30 Comments - Fed up - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 9:28 am: Ms Davis and Gov Quinn don’t let a little thing like your word get in the way of doing something else later. - wordslinger - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 9:38 am: Is the idea that a “yes” vote by Davis would have provided cover to gain another five? Is that legit? –”Downstate needs something to hang their hat on,” Rep. Brandon Phelps, D-Harrisburg, said earlier this week. “We haven’t got anything. This is one thing we ask.”– I understand the frustration here on conceal carry, but let’s get real. Downstate, particularly Southern Illinois, benefits more than anyone from the income tax increase — jobs, schools, roads, etc. - Plutocrat03 - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 9:38 am: So King Richard believes that in addition to his multiple taxpayer supported pensions, he deserves an open tab for security and two automobiles because he says so. Ridiculous. I always thought that his security detail was overdone in the first place. Silly me. I though that once a pol was out of office the responsibility for personal transportation and protection moved to the realm of a personal responsibility. - Anon - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 9:51 am: “I understand the frustration here on conceal carry, but let’s get real. Downstate, particularly Southern Illinois, benefits more than anyone from the income tax increase — jobs, schools, roads, etc.” —- have you been the southern IL? They are experiencing high level of unemployment and now flooding in Southern IL. If you aren’t a state employee, teacher, or farmer you do not have a job. They have experienced a vast amount of factory closings and job layoffs! They need additional money- if you are to have a baby in the Metroeast area you need to travel all the way to St. Louis to deliver your baby. This is exactly what Southern IL is referring to- Chicago is out of tune with their needs and values. After living in Chicago, Central and Southern IL, I can see the difference and I support conceal carry. - He Makes Ryan Look Like a Saint - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 10:01 am: It is sad when a persons word means nothing. Unfortunately that is the norm in the legislature. The argument that cops were shot from someone with a concealed firearm is insane. These people were criminals. - Plutocrat03 - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 10:03 am: “America is no longer the wild, wild West” Seems like in Chicago, it is the wild south, west, east and north sides. There are war zones who have a smaller annual murder count. The politicians should be ashamed of themselves by preventing law abiding citizens an additional level of safety. - wordslinger - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 10:05 am: Anon, Rep. Phelps said Downstate had received nothing, and implied that the income tax increase was a tough vote. My point is, an income tax increase benefits his region a great deal. So he definitely got something. –After living in Chicago, Central and Southern IL, I can see the difference and I support conceal carry. – Since you can see the differences, maybe you should get behind a home-rule opt out. That clearly would pass and allow conceal-carry in the great majority of the state’s geographical area. - amalia - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 10:14 am: thanks so much for putting the pix of the board up!!! - Bill Edley - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 10:19 am: Concealed Carry is special interest legislation, pure and simple, and has little to no relationship to downstate “security” interests. It’s a misnomer to claim downstate has security challenges requiring that we arm our citizenry. How foolish a presentation and a waste of legislative effort when downstate has real economic security interests that continue to lack effective actions. - Deep South - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 10:45 am: I’m “Downstate” and I certainly don’t feel I need concealed carry as some sort of perk from the state. I’m not necessarily against concealed carry, but its not something I need to hang my hat on. Puh-leeze. - Todd - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 11:05 am: Phelps was commenting on the fact the downstate dems are in conservitive districts, and they are POd about the tax increase, civil unions and such. That the “state” as a whole is out of touch with their values and see a very liberal chicago agenda being shoved down their throat. The down state dems feel very vulnerable and feel this is an issue they could bring home to sooth some of those hard feelings. Similar to the med mal or work comp issues that have come up. Word- you keep pushing an opt out and it is not an option. This side of the street I’m leagal, I cross the street and my permit is no good. For those that complained about about the list of no carry zones, how could someone keep up with 200 plus different municipal ordiances, parks ok in hinsdale, not chicago heights, …… It just does not work practically. - Rich Miller - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 11:08 am: ===how could someone keep up with 200 plus different municipal ordiances=== I would assume that most folks spend most of their time in their hometowns, so that would be easy. If they wanted to travel elsewhere, they could simply use the Google for two seconds. - tired of press - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 11:13 am: It bothers me to see legislators attacked for changing their mind. Doesn’t that just make it harder for them to take in new information and do a better analysis? Do we have to make them live in fear about it. I don’t see this as newsworthy. I understand that people may not always change their minds for noble reasons, but there is nothing wrong with doing it. - Rich Miller - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 11:15 am: ===It bothers me to see legislators attacked for changing their mind.=== The largest issue for me isn’t that she changed her mind. The issue is that she is saying she never changed her mind. - wordslinger - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 12:03 pm: –Word- you keep pushing an opt out and it is not an option. This side of the street I’m leagal, I cross the street and my permit is no good.– Todd, I’m not pushing it, exactly. I can live with the status quo. But it would likely pass and allow conceal carry in the great majority of the state’s geographical area. There’s some precedent for it in the California and New York experiences, two Northern states, like Illinois, that often have to balance Big City/Suburban/Rural differences. - Rich Miller - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 12:04 pm: ===you keep pushing an opt out and it is not an option.=== Todd, it’s not an option because you won’t compromise. Simple as that, brother. - Rich Miller - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 12:06 pm: Also, ask some of your legislative supporters whether they’d rather wait the years for a lawsuit to get all the way up to the USSCt or do something now which will bring concealed carry to several parts of the state. Wouldn’t it be better to show that concealed carry won’t cause OK Corral fights in Rockford, or Quad Cities, etc. and then try to expand it later? Get your foot in the door, man. - Downstate Commissioner - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 12:21 pm: Can somebody explain to me why two issues, one “liberal” (medical marijuana)and the other “conservative” (concealed carry) both fail on the same day in the Illinois house? Oh, guess I answered my own question- Illinois… - 47th Ward - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 1:10 pm: Whether Davis told McDonald she’d support it or not, whoever worked that roll call should have NEVER counted on her. I’ve done my share of roll calls, and given this issue, if she was down as a yes, Phelps (or someone) should have pressed her hard to confirm her intentions. I’m neither attacking nor defending Davis. But anybody who knows anything about roll calls and this issue should know better. Having Monique Davis as a “Yes” should have been raising some serious questions. If I was a proponent, I would have welcomed her support and made sure I had a 72nd vote lined up just in case. - Yellow Dog Democrat - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 1:42 pm: What downstate Illinois needs is jobs. - tired of press - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 2:13 pm: Yes. Fair enough, Rich. I take your point. 47th Ward is absolutely right given how short they were on votes. The medical marijuana people apparently also cannot count votes. There is the real answer to Downstate Commissioner’s question about how a conservative and liberal bill can fail on the same day. - 47th Ward - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 2:18 pm: ===a conservative and liberal bill=== These weren’t conservative or liberal bills, they were Libertarian bills. Barry Goldwater would have voted yes on both and wondered what all the fuss was about. - fisherman - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 2:50 pm: Ignoring the fact that many people would re$ain defenseless - particularly in that violent big city so opposed to reform, a big problem with leaving home rule as an option is the penalty for if you forget to disarm when you run into town for that part or when you unknowingly cross into a home rule area traveling. - Rich Miller - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 2:54 pm: fisherman, them’s the breaks. - John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 2:56 pm: ===you keep pushing an opt out and it is not an option.=== Good. I wouldn’t want to see those outstanding McDonald plaintiffs left. The citizens of Chicago are just as deserving of appropriate self defense as the rest of the state. - John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 2:57 pm: errata: left behind. - Rich Miller - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 3:15 pm: ===The citizens of Chicago are just as deserving of appropriate self defense as the rest of the state. === Maybe so, but their elected legislators don’t want it. So, either you face reality or you fail. - wordslinger - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 3:41 pm: –Good. I wouldn’t want to see those outstanding McDonald plaintiffs left. The citizens of Chicago are just as deserving of appropriate self defense as the rest of the state.– Clearly, their elected representatives don’t want it. But the facts are, when you start moaning about how Downstate citizens and legislators want it, but you won’t take a compromise that will give it to them, my spider sense starts to tingling. Proponents needed 71 votes, they got 65. Yet someway, somehow, Monique Davis’ alleged one-vote flip-flop killed the whole deal. I’m guessing Rep. Davis’ photo and history on some NRA direct mail would be pretty sweet. Raise a lot of money. Meanwhile, if you want to pass conceal carry for the great majority of Illinois, it looks like the votes are there. So you have to ask yourself a question: Do I want to pass conceal carry right now for the great majority of folks who’ll never venture into the City of Chicago, or do I want to keep failure live as a fundraising mechanism? - Todd - Friday, May 6, 11 @ 8:25 pm: Word – Your conspiracy theory about fundraising is just that. The fact is certain things you think are a compromise are not practical, and simply seek to gut the bill. On the other side, some are just principled stands on issues. Otis McDonald, deserves the same right to have the means of self defense available to him as anyone else in the state. Having a two tiered system that says Chicago can continue to violate people’s right’s isn’t a compromise in our book. Carving out so many towns by your suggest opt out leaves those of us who work up north in a never ending maze that makes it way to difficult try and navigate. And essentially guts the law. The CA law you keep citing is a statewide permit. So if you get one from your sheriff in Ventura CA, you can go over to LA and not worry about it. Or if you get a permit from your sheriff from Riverside, you could wonder all over San Fran and they can’t say much about it. So while the permit is discretionary, unless there are restrictions placed on them, and most sheriffs don’t restrict the places you can carry, they are good by state law throughout the state. BTW did you read that brief yet? We are already in the federal courts on the issue. And we’ll be in more court rooms soon. 47 as for the roll call, When I heard Davis say what she did, I knew someone had gotten to her and the next question was who else did they get? The roll call showed us who it was. So now we go back and build it again. WE ran the check on those names more than once. When a state rep comes out and confirms X says they are a yes, you can only get so many confirmations. When a members of the leadership team says So – n So is a yes, as they are working a whip count from the floor, you take them at their word. Not much more than that. The Board hit 68. With Davis and two others that didn’t make the roll, that’s 71. At some point you simply have to put it up on the board and see what happens. They also knew that the House was their best bet to stop the bill. But the fact remains that a majority of the House is supportive of a right to carry law. It is only a minority that keeps it from happening. - G. Willickers - Saturday, May 7, 11 @ 12:09 am: @ word - “But the facts are, when you start moaning about how Downstate citizens and legislators want it, but you won’t take a compromise that will give it to them, my spider sense starts to tingling.” Not even a compromise on home rule but smaller compromise to lengthen the list of restricted areas (aka, Scalia’s “sensitive areas”) noted in Section 70. After adding libraries and community colleges Phelps flat out refused to add any more common sense locations. That led directly to the money quote from yesterday’s Trib editorial railing against HB148. In summary, the Trib asked why guns are not ok in the General Assembly’s chambers but they are ok in a playground, mall or hospital? More @ Word - “Proponents needed 71 votes, they got 65. Yet someway, somehow, Monique Davis’ alleged one-vote flip-flop killed the whole deal.” It’s easier to raise money when you have a boogeyman to raise it against. Face it Illinois gun owners - you’re being fleeced by a gun industry interest group whose only goal is to increase its bank account. They may say they want you to be able to carry a gun anywhere but they routinely fail to even get a toehold in the door of opportunity to do so, yet always seem to find a boogeyman to plaster all over their pleas for more of your dollars. Kotowski… Davis… Obama… (Heck, Obama has been one of the friendliest, pro-2A Democrats in literally half a century. He opened up national parks to guns and has bent over backwards to give Republicans and the NRA whatever they want. Yet the NRA still fundraises on the guy’s name and still tries telling its membership Obama’s coming after their guns.) Wake up gun owners. You’re being had. Sorry, comments for this post are now closed.