* I have vivid memories of stories like this from the early 1980s recession. We’re in for it now…

Inside Talecris Plasma Resources in Waukegan, business is good. Past the overflowing waiting room, 30 people recently reclined on comfortable red leather chairs, each one making $20 to $45 as they watched TV, listened to music or chatted with neighbors.

The source of the cash is blood plasma, precious to pharmaceutical companies as the raw material needed to make a wide variety of medicines. Thin tubes carried blood from each person’s arm to a piece of whirring machinery that gradually filled a container with the valuable yellow fluid. […]

An industry group said total donations may hit 16 million this year, up from 10 million donations just three years earlier. At the Waukegan center, manager Rhonda Johnson said this fall was among the busiest seasons she’s observed, with more first-time donors joining the twice-a-week regulars.

* Oy…

The Sun-Times Media Group has moved to lighten its load—in the board room and on its ledgers—in the face of pressure from top shareholders agitating for change as their investments dwindled to pennies per share.

The parent of the Chicago Sun-Times and dozens of other Chicago-area publications announced Tuesday that Chairman Raymond Seitz and board members Gordon Paris and Graham Savage plan to resign by the end of the year.

Sun-Times Media also plans to de-register itself as a Class A stock in early 2009, a maneuver Chief Executive and Chicago Sun-Times Publisher Cyrus Freidheim Jr. said this summer would save about $10 million annually in lawyering, accounting and paperwork.

Every penny counts, particularly when shares closed Tuesday at 8 cents apiece, putting the company’s market value at less than $7 million. The company this month announced a $168.8 million loss in the third quarter.

* Chicago’s budget is melting down…

* Budget Cuts in the Police Department

* City Council Set To Vote On 2009 Budget

* City Council to vote on Daley budget today

* And the state’s budget is crashing…

Against the backdrop of the national economic crisis, Gov. Rod Blagojevich said Tuesday he wants more power to use his budget ax to close a growing budget deficit.

The governor offered no specific programs that are on the chopping block, but noted his moves could affect public schools and universities, state pension funds and grants to local governments. […]

State Sen. Donne Trotter, D-Chicago, a key Senate budget negotiator, said the plan will give the governor options if the sluggish economy continues to drive down state revenues.

“We’re in a state of emergency,” Trotter said. “The way things are going, it could get worse.”

* More gloomy news…

Cash from income, corporate and sales taxes is expected to fall more than $800 million short by June, the end of the state’s fiscal year, Blagojevich budget director Ginger Ostro said Tuesday. Investment losses, a pre-existing budget deficit and a decline in casino revenues brings the total shortfall to at least $2 billion.

But it could get worse, predicts Dan Long, director of the Legislature’s bipartisan budget forecasting commission.

“We think it could be larger,” Long said. “We are entering the worst period right now.”

Long said the gap could widen to $2.8 billion or more.

* The Rockford Register Star runs an incomprehensible editorial that bashes the governor’s plan, but calls for unspecified legislative action…

We haven’t seen anything lately that would make us think the governor has earned lawmakers’ trust back.

Other parts of Blagojevich’s plan are troubling as well. He proposed a short-term borrowing program to help reduce the state’s pile of unpaid bills. The bills need to be paid, but borrowing more money seems risky. We wouldn’t advocate a homeowner making a mortgage payment with a credit card. It not only delays the problem, but would add to overall debt as well.

The governor also wants to ask the federal government for $1 billion over three years. With bailouts and requests for bailouts, we don’t see where the feds have any money to throw around.

Lawmakers avoided making tough decisions while they campaigned for re-election. The election’s over and campaigning is done (for now.)

Inaction has made Illinois’ problems worse. It sends a chill up our spines to think how bad things will get unless the General Assembly acts this week.

Acts on what? They never say. That’s the trouble with crises like this. We all scream and shout, but nobody offers a realistic alternative. And it doesn’t look like the governor is gonna get much cooperation from the GA, either…

[House Majority Leader Barbara Flynn Currie] said much of the belt tightening can be done without lawmaker approval and that they will be hesitant to grant additional authority “without a lot of specificity on where those cuts are going to go.”

State Sen. Jeff Schoenberg, an Evanston Democrat and co-chair of the Legislature’s budget forecasting arm, said he doesn’t foresee lawmakers giving up oversight on cuts.

Next year may make the past two years look pleasant.