Election circus put Obama on parade from Illinois to Washington

Regardless of what happens a week from Tuesday, two politicians - a black man and a white man - will have had a profound effect on the course of American history.

Alan Keyes and Jack Ryan.

Without Messrs. Keyes and Ryan, Barack Obama and Joe Biden would not be where they are today.

For those who don't remember (or have opted to forget) the sad and sordid tale of 2004, Alan Keyes was the Illinois Republican Party's substitute choice to run against then little-known Barack Obama for an open U.S. Senate seat.

Keyes, never before an Illinois resident, was tapped as a willing sacrificial lamb after party-backed candidate Jack Ryan dropped out of the race during the summer of '04, a few months before the election.

Ryan, you may recall, was the squalid part of the story.

He quit the contest after ABC 7 News and the Chicago Tribune went to court in Los Angeles to open up some legal files that Mr. Ryan didn't want the public to see ... at least not before he could beat Obama to the U.S. Senate.

The records, part of his divorce from sultry TV actress Jeri Ryan, revealed that the candidate had pressed his ex-wife to visit group sex clubs with him. Ms. Ryan stated in the court records that she did so against her will.

While such exotic fetishes may be more common after politicians arrive in Washington, Mr. Ryan apparently decided that his election hopes had been dashed and he gave up the race.

That was when GOP wisdom dictated that perennial candidate Alan Keyes be drafted as a stand-in.

While Keyes vs. Obama produced a few interesting moments in the fall of 2004, the spectacle of a titillating sex scandal in Illinois politics had overshadowed just about everything else ... including the usual inspections of both candidates' citizenship, finances, personal relationships, business dealings, links to supporters, ties to political action committees, legislative voting records - if any, etc. ...

There weren't even the quirky questions, such as "Can you name the state spice?" or "Recite the alphabet backward."

The attention paid to Jack Ryan's self-induced sex scandal, the attending court fight over his divorce records, the eventual release of such grimy details and the walk-up to his resignation, resulted in Mr. Obama being able to circumvent the normal pre-election scrutiny.

It was like trying to watch a two-ring circus. Do you keep your eyes on the 400-pound, fire-eating man who has just set his feather costume ablaze? Or do you watch the dog trainer feed niblets to his prancing poodle?

Of course, once the Ryan show finished in the main ring, the eye-rolling choice of Alan Keyes as GOP prop made it a three-ring circus. Like a high-wire acrobat on a long fall, Mr. Keyes was a final distraction that ensured Mr. Obama would be elected.

There was simply no "vetting" of Obama or his record. Maybe it would have mattered, maybe not. We'll never know.

But in late 2004, by the time GOP golden boy Jack Ryan got out of the way and political punching bag Alan Keyes had joined the ballot, nothing could have stopped Obama's election.

Mr. Obama ended up winning with 70 percent of the statewide vote.

Afterward, Keyes wouldn't congratulate Obama saying it was "not anything personal," but that it would be wrong to "extend false congratulations to the triumph of what we have declared to be across the line." Keyes said Obama crossed the line's position on life.

Today, Mr. Ryan runs a handful of neighborhood newspapers in the South suburbs. That is an interesting career change, considering he blamed news organizations for his political demise.

Keyes returned to Maryland, apparently giving up on his '04 campaign pledge to live happily ever after in Calumet City regardless of winning or losing. He is an Independent Party candidate for U.S. president but is only on the ballot in California, Colorado and California.

If Barack Obama wins next Tuesday, this back-story probably won't make the American history books. But Obama knows. And so do Jack Ryan and Alan Keyes.

But if you still don't buy into the chronology, you really only have to ask yourself one question. You remember that stirring speech Mr. Obama made at the 2004 Democratic National Convention in Boston? The one that put him on a pedestal overnight?

A few months later, if Obama had then lost the 2004 Senate election, do you think right now he'd be a week away from the White House?

• Chuck Goudie, whose column appears each Monday, is the chief investigative reporter at ABC 7 News in Chicago. The views in this column are his own and not those of WLS-TV. He can be reached by e-mail at chuckgoudie@gmail.com.