Yes, I know that Rod Blagojevich vowed to change “business as usual” if he was elected governor. I also know that most of that change has been in the way his office describes its behavior, not in the actual behavior itself.

But the Republican belly-aching about losing coveted state jobs just because of their party affiliation is a bit hard to take when they do stuff like this:

The Sangamon County Board Tuesday named Sharmin Doering, daughter of county Republican Chairman Irv Smith, as executive director of the county’s community resources department. […]

She was among Illinois Department of Transportation employees, many of them Republicans, who were dismissed from that agency last summer. She made about $66,000 annually there and has pending litigation against the department, claiming her dismissal was politically motivated. […]

Doering said later she didn’t know how many people were interviewed for the job. Asked about her reaction if people think her father’s position led to her hiring, Doering reiterated her experience with public service, adding that she spends a lot of her free time working to save animals as a board member of the Animal Protective League.

Among her activities, she said, is leadership of an effort, working with others, to find homes for 200 cats per year that otherwise would have to be euthanized by the county.

I doubt her work saving cats had as much to do with her appointment as being Irv Smith’s daughter.

Doering, by the way, was once a member of the State Employees Retirement System board.

I don’t really have a problem with Smith helping his own kid. I do have a problem when he criticizes the other side for doing the same sort of thing. A pox on all of their houses.