* There will just never be another one like him. May he rest in peace, and I hope there’s a bar there for him…
From a slate of senators, congressmen, governors and two Mayor Daleys on down, anybody who was anybody in Illinois politics over many decades knew and respected Bill O’Connell, the last of a breed of journalist-activists who covered the news in Springfield and wasn’t shy about making the news happen behind the scenes along the way.
William J. O’Connell Jr., 83, died Sunday, Sept. 23, of complications from cancer.
From 1955 until his retirement in 1996, he commanded the political and Statehouse beat for the Peoria Journal Star. He quickly built a reputation for keeping a keen watch over Illinois’ public officials.
But it was Mr. O’Connell’s deep understanding of why and how things got done that brought admiration from his readers, fellow reporters and top politicians. […]
When Richard M. Daley was a young man sent to work on the state’s 1970 Constitution in Springfield, he was urged to sit down with Mr. O’Connell to learn some of the more important ins and outs. And whenever Daley returned as mayor before retiring last year, he would speak about the one reporter he knew well in Springfield: Bill O’Connell.
O’Connell was somebody I always looked up to. We had different styles, different goals, different ways of doing business, different tastes, but Bill was the man. And everybody knew it…
Credited with the ability to bring together lawmakers from downstate and the Chicago area to the benefit of both, O’Connell was both journalist and community promoter. His influence helped persuade lawmakers to, among other things, fund the Peoria Civic Center and other area improvements.
“I can’t think of a major project or event in the Peoria area that he didn’t have a powerful hand behind the scenes in making happen,” state Rep. David Leitch, a former reporting colleague, said at O’Connell’s 1996 retirement.
He stomped on the terra.
*** UPDATE *** Bill O’Connell Services…
Visitation will be 4:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. Friday at Wright & Salmon Mortuary, 2416 N. North St.
Visitation also will be from 9 a.m. to 10 a.m. Saturday at St. Bernard Catholic Church, 509 E. Kansas St., Peoria. Mass will start at 10 a.m. Saturday at the church.
Mass will be followed by burial at Resurrection Cemetery, 7519 N. Allen Road, Peoria, according to Wright & Salmon.
* The Question: Should AFSCME be forced to give back some of their wage hikes in contract negotiations? Take the poll and then explain your answer in comments, please.
In fact the net annual increase over the life of the last two contracts is just 28.5%. (Gross increase 32.5% less 4% new employee pension contribution.)
And for nearly 30,000 employees, including all those in Human Services and Corrections, the increase is even less – because Gov. Quinn has refused to pay last year’s increases totaling 5.25%. So most state employees have actually received just 23.25% over the last eight years.
The only way Gov. Quinn gets anywhere such a figure is by including step (longevity) increases that are only granted in an employee’s first 8 years. Only about half of all state employees receive any steps at all, so if this is the basis for Quinn’s fuzzy math, it is misleading. Further, only those employees actually hired eight years ago – in 2004 – would have received steps and COLAs in each of the eight contract years Quinn refers to. That is a miniscule number of our 40,000 members in state government.
Pat Quinn should stop lying to the public and attacking public servants who care for veterans and the disabled, keep our communities safe, prevent child abuse and perform countless other vital public services in Illinois communities each day.
*** UPDATE 1 *** The DCCC is now using Plummer’s comment in a new TV ad…
* Script…
When he praised the plan to end traditional Medicare… …Jason Plummer said the benefits are “pretty obvious.”
You see, even though it makes seniors negotiate with insurance companies for coverage
… and pay sixty-four hundred dollars more every year
…it gives a massive new tax break to millionaires like Plummer.
That might be the obvious choice for Plummer, but ending the Medicare guarantee is wrong choice for the middle-class.
*** UPDATE 2 *** NRCC response…
Nancy Pelosi’s campaign arm, the DCCC, has seen the writing on the wall for Blagojevich’s General Bill Enyart and his struggling campaign. Today the DCCC launched a false and negative attack ad against Jason Plummer in an attempt to distract voters from the fact that their recruitment process failed them once again and they are stuck with a lackluster candidate in Blago appointee and trial lawyer Bill Enyart.
As you cover the DCCC’s lame attempt to cover up the fact that Bill Enyart can’t gain momentum with voters, please consider the following quote.
NRCC Statement: “Trial Lawyer Bill Enyart’s Washington attack dogs are hoping they can distract voters from the fact that Bill is an Obama-Pelosi rubber stamp who will vote against Southern Illinois at every turn. The best way to keep Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi’s radical policies out of Southern Illinois is to keep trial lawyer Bill Enyart out of Congress.” – NRCC Spokeswoman Katie Prill
*** UPDATE 3 *** DCCC…
Unexplained Millionaire Jason Plummer Calls Radical Congressman Who Compared Social Security to Slavery “An American Hero”
The Tea Party Majority Congress is one of the most unproductive and unpopular in history, and Unexplained Millionaire Jason Plummer today signaled he’s in line with its most polarizing and extreme Members. Plummer praised Tea Party radical Congressman Allen West who is best known for incendiary comments like claiming Social Security is “a form of modern 21st century slavery,” and that “if you support Medicare the way it is now, you can kiss the United States of America goodbye.” Plummer today pledged to work with West and called him “an American hero.”
“Unexplained millionaire Jason Plummer has found a role model in Washington - one of the most extreme Tea Party Members of Congress who believes Social Security is slavery and Medicare will be the end of the U.S.,” said Haley Morris of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. “Southern Illinois families are fed up with the mess in Washington, and Plummer today proved that he will make things worse by joining the most extreme ranks of the Tea Party majority in Congress.”
Background
West Compared Social Security to Slavery. “Since June of 2009 or so, we have seen 2.4 million private sector jobs created, but we’ve had 3.1 million people going on Social Security disability,” said West. “So once again, we are creating a sense of economic dependence, which to me, is a form of modern 21st century slavery.” [Sun-Sentinel, 7/09/12]
West Said Medicare Would End United States. “I gotta tell you something: If you support Medicare the way it is now, you can kiss the United States of America goodbye.” [WPTV, 4/27/11]
Plummer Called West an “American Hero.” In September 2011, Plummer praised Allen West calling him an “American hero.” Plummer said it was an “honor” to receive West’s endorsement and is looking forward to working with him if elected to Congress. [JasonPlummer.com, 9/24/12]
West Voted to End Medicare, Protect Tax Breaks for Big Oil and Millionaires, Encourage Companies to Ship Jobs Overseas. West voted for two budgets authored by Congressman Paul Ryan. The budgets would end Medicare’s guaranteed benefit, protect $40 billion in tax breaks for big oil, provide people earning more than $1 million a year with an average tax cut of $265,000, and create incentives for corporations to shift profits and jobs overseas. Additionally, the Congressional Budget Office estimated it will increase health care costs by an extra $6,359 by 2022 for future Medicare beneficiaries, while a household making between $50,000 and $100,000 would face a tax increase of at least $1,358. [H Con. Res. 34, Vote #277, 4/15/11; H Con Res 112, Vote #151, 3/29/12; Center for American Progress, 3/20/12; Center for American Progress, 3/20/12; Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, 3/27/12; Tax Policy Center, Table T12-0078 and T10-0132; Citizens for Tax Justice, 3/22/12; Joint Economic Committee, 5/20/11; Joint Economic Committee, 6/20/12]
[ *** End Of Updates *** ]
* Last week’s debate between Republican Jason Plummer, Democrat Bill Enyart and Green Party nominee Paula Bradshaw included some testy back and forth over the so-called “Ryan plan.” The Democrats are saying that Ryan’s proposal has been a “down-ballot disaster” for the GOP, and candidates are actively running away from it, including Plummer…
Enyart accused Plummer of endorsing the deep cuts in federal spending, including the privatization of Medicare, called for in the Ryan plan.
Plummer denied supporting the Ryan plan.
“Let me repeat this in front of everybody,” Plummer said. “I have never endorsed Paul Ryan’s budget. And I do not support Paul Ryan’s budget. And if you say that again you’re being dishonest to the people of Southern Illinois.”
Plummer said that if Enyart was going to be dishonest to the people of Southern Illinois “when you’re asking for their vote, what are you going to do when you’re their congressman?”
Enyart said he had seen a tape of Plummer endorsing the plan. In defending their accusation, Bresler quoted Plummer speaking in June at town hall in Alton. A video of the speech is on YouTube.
In the video, Plummer doesn’t explicitly say he endorses the plan, but said the benefits of it are “pretty obvious” and puts social security in a situation where it will be there when people are retiring. Plummer also said the negatives of the plan “are very political, to be frank.”
“That’s an endorsement,” Bresler said.
Plummer said Enyart was trying to change the topic of conversation in the campaign by “making up the story” about the Ryan plan.
“I’m sure he’s going to go out there and take something out of context and splice a video or something, but the honest truth is pretty simple,” Plummer said. “He knows I’ve never endorsed it, he knows I’ve spoken out against several different portions of the plan.”
Plummer “Thinks The Benefits Of The Ryan Plan Are Pretty Obvious.” At a June 2012 town hall, Plummer was asked if he supported the Ryan plan. He answered “The specifics of it are pretty simple. I think that the Ryan plan aggressively addresses basically every entitlement program that we have. […] I think the benefits of the Ryan plan are pretty obvious. They aggressively put Social Security in a situation where it will actually be there for people that are retiring. It puts Medicare in a situation that it will actually be there to fund the healthcare needs of the people that it’s there for. The negatives of the Ryan care are very political to be frank.”
* And here’s my transcript of Plummer’s Ryan plan comments which the DCCC and Enyart missed…
“They’re gonna have these ads where we’re dumping senior citizens over the cliff. They’re gonna talk about everything that they can possibly talk about except for the stuff that will actually solve the problems we’re facing. And so the negatives of the Ryan plan are exactly those things. They’re going to try to use the Ryan plan to defeat Republicans across this country because they’re going to turn it into something that it’s not.
“It’s not something that’s going to devastate the lives of senior citizens. It’s not something that’s gonna be destructive to American families across the 12th Congressional District. But they’re gonna try to portray it as that.
“And we need to make sure that we have people out there going, ‘You know what, don’t you want to solve the problems or do you just want to talk about the problems?’
“And I think Republicans are trying to solve the problems, and they need reinforcements in Washington, DC to make sure that gets done.”
He gets closer in that video to endorsing the Ryan plan of anything I’ve seen yet.
* I showed my transcript to Enyart’s campaign. Its response…
Yes, that last line is the best part. They need soldiers like Jason to help end Medicare
