This column appeared in today's Chicago Tribune newspaper

Alan Keyes' former campaign manager Bill Pascoe jokes that if he ever writes a behind-the-scenes book about the wildest three months in state political history he will use the title, "It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time."

Bring in an intelligent, articulate, famous conservative from Maryland, Keyes, as a pinch-hit U.S. Senate candidate to battle an intelligent, articulate, famous liberal, Democrat from Hyde Park, Barack Obama. May the best ideology win!

Keyes went on to get only 27 percent of the vote in November 2004, then refused to make the customary concession call to Obama on the grounds that Obama is "evil."

At that time, Pascoe's good idea seemed like the worst idea anyone ever had.

But was it? Looking back a full year on the comically disastrous campaign, it seems more like a tale full of sound and fury that signified nothing.

Today finds almost no evidence that Keyes was here at all.

Despite his many chesty declarations that he planned to stick around no matter what--"I'm here and I'm committed to the people of Illinois" was one of many such promises--he skedaddled back to Maryland shortly after the election, former aides said.

Numerous efforts to reach Keyes for comment through his current spokeswoman were unsuccessful.

A handful of his loyalists occupied his campaign suite at 118 N. Clinton St. for several months after the election, but they're long gone now, said former top Keyes consultant Dan Proft.

Proft, who still maintains an office in the building, publishes the Illinois Leader and is working for GOP gubernatorial hopeful state Sen. Steve Rauschenberger and other clients.

The Keyes conflagration "has had no effect on this campaign cycle," Proft said, referring to the brewing Republican primary fight in which state Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka, a social moderate who was very critical of Keyes, appears to be the front-runner.

"I think voters look back on it as a total anomaly," he said. "We took a flier bringing him in. It didn't work out. Now we're back to a field of excellent home-grown candidates."

A long-term advantage of the kooky Keyes candidacy may have been that it spared mainstream Republicans and their party faithful a truly demoralizing defeat against the inevitable Obama.

The regulars kept their powder dry for 2006, and Keyes' spectacular loss-by 43 percentage points-was no reflection on anyone but his pompous, moralizing windbag self.

"This was a unique event," Pascoe said.

Pascoe accepts responsibility for promoting the idea and for recruiting Keyes. But responsibility for the scattershot, polarizing nature of the campaign belongs only to Keyes, who proved mostly unmanageable.

"I had a brilliant candidate who could speak about any subject and who, unfortunately, did speak about any subject," Pascoe said. "He didn't allow himself to have an unexpressed thought. We had no message discipline."

Keyes would call a news conference to address a particular issue, reporters would bait him with rhetorical questions and Keyes would eagerly and colorfully pontificate. The next day's headlines would inevitably read "Jesus wouldn't vote for Obama, Keyes says" (Tribune, Sept. 8, 2004) or something equally piquant.

"Long term, he may have helped the party with movement conservatives," said veteran Republican consultant and commentator Tom Roeser. "They used to complain: `You never let one of our guys run.' Well, we did. And he was a disaster. Now they may be more agreeable to backing candidates who don't match up on all their issues."

GOP state Chairman Andy McKenna said he hasn't heard a word this year from the man who vowed to remain and help unify the party.

But, ironically, McKenna said, Keyes has helped the party come together by being an ongoing reminder "that we need common-sense candidates to talk to people in a common-sense way about the issues they care about," he said.

Such optimism may be wishful thinking colored by amnesia. But a year later, what legacy or stain can we say Keyes left, other than yards of colorful copy and an object lesson in political ineptitude?

Good idea? Bad idea? Alan Keyes now seems more like a weird dream.

(Keyes2004.com photos)

Funny, the first thing I thought of the other day when I saw the headline that Judy Topinka is running for governor was... "but she was the one who as head of the Republican party was powerless to prevent the Keyes campaign last year."

I remember last year thinking... what a strange club that the person in charge who publicly said that Keyes would be a disaster couldn't do anything about it.

The same people who foisted Keyes upon Illinois last year are now claiming that Topinka, a moderate with broad appeal and a centrist approach who could easily takes Democratic votes away from Blago (speaking as a Democrat myself), fails the litmus test for the right wing-nuts. So glad they're going all out to shoot themselves in the foot again.

Zorn's column made me smile. Alan Keyes got fewer votes than a WASP-named pet would have.

Keyes is what people refer to as an educated fool; one whose book learning hasn't overcome his zealous theology (not philosophy)and bombastic strutting. His campaign was hilarious.

Keyes would have us revisit the 300 year old drought of scientific advancement Europe experienced, better known as the Dark Ages.
Ironically, he reacted to his own daughters' revelation by cutting her college support off. Now that's a Christian, vengeance over reconciliation, retaliation over forgiveness.

Moreover, moderate Republicans need to stand up to the neocon bullies that rule their party, lest they become neocons themselves.

I do not remember who it was that said that Keyes reminded him too much of Marvin the Martian to take him seriously. But how dead on was that? Kind of like Joe Lieberman---he reminded me too much of Henry Gibson from Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In and I just never could take him seriously.

I like it when Eric uses his column to laud people he likes, and smite people he doesn't like, especially when I agree with him.

It doesn't seem so gossipy when he does it, as opposed to say, Oprah.

ZORN REPLY-- I'm not even sure how this comment pertains to the column--there wasn't much lauding or smiting in this column unless you count the obligatory, nearly ritualistic and here somewhat tangential tossing of the thesaurus at Keyes. But OK.

So the Republicans actually think that no one will remember that they were the ones who unleashed the wit and wisdom of Alan Keyes on the state of Illinois?

So their leadership believes that the voters are as shallow and pointless as their candidiates?

Maybe next election they can bring George W. Bush in to prove it to us once and for all.

ZORN REPLY-- As one who has seldom cast a vote for the Party of Nixon let me defend the mainstream GOP members in this state. I don't think voters will hold Keyes against them in the next election cycle precisely because he was so clearly a one-off--a wacky aberration during a very weird election and not a signal of a strong movement of the party to the right. Remember, the history of this is that none of the plausible candidates wanted to run against Obama so they were left to pick among a raft of implausible candidates. Keyes was supposed to generate so much heat and light that he'd keep Obama pinned in Illinois. In retrospect I think they'd have been better off taking my advice and not put forth a candidate; this was the next best thing.

When the Republicans went with Keyes, I immediately thought that it was a sign of their enormous respect for Obama, because they weren't even going to try. In a way it was a win-win situation--the Republicans used Keyes as a sacrificial lamb and were able to blame the fiasco on the far right of the party, and Keyes used the Illinois Republican party to get out his hateful rhetoric.

While the article calls Keyes run "a tale full of sound and fury that signified nothing" or a "a total anomaly" I believe a better characterization would be a desperate attempt by a disorganized party to polarize the state by "values" and split racial voting lines.

Furthermore, saying that the "polarizing nature of the campaign belongs only to Keyes, who proved mostly unmanageable" is letting Illinois Republicans off far too easily. Anyone who has ever paid attention to Keyes beyond a cursory level would know to expect exactly this type of behavior from him. I would think a party might want to give a deeper look at someone they choose to run for one of the nation's highest office.

John Rogers at Kung Fu Monkey uses Keyes' 27% to define a bottomline Crazification Factor for the population at large:
http://kfmonkey.blogspot.com/2005/10/lunch-discussions-145-crazification.html

via Fred Clark at Slacktivist

Trying to foist Keyes on us was a sign there are no moderate Republicans. I'm never voting for one again, for any office, any time.

I'm with Cheryl!

Keyes campaign only became hilarious after it became clear that he was not going to win. When he first came to Illinois, I was seriously fearful that he might have a shot and that there'd be one more total ring-wing whackjob making laws in the Senate. Fortunately people were somewhat quick to figure out what a lunatic he is and then I was able to relax and play the "What Could He Possibly Say/Do Next" game.

I notice that the column doesn't even mention how Keyes got the opportunity to run--because the Chicago Tribune, Eric's newspaper, went out of their way to character assassinate the Republican primary winner, Jack Ryan, and drive hm out of the race. It's sort of like discussingAmerica's entry into World War II, and not mentioning the Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor.

Alan Keyes' candidacy illustrated how disconnected the Illinois Republican Party is from the people of our state. Obviously lacking any meaningful diversity in its ranks, the pathetic scramble by the GOP to find a black person - any black person - to go up against Obama smacks of cynicism and disrespect. Keyes rhetoric was more than just posturing; it was abusive, and the Illinois GOP leadership was well aware of it (unlike Jack Ryan's divorce fiasco: Thanks, Judy, that was disgusting, too!). And why go to Maryland to dig up a candidate for an Illinois race? Any downtown street corner could have produced an illogical, irrational, shouting man who was truly a resident, and more easily.

Eric, I read your article, now I'd appreciate if you'd read what I have to say. I thought wow, here's a liberal going to task on a black man. But of course the black man had to be a good, conservative, Christian man. You had the "guts" to write more disparing articles about Alan, than you ever did about the supposed millionaire "reverend" in Chicago, who has cheated on his wife. I'm sure you're scared to death of what Jackson's cronies would probably do to you if you wrote a disparaging article about him. So keep ignoring everything Jesse does, and pick on Alan you brave guy. Let me take one wild guess. You're one of those liberal white guys who doesn't live in a predominately black area, and if you live in Chicago, you send your kids to private schools (if you have any). Alan did many great things. He brought to people's attention the horrors of abortion. Alan doesn't espouse the clandenstine way of eliminating the black race (abortion). ERic, answer me one question since you claim to read all your email. Do you consider it a priority to vote for someone who would like to eliminate the killing of black babies thru abortion?????????? Two more question, what would have became of you, if your mom would have "chose" to eliminate you? Do you really believe Jesus would vote for someone like Obama, who espouses abortion?? Let me guess, you dont like to answer the tough ones, only the softball ones.

ZORN REPLY-- I've been neither a big fan or a big critic of Rev. Jackson over the years. He's a mixed bag, clearly...has a lot of important things to say and has done good things. Also, not so much. But he's not the issue.
I do not believe for one moment that race or racism plays any role in the pro abortion-rights movement. Generally, abortion occurs in cases of pregnancies of unmarried women. I don't know the answer to this question so I ask it both rhetorically and out of curiosity--
Given all pregnancies of unmarried women, Is the percentage of abortions of such pregnancies greater in the black population than in the general population or the white population?
I hope that question's clear ( and relevant). It asks that, if we control for cirumstances, is the black abortion rate any higher than any other rate.
It leaves unaddressed the mechanism through which you blame anyone but the person who seeks the abortion for the abortion itself -- if coercion is a problem, then let's address it.
I'm pro choice. And I don't consider the question of what Jesus would say about abortion to be relevant to what the law should be regarding choice in this matter.

Keep voting for the democrats and keep wondering why taxes are so high. Did you ever wonder why when you cross the border and buy gas in Indiana, it is so much cheaper than here in Illinois, even though we have Chicago, which generates huge revenue?????? Mabey Obama will lower the taxes? yeah, right!!!! Where do I get the free housing and free healthcare?

I somewhat object to the observation of a pompous moralizing Keyes. I found him to be similar to what many other political candidates have said over the years just with slightly more insensitivity (not calling Obama after or saying Jesus would not vote for Obama) or boldness. Maybe I made an even more controversial comment, but I think we are all guilty of pompous moralizing and insensitivity.

A point I want to make and I really would prefer to have mentioned in a print resource is the idea of we become or were what we hate most. If we speak against the Jewish religion or some Jewish people, you will discover that 100-300 years ago we were Jewish. If we speak against the communists, one can discover that 1,000 years ago we lived on communal land. If we speak against the Germans or Russians or Africans, you might discover that you were German or Russian or African. It is just a genealogical hypothesis--"What you hate most is what you were or will become over some period of time."

I had and have some concerns with Israel's treatment of the Palestians and criticism of those who wanted to discuss the facts of the Holocaust, and just yesterday I looked on the Jewish Gen website and discovered that some of the surnames in my family are way back the same as Jewish surnames or Holocaust names. That led to that discovery.

So when I criticize psychiatry or something for overusing medication or the government for being too persecutory sometimes or people for not giving credit or people for making false accusations, I will probably become persecutory or overuse medication too or it has happened in the past.

I hope I am wrong about this hypothesis when I criticize too much use of violence.

The hypothesis is indeed similar to the mote you see in another's eye is really in your eye.

James T. Struck

After reading Witz's post, I have to think that there really is something to that 27% Crazification Factor idea brought up earlier on this thread.

I think I should remember this fiasco when I vote next time. If I am to believe every comment that I read here and this particular post, Alan Keyes was still put forward as a candidate for the US Senate. This may be an abberation, but this episode isn't going to help Judy Baar Topinka in getting my vote.

It may be that people want representation in step with their needs.

Eric,
Thanks for answering my questions. Although we differ in philosophy, I do respect you for having a forum where you allow people to e-mail and post them (even those who have different opinions than you), and for taking the time to answer my questions. I don't believe many columnists, especially those who I disagree with, would do so. I take my hat off to you in regards to that.

Keyes had no chance to begin with. Did Keyes lose because he was politically inept or was it more because the things that he believed in firmly did not appeal to the average citizen? Isn't sort of neat that he was politically inept and willing to discuss anything that anyone brought up instead of sticking to "the message"? As a member of the reader advisory panel for the local paper, I got to question several candidates from both parties last election cycle here in Indiana. I have developed an intense dislike for sticking to the message, being evasive when your question is controversial and giving out the official sound bite answer. Someday, when I decide the time is right to run for office, I hope that I can appeal to the people by being politically inept and telling people what I think. Then again, I have always been a dreamer.
Manny

Hey Witz,

Since you're so concerned with black women having abortions, maybe you (and your ilk) can adopt all the adolescent black children that have no guidance and get into trouble at an early age.

You see, many young, unmarried women choose abortion precisely to avoid these problems down the road. Perhaps the sperm donors should marry these women and raise their children.

Keyes, incidentally, exiled his daughter after her outing as gay. That's what is puzzling about the so-called Christian Right; they are Old Testament types, choosing vengeance over redemption, as Christ taught.

Is Keyes being a good Christian by cutting off college support for his daughter?

Having lived in Virginia and seen Keyes run unsuccessfully for President, I was astonished when I found out my homestate invited him to partake in the race for Senator. My question to the Illinois Republican Party is this: if someone like me was aware of Mr. Keyes nonsensical ramblings and I'm not in politics, why weren't they? Keyes may be a Harvard graduate, but he makes as much sense as someone who just suffered a severe concussion. I'm glad he's gone because he's an embarrassment for everyone in the Illinois political scene, not just Republicans.