The Perky Papist

DA NO

Ditka Says He Won't Run for U.S. Senate

That big whoosh you just heard? Illinois Democrats exhaling.

After this commercial, the next round of: Who Wants to Be a Senator?

Already out of storage . . .

Super Fans back Coach: He'll win with 118% of vote

Of course, I love the Super Fans. Too bad SNL doesn't run in the summer. Political season's the only time I really watch it now. I still laugh when I think of the Al Gore veepstakes parody four years ago, riffing off "The Bachelor" (brand-new then), with Al and Joe Lieberman clinking champagne flutes in a hot tub. Can you buy those sketches somewhere?

Super Fans back Coach: He'll win with 118% of vote

July 14, 2004

BY LUCIO GUERRERO Staff Reporter

Bob Swerski has some advice for Barack Obama -- drop out of the race, you've got no chance against Da Coach.

"I have a prediction for the race -- Ditka: 118.4 percent of the vote, Obama: -4," Swerski told the Sun-Times Tuesday. "Not only do I think Obama should drop out, I think Mr. Bush should drop out, too."

Of course, Swerski's views may be a bit jaded. After all, he is a Super Fan.

As a regular fixture on Saturday Night Live, Swerski and his fellow Super Fans would get together at Ditka's to talk about their beloved Bears -- aka Da Bears -- and its larger-than-life coach, Mike Ditka. So of course, when word reached the Super Fans that Ditka could be on his way to the Senate, they wanted to be heard.

"My only concern is that the Senate would restrict him to one vote," said Swerski, who's a close friend of actor George Wendt and was with him on Tuesday when the Sun-Times called. "He is such a massive man that he would probably need a two-thirds majority on his own."

Swerski said he didn't care that Ditka didn't have any political experience -- he does have a Super Bowl ring.

"His judgment is impeccable," said Swerski. "He ran the Fridge for a touchdown in the Super Bowl -- that's judgment, that's vision."

And why stop at the U.S. Senate, Swerski said.

"It's going to be a DITKtatorship," he said. "He will be the omnipotent ruler of the world."

Now that Ditka is back, will the Super Fans return to SNL?

Wendt said he called Rob Smigel, creator of the Super Fans. "He's dusting off the briefcase with our mustaches and Bears jerseys."

Copyright © The Sun-Times Company

Lots of Ditka-buzz

Just in case you've missed out . . .

Because of the whole Jack Ryan mess, the Illinois GOP has spent the better part of the last month trying to find someone - anyone - to fill their senate slot. In the last week, however, party mo has started to shift and follow the grassroots momentum to Mike Ditka. Seriously. (And I'm not saying this with condescension.) He's interested, family's willing, state and national parties are up for it. Now, can you just picture it: DITKA FOR SENATE? The possibilities boggle the mind. I'll say just two words: Reagan Democrats. One more word: Labor.

Anyhoo, word on the street (or on the 'net, anyway) among political junkies is that RNC/GOP biggies are heading to Chicago and there could be an announcement today. Though the two items could be unrelated.

See? They ARE going to use Reagan at the convention!

"They", of course, being the Democrat Party.

Ron Reagan to Address Democrat Delegates

What moxie! You go, traitor-boy. Not that he was ever really one of "ours", but, still.

Tres charmant Kerry fundraiser last night

New York Times (free registration req'd) reports. I think they left a couple of words off of the article head: It's "Kerry's Celebrity Fund-Raiser Is a Huge Bash of Bush".

Kerry's Celebrity Fund-Raiser Is a Huge Bash

Some choice tidbits:

In a two-and-a-half hour gala that raised $7.5 million, a record for a single event, Chevy Chase poked fun at the president's pronunciation of "nuclear" and "terrorist" and said Mr. Bush had invaded Iraq "just so he could be called a wartime president." Paul Newman decried "tax cuts for wealthy thugs like me" as "borderline criminal."

I'm glad Chevy Chase, that great foreign policy analyst, has made it clear we're not actually in a war or anything. Now we know where John Kerry stands. Good job.

The comedian John Leguizamo, who is half Puerto Rican, said the notion of Hispanics supporting Republicans was "like roaches for Raid." And Whoopi Goldberg, after joking about refusing to submit her material to campaign censors, made an extended sexual pun on the president's surname.

Hey, John Leguizamo, I'm 100% Puerto Rican, si lugar di nacimiento means anything. (I suppose it doesn't - or are Charlize Theron or Teresa Heinz Kerry "African", or what? Class, please discuss.) And I don't find that funny. But maybe you should ask Columba or George P. about it.

Then the Academy-Award-winning actress Meryl Streep asked which candidates Jesus might support.

"I wondered to myself during 'Shock and Awe,' I wondered which of the megaton bombs Jesus, our president's personal savior, would have personally dropped on the sleeping families of Baghdad?" Ms. Streep said.

Steve Schmidt, a Bush campaign spokesman, denounced the event as "a Hollywood fund-raiser filled with enough hate and vitriol to make Michael Moore blush."

After the concert, Mr. Kerry's press secretary, David Wade, said, "Obviously John Kerry and John Edwards do not agree with everything that was said tonight," adding: "Performers have a right to speak their minds even when we don't agree with everything they say. That's the freedom John Kerry put his life on the line to defend."

Hey, did you know - John Kerry was in Vietnam! Yes! Really!

Most telling point:

Campaign aides said the performers would not allow broadcast journalists to record the concert.

The performers wouldn't allow it? Or - maybe the campaign didn't want it recorded? But that would be a little Moore-ish of me to so speculate, wouldn't it? I'm sure the performers, people like Dave Matthews, were just afraid of bootlegs.

But unlike one of Mr. Kerry's vanquished primary rivals, Howard Dean, who denounced racial humor and profanity at one of his own fundraisers in New York, Mr. Edwards and Mr. Kerry hardly veered from their script when they mounted the stage at the end of the extravaganza, looking more subdued than they had all week.

So Howard Dean had better manners and more presence of mind than John Kerry?

Surely a national party can do better than this.