Chicago Hypocrisy Committee

They want to take down Abraham Lincoln, but not Paddy Bauler

The Chicago Monuments Committee recently met for the first time. Their agenda is to examine monuments for "white supremacy", "connections to racist acts" and "creating tension between people". They have identified "problematic" monuments, include statues of Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses Grant, for removal.

Mayor Lightfoot formed the committee and will likely follow its recommendations. She has already removed statues of Christopher Columbus.

If the Democrats are renaming monuments and parks, why is it that Bauler Park is not on their list?

Bauler Park is named for Paddy Bauler, former 43rd Ward Alderman and well-known crook. He is famous for saying "Chicago ain't ready for reform (yet)", running a speakeasy during Prohibition, shooting two police officers, and many, many, many stolen votes. His Wikipedia article doesn't even begin to scratch the surface.

Here's just a bit on the man, from the Chicago Tribune:

Bauler unabashedly courted every kind of voter, including ghost voters-those who, in an old and cherished Chicago tradition, voted in wards in which they didn't reside. During the 1962 aldermanic election, Tribune reporters discovered four ghost voters falsely registered as residents in flats above Bauler's tavern. Confronted with the evidence, the alderman admitted that they lived outside the ward, but he argued, ''The flats are furnished; they have steam heat, and, besides, they all pay me rent.'' Then there was the mysterious case of one Allen Jackson, who registered under four names in Bauler's ward. ''He's not my guy,'' insisted Bauler in mock astonishment. ''How did he sneak in here?''

In December, 1933, Bauler was charged with assaulting, with intent to kill, a Chicago policeman. In conflicting testimonies, some witnesses said Officer John J. Ahearn, accompanied by fellow officer Eddie Hayes, demanded entrance to Bauler`s tavern even though it was officially closed. When Bauler opened the door to allow departing guests to leave, Ahearn allegedly swung at the alderman, hitting him on the shoulder. Hayes then grabbed Ahearn and forced him back to their parked car. Bauler, said Hayes, then pulled out a revolver and fired two shots that both hit Ahearn, who was by then sitting in the car. The officer then fired back twice, missing Bauler but wounding Deputy Sheriff Frank Wright, who was standing nearby. Bauler claimed he fired in self-defense, and though Ahearn insisted that the alderman opened fire without provocation, the alderman was acquitted, and the policeman was dismissed from the force.

I recall hearing a story about Bauler that may not have been published before. Richard Means, longtime Chicago election attorney, told me once that Bauler had a polling location placed at the firehouse. The voting booths were arranged around the fire pole. He had someone upstairs looking down through the hole to see how people voted.

Chicago Democrats are interested in tearing down American heroes, but haven't even looked at a park named for a crook, probably because his crimes involved vote theft by the Democrat machine. They want to put American history on trial, but not their own.

Is it possible that Bauler Park is just an historical oddity?

Nope.

From an article published a few days ago on Oscar D'Angelo Park:

D’Angelo was disbarred in 1989 after the federal Operation Greylord investigation into corruption in the Cook County judiciary revealed he was providing judges and other officials with rental cars as gifts.

That never seemed to slow him down. In 2000, the Sun-Times reported D’Angelo received a $480,000 fee for brokering a deal that gave two close friends of Daley’s wife a piece of a lucrative newsstand contract at O’Hare Airport.

So long as we're renaming things, let's have a look at everything, shall we? How many parks and streets are named for Chicago Democratic machine politicians with a history of corruption?

I expect it wouldn't take long to find quite a few of them.