Very good AP article on the topic.

"Unlike the old days at City Hall, Daley has fewer ways to punish those who challenge him because the political patronage aldermen historically depended on is less blatant than when his late father, Mayor Richard J. Daley, ran the city, political consultant Don Rose said."

"So the current Mayor Daley is "less scary than the old man used to be," Rose said."

Chicago to vote on moving museum to lakefront park