Blago and Diversity

Here are excerpts from my new VDARE.com column Blagojevich, Obama, and the Diversity-Fueled "Chicago Way:"

This scandal is of particular interest to VDARE.COM readers because immigrants and immigration policy play such a large role. For instance, the go-betweens in the alleged deal in which Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., apparently the high bidder, would raise at least $1 million for Blagojevich were members of what the Chicago Tribune calls [Blagojevich Fundraiser Held by Jackson Allies Saturday, by David Kidwell, John Chase and Dan Mihalopoulos, December 12, 2008] “the close-knit and politically active Indian business community”.

Another of Blagojevich’s Senator schemes has proven embarrassing to one of the strongest supporters of illegal immigration: the huge Service Employees International Union, which claims to represent unskilled workers, often illegal aliens. The SEIU is potent political force on the far left, but it curiously less potent at getting higher pay for its teeming members.

On page 60 of the criminal complaint:

"ROD BLAGOJEVICH stated, 'I want to make money.' During the call, ROD BLAGOJEVICH, HARRIS, and Advisor B discussed the prospect of working a three-way deal for the open Senate seat. HARRIS noted that ROD BLAGOJEVICH is interested in taking a high-paying position with an organization called 'Change to Win,' which is connected to Service Employees International Union ('SEIU'). HARRIS suggested that SEIU Official make ROD BLAGOJEVICH the head of Change to Win and, in exchange, the President-elect could help Change to Win with its legislative agenda on a national level."

In other words, in this scenario, Blagojevich, who has apparently been under financial stress ever since his Lady Macbeth-type wife had to give up her job as a real estate agent / bagwoman because most of her commissions were barely disguised bribes for her husband, would promise to resign as governor. Obama would lean on his friends in the SEIU to give the disgraced governor a job paying $250-300,000 pushing SEIU’s agenda (which includes amnesty). Before moving on, Blago would appoint to the U.S. Senate Valerie Jarrett, Michelle Obama’s old boss when she worked for the Daley Machine.

Tom Balanoff, head of the janitors’ local in Chicago and a close ally of Obama, evidently conveyed Blagojevich’s brainstorm to the Obama camp.

President Andy Stern’s corrupt SEIU is less a union that battles for higher wages for its members than a front for the Open Borders lobby pushing for higher immigration. Wages are ultimately determined by supply and demand, which is why Cesar Chavez, during his prime, ruthlessly fought against illegal immigration in order to keep the supply of labor down and the price of labor for his members up. But, in contrast, Stern’s strategy is to maximize the number of unskilled service workers paying dues into his union at the expense of his members’ wages. Much of his energies go toward promoting leftist political victories rather than getting higher pay for his workers....

Seen up-close, Chicago politics resembles a bizarrely intricate multi-generational soap opera.

Obama and Blagojevich have long been allies, but never have been particularly friendly, coming as they do from very different ethnic bases. They do have a close friend in common: Tony Rezko, the Syrian immigrant operator whom Patrick Fitzgerald sent to jail earlier this year....

The second main reason for Chicago’s corruption: Chicago’s diversity.

Its long history as a major immigrant gateway means that the population is greatly divided by ethnicity. As Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew, perhaps the most astute statesman of the 20th Century, noted: "In multiracial societies, you don't vote in accordance with your economic interests and social interests, you vote in accordance with race and religion."

The voters who comprise Chicago’s various ethnic blocs know their representatives are sonsabitches. But at least they are their sonsabitches.

You let your group’s veteran politicians pocket some bribes because if you got all high and mighty and threw the bums out and replaced them with some public-spirited novices, your ethnic group would find itself despoiled by all the other ethnic groups’ wily old politicians.

In summary: clearly, the Main Stream Media failed to tell us much about the real Obama.

The fact is that he’s much more interesting than his canned image as the post-racial reconciler.

Not as edifying, perhaps—but interesting.

And the Obama Presidency is just going to get more and more interesting.

To learn who Obama really is, please buy my new book, which serves as a reader's guide to the President-Elect's opaque but revealing autobiography. Just click here to buy America’s Half-Blood Prince: Barack Obama’s “Story of Race and Inheritance."

More

My published articles are archived at iSteve.com -- Steve Sailer