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Thursday, Apr 16, 2009 - Posted by Rich Miller

* The Illinois Republican Party has a new web ad blasting Democratic Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias, who is running for US Senate…

* The controversy in question was in a Crains blog post this week…

Illinois families lost $85 million in hard-earned savings on his watch. Should he get the blame?

That surely is not the question that Illinois Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias wants before voters as he prepares to declare his candidacy for the U.S. Senate sometime after the weather gets warm. But the question is real and, depending on how it plays out, it could get a ton more publicity.

Mr. Giannoulias and his office are directly involved in a little-noticed aspect of the nation’s economic collapse, one involving good judgment, investment savvy and trust. While there’s plenty of blame to go around — most of it likely on others, not Mr. Giannoulias — there’s also plenty of gray area, plenty of reason to ask lots of questions.

At issue is what happened late last year to the state’s $2-billion Bright Start college savings program, administered by the treasurer’s office.

Go read the whole thing.

The IL GOP’s background post on Giannoulias is here.

24 Comments

This just in…

Thursday, Apr 16, 2009 - Posted by Rich Miller

* 1:12 pm - Not backing down…

Congressman Mark Kirk is standing by his earlier comments that Illinois residents “are ready to shoot anyone who is going to raise taxes” as much as Gov. Pat Quinn is proposing.

As I’ve been telling people in comments, if Kirk believes this sort of language is perfectly acceptable and not irresponsible, then he ought to go ahead and make it a part of his campaign routine and see how that works for him.

Hint: It won’t.

…Adding… A commenter notes…

Can he imagine how quickly a student at school would be hauled down to the office if a student announced at school “Students are ready to shoot anyone increasing the homework load by that extent”?

Now do you get it?

And if you still don’t, substitute “student at school” with “employee at work” or some such thing.

*** 5:19 pm *** Chicago Public Radio has the Kirk quote…

“Shoots is a strong word, but it’s a political term of art. And when you fill out a tax form and hear about leaders that want to increase the bite that the government is taking out of your family income, people are mad. People are very mad.”

“Shoots” is not a “political term of art” that I’ve ever heard.

* 1:32 pm - Yikes. From a press release…

The Illinois seasonally adjusted unemployment rate for March is 9.1 percent, the highest level since November 1985, according to data released today by the Illinois Department of Employment Security (IDES). The March rate is +0.5 percent higher than February and the sixth consecutive month to record an increase.

Total non-farm payroll declined by –39,300 jobs in March 2009, the second largest over-the-month decrease on record (back to 1990). In March, the number of unemployed people in Illinois increased to 596,000 (+27,400), the highest level reported since September 1983. […]

In Illinois, the Manufacturing sector lost -14,200 jobs in March, its third largest over-the-month reduction since January 1992. In the last year, this sector has dropped by -60,800 jobs, more than 9 percent of its total workforce. The Professional and Business Services sector reported -13,200 fewer workers, the second largest decrease on record and its third decline in excess of -10,000 in the last five months.

* 2:12 pm - I gotta give props to Congressman Aaron Schock for not totally losing it on Colbert, but why do politicians eagerly subject themselves to interviews like this?

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Thursday, Apr 16, 2009 - Posted by Rich Miller

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Question of the day

Thursday, Apr 16, 2009 - Posted by Rich Miller

* What is your “pet” state program or project that you absolutely don’t want cut in the budget negotiations?

Please, no snark today.

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Blagojevich: Cub advice, blustering at Goudie and getting bet on *** UPDATED x1 ***

Thursday, Apr 16, 2009 - Posted by Rich Miller

*** UPDATE - 11:51 am *** From this morning’s arraignment…

[U.S. Distirct Judge James B. Zagel] said at the hearing Thursday that the Blagojevich trial will take six months, and likely will not begin for two years.

While this would be the normally expected schedule, I kinda wonder whether Blagojevich will try to get it moved up to coincide with the 2010 election - when he can do maximum damage. Since there are other defendants, though, that may not be feasible.

[ *** End of Update *** ]

* I always suspected that Blagojevich was sending Piniella advice. But only once?

The next day, on May 31, 2007, Blagojevich sent a handwritten note, a copy of which has been obtained by the Chicago Tribune. It began, “Dear Lou.” Blagojevich included a Jack Higgins editorial cartoon that had run that morning in the Sun-Times, comparing Piniella’s management to Blagojevich’s.

Blagojevich then made his suggested line-up changes — specifically recommending Alfonso Soriano bat third, followed by Derrek Lee and then Aramis Ramirez.

* The former governor was all smiles for the reporters before and after his arraignment earlier this week. But it was a different story as he rode an elevator up to the courtroom with ABC7’s Chuck Goudie…

But once we were behind closed elevator doors, away from the cameras, Blagojevich launched into a pitched tirade about something else: illegal gambling and allegations that he worked as a bookmaker, taking action from sports gamblers before he got into politics.

“That bookmaking story was (bleep),” said Illinois’ former leader. “I did not do that. I deny it. It’s a (bleepin’) lie,” he said in what would become an uninterrupted diatribe.

Pointing to me, he said, “This man is a (bleepin’) liar. He puts lies on TV.”

Blagojevich was referring to an I-Team report from a few months ago…

The ABC7 I-Team has learned that an attorney who went undercover for the FBI in the late 1980’s says he told federal authorities years ago about wrongdoing by Blagojevich. His name is Robert Cooley.

Cooley says that before Rod Blagojevich got into politics he was a bookmaker on the North Side who regularly paid the Chicago mob to operate.

Back to this week…

“That Cooley is a liar,” he said. “I am going to sue that (bleepin’) Cooley,” Blagojevich stated, his face red at this point with apparent anger. He repeated: “I’m going to sue him.”

Class to the end.

* And while possibly illegal, this might be fun…

You can now bet on Blago’s fate.

“With public speculation swirling out of control and people searching for answers,” the online betting service BetUs.com informs us, the folks there have been gracious enough to post odds and accept wagers “on the shamed governor’s future.” […]

The service also is taking wagers on questions that are a little snarkier. Will he get a divorce? Odds are 9-1 that he will. Will he move out of the U.S.? Oddsmakers place the likelihood at even. What will his next job be? Best odds are on used-car salesman, followed by telemarketer, pizza delivery guy, construction worker and motivational speaker.

I wonder what the odds are that he winds up as the Cub manager?

Maybe we could make that a QOTD one day.

* Related…

* Blagojevich cohorts to be arraigned today: Former Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s former chief of staff, campaign finance chairman and a millionaire lobbyist are scheduled to be arraigned today on charges related to the racketeering and fraud case against the ousted governor.

* Quinn: Blagojevich TV ‘hard to believe’

* ‘I’m a celebrity … and I love being here’

* Difficult times lead to stress test of Illinois’ old-style politics

* Arraignment for Blago’s ex chief-of-staff

30 Comments

Tea and Houli - and a guy named Cullerton

Thursday, Apr 16, 2009 - Posted by Rich Miller

* An attendee of a suburban tea party is apparently so mad at state taxation that he isn’t thinking straight…

Mike Olesen, owner of Stockholm’s Pub in downtown Geneva, spoke of how Blagojevich’s hike in the “gross receipts tax” is crippling businesses, and Quinn’s proposal would do the same.

He said he was going to open another restaurant in Sycamore last year, but didn’t due to the state’s system of taxing businesses.

“That’s a million dollars in revenue that is not coming into this state,” he said, adding that it also stopped new jobs from being created.

Wow.

So, he decided not to open a new restaurant a year after Blagojevich’s GRT died a painful legislative death? Bizarre.

Remember this column I wrote for the Sun-Times?

Ohio has cut its income tax rates by 21 percent since 2005. Yet, a new statewide poll taken by Hart Research Associates discovered that a mere 8 percent of Ohioans knew their income taxes had been reduced. A third of Ohioans actually thought their taxes had increased. The rest either didn’t know or figured their tax rates were about the same.

People are just ignorant in general, I suppose.

* So, how will taxpayers like Olesen and “The Shootist” Mark Kirk respond to Cook County Assessor Jim Houlihan’s new tax plan? Probably not well. But they probably won’t like anything anyone proposes.

Houlihan outlines his plan this morning in a Tribune op-ed. He buries the lede, of course…

increasing the income tax rate to 4.25 percent

Gov. Quinn wants to increase the rate to 4.5 percent, so there’s not much of a cosmetic difference. Also, Houli’s plan is a 42 percent income tax hike, which is what Dawn Clark Netsch proposed.

* You have to hunt around the op-ed for his other tax hikes. Houlihan wants to expand the sales tax to cover services and eliminate the sales tax exemption on food.

There are positives to the proposal, like cutting the state’s overall sales tax rate to by 1.75 percentage points to 3.25 percent (Oops. Fumblefingers). He is also against raising the corporate tax rate. He wants to greatly increase the Earned Income Tax Credit and would double the personal income tax exemption to $4,000. He’d eliminate the income tax credit for property taxes and replace it with a statewide property tax circuit breaker…

A circuit breaker would give a rebate of up to $1,500 to homeowners who paid more than 5 percent of their income in property taxes. The benefit would be based on income and family size. This would be more targeted and cost-effective than the property tax credit.

All told, Houlihan claims, the plan would net $2.73 billion to the state coffers, even after municipalities get their traditional 10 percent share. Schools, he says, should get $823 million out of the deal.

The bottom line, apparently, is he leaves about $1.9 billion for the deficit - which is somewhere around $12 billion.

* But Senate President John Cullerton has a far simpler idea…

“We could accomplish the same amount of money the governor acquires with his income tax increase by making it a one percent increase instead of a one-and-a-half percent increase, but without having an increase in the personal exemption.”

One point and be done with it? That may be a more doable plan.

* Tea party roundup…

* Tax Day fix requires more than ‘tea parties’

* Protesting T as in taxes

* Tax Day Protest Draws Hundreds in Chicago

* Protesters blast taxes, spending at TEA Party

* Tax Day Tea Party

* Twin Cities Tea Party

* More than 500 protest during tax day ‘tea party’

* Hundreds rally in downtown Bloomington at ‘Tax Day Tea Party’

* “TEA Party” held and historic sites to reopen

* Tea’d off about taxes

*Tea Party Tax Protesters ‘Mad As Hell’

* Crashing the (Tea) Party

* The TEA Party in Cary

* Chicago Tea Party - 1

* Chicago Tea Party - 2

* TEA Party!

* Lisle Tea Party

* Springfield Tea Party

* Crystal Lake TEA Protest Biggest in McHenry Co History

* GOP hopes to build momentum behind nationwide ‘tea parties’

* Adams: From the Sons of Liberty to today’s tea party followers

* Remember Tax Day on Election Day

* Tea parties: Which Q-C earmarks should be cut?

* Schakowsky Calls Parties “Despicable’ and “Shameful”

62 Comments

Morning Shorts

Thursday, Apr 16, 2009 - Posted by Mike Murray

* Putting people to work will restore trust in government

More than half a million people are out of work today in Illinois. Almost half of those people lost their jobs in the last year.

It hasn’t been this bad since 1983.

* StreetWise halfway to goal

A dire financial situation may have improved Wednesday for StreetWise, the Chicago publication to the homeless, after a series of well-timed donations and funding challenges carried the magazine halfway to the $75,000 total it says it needs to survive.

By the end of the day, donations had reached about $41,000 said StreetWise board vice chairman Pete Kadens—including a single donation from Jim and Kay Mabie for $20,000 that came with a matching challenge to other potential donors. Another board member, U.S. Rep. Danny Davis, also donated $1,000 at the news conference. Smaller donations have been pouring in as the magazine’s plight has been publicized.

“Unreal,” Kadens said. “I’m on Cloud Nine.”

* Aldermen vow to save StreetWise

* StreetWise donations pour in

* Zell says Tribune acquisition a mistake

The real estate mogul, who took Tribune private in an $8.2 billion deal in 2007 that loaded the company with debt as revenue started to slide, also said the acquisition was a mistake.

“I was too optimistic in terms of the newspaper’s ability to preserve its position,” he said.

* Mayor Daley will lay off 1,600 City of Chicago workers unless unions agree to givebacks

They were told that plummeting city revenues threaten to poke a $250 million hole in Daley’s 2009 budget. And unless the $2.5 billion deal to privatize Midway Airport is revived this year, the shortfall would approach $300 million.

The bottom line: Without another painful round of union concessions to be chosen from a pick-your-poison menu presented to organized labor, as many as 1,600 city employees could lose their jobs. That’s on top of the 420 city workers laid off Jan. 1.

* Truth In Politics: Cook County Tax Rollback

Palatine is one of 12 suburban townships that voted overwhelmingly in a referendum against the 1 percentage point sales tax increase imposed last year. Stroger said voters were misinformed.

“I think that just goes comes from, they don’t really know where their money goes,” Stroger said. “Most of the money that goes to government does not go to the county.”

“I mean, it’s insulting to me,” said Arlington Heights resident Francesca Spatafora. “Why even bother making the change? It’s not gonna do much to help us.”

* After hiking sales tax, Stroger proposes rolling back county tax

Ald. Toni Preckwinkle (4th), who is expected to challenge Stroger in next year’s Democratic primary, branded the tax rollback a desperate attempt by an embattled incumbent to salvage his re-election bid.

“Other than fact that the election is closer, what’s happened in the last month to lead people to believe we no longer have need for the money?” she said

* A race to cut Cook taxes?

Oddly, Stroger’s bitsy rollback proposal is one of three competing tax-cut plans: County Board member Tony Peraica wants to kill the full increase this year. And four other board members propose eliminating the entire increase over four years: The four are Larry Suffredin, Forrest Claypool, Tim Schneider and Bridget Gainer, a board newcomer we’re pleased to see as a sponsor.

We prefer the Peraica plan. Saving taxpayers close to $400 million in 2010 would force the long-overdue economies that Stroger has promised but failed to deliver.

* Stroger Critic Questions Cook County Sales Tax Proposal

* Cook County May Roll Back Some Of Its Sales Tax

* Cook County taxes: Board President Todd Stroger asks commissioners to pare back sliver of tax increase

* Sheriff’s corruption unit to probe suburbs

Dart has formed a new Financial Crimes/Public Corruption Unit, the first of its kind in the sheriff’s office, to investigate allegations of corruption in school districts, park boards and municipalities.

“That’s been a special interest of mine ever since I was an assistant state’s attorney and began investigating corruption in the Ford Heights Police Department many years ago,” Dart said.

* Chicago Park District hiking summer camp fees

* Ice storm cleanup in state parks cost $500,000

* Iroquois County — Attempt to reopen budget defeated

* Area taxing bodies feeling the hurt; don’t expect relief

* Dear Gina’s MySpace Wall: I’m From JP Morgan, And I’m Here For Your Father’s Car

* Northern Trust making more loans: report

* AptarGroup profit falls 28%

* School districts share $654,000 in federal money

* States seek stimulus money for high-speed rail

* Airport will get $7.3 million in recovery act funds

* Planning commission monitoring ‘wish list’ for stimulus funds

* Waukegan Harbor nets stimulus money

* Quigley hopes never to lose his sense of ‘Wow’

* Durbin gets star treatment at Barbour Language Academy

* Committees agree: Drive without a valid license, vehicle will be seized

* Cars may be impounded for motorists without license

* Chicago police and drunken driving: 13 officers were arrested in ‘08 for drunken driving, officials say

* Chicago police send wrong message with court no-shows

* Olson: More power for state AGs bad for banking industry

* Powerful Women Strike A Delicate Balance in South Suburbs

* Ron Burke: OK clean-energy law to help achieve 2 goals

* New law helps Illinois kids get therapies

* Holocaust museum: Sunday’s opening in Skokie to have powerful message of hope amid the horrors

* Museum acquired ideal location in Skokie

* A Holocaust Survivor Hands Off Her Story

* Unfiltered: Cipora Katz’s Story of Holocaust Survival

4 Comments

Mark Kirk doesn’t even know where the line is

Thursday, Apr 16, 2009 - Posted by Rich Miller

* Congressman Mark Kirk is apparently a wee bit upset with the governor’s tax hike proposal…

“I think the people of Illinois are ready to shoot anyone who is going to raise taxes by that degree.”

Perhaps someone who hasn’t yet lost his or her mind in the Illinois GOP could advise this distinguished gentleman to turn it down a notch or two?

Seriously. What the heck? I mean, I’ve heard of dogwhistling the base, but that was like a foghorn in a library. I thought Kirk was supposed to be a moderate? He sounds a bit like Alan Keyes on meth. Or maybe Rod Blagojevich before he was hampered by federal bail restrictions.

* Kirk, by the way, reported raising $696,000 in the first quarter and has $597,000 on hand and said he may run for governor or US Senate.

I certainly hope his “shooting” comment wasn’t indicative of the sort of statewide campaign we can expect from him. We just got rid of one crazy guv. I’m not sure I could take another one so soon.

* Afterthought: Alexi Giannoulias raised over a million bucks in a month and Kirk raised almost 700 large in a quarter. Campaign contribution caps are really keeping the money out of DC politics, aren’t they? Sorry. Couldn’t resist.

* Meanwhile, as I told you the other day, DuPage County Board Chairman Bob Schillerstrom is considering a bid for governor…

Schillerstrom’s chances are far from clear. He has experienced diminishing political influence in recent years, having lost both authority and seats on the county board. Additionally, he faced harsh criticism from GOP officials for supporting a half-cent sales tax increase to fund mass transit expansion and public works projects.

On Thursday Schillerstrom held a forum to let voters speak out against Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn’s income tax increase proposal. If he were governor, Schillerstrom said, he would opt for tough cuts, even in education and health care, before raising taxes during a recession.

Besides the tax issue, there’s also all those campaign contributions from people who do bidness in the county, developers and the like. This probably won’t be the most favorable environment for him, but he’s ready to move on, so here he comes.

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