I don't think he's going to fool anyone this time. Last year when the Daley forced him to publically take his original position back was the end for Blago down here.
He's made enough on the record gun control statements in the last year to bury him in the campaign.
Now if only Topinka was really pro gun.....
Jeff
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/ne...C1C8C7BC8347B36A862571A500639610?OpenDocument
He's made enough on the record gun control statements in the last year to bury him in the campaign.
Now if only Topinka was really pro gun.....
Jeff
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/ne...C1C8C7BC8347B36A862571A500639610?OpenDocument
Gun support is key to Blagojevich's downstate revival
By Kevin McDermott
POST-DISPATCH SPRINGFIELD BUREAU
07/08/2006
SPARTA
Four years ago, Rod Blagojevich, a lifelong Chicagoan with a history of supporting gun-control, stunned the Illinois political world by convincing culturally conservative voters throughout Southern Illinois to help put him in the governor's office.
Now gunning for re-election, Blagojevich is attempting another downstate surprise. But it may prove more elusive this time, as he tries to stay out of the crossfire of the state's continuing gun-control debate.
In opening a major new shooting complex in this green, wooded swath of Southern Illinois, Blagojevich last week pulled the trigger on what could be a difficult downstate re-election campaign. With shotgun blasts echoing from the nearby shooting range, the Democrat issued a quasi-apology for his 1993 attempt as a state legislator to raise the fee on firearm owner identification cards, saying: "I am older today, wiser today."
He revived his self-effacing "Ducks Anonymous" joke from the last campaign. (The hunting organization is actually called Ducks Unlimited.) And he recounted his humble immigrant's-son beginnings, carefully connecting the blue-collar themes common to both factories and farms.
"Had my dad immigrated to the southern part of the state, instead of being a steelworker, he'd have been a coal miner, and I probably would have grown up instead of shooting hoops at the playground, shooting rifles and hunting," said Blagojevich, appearing in casual dress outside the state-funded $50 million World Shooting and Recreational Complex that his administration championed.
"A guy in my neighborhood with a gun, that's a gang-banger, and he ain't hunting deer or quail. That guy's up to no good. It's a lot different down here," Blagojevich added, stressing that he understands the distinction. "It's law-abiding, it's legitimate, and it ought to be celebrated."
After four years of sometimes strained relations with Southern Illinois - over things like prison employment cutbacks, budgetary largess aimed at Chicago, and the governor's continuing support of certain gun-control measures - Blagojevich's speech last week contained a hint of regional truce-making.
At one point, he literally compared his appearance in Sparta to former President Richard Nixon's historic opening of relations with China. "No one thought it was possible for him to go to China and open up those doors," said Blagojevich. "(At) the beginning of my career with that (firearms fee increase) bill back in 1993, who'd have thought that I'd be the governor today to open up the Sparta shooting complex?"
Still, Blagojevich has continued to support gun control in certain instances. Most notable was his veto last year of a bill that would have prohibited local communities from enforcing gun-control laws that are more stringent than state law.
Proponents of that bill - mostly downstate pro-gun lawmakers - specifically cited the new shooting facility, warning that tourists from all over the country could find themselves ensnared in a patchwork of local gun-control ordinances while en route to Sparta with their guns.
Support eroding downstate
Those kinds of stances on guns are likely part of the reason Blagojevich's support has been eroding downstate, a region that was crucial to his 2002 victory.
In the general election against Republican Jim Ryan that year, Blagojevich won more than 50 percent of the vote in much of deep Southern Illinois, including the region that encompasses Sparta. But a Post-Dispatch/KMOV-TV (Channel 4) poll taken in March showed Blagojevich's approval rating in Southern Illinois since then has dropped to about 45 percent.
That poll found Blagojevich still narrowly beats Republican challenger Judy Baar Topinka in a hypothetical head-to-head contest in the region, but that a full 15 percent of voters there hadn't yet made up their minds - the highest "undecided" percentage anywhere in the state.
"He gave the impression (in 2002) that he cared about Southern Illinois. They feel like he has broken every promise he made," said state Sen. David Luechtefeld, R-Okawville.
Luechtefeld worked with Blagojevich to get the Sparta complex finished. But he said that accomplishment doesn't negate what downstaters see as chronic neglect by a governor who has chosen to remain in his native Chicago rather than move into the Governor's Mansion in Springfield.
Gun control - like the death penalty and abortion - is an issue that has deeply divided Illinois Democrats, highlighting the ideological split between the northern and southern wings of the party.
Whether Blagojevich can get downstate residents to again look past their disagreement with him on those issues may depend on whether he can convince them they have common ground on labor, education and economic issues.
"It's always easy (downstate) to run against Chicago," said John Jackson, political scientist at Southern Illinois University Carbondale, "but he's got a story to tell, and it played well here last time."
In campaign mode
Blagojevich, clearly in campaign mode last week, even took a few shots at his fellow gun-control advocates, telling the Sparta audience: "Some people from where I come from need to come down here and appreciate what you do."
But several prominent gun-control activists said last week they aren't bothered by Blagojevich's appeal to downstate gun owners. "The people who will be using the Sparta complex are not the problem," said Jennifer Bishop, the Chicago-based Illinois field director for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence.
The pro-gun lobby, on the other hand, isn't going to disarm. One lobbyist who attended the Sparta opening last week praised the new facility while simultaneously alleging that Blagojevich's support of it is a cynical attempt to placate angry downstate voters.
"He thinks he's going to buy his way into the hearts and minds of the shooting world by this little stunt today," said Todd Vandermyde, a lobbyist for the National Rifle Association. "He's trying to get back into downstate . . . (which has been) shortchanged for the sake of Chicago at every turn."
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