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Friday, Aug 19, 2011 - Posted by Rich Miller

* The day set aside every year at the Illinois State Fair for the minority party is always filled with people who have very high hopes. This, however, may be a bit much…

Republicans predicted they will overcome Democratic-drawn legislative and congressional map and beat President Barack Obama in his home state on Thursday, their day to rally party activists at the Illinois State Fair.

If the map is tossed out by the courts, then the Republicans will do far better. But beating Obama here? I wouldn’t bet very much money on that. However, Sen. Murphy is almost undoubtedly correct about this point…

“You look at Bill Brady getting 99 out of 102 counties, you see people up in my area in suburban Cook that are really suffering when they expected something different when President Obama was elected,” said state Sen. Matt Murphy, R-Palatine. “The 61 percent he got in 2008, he’ll be nowhere near that.”

Obama won Murphy’s very Republican Northwest suburban district in 2008 with about the same percentage that Murphy received. Not gonna happen next year.

* Senate GOP Leader Christine Radogno is also probably right…

“I would be surprised if that happened [Obama losing Illinois] just because I think there is a real allegiance to the favorite son, a pride in having the president,” Radgono. “I think it’s going to be a heckuva lot closer than it was last time. I don’t think his re-election is a shoo-in as people thought it was a couple years ago.”

* More hope…

Republicans largely ignored the impact of new legislative and Congressional districts, drawn by ruling Democrats at the statehouse, that are likely to help Democrats keep control of Springfield and win back seats in the U.S. House. Republicans are challenging the maps in court.

They talked about building on the five seats they picked up in Congress last year, statewide victories by Treasurer Dan Rutherford and Comptroller Judy Baar Topinka, and gains in the Illinois House and Senate, where they are minorities in both chambers. Demetra DeMonte, a Pekin resident who serves as secretary of the Republican National Committee, said the Republican tide that swept America last year was the “beginning of a Renaissance.”

Added U.S. Rep. Aaron Schock of Peoria, “I don’t know about you, but I smell blood in the water.”

Rally speakers drew parallels between Illinois’ dismal finances and the Washington battles over the budget and deficit. Calls for change were buttressed by new unemployment figures released Thursday that show joblessness in Illinois rose to 9.5 percent - the third consecutive month unemployment has increased in the state.

* The latest unemployment report is not good at all…

A lack of consumer confidence and uncertainty about the national economy contributed to the third monthly increase in unemployment in a row in July, officials with the Illinois Department of Employment Security said Thursday.

The 9.5 percent rate was up from 9.1 percent in June and compared with 10.1 percent in July 2010. Total employment was down by 24,900 jobs. […]

Illinois has added 28,900 jobs this year and 72,200 since January 2010 after the July losses are subtracted. The department also noted manufacturing employment increased for the fourth straight month in July.

* Many top Republicans have yet to pick a candidate in the presidential race, but some have…

State Treasurer Dan Rutherford is Romney’s state campaign chairman.

“I’m going to be putting together the delegates and we’re going to be working hard to elect him the next president of the United States,” said Rutherford.

Meanwhile, State Senator Kirk Dillard says he has “promised” to help Governor Perry.

“He brings a record of job creation second to none of any governor in America,” said Dillard.

Other high-profile Republicans are waiting for a candidate to sign their dance cards. Conservative activist Adam Andrejewski, who raised money for Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty before Pawlenty dropped out of the race, is available.

* Some media outlets reported that yesterday’s turnout yesterday was a bit sparse. I’ve seen much worse, particularly during the last two years of George Ryan’s administration and the first year or two of Rod Blagojevich’s. Illinois Republican Party Chairman Pat Brady said the Democrats had more people this week because they bussed in union members. Um, Chairman, those union members were mostly protesting against Quinn outside the fair gates.

* A couple of hours before the event started, the statewide and legislative Republican leaders reiterated their opposition to more state borrowing…

Soon to enter their ninth year in Illinois’ political wilderness, Republicans rallied Thursday against Gov. Pat Quinn’s management of the state budget, beat up President Barack Obama for mishandling the economy and insisted the party finally has shaken George Ryan’s tarnished legacy.

Those messages represented the themes of Republican Day at the State Fair, giving an early glimpse of some of the talking points the GOP will use in the 2012 elections, when Obama aims to retake the White House with a strong Illinois showing, and control of both legislative chambers will be up for grabs.

“We have the right message: fiscal responsibility, no more borrowing. We’re all together on this message. It’s what this state needs, and it frankly is what this country needs,” Senate Minority Leader Christine Radogno (R-Lemont) told a couple hundred supporters at the fairground event.

“We have an electorate that’s been shocked into awareness by the horrible mismanagement by the Democrats,” she said.

* More…

Illinois Treasurer Dan Rutherford, Illinois Comptroller Judy Baar Topinka, state House Minority Leader Tom Cross and state Senate Minority Leader Christine Radogno held a joint news conference here to address comments Quinn made late last week.

“The very thought that anyone would consider borrowing as a solution to our problem is breathtaking. We cannot use borrowing as a crutch for a tax system and budgetary system that is just broken,” said Topinka, who is in charge of the state’s checkbook.

Quinn told a gaggle of reporters Aug. 11 that he would continue to push his plan for borrowing in the upcoming veto session in October, despite the Legislature refusing to support his original idea this spring to borrow $8.75 billion.

* However…

Republicans offered few details about how they would run things differently if put in charge of Springfield.

They criticized Quinn for not paying down a $4 billion pile of overdue bills but rejected his proposal to eliminate the backlog by borrowing money, and they acknowledged their own budget plans would take about five years to pay off the bills. Republican leaders proposed cutting government spending by making unspecified changes to Medicaid, government pensions and health insurance for state employees.

* In other GOP action…

Members of the Illinois Republican State Central Committee voted Thursday to impose term limits on committee members and also decided to move the party’s Springfield office to save money. […]

Rodney Davis, the GOP’s interim executive director, said the term limit will take effect in 2014 – the next year members of the state central committee are up for selection. The party has one member from each congressional district, and each of those people appoints a deputy member.

The rule would allow a person to be a deputy member for eight years and a regular member for another eight.

Davis also said the central committee decided to leave its current headquarters at 320 S. Fourth St., which costs $1,600 per month in rent. The party will rent space from the Republican state Senate campaign operation at 2731 S. MacArthur Blvd. The move could come as early as Oct. 1.

From the way it was explained to me yesterday, the term limits kick in with the next election in 2014. Previous terms are not included in the new limits. So, if somebody has been around for several terms, he or she could still run for two more four-year terms in ‘14.

* Related…

* Video: Pat Brady on 2012

* Video: GOP leaders

* Republicans talk unity, while divides still plague candidates

* Illinois GOP plans bigger straw poll

* Hultgren gets cheers, boos during tax talk in Geneva: Some constituents held signs that read “Where are the jobs?” and “Tax Wall Street Millionaires.” Others stood outside with a greeting of “Throw the bum out” while passing out literature with a photo altered to show President Barack Obama with crossed eyes and a Hitler-esque mustache. Hultgren would get simultaneously booed and cheered no matter what he had to say, on topics from job creation to taxes.

* Eaton: Unfortunately, Illinois has a GOP establishment

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*** UPDATED x1 *** Will Walsh flame out?

Thursday, Jul 28, 2011 - Posted by Rich Miller

* Freshman Congressman Joe Walsh’s biggest obstacle to reelection is the Republican primary next year. Unless the new map is tossed out by the courts, he’ll most likely be up against fellow freshman Republican Randy Hultgren. Whoever wins that primary will almost assuredly win in November.

Walsh, who won a fluke election against Democrat Melissa Bean last year, has brilliantly played to his hardcore base this year with multiple appearances on national cable TV shows. He has displayed an enormous talent for delivering red meat, made-for-cable rants against President Obama. Democrats and moderate independents may be horrified with Walsh’s rather odd schtick, but this is all about the 2012 primary. Up until now, I’ve considered him the odds-on favorite against Hultgren, an equally conservative, but camera-shy and soft-spoken tea partier.

* Too much heat can create a flameout, however, and Walsh’s checkered past may be starting to catch up with him…

Freshman U.S. Rep. Joe Walsh, a tax-bashing Tea Party champion who sharply lectures President Barack Obama and other Democrats on fiscal responsibility, owes more than $100,000 in child support to his ex-wife and three children, according to documents his ex-wife filed in their divorce case in December.

“I won’t place one more dollar of debt upon the backs of my kids and grandkids unless we structurally reform the way this town spends money!” Walsh says directly into the camera in his viral video lecturing Obama on the need to get the nation’s finances in order. […]

In court documents, after his ex-wife, Laura Walsh, asked a judge to suspend his driver’s license until he paid his child support, Joe Walsh asks his ex-wife’s lawyer: “Have you no decency?”

Joe Walsh’s attorney, R. Steven Polachek, called the claim of a $117,437 debt “unfounded. […]

Before getting elected, he had told Laura Walsh that because he was out of work or between jobs, he could not make child support payments. So she was surprised to read in his congressional campaign disclosures that he was earning enough money to loan his campaign $35,000.

“Joe personally loaned his campaign $35,000, which, given that he failed to make any child support payments to Laura because he ‘had no money’ is surprising,” Laura Walsh’s attorneys wrote in a motion filed in December seeking $117,437 in back child support and interest. “Joe has paid himself back at least $14,200 for the loans he gave himself.”

Walsh’s most fervent supporters will undoubtedly dismiss this story as a “liberal media” attack on their firebrand hero. But it won’t take too many more reports like this to give Hultgren the campaign ammunition he needs to make Walsh a one-termer. Walsh’s curious ability to find money for expensive houses and large campaign loans have never been fully explained, so I expect there will be more follow-up, particularly since he has attempted to become a national spokesperson for the Obama opposition.

Also, this is Illinois. We have a long moderate tradition here (moderate meaning “temperament” rather than actual voting records). His over the top act could easily grow stale, particularly if it’s undermined by personal integrity questions.

*** UPDATE *** From a press release…

Congressman Walsh Statement on Chicago Sun-Times Hit Piece

WASHINGTON –It is not lost on me that a court case filed almost 8 months ago regarding a marriage that ended more than 8 years ago would be brought up today. We are 72 hours away from one of the biggest decisions our country has to make about its financial future. I understand why this is a story and why the media has to ask me about it. I understood as a candidate, and I understand as a sitting member of Congress that the scrutiny of my personal life will be intense. This is a tough business. It’s also not lost on me that not everyone agrees with me politically, I am the tip of the spear in this current debate, and I will be attacked.

Let me say this. I love all the members of my family past and present. I’ve always given everything I have to meet my financial obligations to my children and I will fight until my last breath against anyone who says otherwise. My children are truly the treasure of my life, which is why I’ve been trying to resolve this issue since January in a court of law, rather than drag my children into it. That is the appropriate venue and I will not discuss this private family issue in public.

The people of Illinois’ eighth congressional district voted for me not because I’m wealthy but because they wanted a fighter in Washington. They did not vote for me because I was a career politician, but because they wanted one of them as their Representative in DC. They wanted someone to stand up to Washington and tell them the spending has to stop. This morning that is exactly what I am going to continue to do.

I have tried to be the most accessible Congressman on the planet and I will continue to do so moving forward. These latest attacks against me are false and I will fight them in the appropriate venue. And as your Congressman I promise you that I am going to put my head down, get back to work and continue to fight for our freedoms and our children’s future. I’m not going to let some hit piece in the media deter me from that.

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