John Rednour on Blagojevich

</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[ "He's not the Rod Blagojevich that I knew and remember," Democrat National Committee member John Rednour said Friday of an Illinois governor whose promising career six years ago--with aspirations of the presidency--is now a train wreck afire in delusion and a profane pathology.

Or, maybe we never knew this governor at all.

Rednour, a senior committee member of the DNC for 36 years who last saw the governor here in Du Quoin in August and again in September at the Democrat National Convention in Denver, has the same questions we all have.

"I can't figure it out. It's like on the one hand he tries to do the right thing," said Rednour, raising his right arm, "and on the other hand maybe he's bad," Rednour said, raising his left arm.

Rednour said that apart from the generational differences, he had high hopes for this governor. "I donated to his campaigns," said Rednour.

And, at the outset, the relationship building included Rednour's son being appointed manager of the Du Quoin State Fair.

Rod Blagojevich had the look and feel of Camelot--a Chicago politician who touted himself as the poor but honest son of an immigrant steelworker--as he jogged south along Rt. 51 shaking hands with fairgoers during the twilight parade. He made the same mistakes all green politicians make--telling a group of card-carrying NRA members in Marion he was for gun control. He was a no-show at this year's fair.

"When Blagojevich came along, they were friends of Jim Ryan and I donated to him. I never had any idea that he was dishonest or that he would do anything wrong like this," said Rednour. "During the fair the year before he was first elected (2002), he was in Du Quoin and came out to the swimming pool and asked what advice I had for him if he became governor," said Du Quoin's black belt Democrat. "You're going to have to be honest and you are going to have to have honest people around you. You have to watch your ego. Undoubtedly he didn't take my advice on any of it," said Rednour, who knows where the line between political connectivity and corruption falls.

"You have to be very careful about what you do and the people you hire," he said.

"My experience in politics is that most (politicians) are honest. You are going to always have some bad apples. Politicians are in the spotlight all the time and Chicago operates different than any place else," he said.

" Sometimes, you don't know who's on first up there," Rednour said.

When George Ryan left the governor's office, the Rednours felt they were back to mainstream Democrat politics. They donated to the campaign. Rednour was criticized for the Du Quoin State Bank accepting Blagojevich campaign fund deposits, but added that at least a handful of area lawmakers also have certificates of deposits in his bank. Call it friendships. Call it investing. Call it paybacks. "Our bank goes out for business just like any other bank and we pay interest on deposits," he said.

In supporting Blagojevich, Illinois democrats in Springfield reciprocated by continuing his son as manager of the fair. John Rednour, Jr. was appointed at the end of the Ryan administration. And, no doubt, there are those who hope and believe U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald's work isn't finished, that somehow he will at least flash a light into the corners of high profile Democrats like SIU president Glenn Poshard and Rednour. Things like arms-length favors to Rednour family members, deposits in his bank--even the casual use of a phone at the state fair or in Poshard's office at SIU to lobby for a capital bill or to electioneer--has to be food for thought.

Rednour says that for whatever reason it has been harder to know this governor. "I know that whenever he and Patty (Blagojevich) were at our house there was never any of this profanity they are talking about now," he said.

Discussions inevitably turned to the state's ongoing support of the fair as a Southern Illinois asset. He said Blagojevich is a complex man.

Rednour, now 70-something, said it's probably a generational difference more than a lack of understanding about how he thinks.

After all, Rednour's political career dates back 50 years to the governorships of Otto Kerner and Sam Shapiro. "He (Kerner) was a nice guy and I knew him when he was up in Kankakee," he said. Kerner served the state well, but got mixed up in an Arlington Park corruption investigation and became the first contemporary governor to be indicted.

As county chairman, Rednour got all of the downstate county chairmen to endorse Paul Simon for governor. " Simon opponent (Governor) Dan Walker never liked me for supporting Simon," Rednour remembers. And, Rednour never cared for Walker, whose hiking boots candidacy seemed too gimmicky to Rednour.

"Of course, Jim Thompson was next and he was the Illinois governor who bought the fair (from the Jabr family) and moved into the (Hayes) house next door into the downstate mansion," he said. Mike Dubois was installed as fair manager and Thompson's sidekick Jim Skilbeck made Illinois politics fun.

"I remember Wanda telling me we had two guests down in the basement. I went down there and Jim and Jayne Thompson were sitting there drinking a beer," he said. "They were super nice to me and we were good friends," he said.

That was during the hey day of Republicans Ralph Dunn and Wayne Goforth. All put on their partisan game face when required, but all were Rednour friends. Dunn sat on the Du Quoin State Bank board up until the time of his death.

"Me and Ralph Dunn owned some houses together in Hawaii once," said Rednour. "When things weren't working out I told him to remember to take lemons and make lemonade. When things weren't going well for me he'd say the same thing, "Now, John, when things aren't going right, take lemons and make lemonade."

"I wish that I had never told him that," Rednour laughed. It got annoying.

To this date, one of Rednour's closest friends and allies is U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, whom Rednour believes will become President of the U.S. Senate before his career ends.

Rednour first met Durbin when Illinois' senior senator worked in Lt. Gov. Paul Simon's office years ago. "It wasn't a big office and Durbin was kind of a go-fer for Simon," said Rednour. Now, he is one of America's most respected statesmen, and they talk all the time.

Rednour said he was offered a position with the state's Central Management Services office back in 1972, but turned it down. "My businesses did better when I didn't accept jobs and resigned from boards," he said.

Politics is a lot of work.

And, Rednour believes that may have caused Gov. Rod Blagojevich's breakdown. "You know, the governor gets maybe a couple of hundred thousand from a $53 billion state budget and I think the governor just got sick of it," said Rednour. "People think politicians are paid a lot, but they aren't," he said. Blagojevich inherited huge state debt he has never been able to overcome. Except for a handful of issues on which he and Senate president Emil Jones agreed upon, the triad of Blagojevich, Jones and house leader Michael Madigan fought like cats and dogs--or worse. State pensions are a runaway train. Every single Ameren customer in the state of Illinois hated all of them for not fending against last year's 50 percent utility rate hikes.

Bills still aren't paid. Taxpayers are mad at lawmakers and lawmakers hate each other. State government became not only dysfunctional, but an embarrassment.

And, maybe "pay to play" and finally the profane demands for $50,000 campaign payoffs from children's hospitals and visions of grandiose appointments to Obama's cabinet, or ambassadorships or getting Chicago Tribune editors fired were somehow perks he felt he was entitled to for six years of grief--an emperor with no clothes.

Does that imagined entitlement extend to being profane. By any standard, you don't call a president elect or Chicago Tribune staff members "Mother F........,". Even the governor's wife has been caught on federal wiretaps swearing like a sailor.

"No, you don't," said Rednour. But, he adds, they were never, ever like that around him. In fact, the governor called late last fall asking if the leaves were turning in Southern Illinois and said they'd be down.They never came.

U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald would disagree, arguing Blagojevich was corrupt from the beginning.

"George Ryan and I are basically the same age," said Rednour. "Wanda became good friends with Mrs. Ryan," he said. "But, I never donated anything to any of them," he said. It was actually Wanda's friendship with the Ryans that landed the $13 million for the Southern Illinois Center at the fair. Somebody at the Capital Development Board said the fair would get only $7 million, but Wanda got a promise from Ryan to get the full $13 million.

Rednour said he liked one of the state's most fiscally responsible governors, Jim Edgar wife Brenda. "They were just very private and quiet people," he said.

Rednour said he has never taken sides on the issues that divided Blagojevich, Jones and Madigan. "I've never really been in the inner circles up there," he said.

"But, here in Du Quoin I will make a tough decision when I have to," he said.

Should Gov. Blagojevich step down?

"That's a matter for his family and his legal counsel," said Rednour. The governor has been charged with a lot of ethically disgusting crimes, but at the end of the day Grand Jurors are going to have to sort out how much of it was "pay to play" versus how much of it was warped dreaming?

"It's not for me to decide," having no opinion as to the means U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald used to obtain the governor's arrest.

Rednour said what he believes will happen is that somehow, Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn will fill the governor's seat and that Quinn will either fill the Obama senate seat or that it will be filled by special election. He doesn't know which.

Ultimately, he believes that Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan will become a candidate for governor, which probably drove her Friday to ask the Illinois Supreme Court to remove Blagojevich.

Of President-elect Barack Obama, Rednour said, "I think Obama is the real deal. "He (Obama) came to me and said, 'If I win the primary will you support me in the general election?'"

Rednour promised he would, first torn between the aspirations of Illinois' junior senator and Hillary Clinton. He knows both of the Clintons well through his work in the the DNC and backed Bill Clinton during both bids for the White House. Obviously, his ultimate support of Obama was the right decision.

"Wanda actually had a better feel for Obama than I did," said Rednour. "I asked her if she talked to Obama and she said 'that guy is going to be America's first black president'."

"He's a smart guy and an honest guy," said Rednour.

"Bush didn't do a very good job as our president, but he's still our president and you have to respect the office," Rednour said.