45 Comments - Ole' Nelson - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:19 am: No big surprise there. He would blame the “Aussie flu” on Madigan if asked. - don the legend - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:19 am: The quickest and easiest solution for Rauner to “get Madigan and his crew out of power.” Rauner should move to Madigan’s district and run against him. - Oswego Willy - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:23 am: All this does is reinforce the fact Rauner made of himself, Rauner is not in charge. Why reinforce your own ineptitude? It’s embarrassing on too many levels, the mocking is so easy to see and giggle at, that a governor of Illinois is always in charge, and Rauner fails the simplist truth, by saying he’s not in charge, when the constitution and the role of governor says otherwise. - ImNotTaylorSwift - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:24 am: Getting rid of Madigan is the solution to everything. High Black unemployment rate? Get rid of Madigan. Need reforms in Illinois? Get rid of Madigan. Gas prices too high? Get rid of Madigan. Termite problem in your house? Get rid of Madigan. Arm broken? You guessed it, get rid of Madigan. - Keyrock - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:28 am: Rauner: “Madigan is also responsible for the Bears losing seasons, climate change, and ring around the collar.” “The only thing that I’m in charge of is my wardrobe. Evelyn might not like it, but I have all these cool costumes.” - wordslinger - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:28 am: So what happens when Madigan is gone? Democrats magically become Raunerites and Rauner starts throwing switches and turning knobs in Springfield government-central to control “the economy,” like some Bolshie commissar? Is that how the American economy works? Fifty Balkan city-states, controlled by government central-planning? Private capital and global dynamics are small players? I wonder why some Milton Friedman-type U of C economist hasn’t won a Nobel Prize explaining state governments’ critical role in driving “the economy.” Maybe because it’s absurd and simple-minded beyond belief. - RIJ - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:29 am: Whine whine whine. I’m so tired of the Rauner whine. Poor, beleaguered Rauner. - Macbeth - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:35 am: Funny, how without an ongoing impasse Rauner looks like a complete fool. He’s utterly — utterly — bereft of any new ideas and incapable of speaking in anything other than (tired) talking points. Someone should at least give Rauner a new talking point. An act of mercy, really. - Oswego Willy - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:36 am: ===“What we’ve got to do together, Democrats and Republicans have got to unite to change the system, get Madigan and his crew out of power.” … Except on January 3rd, the governor admitted that Madigan isn’t “gonna go anywhere.”==== Which time is Rauner being truthful to Madigan or what can and will happen? Rauner is a failed governor. Ask Pat Quinn how it goes when painted with truth as a failed governor. Be it the National Review or national FoxNews… Rauner is a failure. - Boone's is Back - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:40 am: “Yes, all democrats must unite around my right to work agenda!” This guy is clueless… - Oswego Willy - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:45 am: Maybe that says it all… Rauner still can’t or refuses to acknowledge the 60/30 dynamic that RTW or RTW Zones doesn’t enjoy im this or his past GA as governor. Willful ignorance or blissfully unaware. - DeseDemDose - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:51 am: In the words Mayor Daley used to describe Blago…Rauner is just plain “Coo Coo”. - Annonin' - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:52 am: GovJunk really out of it. Can’t get the crew at WVON to pitch softballs. How did the deposit in South Side bank do? Put lots of people to work? - Flip357 - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:52 am: Rauner gets the flu: Madigan did it. Rauner catches a water-born bacterial infection: Madigan did it. Toilet paper in Governor’s office is too scratchy: Madigan. - Flynn's Mom - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:54 am: Damn you Madigan for this snow and cold weather. - Langhorne - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 10:59 am: So, at this rate, rauner has his budget address ready—300 pages of we cant do anything, because….madigan. Three years in, crisis leverage failed to produce anything but damage. Rauner still hasnt learned how to count to 30 and 60. Rauner is not in charge, anyway. The real test is how repubs choose to participate. - Grandson of Man - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:02 am: “What we’ve got to do together, Democrats and Republicans have got to unite to change the system, get Madigan and his crew out of power.” He refuses to accept reality. Democrats won’t implement his anti-union agenda, with or without Madigan. If Madigan was gone, maybe there would be a modern DPI press shop. Rauner was at an African American church, I believe, yesterday, sayin’ we have to work together. Lyin’ to the clergy again. Rauner has no business honoring MLK, not after what he’s trying to do to unions, and especially the union for which King sacrificed his life - PublicServant - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:03 am: ===What we’ve got to do together, Democrats and Republicans have got to unite to change the system, get Madigan and his crew out of power.=== Maybe someone should ask him a follow-up. Something like, “So, your proposal for increasing black employment, once “Madigan and his crew” can’t block it, is what? - Southside Markie - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:11 am: == The only thing that I’m in charge of is my wardrobe. == Not true. Madigan controls my closets. I broke a shoelace this morning. I wouldn’t have if Madigan was gone. - Lucky Pierre - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:14 am: The problem of high black unemployment did not start 3 years ago. The situation is improving nationwide but we are still lagging in Illinois and Chicago “So we aren’t shocked that the unemployment rate for African-Americans in Illinois is 10 percent. That’s the highest of any state, according to the Economic Policy Institute. Yes, the lagging economy in Illinois hurts millions of people — African-Americans disproportionately so. That’s a big reason why we write so often about the slow economic growth in Illinois, with job creation poky and, each year, residents leaving by the tens of thousands for other states. The response of Illinois legislators has been to raise the personal income tax rate by 32 percent and to avoid upsetting a status quo that pours enormous resources into the public sector. Here’s the bigger picture: The U.S. economy is in the ninth year of expansion. It will become the longest on record, surpassing the 1990s boom, if it reaches the second half of 2019. Growth, which had been unspectacular, perked up during President Donald Trump’s first year in office because businesses are investing more. Attribute their optimism to the tax reform deal and the administration’s focus on removing regulatory red tape. With growth and investment come hiring: Employers added nearly 2.1 million jobs in 2017, the seventh year above 2 million. The benefits, though, aren’t equally shared. At 6.8 percent, the black unemployment rate nationwide is nearly twice as high as the 3.7 percent rate of white unemployment. Cue that 10-percent rate of black joblessness here: As more African-Americans in other states come off the unemployment rolls, many of those who live in Illinois are left behind. In Chicago, the job situation in hollowed-out West and South side neighborhoods is dire. Manufacturers left long ago. There are few retail and restaurant jobs. All the economic activity is located miles away in the Loop and elsewhere in metropolitan Chicago. Too many young people have inadequate job training and … nothing to do. According to the Great Cities Institute at the University of Illinois at Chicago, more than 40 percent of 20-to-24-year-old black males in Chicago are out of work and out of school. Does a booming national economy ever touch Chicago’s most impoverished neighborhoods? Can young people be drawn out of urban isolation?” Speaker Madigan will do nothing to improve the environment for Illinois manufacturers who used to employ large numbers of African Americans. He is the reason Illinois is trailing the rest of the nation in jobs and leading in outward migration. The tone deafness on this from Democrats is indefensible. Workers Comp and tort reform are not anti union, it is pro middle class jobs. Why is Indiana creating more union jobs than we are? - 360 Degree TurnAround - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:14 am: Let’s see, Madigan became a general assembly member in 1971. How was black employment before 1971? - Lucky Pierre - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:15 am: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/editorials/ct-edit-black-unemployment-20180109-story.html Forgot the link - wordslinger - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:19 am: –Let’s see, Madigan became a general assembly member in 1971. How was black employment before 1971?– Explain the connection between being a member of the GA and black unemployment. - Oswego Willy - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:19 am: ===Let’s see, Madigan became a general assembly member in 1971. How was black employment before 1971?=== (Sigh) It has never worked that way. Ever. Even governors that took credit for good employment numbers and governors who took the blame for bad employment numbers… governors own those numbers, both fairly AND unfairly. The point? Governors love the good numbers, Blane others for bad numbers, but voters are seemingly told that governors are responsible for them, no matter how they fall or who wants that parallel to be made. It’s not the GA. - Streator Curmdgeon - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:20 am: “Here’s the simple fact. We used to be the Land of Lincoln. Now, we’re the Land of a Thousand Dances. We used to be the land of opportunity, now we’re the land of Governor Ahab and Moby Madigan. We used to be the land of achievement, now we’re the land of goofy vests.” - Anonymous - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:21 am: And the solution to global warming is to get rid of Madigan. Or the skyrocketing cost of vanilla. Or this cold weather streak that’s shutting down schools. Or that the cat threw up in my shoe. Really, Rauner? - Oswego Willy - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:22 am: So, “Lucky Pierre”… Rauner isn’t in charge. Hmm. Lots of words to just say Rauner is grossly inept and isn’t in charge, things that make re-election seem untenable, and voting Rauner out a better choice for illikois. - Demoralized - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:23 am: ==The problem of high black unemployment did not start 3 years ago.== Nobody said it did. But, it is absurd to say that if only Madigan were gone everything would be better. That’s utter nonsense. - Huh? - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:27 am: Can’t get breakfast in bed on Valentines Day because you are single and living alone - Madigan’s fault. - Grandson of Man - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:36 am: Rauner’s economic “plan” calls for even more exploitation of African Americans, that they should weaken themselves and give up their collective economic voices in order for super-rich white corporation owners to invest in their neighborhoods. Rauner’s “economic plan” is court-driven union weakening and bypassing Madigan to reduce union membership. - Lucky Pierre - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:40 am: Madigan will do nothing to change our business environment so it is not absurd to blame him for our terrible business environment and lackluster employment numbers among minorities and low skilled workers. JB and Kennedy can pretend no one ever mentions Illinois lack of competitiveness, they know better - Belle - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:43 am: I bet I’d be 20 lbs thinner if not for Madigan - Arsenal - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:46 am: When your only tool is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. - Sir Reel - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 11:57 am: I agree with Rauner. If Madigan was gone, that would create thousands of jobs in the Speaker of the Illinois House of Representatives field. - Rabid - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 12:12 pm: madigan is the man, and he’s keeping the poor govenor down - Michelle Flaherty - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 12:39 pm: Can’t believe Madigan whiffed on that sideline tackle and let the Vikings score on the last play. The Saints would be in the NFC championship if it wasn’t for Madigan. - Lucky Pierre - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 12:41 pm: In 2016, union members accounted for 14.5 percent of wage and salary workers in Illinois, compared with 15.2 percent in 2015, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today.Mar 1, 2017 This is the Democratic party in Illinois. Do everything to protect a declining special interest group at the cost of hurting the majority of middle class residents in Illinois by giving the unions veto power over pro business legislation. - Generic Drone - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 12:44 pm: Rauner claims the cure for cancer is to get rid of Madigan. - Oswego Willy - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 12:53 pm: ===This is the Democratic party in Illinois. Do everything to protect a declining special interest group at the cost of hurting the majority of middle class residents in Illinois by giving the unions veto power over pro business legislation.=== So, in turn, instead of finding 60 and 30, Rauner actually vetoes, as a governor can only do, 3 straight budgets to hurt ALL of Illinois, purposely, as a plan to create crisis, and hurt Illinois’ neediest. Hmm. That Rauner, a failure and purposely hurting people because of his own failures. What would be different in a second term? - 47th Ward - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 1:32 pm: Who knew that one $67,000 per year, part-time job would solve the persistent problem of black unemployment in Illinois? - Demoralized - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 1:36 pm: ==special interest group == I laugh every time you bring up this “special interest group” argument as if Madigan and the Democrats have the market cornered on the special interest group front. Who in the world do you think the Governor is kowtowing to? could it be the business community? Special interest groups are a fact of life in politics LP. Pretending that one side wears a halo is ludicrous. - VanillaMan - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 1:57 pm: Rauner also believes it’s Madigan’s fault that the Earth rotates around the sun, men have beards and he’s out of that delicious buttery flavor of Country Crock magarine. - VanillaMan - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 2:06 pm: LP Have you ever had an original thought or are you just a Mynah bird sitting in a small office filled with high school students reading the Chicago Tribune opinion page? You are an excruciating bore. - Demoralized - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 2:12 pm: ==Earth rotates around the sun== Wrong VMan. It rotates around Madigan. - Anonymous - Tuesday, Jan 16, 18 @ 2:46 pm: Umm….Earth rotates on its axis. It revolves around the sun/Madigan ;D Sorry, comments for this post are now closed.