* I’ve had one of the best State Fair experiences ever. And let’s hope (probably beyond hope) it doesn’t rain tonight because I really want to see these guys…
While political reporters, analysts and party strategists argue over whether there is or is not a wave approaching, one thing is clear: it’s an extremely difficult landscape for Democratic candidates.
Candidates, party committees, and outside groups are polling dozens of House races as they formalize their fall ad strategies. And increasingly the news ranges from good to great for Republicans, and very few competitive races trending toward Democrats. […]
Illinois’s 13th District. Former Madison County Judge Ann Callis started the cycle as one of Democrats’ top recruits. But her challenge to Rep. Rodney Davis (R) just isn’t materializing. The congressman is in a very strong position and Gov. Pat Quinn is proving to be an anvil around the neck of Downstate Democratic candidates. We’re moving the race from Toss-Up/Tilt Republican to Lean Republican.
State and local police departments obtain some of their military-style equipment through a free Defense Department program created in the early 1990s. While the portion of their gear coming from the program is relatively small (most of it is paid for through department budgets and federal grants), detailed data from the Pentagon illustrates how ubiquitous such equipment has become.
Highlighted counties have received guns, grenade launchers, vehicles, night vision or body armor through the program since 2006.
* Keep in mind that “recipients” can include state and local governments based within the counties. The national map…
* A few random Illinois counties. Check out all the armored vehicles…
* The Illinois Department of Central Management Services was mandated by statute way back in 2012 to expand a state employee database to include municipal employees. CMS claims it was never appropriated any money and so never expanded the database.
One of the co-sponsors of that legislation, Rep. Jack Franks, is not happy…
“There was no appropriation necessary,” Franks said. Local governments “already have this information and all they have to do is transmit it to the state electronically. There’s absolutely no cost and anybody who hides behind that ought to be tarred and feathered.”
State law requires local government agencies to post salary information on their own websites about employees whose annual total compensation exceeds $75,000. Many post the information for all employees.
West Chicago Republican state Rep. Mike Fortner was the chief sponsor of the bill to add library district employees to the database. He had no idea when his bill passed last August that Central Management Services officials hadn’t implemented the database for other local government employees. He also said he was never informed of appropriation issues.
“I would naively suspect that if you’ve got the person on staff doing the website for the state agency, it’s at most an incremental increase in responsibility,” he said. “I get that the first time (reporting) may take more work, but maintaining it would not be near as much.”
Because none of the laws include an enforcement component, there’s little recourse to compel the state agency to create the databases, according to legal experts.
The governor ought to step in and order CMS to do its job.
Illinois Lt. Gov. and Democratic candidate for state comptroller Sheila Simon performed a same-sex marriage ceremony Thursday afternoon in Springfield. […]
“The party that fought tooth and nail against same-sex marriage is at the state fair celebrating their intolerance,” said Simon’s campaign manager Dave Mellet in a press release. “Meanwhile, Sheila Simon is on the capitol steps, helping two men celebrate a wedding that Republicans forced them to wait on for two decades.”
Simon’s campaign is calling out Republican incumbent Judy Baar Topinka for appearing at LGBT rallies, but failing to support her LGBT employees while serving as state Treasurer, when she “chose to be the only constitutional officer in Illinois to prohibit same-sex domestic partners from receiving health care coverage,” according to Simon’s campaign.
“It’s hypocritical for Judy Baar Topinka to stand up at GLBT rallies, and then raise money and rally with a man who has pledged to veto same-sex marriage,” Mellet added.
Tying her to Rauner is a good move. The treasurer’s office stuff is accurate, but a whole lot of people, including President Obama, have “evolved” on this topic since 2008. So, I’m not sure if it can get any traction, particularly since JBT worked so aggressively to pass gay marriage.
Wearing a Bruce Rauner T-shirt and a pair of Prada shoes, U.S. Rep. Aaron Schock walked onto the State Fairgrounds putting the political divisiveness between himself and the gubernatorial candidate behind him.
Topinka called for everyone to get people to vote GOP: “It doesn’t matter if you’re Republican, Democrat, independent, vegetarian, whatever. This is where it’s at.”
Former Marine Paul Schimpf, who is seeking to unseat Attorney General Lisa Madigan, said her 12 years in office have seen two governors go to prison for corruption.
“Her record speaks for itself,” Schimpf said. “Trust a retired Marine, not the Madigan machine.”
“That house is the people’s house,” Rauner said [of the governor’s mansion]. “We should treat it with reverence; we should treat it with respect. Some of you guys who know contractors may have to help me. We have to repair the roof and pump out the basement.”
It was a reference to reports earlier this year that the mansion roof was leaking so badly it damaged rooms on the third floor and led to flooding in the basement. Mansion officials have estimated the roof is at least 40 years old.
“The current governor takes care of the governor’s residence the way he takes care of the economy,” Rauner told the fair crowd.
Sanguinetti was a no-show at a Republican unity breakfast in Springfield Thursday and seemed to tiptoe around the controversy while expressing her adoration for the State Fair during a brief speaking role at the Republican fair event
“Over the last six years, and I apologize to my kids already, this is a family tradition coming to this place,” Sanguinetti told the party faithful at the fairground rally.
“I think she should apologize for those disrespectful remarks,” Quinn told reporters in Chicago. “That isn’t the right way to talk about anybody or any cow in Illinois. We’re proud of our cows. They’re the best that ever was.
“She ought to say she’s sorry to a bunch of cows,” Quinn said.
He was making a joke, but that didn’t translate well to the printed page.
“You know what? I bet Pat Quinn and his Chicago machine political allies don’t even know what a steer is,” Rauner said. “You know what? A steer is a castrated bull. You know what?
“I tell ya,” Rauner continued, “Pat Quinn and his cronies, and these corrupt patronage workers, they know — they do know bull. You hear Pat Quinn generate a lot of bull when he’s talking about his failed record, failed record on jobs, on taxes, on schools.”
No, I don’t “know what.” How about asking us again?
Bruce Rauner remained defiant in insisting he’s released enough on his taxes and wouldn’t commit to making public his full tax schedules for inspection before the Nov. 4 election.
“We will release our tax returns when they’re prepared and filed on Oct. 15 and at that point we will have released four years of our tax returns. We outlined and detailed our tax rate. My tax rate is the same as Pat Quinn’s,” Rauner said to a packed scrum of reporters after riding into the fairgrounds on his Harley.
Rauner ducked when asked if he would release his full schedules, talking over reporters and repeating that he’d release his 2013 tax documents in October. Rauner has asked for an extension and that is the due date. Gov. Pat Quinn and other Democrats on Wednesday repeatedly called on Rauner, a multi-millionaire with hundreds of investments, to release the full details of his finances for public inspection. While candidates are not required to do so, it has become the new norm to release full tax schedules and it was something that Mitt Romney eventually did in the 2012 presidential election. His tax documents were some 700 pages.
* But not every Republican agreed with Rauner. Charles Thomas…
Earlier at the state county chairman’s meeting, other Republicans differed on how much Rauner or any candidate should reveal of his or her personal finances.
“I think that basically candidates need to be a transparent as possible,” said Paul Schimpf, R-Attorney General candidate.
“I think you have to see where your money is and I think people need to be upfront about that,” said Judy Baar Topinka, R- Illinois comptroller.
* From the DGA…
“If Bruce Rauner doesn’t want to trust the people of Illinois with information about his finances, the people of Illinois shouldn’t trust Bruce Rauner. He has hidden his policies from them. He has hidden his foreign investments from them. He has hidden the details of how he built his corporate empire at the expense of workers, seniors and communities.
“Releasing tax information is a low bar of disclosure for a public official, not a ‘diversion’ as Rauner says it is. It’s an easy test of whether he is worthy of the public’s trust. Bruce Rauner has failed that most basic test and he shouldn’t be trusted.”
* And the Quinn campaign released a photo comparing Romney’s disclosed tax returns to Rauner’s…
On a day when Republicans were otherwise well-choreographed, U.S. Senate candidate Jim Oberweis attempted to respond to the Democrats’ painting them as the detached party of the rich. Oberweis, a millionaire who has so far donated $1 million to his run for Senate, worked to cast Durbin as a millionaire. The attempt landed with an awkward thud.
“Please repeat after me,” Oberweis asked the crowd. “Millionaire! Career politician! Dick Durbin! Must go!”
Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Thursday blamed the economic squeeze on the middle class for his 35 percent showing in a Chicago Tribune poll that also shows him trailing Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis. […]
“There’s tremendous economic stress in people’s lives, which is why I’ve pushed for the minimum wage, which is why I’ve pushed for policies to make sure our small businesses have a fair chance and an equal chance with big companies,” the mayor said.
“You have to have a set of policies in place — from pre-K to community colleges to playgrounds to parks to after-school activities — to give everybody a chance to not just look at the gains, but know that they have a future in those gains. We’re not where we need to be. We’re not repeating the mistakes that got us into the problems. But we’re not at the pace or place we need to be where everybody’s feeling an opportunity that they have a chance at a middle-class job.”
Yikes. When the overwhelming majority is siding with the CTU against you, that’s trouble with a capital T. That sound you hear is Karen Lewis’ cackling.
Among parents of children in Chicago Public Schools — about one-fifth of those taking part in the survey — nearly 4 out of 5 disapproved of the mayor’s handling of public education while only 19 percent approved. But even those without children in the public schools disapproved at a 62 percent rate, while only 27 percent approved. […]
While dissatisfaction with the mayor on education crossed racial lines, it was more intense among African-American voters. Critics contend black neighborhoods were disproportionately targeted for school closings. Fully 77 percent of black voters disapproved of Emanuel’s handling of the city’s schools while only 14 percent approved. […]
Among white voters, 52 percent disapproved while 38 percent approved. Those numbers slipped from May 2013, when 46 percent of white voters approved of Emanuel’s handling of the schools and 44 percent disapproved. The poll found a similar dynamic among Hispanic voters. […]
Emanuel’s approach on charters versus neighborhood schools was roundly criticized by voters: 72 percent disagreed with that approach, compared with 18 percent who agreed. African-American voters most severely opposed the policy — at 83 percent — while only 10 percent agreed with Emanuel. Nearly 8 in 10 parents of CPS children also were opposed, as well as 75 percent of female voters, 69 percent of men and 63 percent of whites.
Former Illinois Governor Jim Edgar says he’s all in for Republican gubernatorial candidate Bruce Rauner.
Edgar says the Democratic agenda offers more of the same policies voters have seen for the past decade. He even equated Gov. Pat Quinn’s tenure to former Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who is now serving a 14-year term in federal prison.
“The Blagojevich-Quinn governorship has been a disaster for Illinois,” he said.
* Gov. Pat Quinn announced some positive economic news yesterday during the State Fair’s Republican Day…
The state Department of Employment Security says Illinois unemployment fell in July to 6.8 percent. It was the fifth straight monthly decrease in the state’s jobless rate.
The new employment numbers included, finally, a gain in manufacturing — though total jobs there remain lower than a year ago.
It prompted Governor Pat Quinn to try to rewrite what has been the established narrative about the State’s troubled economy as he seeks another 4-year lease in the Executive Mansion.
“Unemployment’s fallen from 9.2% last year to 6.8%. It’s the steepest decline since the 1980s. Last month employers created 11,200 jobs,” Quinn said.
And even better, the decline now is being propelled not by people leaving the job force but by the creation of new jobs, with 11,200 positions added just in July. […]
The preliminary seasonally adjusted unemployment rate dropped from 7.1 percent in June to 6.8 percent in July, according to the Illinois Department of Employment Security. The state rate is still somewhat above the national figure of 6.2 percent, but the 0.6 difference is just a fraction of what it was a year ago.
Since July 2013, the Illinois rate has dropped an enormous 2.4 percentage points, from 9.2 percent to 6.7 percent, according to the federal data released by the state. That’s the biggest year-over-year decline since 1984, putting the unemployment rate just above the 6.8 percent level of August 2008. […]
According to the figures, derived from a different survey than the unemployment data, the state added 11,200 private sector jobs in the past month, and 35,600 over the past 12 months.
The July gains were widespread across various sectors, with professional and business services up 5,900, manufacturers adding 3,900 positions and construction 1,900 slots. Leisure and hospitality dropped 3,800 in the month.
According to the governor’s office, this is the lowest unemployment rate in six years. And you’d have to go back to 1984 to see such a sharp drop in the rate.
“Celebrating today’s job numbers is like cheering a touchdown when you’re down 35 points with two minutes left,” said Mike Schrimpf, a campaign spokesman.
“Our state is still down thousands of jobs since the beginning of the year, we still have one of the worst unemployment rates in the entire country and thousands of Illinoisans have given up looking for work. On top of higher taxes, this means too many families continue to suffer under Pat Quinn. Thankfully, Pat Quinn’s time is almost up and his term in office can’t end soon enough for the working people of Illinois.”
* Related…
* VIDEO: Quinn announces state unemployment rate drops
* Illinois’ tax burden? Not so bad, according to new report
