The Illinois primary of February 2 featured a 6-candidate race for the Democratic nomination for Lieutenant Governor. The race included four Democratic state legislators and a political newcomer, Scott Lee Cohen. To the surprise of almost everyone, Cohen won the primary with 26.0% of the vote.
Cohen has personal foibles, as described in this Chicago Sun-Times article. In Illinois, candidates for Governor and Lieutenant Governor run as a team in the general election, even though at the primary, the offices are voted on separately. The article also mentions that reporters asked Governor Pat Quinn if he might consider resigning from the Democratic ticket, and run as an independent candidate, so as to free himself from being on a joint ticket with Cohen. The Governor replied, “Let’s take a look at how the situation evolves.” Obviously the Governor is hoping that Cohen will resign from being the Democratic nominee for Lieutenant Governor.
In 1986, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Adlai Stevenson resigned from the Democratic ticket after the primary had produced a situation in which his Lieutenant Governor running mate was otherwise going to be a follower of Lyndon LaRouche. Back then, Stevenson was not permitted to run as an independent candidate because he had already missed the filing deadline, so Stevenson qualified as the nominee of a new party, with an entirely different Lieutenant Governor running mate. The new party was the Illinois Solidarity Party. The Illinois Solidarity Party, with Stevenson as its gubernatorial running mate, polled 40% for Governor. The Democratic party slate that year had no one for Governor and the LaRouche follower for Lieutenant Governor, and that joint slate polled 7%. If the Democratic Party combination of no one for Governor and the LaRouche follower for Lieutenant Governor had polled under 5%, the Democratic Party would have lost its standing as a qualified party for all partisan office in the state. It would have retained its status as a qualified party for most district offices and all statewide offices, but it would have been off the ballot in those districts in which it had not run any nominee, which would have included a large number of legislative districts and partisan county offices.
Nowadays, the independent petition deadline is much later, and Quinn, if he wished, could run as an independent candidate with a new Lieutenant Governor candidate.
I think the Green Party could be entering a Renaissance period. If they work hard and continue to get breaks like this one, and the situation in Texas they’ll be in decent shape on a national level. Also, up here in New York State our Democratic governor is very unpopular. If he wins his primary the Greens could maybe, just maybe, get their ballot line back. Illinois, Texas, New York….You never know what could happen.
Richard,
Since you brought up the 1986 Illinois elections and “I was there,” as they say, permit me a few what ifs, that we might learn a few lessons from. (see below)
FYI, I was the campaign manager for the LaRouche Democrats who won the Lieutenant Governor as well as Secretary of State as well as 2 Democratic Congressional Nominations in that year of 1986.
FYI, Adlai Stevenson, had previous met with LaRouche and was in agreement with us on many issues of substance.
FYI, Adlai Stevenson intended to pursue the Democratic nomination for President, had he been elected Governor. Any one who knows his family history or speaks with him personally will know the truth of the above statement.
FYI, Adlai Stevenson was threatened by the late Senator Paul Simon among others, with being called a neo-Nazi if he stuck on the ticket with LaRouche. That statment can be verified by looking at an interview Adlai did with a Burlington, Vermont paper after his sanctimonious fall.
FYI, If Adlai had not succumbed to the threats, he most likely would have become Governor and then gone on to secure the Democratic Presidential nomination and ACTUALLY BECOME PRESIDENT!!!
Now, what this means is that Mark Fairchild, LaRouche Democrat, would have become Lieut. Gov, which means that Adlai Stevenson would have had the benefit of the knowledge and wisdom of Lyndon LaRouche, the world’s foremost American System physical economist, and the author today of the new 4 Power Alliance of India, China, Russia, and the US, a budding alliance to rebuild the collapsed world economy with a new credit system to replace the dead, bankrupt Anglo-Dutch globalization system which has died and whose PRIVATE GAMBLING DEBTS are presently being bailed out with TRILLIONS of dollars of PUBLIC TAX DOLLARS ILLEGALLY!!!
Conclusion, We could have avoided the last 20 plus years leading to economic disaster, had LaRouche been brought onto the scene back in the 1980’s, which was what the results of the Illinois Primary and Many Others that year should have resulted in……….
So, listen to LaRouche NOW, and quit listening to bankrupt idiots…. Gerald Pechenuk, LaRouche PAC
I’m sure that Mr. LaRouche shared his knowledge and wisdom with Reverend Jim Bakker, his roommate in federal prison.
to Steve Rankin,
Was Larouche right about the crash of the global speculative financial system LIGHT YEARS ahead of everyone else? YOUR DAMN RIGHT HE WAS TOTALLY RIGHT!!
You might actually have to read some of Mr. Larouche and actually think, for a change, and then SEE what world leaders, including people in the US, SEE in Larouche, and SEE what the young people SEE in LaRouche, because your old SORE ASS smart aleck bullshit don’t count for a nickel, any more…..
Sorry Steve, you can’t live in the past, come up to the present and present some positive alternatives for the future. That would be the human thing to do!!
In the meantime, get on http://www.larouchepac.com and enjoy!! Gerald Pechenuk, LaRouche PAC
Cohen dramatically outspent everyone else, best as I can tell. (I haven’t looked at the disclosure data.) He had the most ads, he was the only one who did direct mail all over the state. And the two legislators who would erstwhile have been the most likely winners were both African-American legislators from the West Side of Chicago, so they cut into each other’s base. I wasn’t paying that much attention to the Democrats’ Lieutenant Governor race, but I thought Cohen was going to win. I don’t know what the big shot Democrats can offer as a serious excuse.
Jim Broadway of State School News Service remarks that one possibility is that the legislature could simply threaten to strip the Lieutenant Governor of all job duties and almost all salary. So I suppose there’s leverage there. We’ll see.
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To Skull/Bones:
You seem to spend most of your days in Uranus.