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Arrr! I completely forgot!
Tuesday, Sep 19, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller Let us all bring a spring upon her cable and dance the hempen jig in the comment section. Avast, bilge rats!
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Defiance as diversion *** Updated x3 ***
Tuesday, Sep 19, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller Well, here’s one way to spin bad news. The Auditor General releases a report that shows the I-SaveRx plan is an expensive mess and violates federal law and the governor issues a press release announcing that he’s expanding the program. Here’s a couple of grafs from the guv’s press release: Governor Rod R. Blagojevich today announced that the State of Illinois will expand its innovative I-SaveRx drug importation program to state employees and dependents. Currently, the program is available and intended for senior citizens and the uninsured, and covers the citizens of Illinois, Kansas, Wisconsin, Missouri and Vermont. […] But that’s not all the Auditor General reported. Check out the screen cap below. They spent a half million dollars in staff costs for a measly 17,575 prescriptions in 19 months, plus hundreds of thousands more in support costs. So, the taxpayer overhead on this thing is roughly $50 per prescription filled by the program..
The audit can be found here. *** UPDATE *** The AP story is now up. *** UPDATE 2 *** Acccording to the audit, the $220,000 in legal fees were exemped from the competitive bidding process. $144,000 of that was an agreement the governor’s own office entered into with a Washington, DC law firm. And as far as those travel costs? We also found that most travel was not approved prior to departure as stated in travel regulations. *** UPDATE 3 *** It looks like the flu vaccine debacle was even worse. Check the audit.
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Parental notification moves forward a notch
Tuesday, Sep 19, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller The Tribune has details. In a victory for those seeking stricter limits on abortion, the Illinois Supreme Court decided Monday to revive a long-dormant state law that prohibits minors from obtaining abortions without notifying a parent. According to the article, no date has been set for issuing the new rules yet, but the ACLU, Lisa Madigan or others could challenge them. Read the whole story for more. OneMan asks whether this might have any impact on races this November. Good question.
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Protected: SUBSCRIBERS ONLY - Schock’s new TV ad; Flider; Granberg; Soto; Haring; Unions; Women guvs; Target feed (Use all caps in password) *** Updated x2 ***
Tuesday, Sep 19, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller
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Question of the day
Tuesday, Sep 19, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller Handicap your local state legislative race. Notice, I didn’t say Congress. This is for state legislative races only, please. Also, tell us what, if anything, is happening in that race.
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First negative ads by JBT
Tuesday, Sep 19, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller There are actually two new ads running. One is the ad described in the Daily Herald piece below. The other (also in the DH story but way down) slams the guv as a guy who promised to stop the budget games but “raided $2.3 billion from pension funds” and now the state has the “biggest deficit in the nation.” The tagline for both 15 second ads is “Had enough?” Ironically, Newt Gingrich suggested that the national Democrats use that line to seize control of Congress from the Republicans. Republican governor candidate Judy Baar Topinka unleashed a hard-hitting TV assault Monday against Democratic Gov. Rod Blagojevich, comparing him to his convicted predecessor George Ryan. I’ll upload at least one of the ads in a few minutes.
This is the ad that the DH wrote about. It’s called “The Check.” [YouTube] Click here for the budget ad [YouTube]. [Gordy Hulten at IlliniPundit did what I should have done and uploaded the ads to YouTube. The links have been changed.]
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Showdown in the 17th
Tuesday, Sep 19, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller The two candidates in the 17th Congressional District faced off for the first time yesterday. As usual, red herrings and bugaboos were fully on display. Republican congressional candidate Andrea Zinga sought Monday to link her opponent to a possible impeachment of President Bush and to Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s ethics problems. That Pelosi argument seems more than a bit weak on several levels. Zinga’s own poll (just 300 respondents, making the margin of error stupendously high, but it’s her poll so that’s the one she uses to make her game plan) showed that 75 percent of likely voters in the district had either never heard of Pelosi or didn’t know enough about her to have an opinion. 49 percent strongly disapprove of President Bush’s job performance, while another 12 percent somewhat disapproved. Meanwhile, she also sought to link Hare and Gov. Blagojevich. [Zinga] said one of Hare’s key backers works in Blagojevich’s patronage office, where “they have put aside veterans who have preferential hiring in order to hire campaign contributors.” That would most likely be John Gianulis, a top patronage official in the governor’s office. John G is the chairman of the Rock Island County Democratic Party and helped engineer Hare’s victory in the precinct committeeman primary to replace Lane Evans. What have you heard about this race lately?
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Another splash
Tuesday, Sep 19, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller Once again, Comptroller Dan Hynes, has managed to make a big media splash. That’s twice in a week. Last week it was the “Barack should run for president” press conference. Yesterday, he warned of an impending state crisis. Paying increased costs for employee pensions, health care for the poor and debt service will eat up virtually all new money the state can expect to bring in over the next three years, Comptroller Dan Hynes said Monday. It’s not easy for a comptroller in a ho-hum race to get publicity, but give Hynes credit for rising to the challenge. It’s also a serious issue, of course. One day, one way or another, the piper is gonna have to be paid. [Some readers have noted that Hynes is essentially slamming the guv close to an election. I must admit I hadn’t thought of that angle (I must be slipping). But they make a good point.]
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Morning shorts
Tuesday, Sep 19, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller * It’s spreading: Critics cry foul over gov’s move to fund one school * Another 400-person CS-T poll allows Tony Peraica to denouce its results as “fundamentally flawed.” Meanwhile Christine Radogno also questioned the results of the CS-T poll done in her race. * “A federal jury on Monday convicted a former high-ranking Illinois Secretary of State official of helping three janitors pocket more than $150,000 in state pay for work they didn’t do.” * Topinka focuses on women’s health * Madigan: Power auction unfair - Attorney general asks court to void results * Oy: “One is a shaggy-haired boy, now 16. Another, a distressed elder brother. Then there’s the bewildered woman, just barely 18. And two older women who say they were overwhelmed with drugs and sex. Their video statements, recorded in April for East Alton attorney Ed Unsell and made available to the Post-Dispatch, present a clearer and more emotional picture of the child sex and drug abuse allegations against former attorney and Metro East power broker Tom Lakin. The accusations paint Lakin - publicly an accomplished lawyer and political boss - as a free-wheeling man of sexual avarice.” * More coverage of and reaction to yesterday’s landmark appellate court ruling on independent candidates in Illinois can be found here, here, here and here. * Stu Rothenberg: “Over the past year or so, I’ve heard more than a few people talking about 2006 as an anti-incumbent election. Well, those people are wrong. We are not going to have an anti-incumbent election in November. We are going to have an anti-Bush election.” * Two state workers ticketed for smoking in a state-leased building. * Ethanol faces uphill road in US
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