There is an old proverb: You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. Here's a new proverb, circa 2006: You can lead Cook County voters to reform, and they won't give a damn.

And here's another: Black voters will vote for a black Democrat any time and every time that he is on the ballot, regardless of qualifications, if he is opposed by a white Republican.

In the race for Cook County Board president, black Democrat Todd Stroger beat white Republican Tony Peraica by 94,457 votes, getting 53.7 percent of the votes cast. In a turnout of 1,263,539, Stroger, the so-called "Amiable Dunce," won 679,025-584,568.

Stroger won in Chicago by 431,105-199,212, a margin of 231,893 votes and a share of 68.5 percent. By comparison, Judy Baar Topinka got 98,488 votes in Chicago in the governor's race, and Peter Garza got 97,659 votes in the sheriff's contest. So Peraica ran more than 100,000 votes ahead of his party.

Peraica won the suburbs by 385,356-247,920, a margin of 137,436 votes and a share of 60.8 percent. Historically, for a Republican to win countywide, he needs to hold the Democrat to under 65 percent of the vote in Chicago and get more than 65 percent in the suburbs. Peraica almost turned the trick.

This year turnout was nearly equal: 633,276 in the suburbs and 633,322 in Chicago. Peraica needed to win the suburbs by more than 200,000 votes and lose Chicago by fewer than 200,000. He failed to do so, for two reasons: race and political affiliation.

Despite discontent concerning the method of Stroger's selection by Democratic committeemen to replace his ailing father, John Stroger, despite the paucity of Stroger's qualifications, and despite the proliferation of corruption within the city and county, it came down to this: Black voters overwhelmingly backed Todd, white ethnic voters in Chicago's outlying wards and suburban whites overwhelming backed Tony, and Todd got just enough support from liberal whites and habitual Democrats to eke out a victory.

"It was an anti-Bush, anti-war, anti-Republican wave," Peraica complained. "If I had more money and more (precinct) workers, I could have won. This election was not about God, gays, guns and abortion. It was about changing how government works. But they tagged me as a 'Bush Republican,' and I lost."

In the 19 black-majority wards, it was business as usual. Stroger beat Peraica in those wards 135,303-16,358, a margin of 118,944 votes and a share of 89.2 percent. In the 24th, 27th, 28th, 29th and 37th wards on the West Side, where Democratic committeemen backed Danny Davis at slating and expressed resentment that another South Sider was chosen to run, Stroger won 32,099-3,577, a margin of 28,522 and a share of 89.9 percent.

Peraica can take some consolation in the fact that he got over 10 percent of the Chicago black vote, higher than the 3.1 percent that Aurie Pucinski got in 1998, when, running as a Republican, she lost the black wards to John Stroger and lost countywide by 332,942 votes, getting 36.9 percent of the votes cast.

Given Cook County's demographics, in the future a Republican will need at least 20 percent of the black vote to win.

Peraica won 13 of 50 city wards, including the 36th, 38th, 39th, 41st, 45th, 47th and 50th wards on the Northwest Side. Pucinski won only four. Peraica also won handily in the Lakefront 42nd and 43rd wards, barely carried the Lakeview 44th Ward, and won the Wicker Park 32nd Ward. On the Southwest Side, Peraica won the 19th and 23rd wards, albeit narrowly.

On the Northwest Side, Peraica won the 41st Ward by 11,320-3,673, the 45th Ward by 6,608-3,795, the 38th Ward by 4,499-3,770, the 39th Ward by 4,499-3,770 and the 36th Ward by 5,870-4,602.

"The voters wanted reform," said Frank Coconate, chairman of the Northwest Side Democratic Organization. Coconate endorsed Peraica and was his coordinator in the Lakefront wards. "The votes for Peraica will be votes against (Mayor Rich) Daley in 2007," Coconate insisted. Peraica won the 42nd Ward by 9,195-6,278, the 43rd Ward by 6,032-4,145 and the 44th Ward by 6,819-6,699.

Coconate's presumption is incorrect. White Lakefront voters opted against Stroger because he was perceived as an unqualified candidate who happened to be black. There is no indication that the Lakefront is in revolt against the "Daley Machine."

The bulk of white voters on the Northwest Side and the Southwest Side also opted against Stroger, because he was both black and unqualified. A pro-Peraica vote in 2006 is not necessarily an anti-Daley vote in 2007. Importantly, local Democratic committeemen did not exert themselves for Todd Stroger in 2006 to the degree that they did for John Stroger against Pucinski in 1998.

In the 45th Ward, for example, Peraica won by 6,608-3,795, a margin of 2,813 votes. In 1998 Tom Lyons' precinct captains pushed hard for John Stroger, and he lost the ward by just 8,335-8,215. In the 36th Ward, Bill Banks' organization failed to win for Todd Stroger, getting 4,602 votes to Peraica's 5,870. In 1998 Banks carried the ward for John Stroger by 8,168-7,930. In the 41st Ward, where Stroger had no ground game, Peraica won 11,320-3,673, better than Pucinski's 11,725-7,925 win in 1998.

The Cook County suburbs are rapidly becoming a Republican wasteland. Although Peraica ran well, Topinka lost the suburbs by 84,246 votes, and in the Cook County Board of Review's suburban 1st District, incumbent Republican Maureen Murphy lost to Brendan Houlihan by 13,062 votes. Of the county board's seven suburban districts, Republicans won five, and two were very close.

The reason for the Republican eclipse is clear: The black suburban vote is exploding. Peraica won 23 of 30 townships, getting 70 percent or better in 14 and 60 percent or better in six. He ran up a huge vote in the upscale North Shore, the northwest suburbs, the western suburbs and the upscale southwest suburbs -- all predominantly white areas.

But Stroger did likewise in the black areas: He got 72 percent of the vote in west suburban Proviso Township (Maywood), and, in the south suburbs, 68 percent in Rich Township, 74 percent in Thornton Township, 81 percent in Calumet Township, 56 percent in Bloom Township and 51 percent in Bremen Township. Liberal Evanston went for Stroger with 54 percent of the vote, but equally liberal Oak Park gave Peraica 52 percent. Peraica got 52 percent of the vote in heavily Hispanic Cicero and 57 percent in increasingly Hispanic Berwyn. In north suburban Niles Township, which has a diverse and racially mixed population, Peraica got 60 percent of the vote.

In 1998 Pucinski won 21 suburban townships but got only 52 percent of the vote, for a winning margin of 26,041 votes while John Stroger won the black townships by huge margins. In that election, white Democratic committeemen in both the city and suburbs made a concerted effort to beat Democrat-turned-Republican Pucinski. They didn't do so in 2006.

In fact, the Peraica-Stroger race is similar to the 1998 U.S. Senate race, in which white Republican Peter Fitzgerald beat the flawed black incumbent, Carol Moseley-Braun, in the suburbs by 13,574 votes, carrying 20 of 30 townships. The Democrat won the six black-majority townships, plus the liberal white townships of Evanston, Oak Park, Niles and New Trier.

As demonstrated in 2004, white voters have no difficulty backing an engaging, qualified black candidate such as Barack Obama. But they won't back a lightweight like Todd Stroger. Black voters, however, won't back any white candidate against a black candidate.

The long-term outlook for Republicans in Cook County is ominous. Stroger has 4 years to entrench himself and build a reputation as a competent administrator. If he doesn't, he'll surely lose the 2010 Democratic primary to Forrest Claypool. If he does, he'll beat any Republican. If the Republicans couldn't beat somebody as beatable as the "Amiable Dunce" in 2006, then they're never going to win a countywide race in the next generation. Republican candidates lost by 582,265 votes for sheriff, by votes 712,823 for assessor, by 733,772 votes for clerk and by votes 805,389 for treasurer.

And even more disasters loom in 2010. Peraica, despite his elevated name recognition, won re-election as county commissioner in his west suburban 16th District (Berwyn and Lyons Townships) by just 845 votes. In the northwest suburban 15th District, which includes Streamwood, Barrington and Schaumburg, Republican Tim Schneider won by just 2,758 votes. In the North Shore 14th District, Republican Gregg Goslin was re-elected by 6,609 votes. In the far southwest suburban 17th District (Orland Park, Tinley Park), Republican Liz Gorman was re-elected by 8,958 votes.

And in the Northwest Side and west suburban (Elmwood Park, Norridge, Harwood Heights, Schiller Park, Franklin Park) 9th District, Republican Peter Silvestri was re-elected by 10,736 votes.

The Democrats now hold a 12-5 majority on the Cook County Board. If current trends persist, the Republicans may be down to a single seat, or none at all, by 2014 or 2018.