The Baltimore Sun wants Rahm Emanuel to run for mayor of Baltimore if the Illinois Supreme Court rules against him in his appeal of this week's appellate court decision, which if upheld would knock him off the ballot.
Reminding us that Maryland's Alan Keyes got an apartment in Illinois on short notice with the express purpose of running against Barack Obama for Senate, in its January 25th online editorial, the Sun welcomed Emanuel with open arms. Evidently, there is an upcoming mayoral election in Baltimore, too.
"Home is where the heart is," according to the Baltimore Sun's editorial board. Not where you lay your head at night. Now that I think of it, what if you work the night shift and you lay your head during the day? Or are we disenfranchising night shift workers in Illinois? After all, a literal interpretation is a literal interpretation. I don't want someone performing surgery on me who takes everything literally. I don't want someone doing anything for me who can't see the forest for the trees.
As the Sun points out, "After all, who is more Chicagoan, someone who was born in the city and represented it in Congress for years, or someone who moves in 365 days before the election?" Of course, the literalists would go for the 365 days guy. That's why they can't see the forest for the trees.
The Illinois Supreme Court has issued a stay for the time being when it comes to printing the ballots. As if local government has money to burn with this frivolous legal challenge and the chance that they would have to print up ballots twice or re-send absentee ballots.
The hearing officer a month ago got it right when he ruled that this turns on whether Emanuel abandoned his Illinois residency when he went to Washington to serve our nation. He kept his house in Chicago and many prized possessions inside that very house, including his wife's wedding dress and the master bedroom's bed.
Let's face it folks. If da Bears had beaten the Packers, would this ballot wrangling even be going on? All Baltimore is asking of Rahm to run there is that he demonstrate he knows how to pick up a crab and is willing to don an Orioles cap.
The Illinois Supreme Court needs to clarify the law here without discouraging Chicago's best and brightest from serving our nation in Washington.