The Daily Herald has a piece today about the split between House Speaker Michael Madigan and Senate President Emil Jones. The hook is the rate freeze, but here’s some other stuff the two couldn’t agree one.

There was no agreement on whether to let counties impose cigarette taxes of up to $2 a pack, something DuPage County pushed in hopes of averting budget cuts and layoffs.

Nor could they find agreement to override Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s veto of added consumer protections for mobile home residents in negotiating leases for the land their homes sit upon, protections designed to help residents of an Elgin mobile home park.

However, also left unfinished was how to fund a nearly 15.6 percent increase to lawmakers’ paychecks that the Senate previously approved. […]

But it is the prospect of higher power bills and what, if anything, should be done that has political leaders at odds.

I didn’t have a weekly column this week because of last week’s vacation, but the previous column, which I don’t think I linked to and which was written after the first week of veto session, was about this split.

Jones has long believed that House Speaker Michael Madigan doesn’t show him enough respect and that Democratic Party of Illinois chairman Michael Madigan does not adequately represent the liberal interests of their party. Jones’ new veto-proof majority has given him some major bragging rights, so the proper respect will be demanded. Since the election, grumbling about the state party’s failure to get involved in any races other than Madigan’s Illinois House contests has also been loud. For instance, while the state Republican Party was sending out mailers and doing media work on behalf of congressional candidates, Madigan’s only focus was maintaining his own majority. Madigan said last week that none of the campaigns asked for the party’s help, but a Jones partisan scoffed at the excuse. […]

The governor’s office claims that Blagojevich phoned Madigan twice last week to talk to him about the minimum-wage bill but that the speaker didn’t return either call. Madigan’s press secretary said he wasn’t aware of any calls from the governor’s office. I asked whether he would check, just to make sure, but he declined, saying that he would know about something as important as calls from the governor.

The governor’s press office then tracked down the record of one of the calls and reported back that Blagojevich tried to call Madigan at 2:51 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 14. The speaker’s spokesman stuck by his claim, however.

Maybe Dr. Phil can conduct a relationship intervention. It may be the Democrats’ only hope of avoiding a massive implosion after their great “victory.”

Since then, Madigan and his people have tried to tone down the rhetoric, and so has the governor. But Jones has carried on.