Good job for undoing the primary partisan spin and great diary.

Obama shouldn't have challenged the petitions, and that this is somehow the same as what Republicans do when they challenge voter registrations at the polls--which is of course nonsense. His opponents either already were, or wanted to be professional politicians, so the standards should be higher for them, it seems to me.

I wish we knew a little more about that aspect of it though. Obviously the petitions of his opponents were flawed in a serious enough way that they couldn't be fixed in time to get on the ballot. My understanding is they only need 750 signatures of registered voters, so it's difficult to see how all four managed to screw that up, but manage it they did.

Why wasn't he able to play hard ball with the last vote on Iraq?  

Why before the vote, weeks before the debates on the floor had been done did he say that the congress would have to give in?

That is not how someone playing hardball, plays hardball!

Was someone there challenging his signatures?

He's from Chicago..how do you think they do politics in Chi-town?

Tiddlywinks?

"he [Obama] didn't just do it to the incumbent, who's the only one who actually did him wrong. He did it to every other candidate in the race. It's one thing to screw with somebody who screws with you - it's another thing entirely to screw with people who've done you no harm just to make it easier for you to get ahead. Sure, it was technically legal - but, to make an extreme example, so were poll taxes once upon a time. And like poll taxes, if not to the same degree, this had the effect of limiting voter choice through an unjust legal technicality. Obama's said he opposes petition requirements for candidates; so why, when push came to shove, didn't Mr. "New kind of politics" put his money where his mouth is? That's my question about this whole business."

That's my question - and I'm still waiting for an answer.

not wimps that concede defeat before the recount. Won't name any names.

She thought that she was entitled to the seat. She wasn't, especially not with false signatures.

His choice divided veteran Chicago political activists.

"There was friction about the decision he made," said City Colleges of Chicago professor emeritus Timuel Black, who tried to negotiate with Obama on Palmer's behalf. "There were deep disagreements."

Had Palmer survived the petition challenge, Obama would have faced the daunting task of taking on an incumbent senator. Palmer's elimination marked the first of several fortuitous political moments in Obama's electoral success: He won the 2004 primary and general elections for U.S. Senate after tough challengers imploded when their messy divorce files were unsealed.

Obama contended that in the case of the 1996 race, in which he routed token opposition in the general election, he was ready to compete in the primary if necessary.

"We actually ran a terrific campaign up until the point we knew that we weren't going to have to appear on the ballot with anybody," Obama said. "I mean, we had prepared for it. We had raised money. We had tons of volunteers. There was enormous enthusiasm."

And he defended his use of ballot maneuvers: "If you can win, you should win and get to work doing the people's business."

At the time, though, Obama seemed less at ease with the decision, according to aides. They said the first-time candidate initially expressed reservations about using challenges to eliminate all his fellow Democrats.

"He wondered if we should knock everybody off the ballot. How would that look?" said Ronald Davis, the paid Obama campaign consultant whom Obama referred to as his "guru of petitions."

In the end, Davis filed objections to all four of Obama's Democratic rivals at the candidate's behest.

While Obama didn't attend the hearings, "he wanted us to call him every night and let him know what we were doing," Davis said, noting that Palmer and the others seemed unprepared for the challenges.

But Obama didn't gloat over the victories. "I don't think he thought it was, you know, sporting," said Will Burns, a 1996 Obama campaign volunteer who assisted with the petition challenges. "He wasn't very proud of it."

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/polit ics/chi-0704030881apr04,0,6270820,print. story

He was ready to compete, but this makes it seem like he was afraid of the competition.  Has he ever won a tough election?

Yes, it is how they do it in Chicago.  Read the Chicago Tribune article.  It's standard practice.  So you haven't heard of it, but it happens all the time.

They had every right (and chance) to run for office and they had a small hurdle to jump to do it. They failed to get 750 actual, real, people who lived there to sign a piece of paper for them.  Instead, they got a bunch of forged names.

Look, the community got to express their desire.  If they wanted someone to run, they could sign petitions for them.  A sufficient number did for Obama, and not for any other candidate.  What is so democratic about letting people on the ballot simply because they want to, regardless of whether it matches any demonstration of desire on the part of the electorate?

As I've said, I don't like what Obama did, but it's not the end of the freaking world.

From the Chicago Tribune Article, 67 of 245 Aldermanic candidates in the city had their signature lists invalidated this past February during the primaries. Not a lot of Republicans run for office out here, so I would be willing to bet that most of those were Dems invalidating other Dems.

She had over 1,000 fake signatures on her ballot, but Obama is the one who's using dirty tricks. How you people can spin this thing that way in your minds is beyond me. I like Edwards a lot, but you guys can make it kinda hard...

Obama is a jerk- get used to it.

This diary is an interesting exercise in twisting the meaning of an article to fit your point of view.

You quote:

Then Palmer's congressional bid collapsed. On Nov. 28, 1995, she placed a distant third behind political powerhouses Jesse Jackson Jr., who holds that congressional seat today, and current state Senate President Emil Jones Jr.

Palmer didn't fade quietly away. Citing an "outpouring" of support, she upended the political landscape by switching gears and deciding to run in the March 1996 primary for her state Senate seat.

You wrote (emphasis mine):

After finishing a distant third in the congressional race Palmer tried to ensure she had no opponent in the state seat for which Obama was already running. Obama then refused to go along with her attempt to grease her wheels to victory by staying in the race. Given the fact she'd tried to force him out of the race I think his decision to play hardball at that point reflects well on him.

Those assertions are not supported by your quote. There were 4 candidates running. Obama knocked all three competitors out of the race by challenging their petitions. He didn't just take out Palmer, he took out Askia and Ewell as well. Were they also trying grease their wheels to victory?

Let's face it. Palmer wanted to stay in office. Obama could have ran against her like most politicians do regardless of past friendships. He  instead cleared the field. Anyone can tell that's hardball; but it's not really an inspiring example of bringing 'a new politics' to America.

This may not seem sporting, but running for office isn't a sport and I would be worried about any presidential candidate who treated it as such.

Nice piece.  And to the "good government" types, I say GROW UP!  This is politics, it is a rough business, especially in Chicago.  

Any strong candidate with a brain can and should use existing rules to their advantage.  Why was it Obama's job to ensure Palmer's name appeared on the ballot when she, as a freaking incumbent, couldn't get 750 valid signatures?  I have collected many signatures in my day and I can tell you that getting 750 valid signatures is not hard, especially if you are an incumbent.

Frankly, this episode makes me respect Obama because I now know he is a tough SOB who is willing to use legal means to advance his cause.  I'd feel the same way if Edwards, Hillary or any other candidate did the same.  Do you think the Repubs would think twice about using this tactic if it would help them?  Isn't it about time the Dems showed some guts and the ability to play hardball?  I am sure all the people screaming about Obama's use of the rules to his advantage were all mad that Kerry didn't challenge the election in Ohio.

You can't do anything if you don't win the election.  I respect any candidate who is willing to use LEGAL means to win an election which is exactly what Obama did.  

since at the time, knocking Willie Randolph into centerfield on a slide at second was within the rules.

But yeah, that was hardball, and this is hardball.

If Obama wasn't campaigning as the "new politics uniter", things like this would be less newsworthy.

But, Obama should know that the media will jump on you if you do things which are counter to your public image.

And it's not thrilling to modify your slogan to "Obama: as clean as any Chicago politician"

Ha.

This isn't a huge problem, but then again, I wonder which Chicago-born politician who is a Senator nudged this story into the papers. ;)

A shout-out to the South Side of Chicago--isn't there anybody who worked on this campaign who's going to comment (besides me)?  Bush Bites, were you with us?

I'm not going to make any slams at Edwards, because Edwards is a good candidate and would have been an excellent V.P.  I admire him greatly, but I support Obama.

But folks--come on.  Alice Palmer was the incumbent state senator.  The bar for her to have come back on the ballot was not high--about 800 valid signatures, as many have noted.  This should have been a slam dunk for her, but it wasn't.

By saying that Obama shouldn't have challenged anyone's signatures, some of you are saying that it's okay that a candidate's first official act be one of fraud.  I have worked on petition challenges, and it's offensive to me as a citizen to see a sheet with all the names in the same handwriting, or every 5th signature be in the same hand, or a petition passer who fraudulently claims that they live in the district, but do not.  

I'll bet that in Oregon (to cite one example noted above), you have a deadline for filing for office, and if you come in 10 minutes after that deadline, you can't get on the ballot.  How is that somehow more fair than saying that you should gain the trust of the people in your district or ward to put yourself on the ballot?

Many other arguments made here are wrong as well.  Someone raised the issue of illegibility.  Interestingly, this doesn't invalidate someone's signature on petitions in Illinois.  If your signature is illegible whenever you sign it, and what is on the petition matches what's on your voter card, it's valid.  

Also, Vox Populi states that Palmer and Obama were running in a special election.  No, they weren't.  Palmer ran for CONGRESS in a 1995 special election.  She and Obama were contending for the state Senate seat in the regular March 1996 primary.  Therefore, the 800 signature threshold represented a tiny fraction of the number of votes that were cast in that district that year.

One final thought--for all of us who worked on Barack's first campaign, Alice Palmer was our state Senator.  We supported her for state Senator when Dick Newhouse retired; we supported her for Congress when she ran in '95.  I was at the first planning meeting for Alice's run for Congress, and I was really depressed when I left.  It was clear that there wasn't any strategy for winning.  I would have loved to have her win, but she did give her word to Barack, and that has to count for something.