Being from Chicago, but by way of Honolulu and Jakarta and many other points west and east, President Obama may not be fully steeped in the doctrines of the Chicago School of Management, as expounded by the eminent Professor Al Capone. Employing phraseology composed by wordsmith David Mamet, 
Mr. Capone discoursed on the fundamentals of organizational success by employing a baseball metaphor. “A man stands alone at a plate. This is a time for individual achievement. But in the field–what? [He’s} part of a team. Looks, throws, catches, hustles–part of one big team.” With his recalcitrant behavior on the health care bill this week, Joe Lieberman, the entirely-too-independent senator from Connecticut, has made it abundantly clear to the president and his 
colleagues on the hill that he has forgotten this principle entirely. Therefore, after the new year, after a weaker health care bill is passed, this entirely-too-independent senator should get a pointed reminder, and be replaced as chairman of the prestigious Senate Homeland Security Committee. It is past time to get tough. The president has spent his entire first year playing Kumbaya with the Congress, and it has netted him less than optimal results–a smaller and more scattered stimulus bill, more anemic health care reform than was once thought possible, no bipartisanship to speak of. Machiavelli advised the prince that it is better to be loved than feared, but since it is not possible to be loved all the time, it is more useful to be feared. Everyone in Washington loves President Obama, but no one fears him. He desperately needs to administer a dose of discipline, as close to Chicago-style as possible, and Joe Lieberman s begging to be the recipient.
I think part of President Obama’s problem is that he lived in Hyde Park, a neighborhood more known for its intellectuals than its tough guys, so he doesn’t know how to fight dirty. Now take our current ruler of Chicago, Richard M. Daley. Like his late father, the original boss of Chicago, junior grew up in the tough blue-collar neighborhood of Bridgeport. In neighborhoods like that you learn how apply the screws to the duly elected officials in City Hall, the Cook County Building and Springfield. Don’t cooperate with the Mayor and your ward doesn’t get its share of funding and services. Things like getting potholes fixed, garbage picked up. In fact, Richard J. Daley is so powerful in Illinois he’s not even considered a politician anymore but a statesman.
I really thought Obama recognized that he lacked the appropriate disposition to govern this way, but that he would compensate by hiring Rahm Emmanuel. So far I haven’t seen this reputed tough guy deliver.
Emmanuel is from the North Side of Chicago, the wimpy side of the city. The South Side where I grew up was the center of Chicago’s industrial base and the location of its rail yards, factories, steel mills and slaughterhouses. When my Aunt was going to elementary school, one of her student field trips was to tour a slaughterhouse. The HOF linebacker Dick Butkus developed his definition of the perfect tackle while playing football on the South Side (it was to hit a player so hard that his head would pop off and roll down the field for 50 yards). On the South Side, we use barbwire to floss and 16-penny nails as toothpicks. On the North Side, they worry about the ban on foie gras.