A people and B people

As far as I can tell, they only let 6 of us in to the Chicago City Council chambers. By us I mean the uninvited, non-mainstream press and non-relatives-or-personal-friends of Maggie Daley. The non-aldermen, non-lobbyists and the non-mayors. In other words I mean the public.

I put on my best Mitt Romney costume and set off against the 6˚ windchill. Leaving Humboldt Park at six forty-five I arrived to City Hall at 7:30 in the morning. Rahm Emanuel's proposed ordinances concerning appropriations and preparations for the May G8 summit were scheduled to be read into the record at 9 A.M. I had planned my first day off in three weeks, expecting the proceedings to run long into the afternoon.

The group was small when I arrived, but they were very lively and awake. Most of them were clearly demonstrators. They passed around buttons and friendly propaganda. For every person under thirty there were two over forty. As the crowd grew, it became more and more diverse. Eventually the lobby to the City Council Chambers became packed with people from all walks of life.

I waited by an old metal detector at the front of a line being guarded by several police officers. News cameras were mounted in front of the mural in the back of the lobby. The wait became a chance for people to share more literature and political flair. Someone running for congress handed out homemade quarter-sheet fliers cut out of printer paper. A cherubic little man kept trying to spark a chant or a cheer, but was largely ignored. When the crowd reached it's high water mark, some folks held a press conference.

The city employees peered out meekly from inside the elevators as they made their way to higher floors. Someone from the National Lawyer's Guild told me that the G8 proposal would be pushed into the afternoon. At the last minute the City Council decided to take up resolutions eulogizing Maggie Daley. The chambers were to be closed to the public until the resolutions were finished, though we were invited to watch behind noise-proof security glass on the third floor gallery. Only friends and relatives of the Daley family were to be admitted until the honorary resolutions were passed. Aldermen and their staffers looked stressed, and they didn't waste time walking past the crowd.

People started shouting and chanting. It seemed to some that resolutions were a tactic to bring down the number of protesters present inside the council chambers for the G8 measures. Some union officials wondered allowed if the City Council was trying to pack the chambers with the Mayor's cheerleaders. They admitted well-rested socialites and frenetic city workers with badges. A pair of older women in matching black mink coats were admitted while the mob looked on in disbelief. The demonstrators were crestfallen when they realized they weren't getting in. It was as if their flight was cancelled while they were in line at the DMV. No one really knew where to put their frustration. Some spewed vulgarities aimed at Maggie Daley. Others dozed off on the lobby floor.

I was standing next to a young lobbyist during the speeches. We talked a little about her routine, how she has a seat inside the chambers that she always goes to and how she was certain she would eventually be let in. She said that it was common for the City Council to take up resolutions at the last minute, but that the resolution portion of the legislative assemblies were rarely if ever closed to the public.

Guerrilla theatre broke out in the middle of the crowd. A woman in a grey pantsuit with a Rahm Emanuel mask directed a "police officer" to arrest and handcuff the demonstrators in the lobby. The "officer" beat people with a foam sword for getting too close to the mayor. Then he "handcuffed" and "gagged" the demonstrators with masking tape. Before long, a third of the remaining crowd was sitting in, sending text messages with their hands taped behind their backs.

The real police came in all shapes and sizes. Some of them were obviously veteran City Council guards. Younger female officers seemed like backup - they were dressed in uniforms less formal than militaristic. They formed two entries, one for the public and one for the people who would actually be allowed inside. Occasionally they would let a demonstrator cross the entry to use the bathroom under guard. The young lobbyist was allowed in when an alderman spotted her in the crowd. A young journalist had his press pass scrutinized, then was instructed to watch from behind the glass in the third floor gallery.

An officer winked at me when the demonstrators voiced their indignation. I got the winking officer to talk to me when I rolled my eyes at the whining tide. He complained that since he never went to college he never got to call the shots. He said if it were up to him he'd let all of us in, and then he told me about how three of his kids were in college and one was a sophomore at DeLasalle. I told him I went to Saint Ignatius and we talked about Jesuit education. We stopped short of comparing moustaches, though I entertained the idea at one point.

People started filtering out of the chambers, and it became clear that the resolutions were winding down. As more and more people left the closed-door session, the two dozen or so demonstrators left in the lobby reached the height of their frustration. Some of them gave up hope that they would be allowed in at all. They also lacked cogent plan for what they would do if they got inside. The original plan was to mass arrest themselves in front of the city council, but they used up all their zip ties in the guerrilla theatre piece before.

A young woman emerged from the chambers. She was smartly dressed, but I couldn't discern her function in the City Council chambers from her appearance. She looked at us sadly on her way to the elevators, stopped, and doubled back to give us the news. "They've already started without you. They're reading the mayor's G8 proposal into the record right now."

The indignation turned into electricity. The crowd started chanting "LET US IN NOW!" and "WE VOTE NO!" A large man with curly black hair addressed the front line of the demonstrators. He said the chambers were full, that there was nothing he could do, and that he'd let us in as soon as more people left. While he said this, a dozen or so staffers and friends-of-Maggie-Daley walked behind him on their way out the chambers. A skinny, middle aged man kicked the metal detector from behind me. I looked sympathetically at my mustachoed police officer friend, then I turned around and told the skinny demonstrator to cool it.

The representative from the National Lawyer's Guild mic-checked the crowd. He told us that it wasn't the police's fault that we weren't being allowed in the chambers. The City Council had decided that we shouldn't be admitted. This boiled the protesters. There was a moment of hot chaos. The lawyer couldn't finish his mic-check, the crowd was so angry. I was angry too. I was swept up by the energy of the room. For a moment, a loud nothing was happening. All of the angst in the room suddenly became personal. I felt like I had to do something. Then I shouted louder than everyone else.

"Mic check!"

"Mic check!"

"The Chicago City council is cutting you out of the democratic process!"

"The Chicago City council is cutting you out of the democratic process!"

"Remember this when your alderman asks you for re-election!"

"Remember this when your alderman asks you for re-election!"

As soon as the crowd said "alderman" my mustacheoed officer and his partner removed the barricade and hurried me through the metal detector. I was the first person they had admitted into the chambers. An officer rifled through my papers, inspecting bits of scores, receipts and my copy of Legend. A reporter with a microphone muttered at me. "What was that?" I asked.

"I said nice work."

ALL OF THIS HAPPENED EXACTLY AS I JUST DESCRIBED IT.

As I approached a dais guarded by a police officer in traditional blues, I appeared alone for the first time that morning. The officer, also mustacheoed with balding salt-and-pepper hair, looked puzzled as I approached. I asked him for directions to the city council chambers, but he stuttered as he processed my question. Who is this peckerwood? I imagined him thinking. What does he think he's doing? I asked him again for directions. "Who are you with?"

"I'm with no one, I'm myself, I'm alone."

"Who said you could come in? Who are you with?"

"I'm independent."

Three more demonstrators came in behind me. The officer gave up and pointed to the entry. "Use the ramp!" he said. "Don't use the stairs! They don't go anywhere." Past a suit and up the ramp and I was in.

I was alone again. The chambers are quieter than I expected. There's no marble echo, just dead carpet, and the only audible voices come from a highly compressed sound system. Some people looked at me. I slipped a polite smile and looked for a seat. There were seats everywhere. I saw a bank of six and headed straight for it. I was unaware of any impression I was making on anyone. I couldn't tell if they knew that the dike had spilled over.

As soon as I sat down I buried my head in my smartphone. I had been narrating the experience on twitter the whole morning. I had to tell my smartphone that I was inside! My smartphone simply could not wait! I barely noticed that the 4 other demonstrators that made it into the chambers filed in next to me in the bank of empty seats. I moved over to fit them all in, sitting next to an older gentleman who nudged nervously away from me in his chair.

That's when I looked up and saw him.

Rahm Emanuel is a short man, slight and oddly tanned. He earned his impeccable suit, which he showed off by constantly fidgeting with its buttons. He stood beside his high chair, spinning it like a bored teenager. Some middle-aged white male alderman was praising him while he looked on with a cool indifference. Everyone could hear the chanting. It was intelligible from behind the third floor gallery glass and the doors leading out to the lobby. Mayor Emanuel slipped his wedding ring from finger to finger as the scene played out.

I found myself unable to imagine what he could possibly be thinking in that moment. Only a year ago he took office, and now this. I tried to observe dispassionately, but I couldn't help but feel some empathy for the man. How quickly his vague popularity had soured into melodrama. Beneath him Walter Burnett praised him from backing down on a few well-publicized issues. Rey Colon and Ed Burke made specious comparisons between the May G8 protesters and the 2011 rioters in London. Everyone equated demonstrators with rioters. Burke called them terrorists. Then he wistfully hearkened back to his own days as a police officer in 1967 and 68. Mayor Emanuel swaggered a little in his droll replies to their praise. He was surrounded by a congress of congratulators. They voted. Only four Nays. The Mayor spun the gavel in his right hand. The demonstrators behind the gallery glass grew even louder. The City Clerk read the roll call and one of the occupiers next to me stood up. His mic check died in the carpet. The other occupiers meekly repeated him. Only 6 of us made it inside, not enough to make an impression. Two police officers pulled the mic checker off the floor and escorted him out of the room. Another officer told the other demonstrators to stand up. I kept my mouth shut, I hadn't said a word yet. One of the nurses stood up, and all the demonstrators were escorted out. I was alone again. The voices from behind the gallery glass suddenly got quieter above us, and the Clerk completed the role call. One of the aldermen objected. Mayor Emanuel spun to his left, facing the news cameras, toward the voice of the dissent from below and said something like: "In the spirit of democracy I adjourned the motion." I was too awestruck to remember what he said exactly. The moment was too large, I was too small to make sense out of any of it.

I blinked down toward my smartphone and when I looked up he was gone.

As soon as Rahm Emanuel left the chambers, the news cameras began tearing down. I tried to think of something witty to shout, but nothing seemed clever or meaningful enough. The council lost all potency the moment the Mayor was gone.

The aldermen moved on with their agenda. Some people noticed me as my leg bobbed nervously. People started to leave the chambers like Sox fans leaving the nosebleed seats at the top of the seventh inning. The aldermen passed an empty-yet-politically-charged resolution declaring Chicago a "Torture Free" zone. They repudiated the entire human world history of torture, obliquely referencing Chicago's own recent newsworthy revelations towards the end. Some members of the City Council left their seats and milled about the room.

One alderman introduced a last minute resolution of recognition. He wanted to pat one of his interns on the back, on the record, while the kid stood up before the chambers. The alderman rattled on about how the intern recently turned 21, how he was a great kid, how he was a noteworthy intern, how he had so bravely come out of the closet, how much he had achieved. He talked about fear and how it kept people from speaking out and being honest. He praised his intern for taking a stand. The aldermen spoke of how the intern had done so much in spite of the fact that he was gay, how he had recorded a youtube video for the it gets better campaign, and how praiseworthy he was for these things and more.

The twenty one year old intern, his generation locked out of the room, nervously occupied his suit. The aldermen applauded him from their swivel chairs, the audience sitting and watching in bored silence. I felt I could say nothing of consequence anymore. I wanted to shout nonsense. The word, "NONSENSE!" I missed my chance. The meeting was over.

On my way out, the balding officer with the salt and pepper mustache told everyone to use the stairs instead of the elevators. David [Daniel?] Orlikoff was being arrested in the Lobby, and they didn't want us to see that as we exited the chambers. On my way to the stairs, I heard the officer say "I'm impressed, you didn't get ejected. You said you were independent and you were true to your word." I told that although I'm independent, my sympathies were with those who had been tossed out of the chambers. I only missed my chance to speak up.

He shrugged a little. "Maybe next time."


tl;dr The only real purpose of today's Chicago City Council is to read political advertisements into the public record.