* Governor returns to center stage to campaign for healthcare plan

* Budget leaves out harbor funding

* Plan to raise casino revenue might be gamble for governor:

“His answer to everything seems to be a tax increase,” she said. “The riverboat industry is a huge industry in the state of Illinois and provides a lot of income and a lot of jobs.”

* Analyst sees budget as ‘lifeboat’ for state GOP

* Slick ads promote business tax plan

* Budget advocates, opponents square off

* Businesses forsee hit if state passes payroll tax

* Cindy Richards: Guv’s budget lands in fair territory

The business community needs to stop stonewalling any idea that comes out of the governor’s mansion or propose a realistic plan that ensures all businesses pay their share of state bills.

* Governor’s plan sparks PR battle

* Former newsman goes to bat for governor on healthcare

* ComEd President: Rate freeze would bankrupt ComEd and cripple the state

* AG Madigan thinks Ameren downgrade may have been orchestrated

“The attorney general is concerned that the relationship between the utilities and the credit rating agencies is not nearly as independent as the utilities claim,” Ben Weinberg, chief of the public interest division for Madigan’s office, said Tuesday.

* Editorial: Ameren ups the ante in rate game

* Editorial: Voting on ICC members won’t help consumers

* Lawmakers not discouraged by Ameren’s ‘junk’ status

* AG Madigan and Patrick Fitzgerald announce $344 million judgment against Medicaid HMO [press release]

* The mother of all judgments; company emails

The case, brought by a civil whistleblower and then joined by federal authorities and the state attorney general’s office, charged that Amerigroup cherry-picked “healthies” and purposely avoided women in their third trimester of pregnancy because they cost more to insure

* U.S. stops payments to Tinley Center

* Senate committee passes .50 caliber rifle ban

* Bill would define lawsuit settlements as public information: “The public has a right to know about where their tax dollars are being spent and why a case had to be settled and who’s wrong.”

* Legislation regulating nurse/staff ratio has only tepid support

* Daley always knew city had to pony up for Olympics

In a stuttering response to a reporter’s question, Daley said he knew “at the beginning” of the bidding process that city money would have to be put on the table. Daley said he kept it quiet — not because he wanted to get past the mayoral election — but because “we’re not putting any direct money into it.”

* City Council takes up Olympic funding

* Daley on blame for postal woes: Feds are ‘Dysfunctional’

* The promise of reform at Cook Co. juvenile detention center

* U of I board buries the Chief

* ‘Uncle Amrish’ helped raise $500,000 for governor

* Immigrant rights groups say suburbs need to start listening

* Carol Marin: FBI inquiries give county officials reason to sweat

* Michael Sneed: Tillman, Daley, Inspector General Hoffman

* Editorial: Merc, CBOT merger good for Chicago

* Excerpts from recent editorials: HPV, budget , electric rates

* City Inspector named in bribe case, said to have pocketed $16,000

* Cooking county smoking ban starts Thursday

* West Chicago to get tough on landlords with code violations

* Smoking laws in some Southland towns

* Ousted candidates back on ballot in Summit Hill

* New Lennox mayor position not likely to be made full-time: I have a lot of time with a flexible schedule to be here when the village needs me, but I don’t think it needs an $80,000-a-year mayor’s salary.”