44 Comments - chi - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 10:00 am: Rauner took more things “off the table”, but it was a little nutty to put them on the table in the first place when he didn’t have the votes. Look at Madigan’s millionaire’s tax. He’s not demanding it be part of some grand bargain. It’s a position he favors, it lost a vote in the house, so it’s gone. He’s not trying to hold the budget hostage over it. That’s the difference; Rauner won’t accept that he doesn’t have the votes for his pet causes. Additionally, Madigan has a much better argument that the millionaire’s tax is budget related. Rauner’s items are not. - Bulldog58 - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 10:01 am: Rauner kept saying he had a plan and that details would be forthcoming. He said he had a budget and that the legislation would be sent to the GA ’soon’ but those things just didn’t happen as far as the fiscal year 16 budget was concerned so he has to accept a lot of the blame. Rauner sent forth bills but they weren’t budget related. - Oswego Willy - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 10:04 am: Rich, you’re second paragraph clearly lays out where we all are, and what got us here. This might be the clearest “lack of success” aspect the new governor had; ===But he’s the governor. It’s ultimately his responsibility to bring those massive Statehouse egos together.=== “Why?” Rauner spent day after day hammering and shaking the Leaders. “Never had to deal with me” rings in my ears over and over, and this “good cop/bad cop” singularly played by one man, Rauner, also fed this; ===And he (Rauner) also seemed to relish this upcoming fight at times. He probably believes he has the Democrats right where he wants them at this very moment.=== If there could be a mistake seen, in real time now, is the idea that playing rough and also being the good cop to push Dems to a point you think you have them where you want them, that doesn’t compute in co-equal, divided, governing. - DuPage - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 10:10 am: We were all waiting to see how Rauner could add up 2+2=5. He was unable to do so. His math ability is not up to 2nd grade level. Rauner’s idea of bringing in minimum wage jobs to “grow the economy” will actually cost the state more. Higher paid union jobs pay significantly more state taxes, and don’t get the earned income credits and other state funded benefits. That concept has not even occurred to Rauner. - siriusly - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 10:13 am: I seem to remember the Governor boasting to GOP supporters that he could negotiate with Mike Madigan and he is used to difficult negotiations. This does not look like a successful negotiation to me. - Wordslinger - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 10:18 am: I don’t think either planned to wrap things up by May 31. Madigan wants as many GOP votes as possible on the coming tax increase and Rauner wants to unleash his negative media campaign. - Joe M - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 10:18 am: Granted, the Governor has backed down form a number of his turnaround agenda points. But correct me if I am wrong - but he never has backed down from HIS budget that is about $3 billions short despite all of his cuts. (He was relying on $2.2 billions savings in pensions - and .8 billion in health ins savings). His sticking to his unrealistic budget the whole time, while holding a real budget hostage to his non-budget agenda, places quite a bit of the blame on him. - highspeed - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 10:22 am: I believe if Rauner had`nt come in, thumping his chest, and threatening the union state workers, there would have been alot more done. - IL17Progressive - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 10:41 am: Rauner’s plan made proposal with total disregard all existing contracts. That is NOT negotiation nor should one every compromise just to get back to the norm. Bruce’s action are those engaged in by corporate, vulture, tyrannical CEO engage when ‘taking over’ and existing company. Bruce is only 1/3 of IL government structure. M.Madigan is correct in never accepting nor compromising on anything in the regressive, destructive, overthrow agenda of Bruce. - VanillaMan - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 10:51 am: Did Rauner really take things off the table, or did they crawl off by themselves and die of embarrassment? This is a man who showed up during the General campaign with prairie chickens, and a regurgitated campaign flyer, touting it as a sensible budget proposal. This is a man who, when offered time to craft his budget, turn down this offer with its political benefit and flushed it, then walked before the Assembly and made a complete fool of himself. This is a man who ran amok across the state proposing that communities shank the economic benefits gained by generations of labor policies. Rauner didn’t understand that “the table” where he met Mr. Speaker wasn’t level. Bruce Rauner knocked two of the legs right out from his side. Those things he took off the table, slid off like Hot Wheel cars on a Rally track. - Phenomynous - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 11:00 am: Rauner was the only person to move from their original position. Madigan said “more, more, more” and Rauner complied. It was Madigan who didn’t play ball. People can try and convince themselves otherwise, but it the truth. There could have been a deal with two agenda items, and now a whole bunch just got thrown back on the table. I don’t suspect the Governor will be so willing to play ball now. - Mockingjay - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 11:02 am: Those who think Rauner’s bills aren’t budget-related don’t understand causation. I get tired of hearing about how people are leaving Illinois for better weather. Get real. - Langhorne - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 11:06 am: Rauner is obsessively committed to his agenda, not getting a budget, or governing (basic management of the executive branch). Normally, the budget is paramount. With rauner, its his agenda. $2.2 B in unconstitutional pension savings? No bill? $700 M in insurance and health care savings? No problem. He knew going in dems were not going to pass his agenda willingly. So if he has to destroy state govt w a lengthy shutdown, lockout, temporary hires, for crisis/leverage, thats frosting on the cake. - Arsenal - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 11:16 am: ==I don’t suspect the Governor will be so willing to play ball now.== Which means what? ‘Cause now you have to get a group of Dems who have little interest or political need to be “centrist compromisers” to vote for a budget. - Juice - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 11:17 am: Phenomynous, what do you mean Madigan keeps asking for “more, more more”? He’s not really asking for anything, and that is why the Governor is having a hard time negotiating. He wants to cut a deal on revenue. The Democratic leadership don’t want to pass revenue for the sake of passing revenue. They think it needs to be passed because the math makes it necessary. And giving the Governor something he “needs”, revenue (because of that pesky out of balance budget he introduced in February), in exchange for things that the Governor wants (RTW, WC reform, tort reform) is not really a strong position to be negotiating from. - Arsenal - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 11:31 am: ==The Democratic leadership don’t want to pass revenue for the sake of passing revenue. They think it needs to be passed because the math makes it necessary.== This is kind of the problem of getting high on your own suppy; Republicans have spent so long telling everyone that Democrats are unreasoning, tax-eating robots that they believe it, and it hurts their governing position. - Wensicia - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 11:32 am: Rauner leads like a typical rich man, he throws money around. First, a payoff for Republicans and coming up, massive spending for advertising the next campaign. That’s leadership? - Arizona Bob - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 11:36 am: This was the first time ion over a decade where a Governor was battling the GA to address the poor business climate in Illinois to allow it to grow and dealing with a GA that is quite content to spend and borrow without taking the tax increase political consequences to keep their political pork largesse flowing. I can’t remember a time in recent memory where there was such a conflict. The question now is whether the people of Illinois are ready to stand up to improve the business climate to attract successful citizens and fight to scale down unnecessary and politically toxic Madigan and Cullerton spending practices. Wasn’t it former Chicago GOP mayor “Big Bill” Thomson who said “I guess Chicago ain’t ready for reform!” after winning another election? - Wordslinger - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 11:43 am: AZ Bob, Paddy Bauler, not Thompson. Wait for the movie. - Abe the Babe - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 11:47 am: Rauner has taken more items off the table than the Dems. True. But consider the items. Should they count if they never in a blue moon could get enough votes to pass? Shouldn’t he only get credit for taking things off the table that were politically possible? - JackD - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 11:49 am: Taking things off the table that one was never going to get isn’t taking things off the table. - Phenomynous - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 11:59 am: There several things in Rauner’s agenda that are doable, the DCEO reform (pulled last minute), causation on worker’s comp (not a reduction in benefits) and in exchange there is a tax increase. Tit for tat, quid quo pro…it’s the way negotiations are done. What is Madigan giving in exchange for a tax increase? Anyone? He hasn’t offered a thing. He isn’t negotiating, he is stalling…an he has been from the get go. - Wordslinger - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 12:02 pm: Phenom, the governor wants and needs at least $3 billion in new revenue as well, based on his proposed budget. You can spin for weeks on end, but the math never changes. - OneMan - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 12:20 pm: What? If the comments here over the last few weeks were right, it was brave Mike Madigan who was the one giving in, not evil Bruce? Say it isn’t so… - Juice - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 12:21 pm: Phenom, I think if you asked the Speaker “do you want a tax increase or do you think a tax increase is needed?” he would go with needed. The Governor had an opportunity to show that was not the case in February, but he did a $3 billion kicking of the can down the road, and then passed a lot of Illinois budget problems onto others (locals, higher ed, health care providers). The Governor is not going to get what he wants by offering up what anyone who can do elementary school math can see is something that our budget actually needs. - kimocat - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 12:55 pm: I think people would be a lot more impressed with Rauner if he would actually negotiate state spending cuts in order to get tax increases. That’s what most of his supporters want — pullback on state spending. Instead he has his ideology out ahead of the curve. I truly do not believe that most people voted for this guy so he could bust the unions and lower wages and benefits for union workers. - Norseman - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 1:17 pm: Rich, you have the benefit of being there and talking to the folks. You have a feel for the emotions that evoked during the session. So you may disagree, but I place the majority of the blame on Rauner’s doorstep. While Madigan and Cullerton share some blame, Rauner’s campaign tactics and missteps poisoned the environment for compromise. It is too simplistic to say that Madigan is to blame because Rauner took the most items off his agenda. By the time he took those items off the table it was too late. The Dems were in no mood to compromise at the very end of the scheduled session. Rauner came out of the box professing war on Springfield special interests and poking the Democrats. Typical partisan rhetoric is not fatal to compromise, but then we get: - Executive orders attacking core union issues like fair share and requiring reports; - Lawsuits attacking the unions; - The Turnaround Tour to tout the creation of right-to-work zones; - The news of a number of reported poor encounters with Rauner’s ego , GOP members threatened with %#$% problems and a black caucus meeting are two examples I can recall; - The doomsday budget with the phony $2.2 billion in pension savings; - The Good Friday Massacre, where - rightly or wrongly, the Dems perceived that they were backstabbed. At a minimum, it was a horrible miscommunications problem; - The infamous legislative package implementing his agenda that was “done,” but never shared; - The super secret work groups, with meetings held in the Gov’s office; - The donations to the GOP members before the vote on the right-to-work non-bill; - The arrogant attitude by the superstaffers; and, - The threat of a massive ad campaign. Prior to the beginning of the above missteps, I thought - and stated in previous comments - that Rauner could reach some agreement with Madigan and even Cullerton on small tweaks to AFSCME. AFSCME created tension among their allies during the pension reduction debates and a few others. Minor curtailing of their position would be a way to send a message of their pique. However, we see Mr. Ham-handed Rauner go after ALL unions with his empowerment zones that would attack fair share, prevailing wage and collective bargaining. We’re talking about the core values of the Democratic Party. Did Rauner expect that party’s leaders to simply ignore those attacks as if it was some meaningless rhetoric. What he did was confirm the fears that unions had during the campaign. Everybody saw room for other compromises, such as workers comp and private partnership for DCEO. But alas, that was not to be because of this poisonous atmosphere. Certainly, Madigan and Cullerton took some actions that were ill-received by the Rauner folks - many that can be agreed as being unhelpful. One would anticipate a list of grievances from them as well. The difference is that they have the proverbial cats to herd so they must do things to placate those cats and the constituencies that feed them. Rauner IS the leader of the executive branch. It’s all him. His money gives him the power to demand fealty from his allies. Rauner is who we thought he was and the Dem GA leadership are who we know they were. A combination that fueled my fear that we would have the disastrous session we’re still in. - Oswego Willy - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 1:27 pm: Well said, - Norseman -, and thanks for cataloging all that you did, and putting in perspective how “blame” really can be seen as “consequences of choices”… if those making choices are honest with themselves. Great stuff. - Rich Miller - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 1:34 pm: Norseman, while your catalogue is quite good and he does deserve blame, it still doesn’t excuse the absolute refusal to offer up a counter-proposal when Rauner pared down his list of demands from 80 down to 2. 2. C’mon, man. He’s willing to back a point increase in the income tax, which ain’t easy for a Republican and his GOP members. He’s willing to do a capital plan, with new revenues to support it. If you’re a subscriber, you know that he wasn’t even absolute on the property tax freeze and workers’ comp causation. And, yeah, he threatened to go nuclear with TV ads, but the Dems shoulda realized that meant things were only gonna get tougher after May 31st, not easier. - Arizona Bob - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 1:37 pm: It’s always interesting to see how political insiders use the term “poisoned atmosphere” as an excuse for not doing their jobs to serve the people of Illinois well. I guess I missed the “compromise” plan the Dems suggested that would enhance growing the economy, show regard for hard pressed taxpayers and get the spending issues in order. This isn’t brinksmanship. It’s political “chicken” and Madigan and his friends have been taking Illinois over the cliff playing this game for decades. I was hoping for a Tip Oneil-Reagan detente here, but it was pretty clear that there were no such statesmen in the GA in 2015. - Oswego Willy - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 1:42 pm: ===Certainly, Madigan and Cullerton took some actions that were ill-received by the Rauner folks - many that can be agreed as being unhelpful.=== Not finding a way to make posdible where Rauner left the door wide open is the biggest MJM/Cullerton failing and blame falls on the Democrats there. The Democratic paranoia, along with anger allowed the blinders to be on both MJM and Cullerton where some room appeared. For me, ===But he’s the governor. It’s ultimately his responsibility to bring those massive Statehouse egos together. And he also seemed to relish this upcoming fight at times. He probably believes he has the Democrats right where he wants them at this very moment.=== That is really the crux right now; egos, egos have been so inflamed. - A guy - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 1:44 pm: Norse, beauty isn’t the only thing in the eye of the beholder. The Dems had a very good shot to make some relatively small concessions and get out of this to fight again next year. They didn’t. I don’t know why, but they didn’t. They’ve actually signaled they won’t budge an inch without a war. Now they’re going to get one. Really silly. History will show that it’s silly. They just can’t recognize a hand where some of the face cards aren’t there. They blew it. They may get another chance shortly, but the patience of the governor and the electorate are running out. - Wordslinger - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 1:45 pm: AZ Bob, the Reagan/ONeil “detente” is largely fiction created by Chris Matthews to sell his book. O’Neil simply agreed to call Reagan’s bills. And after Reagan got shot, his popularity went through the roof for about a year so Southern Democrats and Northern Republicans bucked him at their own peril. - forwhatitsworth - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 1:50 pm: == Rauner’s campaign tactics and missteps poisoned the environment for compromise.== WELL SAID!!! - Norseman - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 2:37 pm: === it still doesn’t excuse the absolute refusal to offer up a counter-proposal when Rauner pared down his list of demands from 80 down to 2. === Agreed. I don’t excuse it, but I can understand it. Definitely shared fault for the failure. I’d put it as 60% Rauner to 40% Madigan. You may put it as the reverse. As you so aptly point out, Rauner is going to use his money to convince the public as to where the blame lies. - A guy - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 2:48 pm: +++ forwhatitsworth - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 1:50 pm: == Rauner’s campaign tactics and missteps poisoned the environment for compromise.== WELL SAID!!!+++ Yep, the environment was so pristine prior to another (gasp) party actually being relevant to the discussion. Hard to imagine you could convince yourself or anyone else of this argument. Scary thing is that you can. That’s how weird things are. wowsa. - zonz - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 2:51 pm: part of what I posted earlier is relevant to Rich’s point about Rauner’s responsibility as Governor: Rauner’s Leadership Deception May 29, 2015 - Rauner’s comments “followed the first face-to-face meeting in two months between Rauner and the four legislative leaders.” from http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/politics/ct-bruce-rauner-illinois-legislature-met-0530-20150529-story.html#page=1 (By Monique Garcia, Kim Geiger and Hal Dardick -Chicago Tribune) - Norseman - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 2:53 pm: === Yep, the environment was so pristine prior to another (gasp) party actually being relevant to the discussion. Hard to imagine you could convince yourself or anyone else of this argument. Scary thing is that you can. That’s how weird things are. === So having the new guy come in trashing folks, purposely or not misleading folks, etc. is going to help? - Rich Miller - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 3:06 pm: ===Shouldn’t he only get credit for taking things off the table that were politically possible?=== If they were politically possible, shouldn’t they have already passed? The guy is a true believer in right to work. He put it aside and hasn’t brought it back. That’s progress, either way you look at it. - Wensicia - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 3:19 pm: ==The guy is a true believer in right to work. He put it aside and hasn’t brought it back.== Part of the reason he put it aside is because it didn’t get the amount of public support on his Turnaround Tour that he expected. He couldn’t claim the people’s mandate. - walker - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 4:18 pm: Are we going to learn how to move forward better in the future with this blame game? There was a potential deal to be made, face saving for all. What happened? If everyone had played their dramatic moves about a week earlier, we’d have had time and heart for a deal. Just too late. Too much playing chicken. The anti-deal momentum was already gaining steam 5 days out. I hoped it could be saved in the last 48 hours, but it was too late. Yes, both sides already had their political contingency plans, but I don’t believe that neither side ever really wanted a timely deal. - zonz - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 4:19 pm: Rich, IMO anything that Rauner campaigned on - - in specifics - - that he’d make part of his agenda upon taking office is fair game for his rolled out laundry list of “wants” following inauguration. Which things did Rauner’s folks seek in his first 100 days that unambiguously fit that description, and which things do not? __________________ - Rich Miller - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 3:06 pm: ===Shouldn’t he only get credit for taking things off the table that were politically possible?=== If they were politically possible, shouldn’t they have already passed? The guy is a true believer in right to work. He put it aside and hasn’t brought it back. That’s progress, either way you look at it. - Louis Howe - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 4:23 pm: Ultimately, we are finding out whether Rauner will govern as an Ideologue or pragmatist. He took some stuff off the table that indicates he’s more true to his natural pragmatist businessman’s nature. Madigan knows his limitations and holds no love for AFSCME. Rauner will be able to cut a deal. - A guy - Monday, Jun 1, 15 @ 4:25 pm: Walk, I had hope too. I really think there’s still a sliver of time, but it’s a sliver. I don’t think the Governor wanted this, but I do think he’s prepared for it and wasn’t going to back down on it. He provided a “bargain basement” price to avoid it. Sometimes I think that the Speaker and the Sen. Pres are so wrapped up in their own intramural squabble that they forgot there’s someone in Lane 1. This could have been avoided. Sorry, comments for this post are now closed.