1. Stan Jones, Montana’s Libertarian candidate for the Senate, is the only —– running for office in the United States this election?
A. Co-producer of “Jackass: The Movie”
B. Blue man
C. Former husband of Anna Nicole Smith
D. Unitarian
2. In mid-October, while on a political trip through Iowa, Al Gore again began wearing something he had not been wearing for several weeks. What was it?
A. His pants
B. His wedding ring
C. A tie
D. A hairpiece
3. Both Rod Blagojevich and Jim Ryan have indicated raising taxes is not the way to solve the state’s budget crunch. Of course, George H.W. Bush made the same pledge as U.S. president and failed to get re-elected. Name the Illinois governor who failed to get re-elected for instituting the first-ever state income tax.
A. Dan Walker
B. John Peter Altgeld
C. Richard Ogilvie
D. Otto Kerner
4. This is the big weekend for political attack ads. Below are quotes from four local TV commercials. Can you identify the candidate being maligned?
A. “If you showed up for work half the time would you get a promotion or a pink slip?”
B. “Coerced testimony. Court reprimands. Wrong for Illinois.”
C. “No crime fighting experience. None.”
D. “After having put an innocent man on Death Row for seven years, won’t even give us a straight answer. . . . It’s a failure of leadership.”
5. True or false: Chicago’s reputation for political corruption is so rank throughout Illinois that no one who has served as the city’s mayor has ever been elected Illinois governor.
6. Fill in the blank: Mike Taylor, a former Denver hairstylist and beauty-school owner, dropped out of Montana’s U.S. Senate race on Oct. 10 after accusing Democrats of making him ——-. (Two weeks later, he re-entered the race, declaring that after much soul-searching and prayer he has concluded it doesn’t matter if you win or lose, it’s how you play the game.)
A. “Look unkempt.”
B. “Look ugly”
C. “Look like a toy poodle left out in a rainstorm”
D. “Look gay”
7. Voters won’t just be deciding on officeholders Tuesday. There will be the usual number of local issues to be decided, typically of no interest to anyone outside the affected boundaries and, sometimes, within them, too. Which of the following referendums will NOT be on a ballot next week?
A. Shall a park district to be named the “Rice Township Park District” be established and organized with the same legal boundaries as Rice Township, Jo Davies County, Illinois?
B. Shall the City of Oakbrook Terrace become a home rule unit of local government?
C. Should the City of Chicago be allowed to offer special-issue bonds to cover cost over-runs of Soldier Field construction?
D. Shall Aurora Township be allowed to make contracts with a city, village, or any corporation relating to disposition of garbage and refuse for unincorporated Aurora Township?
8. Ka-ching. That noise you hear is political machinery revving up for the 2004 presidential campaign. Races are run on cash. In federal elections, who is the Big Donors’ Darling, the man who has raked in more dough than anyone for the past 14 years, according to a study by the Center for Responsive Politics?
9. Saddam Hussein, who managed to get an astounding 100 percent of the vote in Iraq’s election on Oct. 16, used which of the following songs as his party’s official anthem:
A. “I Will Always Love You”
B. “Love Stinks”
C. “I Am Woman, Hear Me Roar.”
D. “I Can’t Get No] Satisfaction.”
10. If Rod Blagojevich is elected governor of Illinois, he’d have one of the most unusual last names the state has ever seen.
His last name would be:
A. Longer than any other governor’s in Illinois history
B. The name with the biggest variety of vowels
C. The only one since before the Civil War to begin with a “B.”
D. All of the above
11. If Jim Ryan wins the gubernatorial election, he’ll have one of the shortest last names among Illinois’ governors. What other governors had only four letters in their last name? Hint: There were four.
12. Connecticut State Rep. Dennis Cleary is finding some friction in an unlikely spot. Who has taken out a newspaper ad supporting his opponent.
A. Cleary’s priest
B. Cleary’s high school political science teacher
C. His condo association
D. His brother, mother and sister
13. Forbes magazine recently came out with its list of the richest American politicians. The state mentioned most frequently as the home of the top 10 richest politicians was:
A. New York
B. California
C. Texas
D. South Dakota
14. Things can get worse: George Ryan has had a bumpy four years as governor, what with all the investigations of his previous tenure as Illinois Secretary of State and the trials of various aides on charges of corruption. But other governors have gotten themselves into more trouble. In fact, two have gone to prison. Who were they?
15. Name the Illinois politician known as “Pink Whiskers.”
16. George Ryan is not a relative of Jim Ryan. But in campaign ads, Blagojevich has used their common last name to try to tar candidate Jim with the allegations raised against incumbent George. Which raises the question: Who was Lar “America First” Daly?
17. Name the Chicago mayoral candidate who told voters, “You damned fools. You can either vote for me for mayor or you can go to hell.”
A. Joseph Medill
B. Big Bill Thompson
C. Ed Vrdolyak
D. John Wentworth
18. Sure, much has been made of the help Rod Blagojevich, the Democratic nominee for governor, has received throughout his political career from his father-in-law, Ald. Richard F. Mell (33rd). But this is Chicago, after all, and critics of relatives helping relatives don’t get much of a hearing. As one mayor put it, “If I can’t help my sons, then they can kiss my . . . ” That mayor was:
A. Harold Washington
B. Richard M. Daley
C. Richard J. Daley
D. Big Bill Thompson
19. And, while we’re on the subject of nepotism, which of the following is not the child of a past or present officeholder?
A. Ald. Edward Burke (14th)
B. Jim Ryan, Republican candidate for governor
C. Lisa Madigan, Democratic candidate for attorney general
D. Cook County board member John Daley
20. Who was known as Walkin’ Lawton? Bonus points for at least two other politicians who made a name for themselves by walking great distances to mingle with voters.
And the answers are …
1. Blue man. Jones, 63, turned blue from drinking a solution of colloidal silver that he believed would protect him from disease. He started taking colloidal silver in 1999 for fear that Y2K disruptions might lead to a shortage of antibiotics. “People ask me if it’s permanent and if I’m dead,” he said. “I tell them I’m practicing for Halloween.” He does not take the supplement any longer, but the skin condition, called argyria, is permanent, whether he’s elected or not.
2. His wedding ring. Gore recently acknowledged that he had gained so much weight in his forced political retirement that, after taking off his wedding band, he was unable to get it back on. “Where there’s a will there’s a way,” said Gore’s spokesman, Jano Cabrera. “Or, as is sometimes the case, when there’s the will and a little warm water, there’s a way. The ring’s back on.”
3. Ogilvie, but, interestingly, the man who defeated him, Walker, went to jail after his term in Springfield for fraud in which he misstated his income.
4. A. Rod Blagojevich; B. Joe Birkett; C. Lisa Madigan; D. Jim Ryan
5. False. Edward F. Dunne was mayor from 1905 to 1907 and governor from 1913 to 1917.
6. “Look gay.” Taylor said that a TV ad sponsored by Democrats, which shows Taylor at work as a hairdresser years ago, had destroyed his reputation by suggesting he was gay.
7. C. The general public has never had a chance to vote on anything related to the $632 million Soldier Field project.
8. House Democratic Leader Dick Gephardt of Missouri, with more than $3.7 million in contributions from the top 100 donors. President George W. Bush ranked second. Bill Clinton ranked 87th. Al Gore was 29th.
9. “I Will Always Love You.”
10. All of the above. At 11 letters, his name is two letters longer than the governor with the second-longest last name, Adlai Stevenson. Blagojevich’s name also has the largest variety of vowels — all but U (and Y, but we aren’t really counting that). His is the only name since William H. Bissell in 1857 to begin with a “B.”
11. George H. Ryan, Thomas Ford, Shadrach Bond and John Wood.
12. Those relatives have taken out a newspaper ad supporting the representative’s Democratic rival, saying, “We’re tired of Dennis … Are you?” Brother Jude Cleary calls the pol “corrupt” and “self-serving” and says the falling-out stems from Dennis Cleary’s handling of his father’s estate.
13. New York. New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg (No. 1, with $4.8 billion), gubernatorial candidate Thomas Golisano (No. 3 with $1.1 billion) and U.S. Rep. Amo Houghton (No. 6 with $475 million) hail from New York.
14. Otto Kerner, convicted in 1973 of bribery, conspiracy, income tax evasion, mail fraud and perjury; and Daniel Walker, the last Democrat to serve as governor, for bank fraud and perjury in connection with his failed savings and loan.
15.James Hamilton Lewis, the U.S. Senate’s first Democratic whip. U.S. senator from Illinois, 1913-19, 1931-39. He was noted for his carefully parted red hair, neat pink whiskers and natty attire.
16. Daly, who liked to dress in an Uncle Sam outfit and proposed shooting drug dealers and castrating rapists, was a perennial candidate who ran for just about every major office, including U.S. president and Chicago mayor, between 1932 and his death 46 years later. Usually, he ran as a Republican, and, often, he was knocked off the ballot for filing irregularities. But, in 1959, he went head to head against one-term incumbent Richard J. Daley for the Democratic nomination for mayor, no doubt hoping to benefit from the similarity in their names. It didn’t work. Chicagoans were able to tell the difference — and it wasn’t just the missing “e.” Daley beat Daly by a margin of 11 to 1.
17. Newspaper publisher “Long John” Wentworth, at 6-foot-6 and mayor from 1857-63, was larger than life. His monument in Rosehill Cemetery is 72-feet tall.
18. Richard J. Daley, in a comment made when he was criticized for steering city business to three of his sons.
19. Jim Ryan. Burke took his father’s place as 14th Ward alderman. Madigan’s father, Mike, is the Illinois speaker of the House. Daley is one of the sons of Mayor Richard J. Daley.
20. Florida Gov. Lawton Mainor Chiles Jr. campaigned for the U.S. Senate in 1970 by walking 1,033 miles from Pensacola to Dade County. He won; voters sent him to Capitol Hill three times. After his retirement from the Senate in 1989, Chiles re-entered state politics and won the governorship in 1990. Daniel Walker, governor of Illinois from 1973-1977, the last time a Democrat held the office. Walker walked more than a thousand miles throughout Southern Illinois. Bill Bradley, former Democratic senator from New Jersey (1979-1997) who walked the Jersey shore every summer to talk with voters.
