connor, head of the City Council's education committee, in a magnet classroom this year. Alderman Ed Smith's, too.

"TV reporter Andy Shaw's daughters are in LaSalle Language Academy, the same as one-time Chicago Sting soccer star Karl Heinz Granitza's children. Monroe Anderson, the Mayor's press secretary and a former Newsweek reporter, sends his son to Inter-American Magnet. Perhaps if he drops Scott off himself, Anderson gives a nod to some of the Board of Ed employees, who also send their children to Inter-American - such as Margarita Rosa, of the board's research and evaluation office. Fernando Colon got his daughter in while working for the board's law department.

http://www.beachwoodreporter.com/column/the_monday_papers_166.php

This morning, I read that the Principal of Whitney Young has been subpoenaed to appear before a Federal Grand Jury on clout for classes!

This nonsense was kicked into overdrive by the mopes who are too lazy to really follow a lead. The same hypocrites who gave padded jobs to Bernadine Dorhn and Billy Ayers were huffing and puffing about the smell of clout at the University of Illinois. They were demanding immediate resignations ( Can I get a Harrumph?) of Trustees and rending their garments that 'No Such Clout Actions Took Place on Their Watches! ( I Didn't Hear a Harrumph From That Guy.Abner! Let Me Hear a Harrumph!).

The Newly Minted BGA Watch Pup, Andy ('What Floor?') Shaw clouted his kids into a school and is now sniffing out corruption? The two Brooks Brothers Bolsheviks who ran University of Illinois (Urbana & CC) who clouted the Underground Nick and Nora Charles into padded sinecures at Northwestern and UICC and padlocked any information on their actions are Howling out Jeremiads?

Progressive Hypocrisy makes Bathhouse John Coughlin and Hinky Dink Kenna seem like Trappist Monks.

Well done Steve Rhodes!

Dan Proft - The Only Candidate for Governor Offering a Real Solution to School Reform

I love Clout. I'd love to have some. Like my helot neighbors, I watch the checking balance dip close to the danger zone each pay period - mortgage, groceries, McAuley Tuition (paid), McAuley books for one ($ 600 + Paid), gas ( $30 fill-up), Mr. Swifty Dry Cleaning (Priceless), Cable ( $58), ComEd ( a lung), People Gas ( the other lung), ATT ($$$$) and of course my extravagant lifestyle that takes me to the Islands ( Blue Island, Stony Island & if I am very good Treasure Island in Old Town).

Clout is that thing you read about in the newspapers and hear on TV - it is a very good thing. I once witnessed a Cook County Board Reformer bully an underling at City Hall Office of Special Events for his Taste of Chicago VIP passes, only to see him on Chicago Tonight with the nodders as he railed against the Bosses!Bosses? The fact is the only genuine exercises of Clout that I have ever witnessed were performed by the Pilates Class of Reformers -"Do You Know Who I Am?"

Yes, Madam, and what you are!

Well, now Dan Proft is running for Governor as a Republican. I just voted for John McCain and have yet to get over that gum scraping.

However, I have always been charmed - charmed I tells you - by Dan Proft's simple declarative sentences that lack any and all passive/aggression that so clearly marks a Progressive, or a goof.

Pat Quinn is earnest. He always seemed to be too good of a guy to be a Progressive, but he plays ball with them and that is enough to put this boy off his Hungry Man dinner. Poor Pat Quinn is staked out for the dingoes.

Dan Hynes? He'll be fine; he always is.

But Dan Proft is the only man in the race talking the truth about Clout for School Reform. Proft's Clout should get him every vote of every Illinois voter who understands that Public Education in Illinois is a Fixed Deal - an Old Country Buffet of empty calories.

Proft wants to make every Illinois school child and their families Clout Captains. Proft is a hard kid. He will brook no guff or back sass from the Nose Gays in the News Business or the Cadillac Commies of SEIU. He has taken some hard hits and yet always manages to get a nice Knuckley one between the lamps of the cheap-shot artists.

Wouldn't you like to have the same "clout" as the politically-connected,
particularly when it came to the education of your children?

Are you tired of a system that discriminates against families based on
their income and address?

Well, under a Proft administration, you have been pre-selected for the
"clout list".

With 13,000 Chicago Public School families with children on waiting
lists to attend charter schools, is it any wonder that a few parents
with political connections would try to get their children into one of
Chicago's elite schools? Of course it isn't. It is entirely natural for
parents to want the best education possible for their children.

Instead of scrambling over a pile of other politicians and media elites
to more vociferously denounce the CPS clout list, I pledge to do the
opposite: I will formalize it and to expand it. It's as simple as this:

If your name is in the phone book, your name is on the clout list.

As governor, I will create a Universal Clout Program.

In a Proft Administration every family, regardless of address or income,
that is currently faced with the prospects of sending their children to
schools that we know will fail them, would be able to send their child
to the school of their choice. Instead of sending education dollars to
centralized bureaucracies like CPS, a Proft Administration will attach
those dollars to the students, allowing their parents to choose which
school is best for their child.

As governor, I will invest in children, not Soviet-era bureaucracies
like CPS.

Competition works.

I like Clout. Hope we all get some.