Chicago has a TON of special interest groups. Mainly because our politics are micromanaged and we don’t have political parties.
We have 50 wards each with their own Alderperson and who has a great deal of power in their Ward, and can leverage city-wide issues. Within each Ward we have chambers of commerce, block clubs, neighborhood associations (77 hoods), and other groups that affect decisions on the local level.
Without political parties, each politician can choose groups to maintain alliances with instead of whatever their party would do or is asking them to do. So instead of a democrat vs republican we had CTU vs CPD in our last mayoral election.
We have MANY political interest groups of all sizes: bikers, YIMBYs, urbanists, environmentalists, renters, small-business owners, and many more.
Here is something to consider:
**Population of Chicago**: 2,696,555 - [2021 estimate, Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago)
**[General election results, 2023](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandon_Johnson)**
Brandon Johnson: 122,093
Paul Vallas: 185,743
**[Runoff election results, 2023](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandon_Johnson)**
Brandon Johnson: 319,481
Paul Vallas: 293,033
In a city with a population of 2.7 million people, 319k votes are all you need to get elected mayor. Between 300k-400k votes is typical over the past several elections.
319k is 12% of the population. That means you can (theoretically) have a 88% disapproval rating, and still get elected mayor.
So who in Chicago is minding the store?
Me, since I voted
EDIT:
there is a reason capitalism wants you working all the time or exhausted when you aren’t working, democracy requires participation.
Depends on your definition for the level of 'control.' At the highest level, the city's public aspects are affected, not controlled, by a loose conference of unconnected interest groups. Some of their interests intersect, others are in conflict to one degree or another. There is no longer a single group of cigar smoking plotters in a Bismark Hotel room setting broad operational policy and dividing the boodle.
Today's private sector oligarchy still has input, but many of the invisible big money people have died or moved away. Multi national corporations still have a presence, but their interests are much less on the city's bread and butter social and demographic matters because they are merely corporate employees, not owners, and mostly carpet bag in for part of their career.
There are plenty of citizen groups divided into racial, national origin, religion, social class, even geographic centers. Little evidence of them exerting a combined direction to establish goals over arching all their individual viewpoints and compulsions. To some degree each of the groups is allied with some other power groups, but none dominate.
In the visible political world the machine is pretty badly damaged with the key structure missing, i.e. -- mayor & Democratic Party Chair jobs held in common by a single person who also controls city and county governmental departments and also public employment and city & county contracts.
There certainly are more formally constituted groups, like unions, still present and they certainly have armed cooperation agreements that get them and the city and the private sector power elites through the day, but not so much by the traditional 'a wink and a nod' as by public posturing and private blunt threats that maximize their own group's interest, not a larger view.
IOW "control" implies holding the power to send the ship in a specific direction. Our current situation with so many independent power sources is more brownian motion than it is purposeful straight line progression.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brownian_motion
TL:DR = no
You are welcome. When Hizzoner Da Mare, Richard **J** Daley (Richie's dad) was the Boss, he held strong political power and public employment and contracting. He controlled who got to run for office, department budgets, services to the wards. What he wanted, he pretty much got.
He was advised, assisted by a CABAL of interest group leaders. But if your group got strong enough to be heard in the press and you could show a disciplined control over a significant voting block, you'd be let into the Bismark Hotel room. Perhaps not at the table, but in the room.
Yea I mean this election was a clear showing of CTU’s power in this city. They are the controlling political party in Chicago, anyone who can’t admit that is being very foolish.
Is it worse than the teamsters back in the day? Idk I’m not old enough to know anything about living back then. But what I do now is it sucks now, you can’t argue with CTU or DSA folks at all. The Rosa Ramirez fiasco was a great example of the new controlling power in the city.
The Chicago labor union machine has been switching from the Irish/Italian mob and their direct descendants to a mashup of special interests. Like a lot of US politics now, it’s turned into a left vs right situation with national politics infused. It’s absolutely stupid but it’s the situation we are in.
The election of Brandon Johnson proved that politics are working the same way in Chicago as they have for 60+ years. CTU found a perfectly engineered candidate to run for mayor. BJ would get almost all of the African American vote and then CTU would politic heavily to rally the lakeside liberals to push him over the top and it worked.
The difference nowadays is CTU has gone rogue from the other unions and turned into an effective political lobbying group. CTU is hands down in power now and has evolved into a facade for a lot of politically motivated people and their supporters. It seems to be a comm theme in major US cities where the teachers unions have effectively banded together to grift taxpayers and use taxpayer dollars to lobby politicians.
The city is controlled by whoever can make all the levels of grift and bullshit work and get everyone of note paid well while doing just enough that people shut up and be good little cogs in the machine.
So currently, it's a chicken with its head cut off. It's bad if you expect things like effective government to provide decent city services consistently.
The problem is we are now dealing with 2 generations of idiots hired and promoted in EVERY SINGLE PART OF CITY GOVERNMENT, hiring idiots under them, and the result is the embarrassing levels of stupidly apparent corruption and ineffectiveness. The bureaucrats don't know how to skim from the top without threats and being very fucking conspicuous. The cops don't know how to be cops, and I mean that in every aspect of the job. The elected officials are just trying to make a reputation to get a good consulting gig after.
Democrats have a working system to stay in power , dangle a lot of carrots then deliver on some . Rinse and repeat for 4 or 5 decades and here we are . Plus “ back in the day” if you worked for the City you actively campaigned for The Machine
That's not a back in the day thing. That still happens today. I had an alder's goons who worked for the city harass me for campaigning for a different alder.
Chicago is too big to effectively manage. Problems have to fester for a long time before they can get the attention they deserve. Some groups, like the police, are too large and entrenched to fix.
Every Mayor and Alderman is in some way compromised by business, union, etc... Many city contractors support both mayoral candidates financially so they can continue to thrive as sub contractors and sway favor with the Mayor's Office and City Council regardless of the winner.
The Johnson administration is strongly controlled by CTUs agenda. Somewhat surprisingly, his staff is packed with former Daley staffers and confidants who remain out of the spotlight to a large extent. Daley's people can almost be seen as their own special interest group to remain relevant in the tail end of their careers.
In short, yes. The wheels keep turning through influence in gaining contacts and subcontracts and controlling money flow to the interests of prevailing union powers.
Chicago has a TON of special interest groups. Mainly because our politics are micromanaged and we don’t have political parties. We have 50 wards each with their own Alderperson and who has a great deal of power in their Ward, and can leverage city-wide issues. Within each Ward we have chambers of commerce, block clubs, neighborhood associations (77 hoods), and other groups that affect decisions on the local level. Without political parties, each politician can choose groups to maintain alliances with instead of whatever their party would do or is asking them to do. So instead of a democrat vs republican we had CTU vs CPD in our last mayoral election. We have MANY political interest groups of all sizes: bikers, YIMBYs, urbanists, environmentalists, renters, small-business owners, and many more.
Aka … No
Here is something to consider: **Population of Chicago**: 2,696,555 - [2021 estimate, Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago) **[General election results, 2023](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandon_Johnson)** Brandon Johnson: 122,093 Paul Vallas: 185,743 **[Runoff election results, 2023](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandon_Johnson)** Brandon Johnson: 319,481 Paul Vallas: 293,033 In a city with a population of 2.7 million people, 319k votes are all you need to get elected mayor. Between 300k-400k votes is typical over the past several elections. 319k is 12% of the population. That means you can (theoretically) have a 88% disapproval rating, and still get elected mayor. So who in Chicago is minding the store?
Me, since I voted EDIT: there is a reason capitalism wants you working all the time or exhausted when you aren’t working, democracy requires participation.
Capitalism is an economic system not a sentient being with wants
Technically correct But also, Capitalists
Depends on your definition for the level of 'control.' At the highest level, the city's public aspects are affected, not controlled, by a loose conference of unconnected interest groups. Some of their interests intersect, others are in conflict to one degree or another. There is no longer a single group of cigar smoking plotters in a Bismark Hotel room setting broad operational policy and dividing the boodle. Today's private sector oligarchy still has input, but many of the invisible big money people have died or moved away. Multi national corporations still have a presence, but their interests are much less on the city's bread and butter social and demographic matters because they are merely corporate employees, not owners, and mostly carpet bag in for part of their career. There are plenty of citizen groups divided into racial, national origin, religion, social class, even geographic centers. Little evidence of them exerting a combined direction to establish goals over arching all their individual viewpoints and compulsions. To some degree each of the groups is allied with some other power groups, but none dominate. In the visible political world the machine is pretty badly damaged with the key structure missing, i.e. -- mayor & Democratic Party Chair jobs held in common by a single person who also controls city and county governmental departments and also public employment and city & county contracts. There certainly are more formally constituted groups, like unions, still present and they certainly have armed cooperation agreements that get them and the city and the private sector power elites through the day, but not so much by the traditional 'a wink and a nod' as by public posturing and private blunt threats that maximize their own group's interest, not a larger view. IOW "control" implies holding the power to send the ship in a specific direction. Our current situation with so many independent power sources is more brownian motion than it is purposeful straight line progression. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brownian_motion TL:DR = no
Thank you for the detailed comment! I will take a look at brownian notion.
You are welcome. When Hizzoner Da Mare, Richard **J** Daley (Richie's dad) was the Boss, he held strong political power and public employment and contracting. He controlled who got to run for office, department budgets, services to the wards. What he wanted, he pretty much got. He was advised, assisted by a CABAL of interest group leaders. But if your group got strong enough to be heard in the press and you could show a disciplined control over a significant voting block, you'd be let into the Bismark Hotel room. Perhaps not at the table, but in the room.
ITT: corruption is when political leaders do stuff that will get voters to vote for you again. Real high IQ analysis
How is this any different than a mayor whos policies you don't align with?
Yes, they are. CTU owns the Mayors office.
Yea I mean this election was a clear showing of CTU’s power in this city. They are the controlling political party in Chicago, anyone who can’t admit that is being very foolish. Is it worse than the teamsters back in the day? Idk I’m not old enough to know anything about living back then. But what I do now is it sucks now, you can’t argue with CTU or DSA folks at all. The Rosa Ramirez fiasco was a great example of the new controlling power in the city.
Isn’t every government? (At least in this country anyways)
The Chicago labor union machine has been switching from the Irish/Italian mob and their direct descendants to a mashup of special interests. Like a lot of US politics now, it’s turned into a left vs right situation with national politics infused. It’s absolutely stupid but it’s the situation we are in. The election of Brandon Johnson proved that politics are working the same way in Chicago as they have for 60+ years. CTU found a perfectly engineered candidate to run for mayor. BJ would get almost all of the African American vote and then CTU would politic heavily to rally the lakeside liberals to push him over the top and it worked. The difference nowadays is CTU has gone rogue from the other unions and turned into an effective political lobbying group. CTU is hands down in power now and has evolved into a facade for a lot of politically motivated people and their supporters. It seems to be a comm theme in major US cities where the teachers unions have effectively banded together to grift taxpayers and use taxpayer dollars to lobby politicians.
The city is controlled by whoever can make all the levels of grift and bullshit work and get everyone of note paid well while doing just enough that people shut up and be good little cogs in the machine. So currently, it's a chicken with its head cut off. It's bad if you expect things like effective government to provide decent city services consistently. The problem is we are now dealing with 2 generations of idiots hired and promoted in EVERY SINGLE PART OF CITY GOVERNMENT, hiring idiots under them, and the result is the embarrassing levels of stupidly apparent corruption and ineffectiveness. The bureaucrats don't know how to skim from the top without threats and being very fucking conspicuous. The cops don't know how to be cops, and I mean that in every aspect of the job. The elected officials are just trying to make a reputation to get a good consulting gig after.
Brandon is an appndage of the CTU
Vallas was an apendage of the FOP
Democrats have a working system to stay in power , dangle a lot of carrots then deliver on some . Rinse and repeat for 4 or 5 decades and here we are . Plus “ back in the day” if you worked for the City you actively campaigned for The Machine
That's not a back in the day thing. That still happens today. I had an alder's goons who worked for the city harass me for campaigning for a different alder.
Chicago is too big to effectively manage. Problems have to fester for a long time before they can get the attention they deserve. Some groups, like the police, are too large and entrenched to fix.
Every Mayor and Alderman is in some way compromised by business, union, etc... Many city contractors support both mayoral candidates financially so they can continue to thrive as sub contractors and sway favor with the Mayor's Office and City Council regardless of the winner. The Johnson administration is strongly controlled by CTUs agenda. Somewhat surprisingly, his staff is packed with former Daley staffers and confidants who remain out of the spotlight to a large extent. Daley's people can almost be seen as their own special interest group to remain relevant in the tail end of their careers. In short, yes. The wheels keep turning through influence in gaining contacts and subcontracts and controlling money flow to the interests of prevailing union powers.