Quote of the Day (Joseph Epstein, on Chicago Electoral Divisions)

“In Chicago elections one’s antipathies are always nicely divided. The division is usually between idealistic incompetence and corrupt quasi-competence. Corrupt quasi-competence, the way of the Daley dynasty, père et fils, for better and worse generally wins the day. The result has been that the city kept humming along, with all its messiness pushed under an ample carpet: horrible public schools, heavy debt, lots of street-gang murder in slum neighborhoods to go around. But beautiful trees were planted everywhere, and the snow got shoveled off the main thoroughfares. Chicago, the city that works—that is, if you don’t look too closely.”—Joseph Epstein, “The Rahmbomb…and Other Chicago Players,” The Weekly Standard, February 21, 2011

The city that Rahm Emanuel takes over from the Daleys (Richard II is in the accompanying image) is merely an urban microcosm of the quandary that Woody Allen once foretold: “More than any other time in history, mankind faces the crossroads ...one path leads to despair and utter hopelessness, the other to total extinction. I pray we have the wisdom to choose wisely.”