Right after I moved back to Chicago a little over a year ago, I realized had no idea who my House member was. This was exciting. It was time to play the House of Representatives lottery! I went to the House site, I entered my info and... I busted. I found out my representative was Rahm Emanuel.
To say I swore very loudly when his name came up would be a disservice to my upstairs neighbors. Luckily the authorities were not called.
So when Barack Obama chose Rahm as his Chief of Staff, I had mixed emotions. First disappointment. Why couldn't Obama pick someone more progressive? Then excitement. Rahm isn't going to be my Congressman anymore! I'm going to get to play the lottery again!
So, there's a special primary election coming up here in the Illinois 5th Congressional District on March 3rd. There are approximately 20 thousand candidates running for the seat. OK, there's only 14. But, night and day, the best candidate is Tom Geoghegan.
Tom is a true progressive who's spent his life working as a labor lawyer.
Tom gets and respects the Netroots. He announced his candidacy on Huffington and Kos. And he's not afraid of the word liberal. As evidenced by the fact that he came to visit with Chicago's Drinking Liberally last night. (Photos courtesy of Steve Stearns.)
This election is an opportunity to put somebody into office who gets it.
And you can help. Even if you don't live in Chicago.
Now obviously you can donate money to Tom's campaign, and you should. But, you can also donate your time. Take a look.
Taking a page from the Obama campaign, the Geoghegan campaign has set up a virtual phone bank where you can log in and make phone calls to voters in in Illinois from anywhere in the country.
So, I'm asking for your help. Help me not have to swear loudly when I mention my House member's name. And help yourselves. Having a man in Congress who has spent his entire life fighting for workers, while at the same time, Republicans are putting a full court press on unions and the Employee Free Choice Act sure wouldn't hurt.