* Center Square…

At a late Thursday afternoon news conference, Deputy Illinois House Republican Leader Ryan Spain and Assistant Leader Patrick Windhorst wondered how many corruption convictions would it to take for Democrats to get serious about reform at the state capitol.

“Another day, another conviction in federal court,” Spain said, adding that “cleaning up the crisis of corruption that continues to plague the state of Illinois” needs to be a top priority.

Spain and Windhorst called for Gov. J.B. Pritzker to call a special session so lawmakers can work on comprehensive ethics reform.

“How many indictments is too many .. how many guilty verdicts is it going to take to have Democrats join Republicans” in ending the culture of corruption in Springfield, Windhorst said.

* Leader Windhorst was asked at that press conference, “What specific ethics reform would address Mapes’ case of lying to a grand jury and the problems with harassment and intimidation that happened when he was chief of staff?“…

One thing that I think is clear is that Mike Madigan exerted almost absolute control over the House of Representatives. That’s done, as leader Spain referenced, because of the rules that were in place, the laws that are in place. Those things needed to be changed and reformed. Speaker Madigan had such control over Tim Mapes that, even when offered immunity, all he had to do was tell the truth and he would escape prosecution. But instead he lied. That shows the amount of control and power Speaker Madigan had.

So we have to put things into the law and make changes to our rules that will limit the power of one person. You know, there’s the saying that power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. And that’s what we’re seeing, absolute power in one man has corrupted that institution and the leadership of that institution, absolutely.

I don’t disagree that more rule changes are necessary in both chambers. I have long argued that the chamber leaders should not choose committee chairs, vice chairs and minority spokespersons. That should, in my opinion, be done by a caucus vote. I’m sure we can all think of something that could be changed.

* But Mike Madigan and Tim Mapes are long gone. That sort of velvet hammer rule no longer exists. I mean, just ask House Republican Leader Tony McCombie, who said this during the Illinois State Fair last week…

The session was complete chaos. And for the first time in decades - in decades - the Democrats didn’t have the capability to negotiate and navigate the budget and they gave up control to the Senate Democrats. Speaker Welch showed that he is the master of mismanagement.

Please pardon all transcription errors.