Mr. Obama did not bring revolution to Springfield in his eight years in the Senate, the longest chapter in his short public life. But he turned out to be practical and shrewd, a politician capable of playing hardball to win election (he squeezed every opponent out of his first race), a legislator with a sharp eye for an opportunity, a strategist willing to compromise to accomplish things.
He positioned himself early on as a protégé of the powerful Democratic leader, Senator Emil Jones, a beneficiary of the Chicago political machine. He courted collaboration with Republicans. He endured hazing from a few black colleagues, played poker with lobbyists, studiously took up golf. (“An awful lot happens on the golf course,” a friend, Jean Rudd, says he told her.)
By the time he left Springfield in 2004, he had built not only the connections necessary to win election to the United States Senate but a record not inconsistent with his lofty rhetoric of consensus building and bipartisanship.
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Two black, Democratic state senators from Chicago, Donne E. Trotter and Rickey R. Hendon, who both now say they are Obama supporters, caricatured him as a privileged, know-it-all greenhorn.
So two Black Democratic state senators "caricatured him as a privileged, know-it-all" and he "endured hazing from a few black colleagues" while courting Republicans, playing poker, and studiously taking up golf? That shows that "he was disliked by the black Chicago establishment"? "He was snubbed by other black Chicago legislators when he was a state senator"?
Excuse me, but I don't think that shows that he was disliked by the Black Chicago establishment. Nor does it show that he was seriously snubbed, if at all, than more than two Black Democratic state senators. Even the article shows that the hazing or early interaction was only temporary.
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