Capitol Fax.com - Your Illinois News Radar » 2012

Wednesday, Apr 11, 2012 - Posted by Rich Miller

* Greg Hinz thinks it’s past time that the media got some answers about Sen. Mark Kirk’s current condition and prognosis…

Can he do that job? Apparently not today. Will he be able to do it in a month, a quarter, or a year? No one is saying.

In the days after Mr. Kirk’s stroke, his physicians repeatedly met with the media and pretty much answered all questions. But it’s been months since the public, via the media, got anything except a statement of a paragraph or two in a press release that his recovering “is continuing,” or some such.

That’s insufficient.

Illinoisans deserve full representation in the Senate and almost certainly are inclined to give the senator the time he needs to recover. But it’s been long enough now that voters deserve some answers so that they and the political establishment can begin to plan for a perhaps changed world.

Kirk suffered his stroke on January 21st, about a week shy of three months ago.

* The Question: Should the media pressure Sen. Kirk’s office for more information about his condition and prognosis, or is it still too early for that? Explain, please. Thanks.

92 Comments

National GOP sends in the cavalry to help “orphan” states like Illinois

Wednesday, Apr 11, 2012 - Posted by Rich Miller

* While this is kind of insulting to the Illinois Republicans, the cash money will be welcome news…

National Republicans have begun to intervene in a handful of key Senate and House battlegrounds where state parties are in disarray, seeking to head off the possibility that local mismanagement could cost the party control of Congress.

The GOP presidential nominee will be impacted by the state party woes, but what especially worries Republican operatives are those states where there is no competition on top of the ticket but which feature a number of pivotal Senate and House contests.

These “orphan states,” most notably behemoths with traditionally weak parties like California, Illinois and New York, are increasingly the focus of top GOP officials in the nation’s capital this spring.
The Republican National Committee is going to set aside at least $10 to $15 million to aid states where there are competitive House and Senate races but minimal presidential action, a party official tells POLITICO. That’s enough to blunt the GOP’s financial disadvantage in several states, though not to erase the disparity or put the orphan-state groups on par with their swing-state counterparts.

Half that money will go to the orphans. The other half will be used for US Senate battles.

* Meanwhile, a guy who couldn’t get 40 valid petition signatures is upset that a new law prevents him from running as an independent…

A new Illinois state law designed to prevent sore losers from running against their primary opponents in general elections has knocked Bill Shelby, challenger for the Logan County coroner seat, off the November ballot - and he never even got the opportunity to be a sore loser.

After being denied a spot on the Republican primary ballot, and now the general election ballot, he will run as a write-in candidate.

“With all the money and effort I’ve already got in it, I just can’t quit now,” Shelby said. “It’s unheard of that a write-in candidate ever wins, but I’m going to keep going and hopefully people will turn out and write my name in.”

The new law, signed by Gov. Pat Quinn just days ago, says that if an individual registers, votes or gets kicked off a ballot while registered for one party during a primary election, the candidate cannot run as an independent during the general election.

It’s pretty simple. If you want to run as an independent in an election cycle, don’t take a Republican ballot or try to run as a Republican. Illinois law was a bit vague on this topic until the state Supreme Court stepped in. The new law just codifies the recent ruling. There was no big conspiracy.

Also, Shelby can still run as a third party candidate. It wouldn’t be easy, but it might be easier than running as a write-in.

36 Comments

Cutting the budget ain’t easy

Wednesday, Apr 11, 2012 - Posted by Rich Miller

* From a State Journal-Register editorial…

Of all the cuts proposed by Quinn as he grapples with a budget deficit of more than $7 billion, closing the state’s “supermax” prison should be among the most easily justifiable. Yet resistance has been strong as opponents decry the potential danger of eliminating a facility that opened in 1998 to house the “worst of the worst” of the Illinois prison system. The main argument of the opposition is that the isolation provided at Tamms is the surest way to keep the most dangerous prisoners — those who menaced other inmates, correctional officers and prison workers — from doing more harm.

As an outpost of complete segregation, Tamms works. But its economics simply don’t work in 2012.

Consider this: When Tamms opened, the state closed its fiscal year with a budget surplus of $1.2 billion. In 1998, the state had the means to devote an entire prison to its worst inmates. That’s not the case today.

At an annual cost of $64,805 per inmate, incarceration at Tamms costs the state more than three times the $21,405 average annual cost per inmate at the 27 other Illinois Department of Corrections facilities. Though it’s known as the state’s super maximum security prison, its population is divided almost evenly between maximum security and minimum security inmates (186 super maximum, 189 minimum). It operates at about half its capacity of 700 inmates.

* Matt Dietrich wrote that editorial and wrote on his blog about the resulting backlash…

I purposely sidestepped the human rights side of the anti-Tamms argument in the editorial and focused exclusively on the numbers. I don’t mean to downplay that side, but going simply by the figures (and I don’t just mean the $26.3 million the state will save closing Tamms), this should be one of the easiest of the many difficult decisions that will have to be made as the state budget is crafted between now and Memorial Day. […]

Judging by the online comments, there is ample public disbelief that Quinn would even consider closing Tamms, and that anyone would agree with him. I say if you can’t accept this cut, you’ll never accept any kind of reduction, especially when it comes to taking away healthcare and a lot of other things that will be even more emotional.

And this is only one cut. It will take about 266 cuts of $26 million to get the state’s budget back in the black. Sorry, folks, but grounding a couple state airplanes won’t get us there.

In hard times, the luxuries go first. There’s no bigger luxury in corrections than Tamms.

* Meanwhile, Sen. John Sullivan had this to say to his local paper about Medicaid cuts…

Sullivan says a small group of lawmakers assigned to study Medicaid has not reached a consensus on how to deal with the problem. He says some want to spread out the cuts over several years while others want to find the entire $2.7-billion this year.

Every dollar in Medicaid cuts that is deferred or not paid for with cuts in other programs or new revenues will mean another dollar added to the state’s already gigantic mountain of backlogged bills. It’s a really stupid idea to defer anything, but politically it may just not be possible to make all these cuts.

* Related…

* Critics of super-prison closure question safety

* Former inmates, employees and congressman oppose closures of prison transition centers

* Timeline for shutting Tinley Park Mental Health Center is called rushed by some lawmakers

* McHenry County day care facilities can’t stand state reduction, providers say

22 Comments

“Gotcha” rules

Wednesday, Apr 11, 2012 - Posted by Rich Miller

* This is one reason why I am no fan of the federal campaign finance laws. People get “busted” for allegedly “breaking” one of a kajillion confusing rules that aren’t really even rules…

Here’s yet another consequence of the confusing super PAC era: House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., may have irritated members of his conference by donating to an anti-incumbent super PAC before the Illinois primary, but Rep. Aaron Schock, R-Ill., could have violated campaign finance rules when he solicited Cantor’s donation.

Last week, Roll Call reported that Cantor donated $25,000 to the Campaign for Primary Accountability as a way of supporting freshman Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill, against fellow Republican Rep. Don Manzullo in a member-versus-member primary in the state’s 16th District (The group ultimately spent over $220,000 against Manzullo). According to both Cantor’s camp and Schock himself, Cantor cut the check at Schock’s request.

That’s where Schock treads dangerously close to the line drawn by the FEC. In an advisory opinion issued last year, the FEC says that federal officeholders and candidates “may solicit up to $5,000 from individuals (and any other source not prohibited by the Act from making a contribution to a political committee)” on behalf of super PACs. Candidates may appear at fundraisers on behalf of super PACs, but they cannot be involved in asking for checks larger than $5,000 — the reason Cantor, Mitt Romney, Harry Reid or even President Obama, for that matter, can appear at fundraisers for supportive super PACs, but they have to leave the room before staffers ask for donations in order to raise unlimited sums.

Schock, it seems, directly asked for a contribution well above the limit the FEC allowed.

Keep in mind that this is an advisory opinion, not an actual law. And the FEC is so screwed up and divided along partisan lines that it’s doubtful anything will become of it.

The “smoking gun” from Roll Call…

Cantor campaign spokesman Ray Allen told Roll Call that Cantor made the donation at the request of Rep. Aaron Schock (R-Ill.) for use only in the Kinzinger-Manzullo race.

“On Thursday, March 15, 2012, Leader Cantor was asked by Congressman Schock to contribute to an organization that was supporting Adam Kinzinger in the Illinois election of March 20. ERICPAC subsequently made a contribution with the understanding that those funds would be used only in the effort to support Congressman Kinzinger,” Allen said.

…

[Schock:] “I said, ‘Look, I’m going to do $25,000 [specifically] for the Kinzinger campaign for the television campaign’ and said, ‘Can you match that?’”

“And he said, ‘Absolutely.’”

Sorry, but I just can’t get too excited about this. I’m not sure how you feel. Perhaps you can change my mind.

* Also, this…

Illinois’ 2009 campaign finance law, passed in the wake of scandals that enveloped Gov. Rod Blagojevich, sought to limit the four legislative leaders’ ability to fund primary races because of fears that the leaders held too much sway over rank-and-file lawmakers once they arrived in Springfield.

However, House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago, was able to skirt the law’s $75,000 limit during last month’s hotly contested 96th House Democratic primary by tapping into his personal campaign fund to support Decatur schoolteacher Sue Scherer.

To date, Scherer’s campaign has reported getting $87,849 in contributions from campaign funds controlled by the speaker — $61,886 from the Democratic Majority committee and $25,963 from Friends of Michael J. Madigan, according to State Board of Elections records. […]

David Morrison, deputy director of the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform, said it’s fair for voters to consider whether Scherer and Madigan violated the spirit of the law even though all of the spending fell within the law.

Um. Those contributions were all well within the legal bounds. It’s beyond fair to report the amounts and how the law is being used to someone’s advantage, but “violating the spirit of the law” is more than a bit much.