In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

131 16 Another Mayor Daley and Another TV Station Bill’s been in New York for a year. When we talk on the telephone, occasionally , I hear nostalgia. I wonder if he’s thinking he’s made a mistake. Anchoring network is much more difficult and more stressful than local. He’s in a newsroom smaller, darker, and more crowded than ours in Chicago. He’s on a floor below bosses on a floor below bosses watching what he’s doing, and scared to death of what he or Diane Sawyer, or anyone at any time, may do “wrong.” At WBBM, we have an executive producer, news director, and general manager over our shoulders; three people, and that’s it. When there’s a problem, we order-in lunch, and solve it, like working in a parish a thousand miles from the Vatican. At CBS in New York, the pope and his cardinals always are in the room. I suspect Bill is having his fill of the network routine, and would like to come home. Until he does, if he does, I’m anchoring with Don Craig, and we’re flush with news that lights up the switchboard. City hall always is a seductive story, but never before as it is under Harold Washington because never before has a black man been in charge, or white aldermen been so bitter and befuddled. One good thing for the mayor is that by crippling his agenda, the aldermen are crippling themselves. Their hate is so obvious, their business in the city council so despicable, that we’re pummeling them in the news—or providing them time on the air to pummel themselves. When they obstruct a reasonable proposal, one that’s objectively reasonable, we go after them with questions: What’s wrong with the mayor trying to prevent redlining in housing? What’s wrong with his plan for replacing patronage with merit employment? Why are you opposing if? My cameraman and I follow two aldermen out of the council, skidding down a flight of stairs, which they do to avoid being stuck with us on an elevator. I’m behind them through a revolving door onto LaSalle Street. Turn right, go north, as the pace quickens until one of them turns right, into Randolph, before he 132 A N O T H E R M AY O R D A L E Y gets to it, slamming his nose into the building instead. The chase is over, but I don’t want to question him holding his nose. That would be inconsiderate; so I allow him to escape, and I head to the studio to edit the tape for six o’clock, at which time I’ll narrate the video, telling our viewers the story. Only in Chicago, an alderman bumping his nose to avoid a reporter. Mayor Washington may have lost a vote, but he flummoxed two aldermen, a pair of his more zealous saboteurs, who, at the next council meeting, may torment him less. “Patronage is dead,” His Honor declares, a sly arch in his brow. “I’m stomping on its grave, and I assure you it’s not alive, and it’s never going to be resurrected during the twenty years I’m in office. It’s gone.” He guarantees it, despite the relentless efforts to embarrass or muddy him into backing off. Hardly a day goes by that I don’t answer a call reminding me about the state of Illinois once suspending Harold Washington’s law license for charging clients for work not done, or about a federal court sentencing him to forty days in jail for failure to file tax returns (he’d paid the taxes, didn’t file the returns). Whispering voices are reviving old rumors that Harold Washington is gay, and that while he was a member of Congress, he was arrested on charges of child abuse. When I hear that one, I call the police chief in DC, who says other reporters are calling about the mayor, and that the rumors are false. All the dirt being whispered already has been used by the media, printed in gossip columns, and filed under old news that has nothing to do with Council Wars, city services, or the mayor’s performance in office. It’s trash being belched by the Democratic Party machinery that’s warming up to grind Harold Washington out of a race for a second term. During our staff meetings around the...

Share