*** LIVE SESSION COVERAGE ***
Monday, Mar 26, 2012 - Posted by Rich Miller
* I’m not sure what they’re going to do today, but here we go. BlackBerry users click here. Otherwise, you can just watch it play out, whatever it is…
4 Comments  
|
Question of the day
Monday, Mar 26, 2012 - Posted by Rich Miller
* The setup…
Sponsors of “Stand Your Ground” legislation in Iowa and Illinois said they still intend to push their respective self-defense gun bills even in light of the national debate spawned by the shooting death of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin in Florida.
Florida is among 21 states with “Stand Your Ground” laws that give people wide latitude to use deadly force rather than retreat during a fight, regardless of whether the action takes place in one’s home or on the street. Iowa and Illinois have “Castle laws,” in which the use of deadly force in self-defense is restricted to one’s home.
A Quad-City area lawmaker said he sponsored a “Stand Your Ground” bill in Springfield last month that languished. He intends to reintroduce it again.
“I support the lawfulness of using very strong force, if necessary deadly force, in self defense when you’re off your property,” Rep. Rich Morthland, a Republican from Cordova, said Friday. “I think it’s appropriate.”
Morthland said what happened in Florida is a tragedy and echoed President Barack Obama’s comments Friday morning that every aspect of the case needs to be investigated.
* From Rep. Morthland’s bill…
Creates the Armed Citizen Liability Act.
Provides that a person is immune from civil liability arising out of the use of force that is intended or likely to cause death or great bodily harm if (i) the person reasonably believed that the force was necessary to prevent imminent death or bodily harm to himself or herself or to another person and (ii) the person against whom the force was used either was in the process of unlawfully and forcibly entering, or was inside after unlawfully and forcibly entering, the dwelling, motor vehicle, or place of business of the person using the force.
In such a case, provides that the finder of fact may not consider whether the person using the force had an opportunity to flee or retreat before he or she used the force, and provides that, with exceptions, the person using the force is presumed to have reasonably believed that the force was necessary to prevent imminent death or bodily harm to himself or herself or to another person. Provides for an award of reasonable attorney’s fees, costs, compensation for loss of income, and other costs reasonably incurred to a person using such force. Provides that nothing in the Act limits any other available defense.
* The Question: Do you support Rep. Morthland’s bill? Take the poll and then explain your answer in comments, please.
85 Comments
|
Caption contest!
Monday, Mar 26, 2012 - Posted by Rich Miller
* Attorney General Lisa Madigan called last week.
Ms. Madigan wanted to know who was emceeing my 50th birthday charity roast this coming Saturday in Chicago. I said it was Senate President John Cullerton. She thanked me and said she would call him.
“Wait a second!” I hollered before she could hang up. “Why are you calling Cullerton?”
The AG said she had decided she wanted to participate in the roast and needed to talk to Cullerton about it. I replied that we already had a program with a strict time limit and there just wasn’t room.
“I’m doing it,” she said.
Knowing there was nothing I could say, I surrendered and went back to work. But I decided to catch up with Cullerton that night to ask what the heck was going on. Yes, she had called, he said, “But I can’t tell you what she’s doing.”
Great.
* So, here’s a caption contest in honor of our persistent AG. Winner gets a free ticket to this Wednesday’s Springfield benefit at Boone’s. The event starts at 5 o’clock and all proceeds from the $20 admission fee will go to Lutheran Social Services of Illinois….
107 Comments
|
Lobbying reforms buried in subcommittee
Monday, Mar 26, 2012 - Posted by Rich Miller
* From the AP…
Legislation attempting to prevent cozy relationships between lawmakers and lobbyists was squashed Friday by an Illinois Senate panel.
The measures would have required officials to disclose family members who are lobbyists.
Legislators also would have been barred from becoming lobbyists for one year after their terms end and they wouldn’t have been able to negotiate for lobbying jobs while in public office.
Similar “revolving door” restrictions already apply for many federal offices and are common in other states.
The measures were buried Friday in a three-member subcommittee that is controlled by Senate Democrats. The Republican member made a motion to pass the bills. Neither Democrat would second the motion, so the legislation is stuck in the subcommittee.
* Background…
In December, former state Rep. Kevin McCarthy, D-Orland Park, quit after 14 years in the House to become a lobbyist for ComEd. The move raised eyebrows because McCarthy had spent the prior two years serving as the main negotiator and sponsor of legislation that gave the utility giant the ability to raise rates on customers with less regulatory oversight.
State Sen. A.J. Wilhelmi, D-Joliet, left the Senate earlier this year to become the chief lobbyist for the Illinois Hospital Association.
The two are among an estimated 40 former lawmakers registered to lobby members of the General Assembly.
Illinois is among 15 states that have no revolving-door provisions for lawmakers. Most states have imposed cooling-off periods ranging from six months to two years.
* Chris Kaergard of the Peoria Journal Star, LaHood’s hometown paper, was outraged…
I also have to take issue with what Senate Democrats’ spokeswoman Rikeesha Phelon told The Associated Press about the bills. She claimed the bills weren’t “buried,” and in fact that everything was on the up-and-up.
“They received a fair public hearing,” she said. “I also wouldn’t consider the issue ‘buried’ because I believe that there are other senators that are continuing to work on similar issues this session.”
Forget delicacy or diplomacy. The ability to say that with a straight face is unbelieveable. It simply defies logic and flies in the face of common sense.
These are the bills currently on the table. They were ready. They were the ones set for a hearing — and instead were brought up in a farce of a hearing.
There is no excuse — none — for not allowing the bills a roll call vote. These bills are not inherently dangerous in the slightest. There is precisely zero reason that they cannot be allowed to the floor for an up-or-down vote. The failure to do so is an abomination, a perversion of democracy, and the more people who say so the better.
Thoughts?
* And in other Senate subcommittee news…
A different panel rejected a plan from state Sen. Dan Duffy, a Lake Barrington Republican, that would have required candidates for office in Illinois to show a birth certificate or other documents that proved they were a citizen.
Candidates need to be citizens to hold office in Illinois, and they have to sign papers when they make their campaigns official stating they are.
Duffy’s plan would have required proof, but the subcommittee voted against it by a 2-1 vote.
He said his proposal was unrelated to disproved rumors that President Barack Obama isn’t a citizen.
“I’m not a birther,” Duffy said. “I believe Barack Obama is a U.S. citizen.”
Frankly, it’s amazing they’re even doing subcommittee hearings since the committee passage deadline has long since past.
* Related…
* Statehouse Insider: Scholarship bill not financial fix
* Bills sponsored by Springfield legislators often go nowhere: Even though they are political opposites of the Democrats who control the General Assembly, neither Brauer nor McCann would complain about the treatment they receive from the majority party. Other Republicans in recent years, however, say Democrats have bottled their bills up in the House Rules Committee, never to be heard from in a committee or on the floor.
* Lawmakers eyeing outdated voter rolls: An effort is under way in the Statehouse to address problems with voting rolls in at least 16 Illinois counties. Under a proposal that could be debated in the Senate [this] week, the state Board of Elections would be required to conduct an audit to determine whether voter registration numbers are current and accurate.
* Editorial: Cullerton: Call the vote - Corrupted scholarship program has to go
* Could suburban ‘lame ducks’ play key role in reforms?: Among Tuesday’s fallen is Rep. Randy Ramey, a Carol Stream Republican who lost a bid for the Illinois Senate. He disputed the idea that lawmakers will change their minds just because they don’t face election. “I won’t flip-flop,” Ramey said. “You won’t see me voting for crazy things that I never would have voted for before.”
* Chuck Sweeny: ‘Drano Law’
22 Comments
|
Losing the magic touch?
Monday, Mar 26, 2012 - Posted by Rich Miller
* My syndicated newspaper column focuses on Secretary of State Jesse White…
It’s difficult not to contemplate how Illinois Secretary of State Jesse White has screwed up lately on so many fronts.
White has managed to mostly avoid scandals throughout his political life, and as a result has become one of the most popular Democratic politicians of the past half century— one year winning all 102 Illinois counties and later taking about 70 percent of the vote in the national Republican landslide of 2010 (Democratic state Attorney General Lisa Madigan won with 65 percent, and Gov. Pat Quinn won with less than 47 percent that year).
But White’s engineering of state Rep. Derrick Smith’s appointment to his old House seat was no doubt the biggest mistake White has made in his decades-long political career.
As you know by now, Smith (D-Chicago) was arrested on a federal bribery charge last week. Smith is White’s guy. There is no plausible deniability for White. He hired Smith at the secretary of state’s office, even after the Chicago Sun-Times discovered that Smith was involved in shenanigans at his city job, from which he was fired. White then put Smith into the House seat, even though Smith was the sort of person who could barely speak in floor debates.
Smith was an embarrassment even before he was arrested. He was in over his head and obviously lacking in skills. He was White’s hack, and everybody knew it. But at least Smith looked like a clean embarrassment. Now, he’s a dangerous embarrassment facing a federal felony charge.
Before the last election, White had promised that this would be his final term. But he changed his mind last year and said he would run again in 2014. It’s possible that the Smith arrest could cause him to rethink those plans. The high-profile bust has most certainly put some blood in the political waters.
Whether White runs again or not, this is the first time he has ever displayed any sort of political vulnerability. There are now visible cracks in his bright, shining armor. The political superman looks more human.
He’s done something that he’s never done before — handed his potential opposition a beautiful gift. “He’s an honest, standup kind of a guy,” White said after he engineered Smith’s appointment to the House last year. That’ll look great in a TV commercial … for his opponent.
White also defied legislative protocol this year by going after state Sen. Annazette Collins (D-Chicago). Collins was backed to the hilt by Senate President John Cullerton as she fought what turned out to be a losing battle to Patricia Van Pelt-Watkins.
Cullerton dumped more than $167,000 into the primary, an almost unheard of amount for a Senate race. That sort of involvement is usually a big warning sign to other pols to stay the heck away. Legislative leaders don’t like it when fellow party members challenge their authority over their caucuses.
This isn’t the first time that White has meddled in that Senate district, though. He backed candidates against former Sen. Rickey Hendon more than once.
And even though White seemingly picked a blue-chip candidate to challenge Collins (unlike the Smith debacle), and even though Collins is an appointee who hasn’t made much impact in the Senate, the Senate Black Caucus was very aggressive in making sure that Cullerton expended serious resources to defend her. As a result, this particular challenge has seemed to generate harder feelings against White than his past efforts.
This was the first time that any Democratic Party leader has so directly and bluntly challenged Cullerton’s authority over his caucus. In this business, if somebody disrespects you, then they’d better be made to fear you or that disrespect could spread to others.
White is attempting to fight off a 9 percent budget cut for the secretary of state’s office proposed by Quinn (who, like everyone but White, backed Collins). White has offered to cut 2 percent instead. Good luck with that.
White needs to clean up his messes. And fast.
* Meanwhile, WUIS’ Amanda Vinicky caught up with Speaker Madigan on Friday…
Since the election, top Democrats including the governor, Chicago mayor, and even Smith’s mentor and former boss, Secretary of State Jesse White, have called on Smith to resign.
But not Madigan, who says he hasn’t talked to Smith since his arrest earlier this month.
“No, I have not spoken with Derrick,” Madigan said.
“And I’m not going to offer any comments or opinion because I’m leading the investigation. I’m the one who created the committee, appointed the chair and so I don’t plan to offer any comment or opinion or direction.”
Madigan is talking about a special committee, formed at the request of House Republicans, that will meet Tuesday to look into the allegations.
* But Mayor Emanuel weighed in…
Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Friday jumped on the bandwagon of Democratic politicians demanding the resignation of state Rep. Derrick Smith (D-Chicago) because of the federal bribery charges against Smith.
“I do not think — while Mr. Smith won the primary — that his name should be on the ballot in November,” Emanuel said.
“He’s already shown a violation of the code of conduct that comes with the honor of serving the public.”
* As did Tom Swiss…
Not even Swiss thinks Smith should resign.
“He was arrested, he wasn’t convicted,” Swiss said. “He wasn’t convicted of anything as of now.”
20 Comments
|
|
Comments Off
|
|
Comments Off
|
*** UPDATED x1 *** Question of the day
Friday, Mar 23, 2012 - Posted by Rich Miller
* It’s Friday, I’m kinda busy yet also pleasantly distracted and I forgot, once again, to get around to a question. So I just pulled this one out of my… um… Sox hat.
As you know, the Springfield version of my 50th birthday party is this coming Wednesday, March 28th at Boone’s Saloon. We’re starting at 5 o’clock. There are no invites and no tickets. Just pay 20 bucks at the door. All proceeds go to Lutheran Social Services of Illinois.
The beer garden will be open, the bar will have plenty of staff and I’ll have some food there. Tom Irwin will be playing for a while as well as Brooke Thomas & Mike Burnett (yes, that Brooke Thomas). The inestimable Mike Fountain is handling the DJ duties.
* The Question: What should be my birthday party’s theme song? Explain, please, and paste in a YouTube link if you can.
*** UPDATE *** I forgot to add that the best suggestion will receive a free ticket to the event.
48 Comments
|
* My Sun-Times column…
“I love the fact Obama obviously has a thin skin,” Tom Swiss wrote in 2010. “His four years are going to be torture for him.”
Less than two years later, Swiss, the former executive director of the Cook County Republican Party, mailed a campaign flier touting “The winning team” of Obama and Tom Swiss.
Did Swiss have a radical change of heart? Heck, no. He spelled out his plans to run for the Illinois House in an email to a fellow Republican last May.
“The people of the district are extremely low information voters,” Swiss wrote. So, he could run as a Democrat, go unnoticed and get himself elected.
It turns out that most of those “extremely” low-info voters he was referring to are black. The 10th House District is centered in Chicago’s heavily African-American West Side.
Swiss is white, but you wouldn’t know it from his campaign literature, most of which prominently featured the same photo of a handsome, young black man. That Obama-Swiss “Team” mailer used that photo as well.
Swiss predicted last May that the upcoming Democratic primary campaign “could possibly be the least expensive State Rep seat pick up for conservatives.”
It didn’t quite work out that way. Swiss ended up spending more than $100,000 of his own money and raised several thousand more from others. His campaign cost him about $50 a vote.
Swiss scored just 23 percent against Rep. Derrick Smith on Tuesday, despite the fact that Smith was recently arrested on a federal bribery charge.
My best friend Brian used to always tell a joke about his dad, a Southwest Side Irish Catholic and about the staunchest Democrat I ever knew: “If Jesus Christ was running as a Republican, my dad would vote for the Democrat.”
I think Brian’s dad, who has since passed, probably would understand what just went down on the West Side, even though a lot of pundits don’t seem to quite grasp it. To them, black Democrats should’ve sided with the white Republican (in a Democratic primary, no less) who wore a deceiving minstrel blackface while holding them in utter contempt.
“Extremely low-information voters,” indeed. The 10th District’s voters knew exactly what Swiss was up to, and they also knew what they were doing.
The choice faced by the district’s Democratic voters was to cast their ballots for Smith, figuring he would resign soon or be kicked out of the House, or side with a guy who was until late last year the 27th Ward’s Republican committeeman.
There’s no doubt in my mind that Smith held his constituents in even more contempt by allegedly soliciting a $7,000 bribe from a day care center owner. And I’m not going to defend any vote for Smith. He has been an embarrassing dim bulb in the House ever since Secretary of State Jesse White orchestrated his appointment last year.
But if White has a brain in his head and more than a grain of political self-protection remaining in his soul, then after Smith either resigns or is kicked out of the House, White will make extra sure that the 10th District finally gets a capable, hardworking, smart state legislator who respects his or her constituents and works hard every day on their behalf.
This is the only way that the voters’ lousy choice can ever be redeemed. And White had better make sure it happens, because if he helps appoint another stupid political hack like Derrick Smith, then the next loud call for a politician’s resignation will be aimed right at him.
* And the Sun-Times editorial board appears to be on the same page with me…
Even before Smith was indicted on bribery charges last week, he was unfit for the job. When we interviewed him by phone last month, his answers to questions on state affairs were halting and shallow. There was a major pause before each answer, suggesting someone was coaching him. His written answers weren’t much better.
He got the job for one reason: He was Secretary of State Jesse White’s guy. White and other Democrats are now pressuring him to resign, giving them a second chance to make an appointment. They owe it to voters to get it right this time.
* Phil Kadner has another idea…
Getting rid of Smith won’t rid Illinois of corruption or convince anyone in this state that the Legislature has standards of ethical conduct.
Instead of removing him from office, just hang a sandwich board around his neck reading, “Will vote for cash!”
Now that’s what I would call honest government.
* Meanwhile, there were earlier reports, including from myself, that the proceedings of the House’s new special investigative committee might be secret. That was based on a reading of the House Rules…
The special investigating committee shall conduct all of its proceedings in executive session, and shall maintain strict confidence as to all of its proceedings and all witnesses, testimony, information, and exhibits that may come before it. No transcript or record of proceedings shall be taken. This subsection shall be adopted and effective upon an affirmative vote of 79 members. This subsection may not be suspended.
But there is no intent to adopt that subsection. Instead, the hearings will be open to the media. But there will be some ground rules, and they look a lot like the Heiple and Blagojevich impeachment. This is from the two spokespeople for the House Democrats and Republicans, slightly edited for style…
The Tuesday hearing will use some general ground rules created for previous high profile events in order to maximize facilities and provide some order and decorum.
1. There will be 40 seats for media. Credentials will be issued each day the hearings are held about 1 hour before the start. Credentials will be needed to acquire a press seat. House press passes, SOS passes. media credentials will be needed.
2. IIS will provide video/audio feed to Room 115 and is surveying for a satellite feed. Crews will work from Room 115 and arrangements will be made for “b-roll”
3. There will a multi box on the west side of the committee room the media section
4. Stills. We prefer a pool led by the AP and will try to accommodate others as time and space permit
21 Comments
|
* Winnebago’s county clerk wants some compensation from ABS Graphics, which cut the county’s paper ballots just a tad too big. 25 Illinois counties had similar problems. In Winnebago, 36 percent of 23,400 ballots cast were too wide to fit into the machines. The county clerk then decided to “reballot,” instead of trimming the ballots with scissor or counting by hand…
In Winnebago County, the problem kept dozens of people working past midnight on Election Day to remake ballots by hand. The tedious work of filling in small ovals with black markers picked up again at 9 a.m. Wednesday, lasting until around 11 p.m. All ballots weren’t counted until after midnight.
More on how the process worked…
Charles Laskonis, as head of the Winnebago County Democratic Central Committee, was called to bring a team of Democrats in for reballoting. A crew of Republicans also was assembled. But state Senate candidates Marla Wilson and Steve Stadelman questioned Laskonis’ presence because he had supported their opponent, Dan Lewandowski. They also objected to the appearance of attorney John Nelson, who was present as an observer, because he represented objectors who tried to have them removed from the ballot.
Mullins responded by allowing representatives of each candidate into the third-floor room of the county administration building, where reballoting was sequestered from candidates and reporters’ cameras.
“We’re all sitting there and (Mullins) said, ‘Anybody in the room who worked on a campaign put your hand up,’ and everybody put their hand up,” said Laskonis, who said the large majority of the ballots he handled were Republican.
The Election Day tension and political posturing subsided as everyone got to work filling out newly made ballots. Ballot makers took an oath to uphold the integrity of the election, then a Democrat and Republican were paired across from each other to begin reballoting. In most cases, when a Democratic ballot needed to be remade, the Republican handled it first and vice versa, said Terri Knight, Harlem Township supervisor who worked on Election Day reballoting.
After the ballot was remade by one person, the other checked. Both initialed their work. Identical numbers were given to both original oversized ballots and their new, smaller counterparts. That allows candidates who question whether a ballot was properly remade to do a side-by-side comparison.
* So, how did this problem happen? From the Tribune…
“It was an issue in the trimming of the ballots,” said Ken Griffin, managing partner at Liberty Systems LLC, one of two ballot vendors who use the same Addison printing company to produce ballots. “The knives they use to cut the ballots as they come off the press were just a little out of tolerance. If you saw it, you wouldn’t believe it was enough to cause a problem. We are thinking this warm weather might have had something to do with it too.
“It’s traumatic for all of us, because we want everything to go as smoothly as it can from the very start,” Griffin said at about 3:30 p.m. Tuesday. “But we believe we have it under control.”
* More from the front…
Vermilion County Clerk Lynn Foster said 56 of her 59 precincts experience the problem.
Foster said she grabbed “every paper cutter I could get my hands on and we have spent all day catching up. We also discovered that if we used ballots from the bottom of the stack they worked better. They come in these shrink wrapped packages so I just told everybody to flip them over and use ballots from the bottom.”
She said she expected as many as 600 ballots had to be sliced.
* And it’s just a good thing Tuesday wasn’t a general election, or officials would’ve been swamped…
“I wouldn’t say we’re happy about it, but it would have been a whole lot worse in a general election,” said McDonough County Clerk Gretchen DeJaynes, whose staff used hair dryers on some moist ballots.
“We had 27 percent turnout,” she said. “In November, in a presidential year, we will have over 60 percent.”
How many ballots were faulty was unknown, Borgsmiller said.
But in Macoupin County alone, about 6,000 of the 7,496, ballots cast did not fit in the scanning machines, Duncan said. DeJaynes said there were problems with a couple thousand ballots in McDonough County.
5 Comments
|
Facebook password measure placed on hold
Friday, Mar 23, 2012 - Posted by Rich Miller
* It’s back to the drawing board for Rep. Ford…
Legislation that would prohibit employers from seeking job applicants’ social network passwords is on hold in the Illinois House. Democratic Rep. La Shawn Ford’s measure would allow job-seekers to file lawsuits if asked for access to sites like Facebook. Bosses could still ask for usernames that would allow them to view public information on the sites.
But critics questioned a provision that safeguards an employer’s ability to “maintain lawful workplace policies” regarding electronic equipment and investigating suspected unlawful or improper activity. They say that contradicts the password prohibitions.
* I hadn’t realized this was much a problem, but even Facebook is upset about it…
Some companies and government agencies aren’t just glancing at a job applicant’s social networking profiles — they’re asking to log in as the user to have a look around. And Facebook wants an end to it.
The social-networking giant weighed in on the controversy Friday morning, reasserting a point in its privacy regulations intended to prevent such requests that makes it a violation of Facebook’s policy to request your log in. […]
Since the rise of social networking, it has become common for managers to review public Facebook profiles, Twitter accounts and other sites to learn more about job candidates. But many users, especially on Facebook, have their profiles set to private, making them available only to selected people or certain networks.
Companies that don’t ask for passwords have taken other steps — such as asking applicants to friend human resource managers or to log in to a company computer during an interview. Once employed, some workers have been required to sign nondisparagement agreements that ban them from talking negatively about an employer on social media.
Asking for a candidate’s password is more prevalent among public agencies, especially those seeking to fill law enforcement positions such as police officers or 911 dispatchers.
* There’s a proposed bill in Maryland as well…
And since 2006, the McLean County, Ill., sheriff’s office has been one of several Illinois sheriff’s departments that ask applicants to sign into social media sites to be screened.
Chief Deputy Rusty Thomas defended the practice, saying applicants have a right to refuse. But no one has ever done so. Thomas said that “speaks well of the people we have apply.”
When asked what sort of material would jeopardize job prospects, Thomas said “it depends on the situation” but could include “inappropriate pictures or relationships with people who are underage, illegal behavior.”
In Spotsylvania County, Va., the sheriff’s department asks applicants to friend background investigators for jobs at the 911 dispatch center and for law enforcement positions.
“In the past, we’ve talked to friends and neighbors, but a lot of times we found that applicants interact more through social media sites than they do with real friends,” said Capt. Mike Harvey. “Their virtual friends will know more about them than a person living 30 yards away from them.”
* From the ACLU…
“It’s an invasion of privacy for private employers to insist on looking at people’s private Facebook pages as a condition of employment or consideration in an application process,” ACLU attorney Catherine Crump said in a statement. “People are entitled to their private lives. You’d be appalled if your employer insisted on opening up your postal mail to see if there was anything of interest inside. It’s equally out of bounds for an employer to go on a fishing expedition through a person’s private social media account.”
What do you think of this?
* Roundup…
* Lawmakers address Caylee’s law, trans fats, straight on red: Legislation inspired by a Florida jury’s acquittal in July of Casey Anthony advanced in the state Senate on Thursday. The measure is among two competing versions of a push to make it a Class 4 felony if a parent fails to notify officials in a timely manner if their child is missing or dead.
* Illinois to become first state to allow online lottery sales
* Press Release: Hutchinson fights to keep Hunger Relief Check-off on Illinois Tax Forms
* Local Officials, Workers Say “No Quinn Cuts” to Illinois Health Facilities, Prisons
34 Comments
|
Audio recording bill killed in the House
Friday, Mar 23, 2012 - Posted by Rich Miller
* Earlier this week, the Illinois House soundly defeated HB 3944, a bill that would’ve allowed citizens to make audio recordings of police in public. It’s currently a felony to do so and a couple of trial-level judges have declared current law unconstitutional.
If the 45-59 House vote is any indication, the judicial branch may kill off the statute before the General Assembly changes it…
One of the bill’s detractors, Rep. Jim Sacia, R-Freeport, said the bill opens the possibility for citizens to alter audio recordings of interactions with police to make them look bad.
Rep. Jim Watson, R-Jacksonville, agreed.
“We should not be creating an atmosphere where people enter this ‘got you’ mode and try to tape law enforcement, trying to catch them (doing things),” Watson said.
“Why should (the police) have to go get a court order to record these people when these people can record them?” said Rep. Dennis Reboletti, R-Elmhurst.
Discuss.
…Adding… A commenter makes a very astute observation…
I’m not seeing prosecutors rushing to appeal the decisions to higher courts when lower courts toss arrests for this type of citizen behavior out. Will it ever make it to the Supremes?
Waiting for the judicial branch might not be an option.
45 Comments
|
It ain’t going to be easy
Friday, Mar 23, 2012 - Posted by Rich Miller
* The Senate met in a Committee of the Whole yesterday to begin the process of understanding the complicated and partially intractable problem of Medicaid spending…
Illinois may be trying to cut more from its Medicaid program in a shorter period of time than any other state, Illinois senators were told Thursday.
Joy Johnson Wilson, health policy director for the National Conference of State Legislatures, said other states have made significant cuts in their Medicaid programs, but have done it over two years rather than one.
Gov. Pat Quinn said in his budget proposal that he wants to reduce Medicaid spending by $2.7 billion next year. A working group of state lawmakers is meeting to find ways to make the cuts. Options include beefing up determination of eligibility so that people who don’t qualify are removed, eliminating or paring back services that aren’t required by federal regulations and reducing rates paid to doctors and hospitals that treat Medicaid patients.
* One of the dilemmas states face…
(T)here are some optional services, such as dental care, that states can cut. Wilson warned that even cutting those services can be tricky. Arizona, for instance, cut dental care but then found more people ended up going to the hospital for dental problems.
* More problems…
Wilson cautioned that some of the money-saving solutions carry their own problems. While Illinois and other states want to move Medicaid recipients into managed-care programs, such programs can be difficult to establish in rural areas that may be medically underserved.
Reducing reimbursement rates can drive medical providers out of the system, she said.
Discuss.
17 Comments
|
Uh-Oh
Friday, Mar 23, 2012 - Posted by Rich Miller
* This is from the federal criminal complaint against state Rep. Derrick Smith (D-Chicago). It’s taken from footnote 1 on page 3 of FBI Special Agent Bryan Butler’s affidavit. “CS-1″ is the government mole who helped the feds nail Smith. CS-1 has apparently been helping the G for years…
CS-1 has one prior arrest for domestic assault, but no convictions. Over the past 3-4 years, CS-1 has received approximately $1,200 from the FBI for his/her assistance in other investigations. In connection with this investigation, to date, FBI has paid CS-1 $4,000. The government has also provided CS-1 with financial assistance for purposes of relocation.
Um. Wow.
I think anyone close to the 27th Ward Democratic Organization ought to have reason to be very concerned.
58 Comments
|
*** LIVE SESSION COVERAGE ***
Friday, Mar 23, 2012 - Posted by Rich Miller
* It should be a short day today, but here we go.
BlackBerry users click here. Everybody else can just sit back and watch the day do whatever it’s gonna do…
Comments Off
|
|
Comments Off
|
|
Support CapitolFax.com
Visit our advertisers...
...............
...............
...............
...............
|
   
|
Hosted by MCS
SUBSCRIBE to Capitol Fax
Advertise Here
Mobile Version
Contact Rich Miller
|
