* Congressman Joe Walsh has responded to the news that rocker Joe Walsh is doing a fundraiser for Democratic challenger Tammy Duckworth. From a fundraising e-mail…
“Life’s Been Good” for the liberal elite…
Dear Friend,
Our nation continues to find itself in dire straits. We’re still hurting as Americans and we need serious leadership.
You and I both know Tammy Duckworth represents Beltway insiders who, over-tax and over-spend. She also represents the “liberal elite”, who are far too out of touch with everyday Americans.
That’s right folks… Tammy Duckworth is bringing in the “rock star” Joe Walsh for a fundraising party on July 1st.
It’s already known she relies on the liberal elite for her campaign’s support. Last fundraising period, her fundraising reports showed she raised more money from San Francisco alone than from the entire 8th district.
But Tammy can keep her “Hotel California” elite liberal supporters, because I want your support.
(Click here to show you support my re-election campaign!)
The Beltway insiders prefer a Congressman endorsed by the liberal Hollywood crowd and backed by the Chicago Machine, because they’re one in the same.
I bet you wouldn’t guess who Joe Walsh’s agent is? Ari Emanuel, Rahm Emanuel’s brother. It figures Tammy is going to continue to roll with the liberal jet-setters and machine politicians.
They want to hand pick her for this seat and get rid of people like me: a person who refused his congressional pension and healthcare package. I’m also a guy who sleeps in his D.C. office, because I know I wasn’t sent to Washington to make it my home.
I went to Washington to shake things up by supporting a Balanced Budget Amendment and the No Budget, No Pay Act and limiting myself to three terms in Congress.
I’m sure they’re just cracking up they got the musician Joe Walsh to come out against the Congressman Joe Walsh, but it’s time to get serious about what we face as a nation.
Tell the Tammy Duckworths and out of touch Hollywood liberal elites of the world that it’s time to get serious about our problems by making a donation to our campaign today.
I don’t need rock stars throwing me a fundraiser. I need support from people like you.
* Who is the worst politician in Illinois? It can be federal, state or local, but the politico must currently be holding office or actively campaigning for an office. As always, explain your answer in comments please. Thanks.
* Ron Shinkman over at Fierce Health Finance read the bill which raises cigarette taxes and gives non-profit hospitals some concrete guidelines on what they have to do to maintain their property tax exemptions and also gives for-profit hospitals ways to reduce their taxes. He doesn’t think much of it…
The charity care provisions of the bill are meant to provide dollar-for-dollar offsets against property tax exemptions not-for-profit providers in Illinois enjoy. Many industry observers say the Illinois bill could serve as a nationwide blueprint for other hospitals falling short on their charity care obligations. However, it’s more like a terrific linguistic design for a colander or sieve. Here’s why:
• Hospitals could make in-kind or financial contributions to their own affiliated facilities or another provider to offset the tax burden.
• Hospitals could make donations of any sort of supply to offset the tax burden.
• Hospitals could argue that any effort they make in terms of community outreach or education could be used to offset the tax burden.
• For-profit hospitals could use charity care to offset their property tax burden.
• For the purpose of tax assessment, the hospital buildings could be depreciated based on age. If they’re more than 40 years old, they are essentially deemed worthless for tax purposes.
My house celebrates its 52nd birthday this year. I suspect asking for a tax exemption based on its age would receive a less than amused response.
Then again, there’s little to find amusing in a bill that pumps steroids into every sleight-of-hand hospitals use to make it seem they’re generous with uninsured patients.
The hospitals did do well. No doubt. We’ve talked about this before. They had to give up some things, though, including a guarantee for providing “free care,” and took a hit on their state reimbursement rate. There’s also a bill to place a limit on putting people in jail over failing to pay their bills, and the hospitals had been among the worst abusers of this loophole. Shinkman doesn’t mention that stuff.
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder pledged under oath Tuesday that the Obama administration under no circumstances would seek to transfer Guantanamo Bay detainees to the vacant Thomson prison in northwestern Illinois.
Holder testified at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in answer to a question from Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill.
Durbin said the state and federal government had agreed to a purchase price for the long-vacant prison, but money appropriated to the Department of Justice needed to be reprogrammed for the sale to go through.
“We want to acquire the Thomson facility,” Holder said, after agreeing to the pledge sought by Durbin. “It would really be a welcome addition to our Bureau of Prisons.”
Durbin wants the federal government to buy the prison to ease overcrowding and spur the local economy. He said the sale would create more than 1,100 jobs and “inject at least $1 billion into the region’s economy.”
Neighbors of state Sen. Suzi Schmidt claim the lawmaker has been harassing them for more than a year, including a confrontation with their 7-year-old son, according to a no-contact order issued against her in conjunction with her arrest Tuesday.
In the court order, the neighbors claim they received a series of harassing calls, texts and emails from Schmidt starting in December 2010 and continuing until this February, despite repeated requests to stop.
A woman states that on March 19, Schmidt “confronted my 7-year-old son and made inappropriate comments to him about an alleged affair I am having with her soon to be ex-husband,” according to the order. […]
In the no contact order, the neighbors also assert that, on June 2, Schmidt “trespassed on our property, removing property from our yard and discarding into the swampy cattails and then proceeding to damage personal property.”
State Sen. Suzi Schmidt, who faced questions last fall of abusing her political influence during a domestic dispute, was arrested Tuesday on charges of damaging her neighbor’s bag of feed, according to police.
Schmidt was also charged with criminal trespass to property and was served with an emergency stalking no-contact order, according to the Lake County sheriff’s office.
Schmidt’s Lake Villa neighbor had warned her to stay off his property in the recent past, and the sheriff’s office obtained a warrant for her arrest last week after she went back on his property and damaged the bag of feed, police said.
“They can warn you, you are not welcome here, then if you violate that, they can have you arrested,” said Lake County sheriff’s Police Chief Wayne Hunter. “There has to be some type of forewarning.”
Schmidt’s arrest makes her the second sitting member of the General Assembly to be embroiled in an ongoing criminal proceeding.
State Rep. Derrick Smith (D-Chicago) was arrested in March as part of an undercover FBI sting that allegedly nabbed him accepting a $7,000 bribe in exchange for writing a letter of support on behalf of a purported daycare operator seeking a $50,000 state grant. Charged with bribery, Smith faces possible expulsion from the Illinois House.
News of Schmidt’s arrest traveled quickly in political circles, with one senior party official saying privately that this latest development warrants Schmidt’s resignation and harms GOP efforts to hold on to the Lake County Senate seat now being fought for by Republican Joe Neal and Democrat Melinda Bush.
“Her entire situation is just tragic,” said Neal, the GOP nominee who won his primary with Schmidt’s backing. “I have no comment on whether she should resign or anything beyond that at this point.”
State Sen. Terry Link (D-Vernon Hills), chairman of the Lake County Democratic Party, said Schmidt’s arrest — after the regret she expressed for her conduct in the 911 recordings — is jolting.
“The thing that surprises me is she did what she did with the 911 and all of that, and I know Suzi has repeatedly said to me she regrets that she did that, that she wishes she could take those words back,” Link said. “Doing something like this, well, it surprises me something like this could happen.”
Link said he did not think Schmidt’s arrest, based on the scant information released by the sheriff’s office, would be enough to warrant action under Senate rules to launch disciplinary proceedings akin to what Smith is facing in the House.
“She didn’t embezzle anything. She didn’t steal anything. I don’t think this is a Derrick Smith type of thing,” he said.
This latest incident comes on the heels of a very public domestic dispute with her now estranged husband. Late last year 911 tapes were made public where Schmidt could be heard telling the dispatcher that she was the former County Board Chairman and to “ignore her husband” who had called police after a dispute. Schmidt then announced that she would not be seeking re-election. Robert Schmidt told the Chicago Tribune that he has since moved out of their home and that they are in the middle of a divorce.
A spokesperson for the state Republican staff told WLS News that lawmakers would be dealing with the matter.
Two of the most powerful legislators in Springfield ran their private businesses out of the offices of a crooked government contractor, according to documents obtained by the Chicago Sun-Times.
State Rep. Edward Acevedo and state Sen. Tony Munoz won’t say why they had desks and computers for their businesses in the Southwest Side offices of Azteca Supply Co., whose owner and her husband await sentencing in a minority-contract fraud scheme.
The two Chicago Democrats — who each hold the title of assistant majority leader in the Illinois Legislature — have never listed the 4500 S. Kolin Ave. address on any business filings with the state of Illinois. Nor have they reported any business ties to Azteca on the financial disclosure forms that they are required to file each year with the legislature.
But an Azteca employee-turned-government-informant told the FBI that Acevedo and Munoz kept the desks and computers for their businesses at Azteca’s offices, according to a recently unsealed search warrant that led to the indictment and convictions of Azteca president Aurora Venegas and her husband, Thomas Masen.
The informant told federal investigators that the two lawmakers “acted as consultants/lobbyists” for the crooked contractor, according to a sworn statement FBI Special Agent Julia E. Meredith wrote to obtain the search warrant for the July 17, 2008, FBI raid on the offices of Azteca, which got millions of dollars in work from the city of Chicago and was the largest female-owned subcontractor on Mayor Richard M. Daley’s O’Hare Modernization Project.
Despite that sworn statement, the FBI did not search the desks belonging to the two legislators because they were “not believed to maintain business records of Azteca.”
* My ticket to last night’s ballgame listed the matchup as “World Champsions” vs. “White Sox.” Well, the St. Louis Cardinals didn’t play much like champs last night…
After dropping two of three to the Houston Astros, Paul Konerko said the Chicago White Sox were looking to get back on track as quickly as possible Tuesday night against the St. Louis Cardinals.
Konerko had three hits to lift his major-league best average to .373, and teammates A.J. Pierzynski and Adam Dunn homered to lead the White Sox to a 6-1 win. […]
Quintana (2-1), making his fifth start, allowed a career-high 10 hits but did not issue a walk and was helped out by three double plays.
“That’s actually what I was looking for,” Quintana said through an interpreter. “The double plays were going to get me out of the inning and I was able to get them.”
White Sox manager Robin Ventura said that Quintana, who is filling in for the injured John Danks, has earned at least one more start.
Is a sweep in the, um, cards? Discuss.
…Adding… The Cardinal fans I was with didn’t appreciate me singing this song after the game last night. Oh well…
Wednesday, Jun 13, 2012 - Posted by Advertising Department
[The following is a paid advertisement.]
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Lower energy and fuel bills will help Illinois’ economy prosper and save families money while moving America toward a secure energy future.
* Gen. Enyart puzzled some folks with his big National Guard retirement announcement followed by a press conference where he announced he hadn’t yet decided whether to toss his hat into the ring for the vacant slot created when Democrat Brad Harriman dropped out of the race to replace retiring Congressman Jerry Costello. But today, he finally made it official. From a press release…
Retired Major General William Enyart Announces Candidacy for Illinois 12th Congressional District
Major General William L. Enyart of Belleville, retired Adjutant General and former commander of the Illinois National Guard, announced today his candidacy for the Democratic nomination for Illinois 12th Congressional District. Enyart cited his dedication to service and his deep ties and loyalty to Southern Illinois as his reasons for pursuing the nomination.
Enyart submitted his questionnaire today and released the following statement:
“Coming to Southern Illinois as a 19 year old enlisted airman, raising my own family here, and serving our community in the Illinois National Guard for the past 30 years has been an honor and a source of inspiration. Today I am proud to rise to the challenge before us and heed the call to serve by fighting for good jobs and a responsible way to reduce the deficit to build a strong middle class and protect the Southern Illinois way of life.
“This is a family decision, and I am honored and humbled to have the support of my wife Annette, our sons, James and Alex, and my daughter-in-law Tanya, as well as our friends and neighbors and the all folks who called and encouraged me to take this important step to serve Southern Illinois. I look forward to an open and transparent process as I seek the Democratic nomination.
“I believe that the next voice representing us in Washington must share Southern Illinois values of hard work, honesty and fairness. Too many folks here are worried about making ends meet, and the future of Southern Illinois is at stake. We need to make sure that there are good jobs for our families, Medicare for our seniors, and an economy that Southern Illinois families can have confidence in.”
Ten Democrats submitted their applications today, including Enyart. Whoever is picked will face Republican Jason Plummer this fall.
* That would be the rocker Joe Walsh, not the politician, of course…
“I’m the real Joe Walsh and I’m proud to back a real American success story — Tammy Duckworth,” the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer said in a statement endorsing the Democratic candidate in her bid to unseat the incumbent Republican who shares his name.
“Tammy’s story, her service to our nation and her continued commitment to working families (like the one I come from) have convinced me that she’s the right choice for Congress,” Walsh, guitarist for the Eagles, said.
Walsh, a six-time Grammy Award winner, grew up in Evanston and will perform a special concert in support of Duckworth on July 1 at John Barleycorn in Schaumburg. Tickets are available at www.tammyduckworth.com/WalshConcert.
Ticket prices range from: $100 for general admission; $500 for reserved seating up front; $1,000 for a reception with Walsh; and $2,500 for a photo-op and meet and greet with Walsh.
The title of the event: “A Private Concert and Evening with The Real Joe Walsh.”
* Sangamon County Judge John Schmidt has issued a landmark ruling against Champaign’s attempt to keep secret electronic communications sent by city council members on their private phones during public meetings…
In July 2011, News-Gazette reporter Patrick Wade asked the city for “all electronic communications, including cellphone text messages, sent and received by members of the city council and the mayor during city council meetings and study sessions since and including May 3.”
The city originally provided The News-Gazette with 24 pages of emails generated during city council meetings. But officials withheld the remainder of the documents, arguing that the correspondence is not public record if it exists on council members’ personal accounts and cellphones.
But last November, the [attorney general’s] public access counselor ruled that all communications regarding city business on officials’ personal devices is subject to public disclosure.
In Monday’s arguments before Schmidt, Laura Hall, an assistant city attorney for Champaign, contended the electronic messages were not public records because an individual city council member could not be construed as the entire council.
“You are not a public body by yourself,” she said.
But Esther Seitz, arguing for The News-Gazette, said that “a public body acts through its individual members.”
And Laura Bautista, an assistant attorney general, said that even if council members used their own cellphones to send an electronic message, you “can’t use a private device to shield yourself from your communication becoming public.”
Gov. Pat Quinn uses his private cellphone to conduct business, and has maintained that those communications are exempt from state FOIA laws. Mayor Rahm Emanuel has also refused to turn over his text messages related to city contracts. Extending Schmidt’s logic outward, far less info could be shielded from public view.
* The Question: Do you agree with Judge Schmidt’s decision? Take the poll and then explain your answer in comments, please. Thanks.
* Pat Quinn just about lost the Democratic primary because of a botched early release program for violent prison inmates. Quinn overreacted and shut down all early release programs in order to avoid being whacked for crimes committed by parolees. As a result, the prison population spiked upward in 2010 and 2011. The General Assembly has sent him a new bill that reinstates a long-standing early release program that Quinn killed with the now infamous “Meritorious Good Time Push” program. The governor demanded legislation before reinstating any early release plan, but he’s not saying yet whether he’ll sign it, although the betting is that he will…
Prisoner early release programs nearly cost Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn his job two years ago, so he stopped them. Now state lawmakers have sent him a measure that once again would let some nonviolent inmates out before their sentences are finished.
Republicans say it’s a Democratic attempt to provide Quinn with political cover, arguing the governor already has the power to launch an early-release program because his administration runs the Illinois Department of Corrections. If lawmakers set up the guidelines, Quinn could blame them if a freed inmate went on a crime spree, Republicans said.
“If someone is released and they are causing a terrible crime which occurs, it’s easy to blame the legislature,” said Republican Rep. Jim Durkin, a former prosecutor from Western Springs. “To a certain extent, that could be viewed as passing the buck.”
The Quinn administration is remaining mum on the bill, with a spokeswoman saying no other person than the governor will review it.
* The bill faced Republican opposition in the House, but it passed the Senate by a wide margin. However…
The early-release bill had an easier time passing the Senate. Even Sen. Brady, who blasted Quinn on early release during the governor’s campaign, voted for it.
Brady later said his vote was a mistake, that he meant to vote “no” because he thinks the bill gives the prisons chief too much discretion and violates the spirit of truth-of-sentencing guidelines that require a prisoner to serve most of his sentence.
“I didn’t see any merit in what they were expanding,” Brady said. “It just doesn’t smell right to me.”
* As Bill Cosby used to say, I told you that story so I can tell you this one. Ever since the MGT Push debacle, Quinn has been trying to boost his crime-fighting bonafides. As part of that effort, Quinn staged a big, splashy press conference yesterday with Chicago’s mayor and law enforcement to sign the state’s new RICO bill into law…
Local authorities now have the power to go after street gangs as criminal organizations under a new Illinois law.
Gov. Pat Quinn signed the Street Gang RICO Act on Monday.
The federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act doles out stiff penalties for acts performed as part of a criminal organization, like the Mafia.
The Illinois law applies the same idea to street gangs. It takes effect immediately.
Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez is a proponent. She says it’ll help prosecutors go after gang leaders instead of treating gang crimes as isolated events. Her office has started a new division for RICO cases. More than two dozen states have RICO laws.
They may say it’s just about street gangs, but it could be used for a whole lot more than that. From the statute…
(b) “Enterprise” includes:
(1) any partnership, corporation, association, business or charitable trust, or other legal entity; and (2) any group of individuals or other legal entities, or any combination thereof, associated in fact although not itself a legal entity. An association in fact must be held together by a common purpose of engaging in a course of conduct, and it may be associated together for purposes that are both legal and illegal. An association in fact must:
(A) have an ongoing organization or structure, either formal or informal; (B) the various members of the group must function as a continuing unit, even if the group changes membership by gaining or losing members over time; and (C) have an ascertainable structure distinct from that inherent in the conduct of a pattern of predicate activity.
However, opponents argue the law gives Illinois’ 102 county state attorneys too much power and leaves potential for abuse.
“The fear is that politically elected people can use it politically,’’ said state Sen. Kwame Raoul, a Chicago Democrat, who voted present on the bill. He also said low-level gang members could get swept up in investigations and charged with harsher crimes. […]
The Chicago Crime Commission, a nonprofit organization that studies city crime, applauded the law and said it was long overdue. Arthur Bilek, the commission’s executive vice president, said there had been little evidence in other states of abuse of power on the part of prosecutors.
“The dangers are insignificant compared to the good that bill can bring by finally beginning to put away these vicious violent drug gangs that are really the new mafia of the United States,’’ he said
The Chicago Police Department said nearly 80 percent of the city’s homicides are gang-related. It also said there are approximately 100,000 Chicago street gang members.
The violence is nowhere near its historical peak of the early 1990s, when Chicago recorded roughly 900 homicides per year. But from Jan. 1 through late May there were 203 homicides, an increase of more than 50 percent over the 134 during the same period in 2011.
Just as important have been dramatic changes within the gangs themselves.
“In the past the gangs were very organized from the top down,” said Sgt. Matthew Little of the Chicago Police Department’s gang enforcement unit. As more gang leaders are arrested, convicted and sent to prison, the gangs they left behind have become “very splintered,” he said.
Young men on the city’s streets agree.
“There is no one to control this, so it has become haywire,” said Devon Tims, who identified himself as one of the Chicago Vice Lords, making him one of the city’s estimated 70,000 gang members.
* Gov. Pat Quinn hasn’t even signed the full budget into law yet, but working parents and seniors are already getting notices that they’re about to be cut off from health coverage…
More than 25,000 working parents in Illinois stand to lose their state-provided health coverage on July 1 - and most of them don’t know it yet.
State officials will eliminate their coverage in just three weeks as part of the $2.7 billion package of cuts and taxes the Legislature passed in May in an effort to save Illinois’ Medicaid program from possible collapse. But with the clock ticking, the state has just sent out notices to the Medicaid families who will be affected once Gov. Pat Quinn signs the bill, as he has promised to do. […]
The state agency responsible for Medicaid sent roughly 26,000 notices to parents losing coverage on Friday, an agency spokesman told The Associated Press. Other letters to seniors losing help with prescription drug costs are being mailed in batches this week, Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services spokesman Mike Claffey told the AP on Monday. […]
Illinois has little experience informing Medicaid patients they’re losing coverage. The program has had few eligibility limits imposed, and mostly the program has grown to cover more residents over the years. Last year, a new income limit was placed on state coverage for children covered by a program called All Kids. But, in that case, the Legislature gave a year before the 4,000 children already enrolled lost their coverage. Their families got many months’ advance notice.
Now, advocates are bracing for phone calls from Medicaid recipients who may have only a week or two to make backup plans. Clinics are rescheduling appointments for patients in the middle of treatment.
NOTICE OF TERMINATION OF ILLINOIS CARES RX BENEFIT
Dear Illinois Cares Rx Member:
We regret to inform you that the Illinois Cares Rx program is ending June 30, 2012. Due to Illinois state budget reductions, funding for the program is being eliminated. This means beginning July 1, 2012, Illinois Cares Rx will no longer help you pay for your prescription drugs and Medicare Part D plan premium. It is important that you contact your Medicare Part D prescription drug plan to find out what your premium and prescription drug costs will be beginning July 1, 2012. See page 4 for phone numbers for the Part D plans that were coordinating with Illinois Cares Rx.
* Gov. Pat Quinn got a little bit overzealous with his pats on the back yesterday…
What appeared to be intended as a pat on the back turned into a little bit more than Emanuel bargained for.
“Thank you for the hit in the back,” Emanuel said — Quinn flashing a devilish grin next to him. “Thank god I was holding the podium when you did that.”
The two men recently, reportedly got into a heated argument on the telephone over gambling legislation. Maybe this was Quinn’s way of getting him back? […]
McCarthy, tough guy that he is, invited Quinn’s masculine back-slap when it was his turn to be introduced.
“Did you hurt yourself,” McCarthy quipped to the governor.
* Ben Polak, chairman of the economics department at Yale University, and Peter K. Schott, professor of economics at the Yale School of Management…
There is something historically different about this recession and its aftermath: in the past, local government employment has been almost recession-proof. This time it’s not. Going back as long as the data have been collected (1955), with the one exception of the 1981 recession, local government employment continued to grow almost every month regardless of what the economy threw at it. But since the latest recession began, local government employment has fallen by 3 percent, and is still falling. In the equivalent period following the 1990 and 2001 recessions, local government employment grew 7.7 and 5.2 percent. Even following the 1981 recession, by this stage local government employment was up by 1.4 percent…
Without this hidden austerity program, the economy would look very different. If state and local governments had followed the pattern of the previous two recessions, they would have added 1.4 million to 1.9 million jobs and overall unemployment would be 7.0 to 7.3 percent instead of 8.2 percent.
In the graph atop this post, I ran the numbers on total government employment after the 1981, 1990, 2001 and 2008 recessions. I made government employment on the eve of the recession equal to “1,” so what you’re seeing is total change in the ensuing 54 months, which is how much time has elapsed since the start of this recession.
As you can see, government employment tends to rise during recessions, helping to cushion their impact. But with the exception of a spike when we hired temporary workers for the decennial census, it’s fallen sharply during this recession.
Note that a Republican was president after the 1981, 1990 and 2000 recessions. Public-sector austerity looks a lot better to conservatives when they’re out of power than when they’re in it.
