The parties are different

by

A pre-emptive defense of the Democratic party, in light of Ralph Nader’s latest run for president:

If Al Gore were president, the Kyoto Protocol would likely be in force right now. Gore negotiated it on behalf of the US, and Russia was moving towards signing it (and thus activating it and making it legally binding) UNTIL the Bush folks leaned on them to not sign it.

As it stands, though, the world has still not implemented any meaningful action against climate change. Meanwhile, ice shelves are melting, coral reefs are dying, seas are rising, and the hope of stopping massive shift in the earth’s climate within this century is rapidly receding into the distance.

Similarly, many other Clinton-era environmental initiatives that the Bush administration has attacked — protecting roadless areas in national forests, reducing pollution from old coal power plants (I live within five miles of two of ’em), protecting the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil drilling, etc. — would not be under attack if Gore were president.

I used to work in affordable housing finance, another field in which the administration has great discretion in setting targets and priorities. (Also, most affordable housing money in the US comes from the feds, not from state or local government.) The repeated cuts to various crucial programs — HOPE VI public housing redevelopment and Section 8 come to mind immediately — have seriously impacted the ability of cities like mine to help the least fortunate. Indeed, the Bush administration has broken twenty years of bipartisan agreement and slashed funding for Section 8 vouchers, leaving tens or hundreds of thousands of families and seniors without any way to pay the rent.

In all of these instances, the policies I’ve mentioned are led and implemented by the administration with little input from Congress (besides budgetary review), so Republicans controlling Congress would have little impact on how a Democratic president would have done things. Further, Bush has already announced plans for policies that merely await approval from a Republican Congress — e.g., his proposals to block-grant Medicaid and Section 8 and to change TANF, thereby allowing states to cut into already the already weak social safety net, or further tax code tweaking that will *permanently exempt* the hereditary aristocracy (e.g., trust fund babes like Jenna and Babs Jr.) from ANY income tax on their unearned inheritances and investments (thereby shifting the entire tax burden to us working stiffs), or the hundreds of billions of dollars in social spending, from LIHEAP to food stamps to public housing to veterans’ benefits, that are right now being axed out of the budget to pay for rescinding taxes on millionaires:


Courtesy Center on Budget & Policy Priorities

There ARE major differences between the two parties. ALL of these measures have been actively opposed and voted against by the Democratic minority (most of it, at least). These differences may not be as immediately obvious as many would like, but they are there, and they DO affect the world we live in. That’s why it’s so important to elect Anyone But Bush in 2004, and to not get distracted by sideshows like Ralph Nader. The notion that “the left could use a cold shower” is ridiculously self-absorbed in light of the very real pain that Bush and his cronies have already inflicted on America.

The Greens sometimes find ways to work within the political system for genuine change, often at the local level. Most of the Greens’ political work in the US, though, has been useless grandstanding, and it seems that every day the Greens find ways to become ever more useless through infighting. In order to gain political traction, the Greens must find ways to energize, not antagonize, their allies, with thoughtful, idealistic candidates and positions.

Bush trailing badly in Illinois

by

A new poll from the Tribune indicates that Bush’s mediocre approval rating among Illinoisans has sunk with remarkable speed. Hopefully, this will dissuade the GOP from investing resources into a state that, thanks to Democratic consolidation in multiethnic Cook County, is rapidly trending Democratic.

For the first time in his presidency, there are more Illinois voters of all political stripes who disapprove than approve of the job Bush is doing, and more than half don’t want to see him elected to a second term, according to the poll.

The survey not only found widespread voter dissatisfaction with the president over the economy and jobs, but more than four in 10 Illinois voters said they believed the Bush administration purposely misled the public about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq as he led the nation to war.

If the election were held today, Kerry would be backed by 52 percent of the state’s voters while Bush would get 38 percent, the poll showed. Another 10 percent were undecided and 1 percent opted for another candidate.

That 14 percentage-point advantage for Kerry compares to the 2000 election result in Illinois in which then-Vice President Al Gore received 55 percent of the vote, compared with 43 percent for Bush.

The survey results among general-election voters show them to be polarized heavily along partisan lines.

With 92 percent of voters who called themselves Democrats backing Kerry and 86 percent of those who identified themselves as Republicans supporting Bush, there appears little opportunity for either side to pick off crossover votes.

In addition, independents are almost evenly split between the two men.

The survey found Bush trailing heavily in the Democratic enclaves of Chicago and suburban Cook County and leading only slightly in the traditionally Republican-leaning collar counties.

Downstate voters were almost equally divided.

The poll also showed signs of a gender-gap problem for Bush. Male voters were divided between Kerry and Bush, but Kerry held a 24-percentage-point advantage among women. White suburban women, the so-called “soccer mom” demographic, favor Kerry over Bush only slightly, 44 percent to 40 percent.

Four new stripmalls!

by

The highlight of today’s Plan Commission meeting: four new strip shopping centers, all with a moat of parking in front, many with “green roofs.” (Agenda item 12, which was left off due to a typo, was a Target.)

Why does black parking lot + green roof = green? Wouldn’t there be a much greater environmental impact, at much lower cost, if the parking lot were green (pervious surface, at least, or maybe no parking at all!) and the roof were black, or white, or silver?

Urban renewal exhibit coming to town

by

The Center for Urban Pedagogy is apparently bringing its fantastic “Urban Renewal: The City Without a Ghetto” exhibit to Chicago in late March. Mess Hall, a space under the Morse L, will host it. I spent a few hours at the tiny Storefront for Art & Architecture a few months ago, engrossed in the exhibit; it strikes a great balance with excellent exhibit design and content that is aimed at the right level, using the right words. Although there’s certainly a leftist bent, the peculiar political situation that drove urban renewal is explained.

May be a Real Chicagoan

by

“Score: 85 points out of a possible 166 points. If you’re under 25, you may still be a Real Chicagoan. If not, you need to get out more.” Well, that’s somewhat reassuring — I am under 25 and have lived here a scant six years. Even the revised, non-geezer Real Chicagoan Quiz from Eric Zorn at the Tribune still rewards people who listen to commercial radio. (Why?)

Appealing legislation

by

Illinois has passed a “builder’s appeal” act, similar to “fair share” legislation nationwide [40-B “anti-snob zoning” in Massachusetts or Fair Share/Mt. Laurel laws in New Jersey]. The legislation is weaker than 40-B — it gives credit to municipalities for well-laid plans, even if there’s little chance of implementation — but the spirit of the law is undeniably important.

The “builder’s appeal” tack on fair and affordable housing is doubly interesting because it, like New Urbanist code reform projects, seeks quintessentially liberal ends through deregulatory means. That’s a cool way to bridge the political divide and to curry political capital with the building-trades crowd.

A palace for a cult, perhaps?

by

The four-story, 24,000-foot building at 1309 N. Ashland Ave. — housing the offices of some Polish honor society — is for sale for $1.9 million. It’s best known for its standing-room auditorium, which was called the Centrum when MP Shows was booking there. (I saw Godspeed You Black Emperor there, which was appropriate given the frayed edges of the space.) But what reuse potential is there for function rooms, offices, and auditorium?

To see the listing, click here and enter MLS # 03140419.

Reconstruction

by

According to Citylink, construction on the North Avenue Streetscaping Project is supposed to begin today. No sign of it outside, though. The streetscaping can’t do much, since North is a state highway (route 72); even the street trees added will be on bulb-outs in side streets alongside the road, not along the actual road. Thus, the drawings looked kind of boring. We’ll see what it ends up looking like, though.

Metro board game

by

At a party last night, I had a chance to play a 1970s board game called Paris Metro (approved by the RATP!). It was frustratingly designed — simply get around town, between various tourist destinations outlined on little cards, with the annoying inclusion of dice and thus chance — but the board was lovely. There was no date on the board or box, but the map predated the demolition of Les Halles.

Oddly enough, I can’t find any web references to this game. All I can find are references to a later board game of the same name, about the construction of the Metro.

Koolhaas at IIT

by

I visited IIT on Wednesday and snapped photos of the Rem Koolhaas-designed McCormick Tribune Campus Center. It’s an island of Kool exuberance in a somnolescent sea of sober, rigid Miesian boxes.

Of the many photos I’d seen (especially those in Metropolis Magazine this month), none made any sense as a collection, nor showed students actually using the building. Sure enough, though, the photos don’t “connect” because the building doesn’t; the many sharp corners hide plenty of things. The distinct lack of furnishings (partially because the building was wildly over budget) gives it an empty feel, even if it’s well used. The urban design is so-so: although the urban context is hardly inspiring, the building does only a bit better at engaging the sidewalk. For a long stretch along State, the building’s sunken a good eight feet; the south entrance is set back behind a lawn (it was reportedly cut short to save funds); and hallways line many outside walls, which provide neither interesting views from the outside nor light for the building interior.

Yes, you can buy Mies t-shirts — made by American Apparel, no less.

While I was on the South Side, I picked up David Harvey’s Paris, Capital of Modernity at the Seminary. It’s almost too pretty to leave on the bookshelf; it would deserve a temporary spot on the coffee table — if only I didn’t have three dozen other books vying for a spot there already.

Property tax: even Daley’s wrong

by

“Daley said higher assessments, due to increasing property values, will result in property tax increases in Chicago of 10 percent to 50 percent this fall. If relief isn’t offered soon, families may be forced out of their homes, he said… Daley called on the General Assembly to impose a statewide cap of 7 percent on the annual increase in residential assessments.”

First, no one’s going to get a 50% increase in their tax bill — unless, of course, Daley has a secret budget hidden behind his back that figures tax rates will go up that high. (Hm…) Second, the 7% assessment increase would be a boon to my neighbors and me, but someone will have to pay the price. If taxes on the trendy north side plateau, the difference will have to be made up by higher tax rates for everyone — but especially in decidedly un-trendy parts of town.

The legislation will raise already bloody rates in south Cook County, where resegregation has slammed property values with the “segregation tax.” Already, property tax rates in Ford Heights are 314% higher than in Inverness, and 247% higher than in Chicago. Do we really want to exacerbate this situation?

(On a side note, I had to go through this 83-page file, listing tax rates for all of Cook County’s 1,000+ taxing districts, just to find those numbers. Man, does this place ever need tax reform of a different sort.)