The following is a selection from a planned-then-discarded kids activity book about Illinois politics I briefly toyed with writing in 2017.
While I have no desire to actually write the adventures of Packy and Cracky the Gerrymander Twins, Their Friend TIFany, Layoffo the News Clown and House Speaker Mike Madigan, it is super-late in the day and I have to run to an interview for an actual story about life in modern Chicago.
So with your indulgence and forgiveness I give you Gubernatorial Corruption Charge Limericks. Answers will be posted on the @1001chicago Twitter account at 9 a.m. Friday, Sept. 28. Thank you for making it to 985 stories and may God have mercy on my soul.
…
Easy (recent convictions)
The appointment will drag. Oh, ya rich?
Then let’s see some swag for ya pitch.
I claimed truth as a tenet
But tried to sell off the Senate.
Bleep me, I’m Rod _____.
No one can fault me for tryin’
To keep death-row inmates from fryin’.
A bribe for a license,
Kids then died for my sins.
Off to prison for me, George _____.
Medium (less-recent convictions)
The bribery scam was an earner,
My race riot report a page-turner.
A rep as strong as Ajax’s
Took down by horse taxes.
Just call me poor ol’ Otto _____.
Take me off this list, you trash-talker.
My office was clean as white caulk, sir.
After politics tanks
I go into banks.
Seems you shouldn’t give loans to Dan _____.
Hard (accused but not convicted)
I was the favorite Democrat son
But my repute was ruined, so that’s done.
My crime, so banal,
Took scrip from the canal.
I’ve got a suburb named for me, Joel _____.
Honesty was what I hung my hat on.
Big piles of cash, my safe sat on.
I was not a barbarian.
As an octogenarian,
Who cleaned up state cash? William _____.
I had six months before charges — that’s all.
Hired eight of the jurors that fall.
My defense — oh this stings –
Was the divine right of kings.
The Klan calls me Lennington _____.
