Mayoral Forum Question-Dodger Toni Preckwinkle Might Be A Cyborg

Toni Preckwinkle might be a cyborg. Or a three-dimensional embodiment of Siri, the bumbling artificial intelligence assistant on your iPhone that rarely gives you a straight answer.

It’s either that, or the Cook County Democratic Party boss doesn’t think Chicago voters deserve answers to topical questions asked at mayoral debates.

It was hard to tell after watching WTTW’s Phil Ponce repeatedly fail to get Preckwinkle to acknowledge, let alone answer, questions during Thursday’s debate on Chicago Tonight.

“It has been reported that you stopped running TV ads. How come?” Ponce asked.

“You know this has been a really great day. I’m grateful for the support I received from Chance this morning. Not only is he a great artist but he is a person who has a, a, a, long history of civic engagement. He’s a community activist. And when he spoke today he talked about my concern for educational equity and criminal justice reform as some of the reasons he supported me.”

Ponce, noticing that Preckwinkle didn’t answer the question, tried again: “Presumably those are topics one might have in television ads. You pulled them. How come?”

That one did not compute with Preckwinkle, either.

“Let me talk, too, about the support I received earlier in the week …” Preckwinkle responded as if a question hasn’t been posed by the debate moderator.

Still, Ponce tried a third time. He offered Preckwinkle a multiple-choice question in hopes of getting her to shed light on why she spiked campaign TV ads: “No. 1, you think you're losing and you don’t want to go into debt … No. 2, you’re out of money. No. 3, maybe you’re spending it on the internet.”

Preckwinkle looked straight at Ponce and her mouth started to move. But the words that came out didn’t match the context of the conversation.

I called Ponce Friday to ask for his take on Preckwinkle’s bizarre non-sequiturs about how her day went without mentioning my cyborg theory.

“I think people are smart enough to draw their own conclusion. … The candidate either doesn’t have a good answer, or doesn’t want to go there or is so intent on sticking to talking points that she doesn’t care what the question is,” he said. “It’s not just what a person says but it’s the nonverbal language that says something about their judgment, candor and intelligence.”

Or, could people be picking up on a cyborg mayoral candidate’s poorly programed artificial intelligence?

Since Preckwinkle can’t be counted on to answer direct questions, I called a lady forced to sit next to her at mayoral debates, her opponent, election frontrunner Lori Lightfoot.

“She never answers the question she’s asked,” Lightfoot said. “Her people feed her lines to say, and she keeps on repeating them. She’s like a robot.”

“Like a robot” doesn’t mean Preckwinkle is a robot. Or a cyborg like “The Terminator,” former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Chicago voters deserve answers.

So, I called the only robot/ cyborg expert that I know, Mancow Muller, who owns the robot from “Lost In Space.”

“Do you know if there’s a way to confirm that Preckwinkle is not a cyborg?” I asked.

“Of course, I do!” Mancow screamed into the phone. “You gotta get water in the orifices! That’s where they plug in! Get your finger wet and check! If sparks fly, then you know! That’s how I know Toni’s a cyborg.”

Mancow hung up. I think he was kidding.

So, I asked Siri, “How do you identify a cyborg?”

Siri directed me to a post on Medium warning people to be wary of “a human who uses automation to amplify their messaging; these should be considered as cyborgs.”

Preckwinkle’s tired talking points sound as automated as the robotext "Kay" from her campaign sent to my south suburban mom's cell phone.

Mom got a text bookended by "Hi Mark!" and a smiley face emoji that sandwiched what appeared to be highlights of Preckwinkle talking points : "Toni is a teacher, parent and proven progressive leader. Have you heard some of the facts about her opponent?"

"Do you know who this is?" Mom texted in a panic. "And how did they get my cell #?"

That nearly convince me, based on the Medium post, that Preckwinkle fits the criteria of an AI candidate running to make history as Chicago’s first cyborg mayor. As things turn out, though, the author of that essay was referring to fake-news Twitter accounts not fake-independent Machine politicians.

I made one last call to genius political spin-doctor familiar with question-dodging tactics used by arrogant, vindictive politicians like Preckwinkle.

“I can confirm, on background, that Toni is not a cyborg,” the spin-doctor said.

“Then, can you tell me what she is?” I asked.

“Not gonna be mayor.”

The spin-doctor has been watching the debates, too.