If you’re sending me a press release, please try mightily to avoid sending me pdf and .doc documents. It’s a lot more helpful to me if you’d just paste the darned text into the body of the e-mail so I don’t have to download your “pretty” files. I’m receiving more and more press releases every day in the form of attached files and it’s starting to get frustrating. If you want your release posted somewhere on this blog, then you might want to try to make my life a little easier. Thanks.
PS: Overly long file names get massively messed up on AOL Mail. Keep the file names short, please.
PPS: Attachments that include supporting documents are fine. But keep the press releases in the body of the freaking e-mails.
* 1:14 pm - That last thread was getting a bit unwieldy and buried, so here’s a new one with some fresh news. CTA union threatens job actions…
“We are about at wits’ end,” said Rick Harris, head of the CTA’s rail union, at a morning press conference in Chicago. “Maybe we have to show you exactly what a doomsday looks like. Maybe that is the signal that needs to be sent.” […]
…the seriousness of the CTA union’s threat of strike-like actions remains unclear. Under state law, transit unions are not allowed to strike, but local AFL-CIO president Dennis Gannon said unspecified “job action” could stifle the system.
“Responsible people have to act now before the end of the year,” said Jim Reilly, head of the Regional Transportation Authority, as he slammed his hands repeatedly on the podium. […]
Reilly said he wasn’t sure using casino money would be politically viable because it would mean downstate residents might end up footing the bill for Chicago area transit. However, he did open the door to a modest fare hike as part of the deal, a concession Republicans see as a bit of sugar to help the tax hikes go down.
* 1:55 pm - The Tribbies reported a little funny last night about the leaders meeting with Mayor Daley…
Meeting with the four legislative leaders and Mayor Richard Daley, Blagojevich hinted that legislative inaction was rooted in endless political sniping. The governor told reporters he opened the meeting by joking with Mayor Daley that “I’ll trade my legislature for his” after Daley’s City Council on Tuesday easily passed a sweeping tax increase package to increase city revenues.
But they didn’t provide the full quote. Here it is…
“We began the meeting by me trying to cut a deal with the mayor: Basically I’ll trade him my legislature for his, because his can vote for all kinds of onerous, terrible tax increases for people, and I’m trying to get mine to save the CTA.”
A bit different, don’t you think? Here’s the relevant audio clip…
[audio:1348.mp3]
* 2:02 pm - Reaction of Sen. Jeff Schoenberg to a federal judge’s blocking of the “moment of silence” law…
“Judge Gettleman has made the right call in questioning whether this unnecessary state mandate is constitutional. For teachers and their students, minutes in the classroom are like precious grains of sand, so we in the General Assembly should instead be concentrating our energies on providing greater investment and innovation into our schools rather than look for new ways to fix the ill-conceived ‘Moment of Silence’ mandate.”
Schoenberg also argued that the ambiguous new law has potential to jeopardize teachers and administrators who could be challenged by individuals or organized political advocacy groups who did not feel that they were sufficiently carrying out the new state classroom requirement, and failed to adequately protect students from overly enthusiastic teachers who might seek to emphasize prayer in their classrooms.
“The expression of faith plays a central role in the lives of many families in our communities and its intrinsic value in shaping our children’s value systems cannot be discounted. These intensely personal experiences should be realized in our homes and in our communities’ fine houses of worship, not in our public schools,” he said.
* 2:04 pm - Sen. Schoenberg was reacting to this news…
A federal judge today ordered the superintendent of the Illinois State Board of Education not to enforce a new state law mandating a moment of silence at the start of the school day, but stopped short of a statewide injunction.
U.S. District Judge Robert Gettleman said his move was meant to preserve the status quo while a lawsuit against the law goes forward. The order today prevents the schools superintendent from issuing any directions or orders for the moment of silence to be held, but only Township High School District 214 in the northwest suburbs is under a preliminary injunction barring the moment from being held.
*** 3:18 pm *** Democratic state Rep. John Fritchey and GOP Rep. Roger Eddy have just introduced new legislation that could address many of the problems the federal judge has had with the state’s current moment of silence law.
HB 4180 changes the title of the law from the “Silent Reflection and Student Prayer Act” to the “Student Silent Reflection Act.” It allows, rather than mandates, a teacher to conduct a brief period of silence at the opening of every school day. It removes language about “silent prayer” and leaves it up to individual pupils. Here’s the actual language striking out the old stuff and inserting the new…
The trouble they’re going to run into is it dilutes the original law, before it was even changed this year. The sponsors of the embattled law wanted to make things mandatory and they wanted the word “prayer” to remain in the statute (where it was before).
* 4:05 pm - It looks like they had a smaller meeting instead…
Gov. Rod Blagojevich did end up meeting with some top lawmakers about mass transit funding as service cuts and fare increases loom for Chicago-area commuters. […]
Blagojevich spokeswoman Abby Ottenhoff said later in an e-mail that the governor went ahead and met with Republican legislative leaders and Democratic Senate President Emil Jones.
Mayor Daley today accused Republican legislative leaders of demanding unwarranted fare hikes and trying to make the CTA the “scapegoat” for their failure to agree on long-term funding for mass transit. […]
Daley said he walked out of a Wednesday transit summit called by Blagojevich — and refused to attend a second meeting that was scheduled for today but was abruptly canceled — because the primary focus was gambling, not transit.
“This is not all about casinos and gambling and poker machines and slot machines. . . . The highest priority is not about . . . who gets a casino or where the casino’s gonna be. The highest priority deals right now [with] people who use public transportation,” Daley said.
Pressed on why he refused to attend today’s follow-up meeting, Daley said, “My role is not to be the governor of the state of Illinois. That’s his role and not my role. . . . That’s their role to figure this out.”
Daley walked out of Wednesday’s summit at the Thompson Center, disgusted that he had been lured to the meeting in what a top mayoral aide later called a “classic bait-and-switch.”
CLICK HERE or the banner below at 1:30 pm Central for a live CBS 2 broadcast of Former House Speaker Denny Hastert’s Farewell Remarks [Coding changed at 1:34, so if it’s not working, refresh the page and try again.]
Aides to Hastert say the resignation will not be official until later this month, a deadline Hastert wanted to meet in the hopes that a special primary could be held on the same day as this spring’s regular primary.
* There’s been an attempt recently to try to pivot on Barack Obama’s statements about the Clinton archive records…
Barack Obama, who’s been scolding Hillary Rodham Clinton for not hastening the release of records from her time as first lady, says he can’t step up and produce his own records from his days in the Illinois state Senate. He says he hasn’t got any.
“I don’t have - I don’t maintain - a file of eight years of work in the state Senate because I didn’t have the resources available to maintain those kinds of records,” he said at a recent campaign stop in Iowa. He said he wasn’t sure where any cache of records might have gone, adding, “It could have been thrown out. I haven’t been in the state Senate now for quite some time.”
Obama’s statement that he has no papers from his time in the Illinois statehouse - he left in 2004 - stands in stark contrast to the massive Clinton file stored at the National Archives: an estimated 78 million pages of documents, plus 20 million e-mail messages, packed into 36,000 boxes. While any file from Obama’s time in the state Senate would be far smaller, the idea that no papers exist at all is questioned by one historian.
“Most of those guys do keep this stuff, especially the favorable stuff. They’ve all got egos,” said Taylor Pensoneau, a historian who has written about Illinois legislators and governors and worked with them as a lobbyist for the coal industry. “It goes in scrapbooks or maybe boxes. I don’t think it’s normal practice to say it’s all discarded.”
The real issue, Clinton’s campaign said, is the availability of “schedules, memos and other documents” from Obama’s time in the state senate.
On Meet the Press Sunday, Obama said he did not have a scheduler and therefore there are no schedules to be had. A spokesman for the Obama campaign said Obama passed along many of his files to his successor, Kwame Raoul.
* I sent an e-mail to a handful of legislators this morning asking about their record-keeping practices. Here are the responses I’ve received so far…
* Rep. Lou Lang…
I think we all have large file cabinets and diaries that we keep for a while but there is not a special requirement that we keep any particular records in any particular way
* Rep. John Fritchey…
I would venture to say that I keep better files than most, but the only record of my meetings would be on the personal calendar that I keep. I do keep most substantive correspondence going back several years though. I would doubt that at the state legislative level, anybody keeps the type of contact records that they are referring to. There is a big difference between the state house and the White House.
* Sen. Jacqueline Collins…
As it relates to records. No, I don’t keep an account of who I meet with. My secretary may have the information jotted down on a daily schedule but I don’t think she retains that information because of the volume of paper we receive on a daily basis.
* Rep. Sara Feigenholtz…
We have old message books and my Chicago staff puts everything in outlook. I keep a lot of stuff… but after 13 years we have to purge so we don’t hoard.
* I’ll post more as they come in, but it looks to me like this Obama thing is just another national non-issue.
* Rep. Susanna Mendoza…
…I don’t religiously keep a detailed file or anything; it’s more like folders on bills with corresponding notes or info in them. Regarding my scheduling, I definitely don’t keep records of that and don’t really know anyone who does. So many of the meetings we end up having are not even scheduled and end up being with people who drive to Springfield to meet with legislators without a previous appointment. I’d be surprised if anyone keeps detailed records of their schedules and definitely believe Obama when he says that there probably aren’t any files or records of his to look over.
The leaders meeting originally scheduled for 10:00 has been cancelled. Speaker Madigan and Mayor Daley declined the invitation. We’ll try to reschedule a meeting with the leaders soon.
Madigan had a prior commitment and offered to send a surrogate. Daley apparently had enough of the crud yesterday.
* 10:00 am - I just noticed this tidbit in today’s Sun-Times…
State Comptroller Dan Hynes’ new Web site that allows people to search campaign contributions made by state contractors logged 171,768 hits in its first 21 days. The site — www.openbook.illinoiscomptroller.com — went live Oct. 2.
Wow.
Also…
A Web site set up by Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn to encourage Gov. Blagojevich to sign a bill aimed at curbing pay-to-play drew several hundred hits in the two weeks it was online.
Not so wow.
* 10:04 am - Yet another round of Hastert’s impending resignation stories has appeared…
Former Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) will announce on Thursday that he is retiring from Congress soon, although the exact date of his departure is still unclear, according to House insiders.
Hastert is expected to tell the House Republican Conference of his decision on Thursday afternoon, and then make his final floor speech sometime after that.
Sources told Fox News the former House speaker’s resignation is expected to become effective in December or January, although no date had been set for a formal announcement. Hastert had said in August he planned to leave Congress but at that time didn’t disclose whether it would be before the end of his term.
* 10:54 am - Those Hastert rumors may be true. From an e-mail sent by Hastert’s chief of staff…
Hey everyone. Tomorrow, Thursday, November 15, Speaker Hastert will
deliver his farewell address on the House Floor. Many people have called me to express interest in seeing him do this from the House gallery. We have secured space for people who are interested.
So…. If you want to do this, please let me know.
Speaker Pelosi’s office is telling us that it will happen at approximately 2:30pm; however, I suggest you be in the gallery by 2:10, which means you need to pick up your gallery ticket in H-164, The Capitol by 2:00pm at the latest (1:45pm would be preferable). As you know, timing is never perfect around this place.
Thanks everyone, and PLEASE, email the many others in this town I have
probably left off this email that you think would want to do this.
Thank you.
Sam Lancaster
Chief of Staff
Former Speaker J. Dennis Hastert
* 12:01 pm - From the Union League Club…
Seven of the eight declared candidates for the office of Cook County State’s Attorney will appear in a Candidate’s Forum at the Union League Club of Chicago , 65 West Jackson Blvd., 5th floor parlor, tomorrow, Friday, November 16 at 10 a.m.
I haven’t been able to get this song out of my head all week…
I was a big Thin Lizzy fan when I was 15 or so, and went to see them open for Styx in concert around the same time. Yeah, that dates me, I know. Still, I can’t for the life of me figure out why this song keeps dancing in my brain. It’s not even my favorite Thin Lizzy tune.
Anyway, somebody told me once that if you share a song that’s been playing in your head you can get rid of it. Consider it shared.
Question: Have any songs been pestering your mind lately? Share.
* The post-meeting spinning was apparently fast and furious in Chicago yesterday. Mayor Daley left the meeting with the four leaders and the governor saying nothing but positive things. But his people told a different story to reporters later in the day. Here’s the Sun-Times’ take..
But City Hall sources said Daley departed angry and frustrated because he kept being stymied in his efforts to discuss bailing out the CTA well ahead of the agency’s latest deadline for fare increases and service cuts: Jan. 20.
The mayor walked out after a little more than an hour.
“It felt like a classic bait-and- switch,” one City Hall source said. Daley “was led there to believe they were talking about the CTA when the aim was to talk about gaming.”
A frustrated Daley offered little after exiting the governor’s Chicago office, but his spokeswoman later said Daley left the bi-partisan meeting when the discussion turned to gambling expansion rather than fixing the mass transit crunch, with service cuts looming Jan. 20.
“Clearly the mayor understands that gaming is likely a part of the overall solution to the transit issue, but everybody knows it would take at least two years for that to happen,” Daley spokeswoman Jacquelyn Heard said. The mayor “kept trying to bring the conversation around to that this morning, but to no avail … I think he felt he said all he needed to say, and there apparently was little interest in talking about the immediate crisis.”
The powerful house speaker stormed out of the meeting after a heated exchange with state Senator Rickey Hendon about how to guarantee that minority investors and communities benefit from an expansion of gambling in Illinois, which was also part of the discussion.
“There was just a lot of nonproductive shouting, threats and allegations,” Madigan said.
“I didn’t raise my voice. You guys know me. I talk loud just naturally. I come from the West Side. You have to talk loud to be heard. That’s all,” said State Senator Rickey Hendon, (D) Chicago.
The meeting was supposed to be for the principals and their top staff, but Jones brought Hendon with him and, well, Hendon is Hendon.
* As I told you yesterday, the governor couldn’t help but jump into the fray…
Speaker Madigan is the only one who doesn’t agree that African Americans ought to participate in the ownership of the [casino licenses],” Blagojevich said.
Madigan denied that through his spokesman, Steve Brown.
Madigan, Brown said, backs a proposal by the House black caucus that minority and women casino owners would be selected through lotteries. Those lotteries, Madigan says, would help prevent problems that plagued the failed Emerald Casino project in Rosemont. When asked whether he perceived Blagojevich as trying to accuse Madigan of being racist, Brown said, “He’s trying to, but it doesn’t wash.”
Abby Ottenhoff, the governor’s spokeswoman, said the governor simply was trying to explain what took place between Madigan and Hendon.
Meanwhile, Cross and his Republican counterpart in the Senate, Minority Leader Frank Watson of Greenville, said transit riders should pay a modest fare increase as part of a funding solution. Democrats oppose a fare hike.
Listen to the raw audio and you’ll hear Senate President Jones dodge questions about whether he could support a fare hike.
* And this, from the same article, is a drastic understatement….
Cross continued to push an alternative idea to tap a share of state gasoline sales tax revenue for mass transit, but that would require filling a hole in the state budget. There are differences of opinion on how to offset that deficit.
There are not only “differences of opinion,” there is no real plan yet.
Democratic Senate President Emil Jones was optimistic the governor and legislative leaders were close to a deal to bail out mass transit agencies and pay for construction projects around the state.
“I believe we can wrap this up in the next day or two, really, because the issues that are separating us are very, very minute,” he said.
The addition of Mayor Daley to the group was supposed to be a positive sign because it would bring all the major decision makers directly into the discussion of how to solve the public transit funding riddle — the ulterior reason for the meeting being to isolate Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan in his running dispute with Gov. Blagojevich.
But the big summit meeting apparently devolved into the same sort of failure to communicate that makes me think we’re going to need to bring in “Dr. Phil” to sort out all the ill feelings before there’s going to be any deal to fund the Chicago Transit Authority. And Daley continued to back Madigan’s play, anyway.
Splitting Daley from Madigan is not gonna be nearly as easy as Blagojevich has hoped.
* More session stuff, compiled by Paul…
* Lawmakers summit ends with angry words, no progress
* Officials discuss transit funding; still no deal
* I had this on the blog yesterday, but the news came in so late that many of you may not have seen it or had a chance to comment…
A federal court judge Wednesday found that a new state law ordering a moment of silence for prayer or reflection at the start of the school day was “likely unconstitutional.”
U.S. District Court Judge Robert Gettleman blocked a northwest suburban school district from following the mandate, and he could extend the ban to schools statewide today. In his preliminary ruling, Gettleman found that the law was vague and questioned how teachers and school officials were supposed to follow it and how it was to be enforced.
Gettleman said the Silent Reflection and Student Prayer Act isn’t specific enough about what is a “moment” and when it should take place. It also may cross the line into unconstitutionality by giving students a choice to pray, the judge said.
The statute states that students shall be given an opportunity for silent prayer or reflection on the anticipated activities of the day.
That would in essence tell a child “you’ve got to think about praying,” the judge said.
Gettleman said he also is concerned about whether a child could or would do something physical in an act of prayer, such as take out a Bible or a Muslim prayer book.
There are only two choices given by the statute, he said. “One is an endorsement of prayer,” he said. “If that’s the way it’s being interpreted, then I think we have a problem.”
* What will the attorney general do? Uknown at this point, but she has already kinda sorta intervened…
The attorney general’s office had been asked at an initial court hearing two weeks ago whether it intended to defend the law, and it had no specific answer then, either.
“The Attorney General has declined to intervene … from what I can tell,” Gettleman said Wednesday.
He encouraged the office’s representative, Thomas Ioppolo, to come back to court today at 11 a.m. with a more definitive answer.
Lisa Madigan’s office said it never intended not to defend the law, but was simply deciding which legal avenue was best to pursue. Because the statute so vastly deviated from normal legislation in that it did not name any party responsible for enforcing the law, there is technically no constitutional officer responsible for it. The office must now determine if it wants to file a motion to intervene or pursue some other avenue of defense. […]
[Madigan’s chief of staff, Ann Spillane] said Ioppolo had written a 15-page brief defending the constitutionality of the law and had argued as much in court Wednesday.
In fact, Gettleman said, for someone who hadn’t officially intervened on behalf of the law yet, Ioppolo’s brief was so persuasive that it forced Sherman’s lawyers to concede to much of his arguments.
* Meanwhile, Eric Zorn wants the General Assembly to step in and rewrite the law…
The state can either fight for this unnecessary and intrusive law by waging an expensive court battle, or members of the General Assembly can attempt to re-write and pass a similar law that overcomes the Constitutional objections.
* Buried way down in this well-done article is some disturbing news…
Meanwhile, the administration is spending its Medicaid dollars at a fever pace. Lawmakers appropriated $6.9 billion for Medicaid spending through June 30, the end of this fiscal year, said Carol Knowles, spokeswoman for state Comptroller Dan Hynes. But by Nov. 8 — roughly one-third of the way through the fiscal year — the state’s health-care agency had spent 45 percent of that money, she said.
“It has been common for that agency to run out of appropriation authority sometime in the spring,” she said. “But at the pace that the agency is going, it likely will run out earlier than ever before.”
Steve Brown, spokesman for House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago, said lawmakers may need to approve additional spending in the spring, but it’s not clear where the state might find the money. […]
“I don’t know where he finds the money for a supplemental appropriation,” Brown said.
Rep. Dave Winters, R-Shirland, predicts the administration will slow its payment cycle to stretch its dollars.
With the ink barely dry on a new state budget, two recently released financial reports already are raising concerns about whether state revenues will keep pace with spending.
Both the bipartisan Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability and Comptroller Dan Hynes issued reports warning that income from some state revenues — particularly the sales tax — could be lower than expected. […]
COGFA does economic forecasting for the General Assembly. It found that for the first three months of the state’s new budget year — July, August and September — sales tax receipts are down by $55 million from a year ago, a 3 percent drop. Corporate income taxes also dropped by $18 million during the period, a 4 percent decrease.
A bright spot was that personal income taxes increased by $120 million. But officials are worried about the drop in sales taxes, which provide more than 25 percent of the state’s revenue. […]
Worse, COGFA doesn’t think things will turn around. The report says both the sales tax and corporate income tax “may well find growth elusive over the remainder of the fiscal year.”
The budget was pretty flush this year and we still saw terrible problems getting things done. Imagine the nastiness if cutbacks have to be made. Not pretty.
Thursday, Nov 15, 2007 - Posted by Paul Richardson
* NEWRuss Stewart: Shills, proxies set to do battle in primary
* NEWPress Release: New Study Finds African Americans, Low-Income Voters, Students and Seniors Least Likely to Have Valid Voter ID at Issue Before Supreme Court
Absent from Wednesday’s debate was any discussion on Schock’s earlier proposal to sell nuclear arms to Taiwan as a way to get China to go along with U.S. policy toward Iran. Schock retracted that statement on Tuesday.
* 18th District Republican candidates participate in forum
* Clout Corner: Co defendants out alleged Troutman target
After the last municipal election, many of the aldermen privately boasted that they intended to be the big, bad wolves of City Hall. No longer would the mayor’s every whim go unchallenged. Evidently, though, much of that was empty bravado […]
Maybe the museum folks will step away from their fixation on Grant Park. Maybe the mayor will offer them any of several alternate sites in wards longing for new development and not so burdened with traffic congestion.
Or maybe the Chicago City Sheep will beg Daley to tell them his wishes — and anxiously bleat their approval.
* Dick Simpson: Chicagoans have a lot to say No about
Joe Chicago, Mary Chicagoland and Aunt Molly need us now to amplify their voices to Bush, Daley, Stroger and all the powerbrokers. The people are possessed of more common sense and idealism than many of their leaders.
Chicagoans are saying no. No more Iraq war. No scapegoating immigrants. No corruption taxes. Chicagoans have always been willing to work and willing to sacrifice. We are willing to have a higher, fairer state income tax. But we won’t support bad wars, bad policies and unfair taxes.
Unfortunately, too often we elect bad politicians who don’t listen to the little people anymore.
At the time, three years ago, City Hall had an unwritten policy against hiring ex-cons. But Felske had clout: He was helping register voters for the Hispanic Democratic Organization, then a powerful patronage army delivering votes for Mayor Daley.
“I don’t regret the protest because I brought a lot of people to this question — about Iraq and what it’s doing to our country,” senior Joshua Rodriguez said.
He and other suspended students and parents protested the possible expulsions, along with the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition and other activists, garnering national attention.
Rodriguez and others insisted their protest — both against the Iraq war and military recruiters at their school — was peaceful.
Listen to Mayor Daley, Speaker Madigan, Senate President Jones and Gov. Blagojevich talk to the Chicago press about today’s meeting. Audio is from Chicago Public Radio…
* 11:14 am - Miracle upon miracles, I’m told the governor actually showed up on time for the big confab this morning with the four legislative leaders and Mayor Daley. The AP has a quick brief…
Mayor Richard Daley and Chicago Transit Authority officials are in a morning meeting with Governor Rod Blagojevich and top legislative leaders in the governor’s Chicago office.
Blagojevich and lawmakers have yet to agree on a plan on how to get money for the cash-strapped CTA and suburban mass-transit agencies.
The governor is supposed to travel to Wisconsin today for a “summit” on energy and climate change, so I’m not sure how long Blagojevich is planning to stick around.
* 11:26 am - There’s been a lot of chin-scratching about where a Chicago casino might be, with reporters and columnists speculating about Navy Pier and Northerly Island, among other places. This is from Chicago Public Radio today…
DALEY: First of all, you can’t select a site. You can’t do that, you can’t select a site, because every real-estate developer would rush in there and buy around the site.
But Daley will say what’s off limits. It’s a no-go for McCormick Place, Navy Pier and Northerly Island. That leaves plenty of real estate left for developers to wonder about.
I’ve been hearing for months that the Congress Hotel is a prime spot. The workers there have been on strike forever, so organized labor would like to turn it into a more union-friendly locale by snatching it away from the owners. The place is a dump, so it would have to be completely gutted out, providing lots of construction jobs. I haven’t seen it mentioned in print before, but keep your eye on that spot.
* 11:29 am - Mayor Daley just left the leaders meeting. The others are still inside.
According to a friend who is there, the mayor said he is optimistic about the future and claimed that the CTA had done its job. More later.
Mayor Richard Daley says he’s “very optimistic” after meeting with Governor Rod Blagojevich and top legislative leaders about mass-transit funding.
But House Speaker Mike Madigan walked out of the meeting, saying it deteriorated to shouting and threats, NBC 5’s Mary Ann Ahern reported.
Daley emerged from Wednesday morning’s meeting in the governor’s Chicago office after more than an hour without saying what was being discussed. He said he left because lawmakers and the governor were getting down to the particulars.
* 12:15 pm - The meeting is over.
*** 4:04 pm *** There’s more in the subscriber section, but here’s a Daily Herald story about today’s “action”…
“It is not a one person show,” said Senate President Emil Jones, a Chicago Democrat, of Madigan’s refusal to go along. “If he wants to kill money for the CTA, the monkey will be on his back.”
The backdoor meeting also included Chicago Mayor Richard Daley, who laid out his preferences for a city-owned casino and transit bailout. Daley declined to publicly back any specific plan to bailout the transit agencies.
Meanwhile, Madigan refused to comment further on the shouting and accusations, but he said he was unhappy most of the talk focused on casinos instead of transit.
Jones said the dispute was between Madigan and Democratic state Sen. Ricky Hendon over mandatory minority ownership and revenue sharing rules tied to the new casinos.
Blagojevich used that dispute to indicate Madigan was racist.
“Speaker Madigan is the only one who doesn’t agree that African Americans ought to participate in the ownership of the casinos,” Blagojevich.
*** 4:48 pm *** Another leaders meeting is scheduled for 10 o’clock tomorrow morning. All leaders are invited. As a consequence, the governor is not going to Wisconsin for the energy summit after all.
A federal judge today found that a new state law requiring school districts to begin each day with a moment of silence or prayer is “likely unconstitutional” and he will for now stop a northwest suburban school district from following the requirement, a ban that the judge could extend statewide Thursday.
The preliminary ruling by U.S. District Court Robert Gettleman was a win for atheist activist Rob Sherman, who filed a lawsuit concerning the new law being applied at Buffalo Grove High School, where his daughter is a freshman.
Gettleman asked the parties in the case to return to the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse Thursday when he could consider making the injunction statewide. The Illinois attorney general’s office is considering stepping into the litigation.
Gettleman said the Silent Reflection and Student Prayer Act isn’t specific enough about what is a “moment” and when it should take place. It also may cross the line into unconstitutionality by giving students a choice to pray, the judge said. […]
Gettleman said he also is concerned about whether a child could or would do something physical in an act of prayer, such as take out a Bible or a Muslim prayer book.
There are only two choices given by the statute, he said. “One is an endorsement of prayer,” he said. “If that’s the way it’s being interpreted, then I think we have a problem.”
The state can either fight for this unnecessary and intrusive law by waging an expensive court battle, or members of the General Assembly can attempt to re-write and pass a similar law that overcomes the Constitutional objections.
Cardinal Francis George and one of his top bishops are stirring up controversy because of statements they recently made criticizing lawsuits from victims of priest sexual abuse.
In a letter obtained by the Sun-Times, the cardinal earlier this year wrote to the parents of a victim and apologized “for the terrible abuse suffered by your son at the hands of Ken Ruge and Robert Becker,” two Chicago area priests who are now dead.
The cardinal also wrote that money was the motivation for proposed state legislation that would allow adults who were abused by priests as children to sue their perpetrators in cases where statutes of limitation have expired.
“This is irresponsible, is not about the safety of children as the sponsor claims, and is clearly, to me at least, about money,” he wrote. […]
State Sen. Terry Link, a Lake County Democrat who introduced the legislation earlier this year, said Monday that the measure isn’t targeting the Catholic Church, but all victims of sexual abuse.
Link, who described himself as a devout Catholic, has heard similar remarks from the cardinal about money being behind the bill, and told him they were offensive.
Question: Who’s right, the Cardinal or the Senator? Explain as fully as possible.
Also, let’s try to avoid attacks on the Catholic Church as a whole, OK? Attempt mightily to stick to the topic at hand.
Talk of recall is all the rage in Illinois these days, fueled in major part by the Chicago Tribune, which in an Oct. 28 editorial said voters should add a recall provision to the Illinois Constitution as an opportunity to remove Gov. Rod Blagojevich.
I respectfully disagree.
I have been a vocal critic of this governor, both in terms of style and substance. But the beauty of representative government is that if the voters don’t like someone, we can vote him or her out of office next time around.
Voters also have the frequently used opportunity, in mid-term elections, to handcuff an underperforming executive by voting his or her party out of power in the legislature.
And finally, in cases of serious abuse of power, our state constitution already allows for impeachment.
Then there’s the recall. Setting aside logistical burdens and cost factors (California’s recall cost an estimated $60 million), I have a larger concern. Good government advocates (and editorial writers) have for years fought to diminish the influence of special interests in politics. They have also decried the proliferation of the poll-driven politician, and bemoaned the increasingly “permanent election cycle.” These reformers are right on all three counts.
Ironically, however, a recall provision would promote each of these blights upon the political process. People love to say politicians make too many of their decisions with one eye on the next election, and that the closer the election comes, the more that becomes true. Now imagine a political landscape in which any aggrieved, well-funded special-interest group has the potential power to shorten any election cycle via a recall.
That group would have just exponentially expanded its political influence. The offending politician would be more poll-driven, and less policy-driven, than ever. And the election cycle would never end.
But - and this is a big “but” - any amendment to the Illinois Constitution implementing recall would have to either be passed by both chambers of the General Assembly or enacted through a Constitutional convention, which voters will have a say on next November.
It’s more than doubtful that the state House and Senate would voluntarily open that can of worms. Any convention, if it happens, wouldn’t take place until 2009 at the earliest, and even then a recall provision isn’t guaranteed.
In other words, you might want to recall him, but you’re almost undoubtedly stuck with Blagojevich as your governor through the end of his term in January 2011.
* While the coverage of yesterday’s tax hike vote in the Chicago City Council was pretty good, the most interesting part - at least to me - was not delved into.
The Sun-Times’ Mark Brown, for instance, listed all 29 members who voted for the tax hikes and the 21 who voted against. Brown also mentioned that the mayor’s budget passed on a 37-13 vote, as did the other stories.
What I’d like to know, though, is who were the wimps? Which members of the city council voted against the tax hikes and for the mayor’s budget? That info is nowhere to be found. It doesn’t even appear to be available online.
* Even so, Brown’s column was darned good and summed up the lapdog situation pretty accurately…
If you’re sitting at home trying to figure out how the City Council could approve $276 million in tax and fee increases — including an $83 million property tax hike — when you’re already ticked off about what you’re paying now, then that may be the problem. You’re sitting, when what you really ought to be doing is moving forward.
Confused? Let me try to explain it the way the aldermen explained it.
Mayor Daley needs the additional tax money so he can continue to “move the city forward,” said Budget Chairman Carrie Austin, the first of many to invoke the mayor’s pet phrase.
“We can move the city forward,” followed Ald. Ariel Reboyras (30th).
“Do we sit still, or do we move forward,” said Ald. George Cardenas (12th).
“We must continue to move this city forward,” said Latasha Thomas (17th). “If you believe that the city needs to move forward . . . then you must vote yes.”
Ald. Ginger Rugai’s version: “I think we have to, as I think everybody has said, move forward.”
Or Ald. Leslie Hairston: “This city is at a critical point. We can decide to move forward or stand still.”
“I’m going to vote to continue to move our city forward,” said Ald. Tom Tunney (44th).
Ald. Ike Carothers (29th) set the record, invoking at least six variations on moving the city forward.
* More city council stories…
* Sun-Times: Twenty years after the death of former Mayor Harold Washington, the City Council honored Chicago’s first African-American mayor on Tuesday, then cast a vote that stirred the ghosts of Council Wars.
* Tribune: Brushing off a rare show of opposition, Mayor Richard Daley won easy City Council approval Tuesday of a spending and tax plan that will tap into the wallets of just about everyone who lives, works or plays in Chicago.
* CBS 2: City Council Passes Budget, Tax Hikes - Big Property Tax Hike, New Tax On Bottled Water Approved
* ABC 7: City Council votes to increase taxes, fees
*** UPDATE *** Thanks to a couple of commenters, I found the roll calls on all votes at the Tribbie blog. They don’t break it down, but I did. According to that list, here are the “wimps” who voted against the property tax hike but for the mayor’s budget…
Brookins (21st), Suarez (31st), Waguespack (32nd), Banks (36th), Allen (38th), Laurino (39th), Daley (43rd) and Levar (45th).
* And here are the seven aldermen who consistently voted against the property tax hikes, against the mayor’s budget and against the other tax hikes as well…
Fioretti (2nd), Preckwinkle (4th), Jackson (7th), Foulkes (15th), Munoz (22nd), Reilly (42nd), Moore (49th).
*** UPDATE 2 *** Ald. Carothers talks about “heavy lifting”…
* The Peoria Journal-Star editorial page spanks Aaron Schock today, finally going over most of the serious flaws with his Strangelovian idea to sell nuclear missiles to Taiwan to force China to help stop Iran from getting nuclear technology. It’s a pretty comprehensive whacking…
At any rate, Schock has been in damage-control mode ever since. First he issued the standard defenses: that his words were “misrepresented” - they weren’t - and that at least he has a specific plan, unlike his opponents, whom he described as “soft on Iraq, Iran and China.” Buried in all that was a semi-retraction: “I do not want to sell nuclear weapons to Taiwan. I want China’s cooperation in dealing with Iran.” On Tuesday his mea culpa went a bit further, saying that “maybe I’ve learned a lesson. … In retrospect, I believe I overstated the remedy. I regret mentioning nuclear weapons … It was a mistake, and I recognize that.” If he seemed nonchalant about the use of nukes before, he’s not anymore.
Nonetheless, Schock is still on his “freedom fighters” kick as his solution for Iran, pointing to previous successes with the strategy, notably Poland’s Solidarity movement in the 1980s. But the picture he paints is not complete. If he would read up on the Iran-Contra scandal, he’d discover that funding those freedom fighters was not one of this nation’s - or Reagan’s - proudest moments. John F. Kennedy’s Bay of Pigs was a fiasco. As for those U.S.-assisted freedom fighters he praises for beating back the Soviets in Afghanistan, who’s alleged to be the most famous one of all? Schock drew a blank, when asked. The answer is Osama bin Laden.
“I’m not an expert,” a defensive Schock said Tuesday. But when you don’t know something, don’t try to fake it, not at this level. No one gets it right all the time, newspaper editors included. But they’re not running for Congress and aspiring to make laws for the rest of us; Schock is. He’s shown potential, but if he wants his campaign to be taken seriously - he’s being ridiculed on statewide blogs as “Aaron Strangelove” - he need not be perfect but he must be better. He’s dug quite a hole for himself.
Not to mention that the Polish “freedom fighters” were peaceful union leaders and not armed insurrectionists.
* The Journal-Star also criticized Schock’s opponents for copping out on big issues and concludes…
If the candidates don’t recognize it by now, this is the big leagues, and we’re not off to a promising start.
* While they don’t mention it, we can only hope that the PJ-Star also now recognizes this “big leagues” fact and will start covering Schock like a congressional candidate instead of lavishing fawning praise on their local boy wonder state legislator.
Schock is only part of the problem. The PJ-Star, remember, completely ignored his outrageous nuclear proposal in its original reporting and glossed over it until today. That’s inexcusable.
But the paper’s story today doesn’t give much hope that any lessons have been learned over there. Check out the lede…
State Rep. Aaron Schock regrets his proposal to sell nuclear arms to Taiwan as a way to get China to go along with U.S. policy toward Iran, he said Tuesday, adding he “went too far.”
The moral of today’s stories is that like it or not, if they are sincere in trying to accomplish the goals that they claim to be seeking, both the Administration and the proponents of damage caps are going to have to find legal and constitutional means to reach those goals.
Doctors and insurers blamed lawyers, particularly the active plaintiffs’ bar in the Metro East area, saying lawsuits drove up rates. Lawyers said the courthouse was becoming a scapegoat as the insurance industry chased profits.
But dozens of doctors retired or left the area rather than pay continually rising insurance rates, and in some instances hospitals and patients were left scrambling to find a physician. The issue became a political firestorm as hundreds attended meetings around the state to complain. President George W. Bush came to Collinsville in January 2005 and told an audience of doctors that medical litigation was tilted in favor of plaintiffs’ lawyers.
This could be the year that the state really does put a casino in Chicago. But at what expense to Joliet casinos?
State legislators at least broach the subject of a Chicago casino almost annually. But talk has seldom been as intense as it is this year, with legislators and the governor looking at a casino in Chicago and at least one other undetermined location to fund future roads, bridges and other infrastructure work.
* Editorial: Hasty state construction plan could hurt more than help
This state has a long enough history of construction programs with catchy names that broke the bank, from Jim Thompson’s Build Illinois to George Ryan’s Illinois FIRST. We don’t need another one with wastefulness similar to those.
Instead, the state needs a plan that helps finance projects based on need, not political favoritism or vote-trading.
State Sen. Dan Rutherford has outlined three elements that must be part of the capital bill and we agree: Any plan must identify a reliable revenue stream to pay for it; include a list of projects on which the money will spent, not a lump sum allotment to leaders; and specify when money would be released.
* Governor’s ‘emergency’ health care rule is rejected
* Panel derails governor’s ‘end run’ to expand health insurance
State Sen. Dan Rutherford, R-Chenoa, who also voted against the change, said a significant expansion of health care might be a laudable goal, but it shouldn’t be put in place without more debate from the legislative branch.
“Yeah, but go through the process,” Rutherford said.
The governor’s proposed emergency rule would provide discounted health care benefits to about 147,000 Illinois residents with incomes up to 400 percent of the poverty level.
State Sen. Brad Burzynski, R-Clare, said the change could mean a family of four that has a family income of at least $80,000 would be getting health care from the state.
“Should those 20,000 people find themselves without health coverage, it would be because of the inaction of the administration, not the actions of [this committee],” Fritchey said.
Ottenhoff said the administration is “working on ways to make sure the 20,000 parents do not lose coverage,” but she did not offer details.
Blagojevich may portray this as another “up” for his agenda. He’s evidently trying to convince people that he’s a man of compassion who won’t let stingy legislators stop him from giving taxpayer-funded health coverage to middle-income families. He says he’s “simply doing my job and setting the right priorities.”
But the people of Illinois, through their elected representatives, are talking back. They’re unequivocally, and repeatedly, saying to Blagojevich: Don’t write a blank check and create debts that will come due for generations.
So what now? Well, the governor can attempt another end run. Or he could sue.
* Wisconsin supporting Illinois for FutureGen plant
Pennsylvania, Indiana and Kentucky have also backed Illinois’ bid. But it’s unknown what influence other states will have on the final decision.
Both Illinois and Texas have offered substantial financial incentives to help try to charm decision-makers. And Illinois officials have gone has far to spend more than $300,000 on a Washington, D.C. lobbying firm.
* Editorial: Teen advice good, but licensing rules are working
There is hope, however. The American Academy of Pediatrics last year cited a study of graduated licensing programs in 13 states that found the programs reduced crashes by as much as 41 percent. Illinois recently toughened its graduated licensing by lengthening the learner’s permit period to a minimum of nine months from three months; moving up curfew; and making teens wait a full year until they can have more than one nonfamily teen passenger in their car. The waiting period is now six months.
“Most states are performing about as well or better than most foreign countries,” said Gary Phillips, who wrote the report. “We’re kind of in the middle of the pack. However, our highest-achieving states are significantly below the highest-achieving countries. There was no state that did as well as the highest-achieving countries.”
