From the very beginning, Republican congressional candidates in moderate districts have been hesitant to embrace Donald Trump. Now, two weeks before Election Day, some of those Republicans are threatening to sue TV stations for running ads that link them to the GOP presidential nominee.
Five candidates ― Reps. Bob Dold (R-Ill.), Mike Coffman (R-Colo.), David Jolly (R-Fla.), John Katko (R-N.Y.) and Brian Fitzpatrick, a Pennsylvania Republican running for an open seat that’s currently occupied by his brother ― contend that certain commercials paid for by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee provide false or misleading information by linking them to Trump.
All five Republicans have, at some point, said they don’t support Trump. And all five have a bit of a case: The DCCC ads do use some creativity to tie them to Trump. […]
Dold demanded the removal of an ad that claimed he was privately raising money to defeat Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. The DCCC was referencing an event Dold headlined called “Beat Hillary at the Distillery.” Dold says the money only went to local candidates.
Gov. Bruce Rauner’s administration is awarding one-time bonuses worth a total of between $3 million and $4 million to non-union workers whose bosses say are doing exceptional work.
About 1,100 merit-compensation employees are in line to each receive a $3,016 bonus under the plan. […]
Rauner’s office said that left a potential pool of about 2,000 employees eligible for the bonus. In order to qualify, an employee had to receive an “exceptional” rating on his or her evaluation. Rauner’s office said about 1,100 employees got that rating. […]
Although the state is delaying payments to many organizations and vendors because of the traditional fall slowdown in tax collections, the bonus payments are being made. Rich Carter, spokesman for Comptroller Leslie Munger, said the bonus payments can’t be differentiated from regular payroll when agencies submit payroll information to the office for payment.
On the WMAY News Feed, Democrat Susana Mendoza questioned how Governor Bruce Rauner can hand out more than $3 million in bonuses at a time when the state is billions behind on its bills.
And she says Republican Comptroller Leslie Munger won’t speak out about it… because Mendoza says Munger is in Rauner’s pocket after accepting millions from the governor and his rich friends.
The most segregating school district border in the country separates Detroit and Grosse Pointe, two municipalities with a long history of inequality. The 1974 Supreme Court case Milliken v. Bradley dealt with a desegregation plan that included majority-black Detroit and its nearly all-white, suburban neighbor districts, Grosse Pointe among them. In that case, the Court held that desegregation could not be ordered across the school district lines drawn by state and local governments. In essence, the Court declared school district borders to be impenetrable, even when cross-district efforts are necessary to achieve meaningful integration.
When the case was filed in 1970, the poverty rate among all residents of Grosse Pointe was 3%. Detroit’s poverty rate was five times that. Things have only worsened since; Detroit’s poverty rate is now 7.5 times Grosse Pointe’s.
* It may surprise you to learn that the 10th most segregating school district border (out of 33,500 such borders in the entire country) is right here in Illinois between the Silvis-area Carbon Cliff Barstow School District 36 and Geneseo’s Community Unit School District 228.
To compile the list, EdBuild compared poverty rates, median property values and median household incomes between neighboring school districts. Here are some of the findings:
• Carbon Cliff-Barstow has a poverty rate of 45 percent while Geneseo has a poverty rate of 6 percent. The average rate across Illinois is 15 percent.
• The median property value in Carbon Cliff-Barstow is $96,300. In Geneseo, it is $147,000. The median for the state is $130,800.
• The median household income in Carbon Cliff-Barstow is $32,273. In Geneseo, it is $62,197. The median for the state is $57,000. […]
Geneseo is mostly white and has just a 4 percent minority population. Carbon Cliff has 10 times more minority students. […]
All third through eighth graders enrolled in Illinois public schools take the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, or PARCC, tests in the spring.
The state average showed that 29 percent of students met and 4 percent exceeded expectations; 28 percent approached, 24 percent partially met and 14 percent did not meet expectations.
In Geneseo, 30 percent met and 2 percent exceeded expectations; 34 percent approached, 24 percent partially met and 11 percent did not meet expectations.
In Carbon Cliff-Barstow, 11 percent met expectations and none exceeded expectations; 27 percent approached, 35 percent partially met and 27 percent did not meet expectations.
Originally, Chicago Board of Ethics Executive Director Steve Berlin ruled that Mayor Rahm Emanuel and any of the 50 aldermen who take advantage of the Cubs’ offer to buy playoff tickets at face value could go in their official capacity. That meant the aldermen would have to use the tickets themselves and be acknowledged by the team by having their names announced or displayed on the digital billboard in center field.
The new policy would only allow aldermen to buy the tickets at face value if they performed a “ceremonial duty” such as throwing out the first pitch, marching onto the field with other officials or making a speech. […]
The city bans public officials from accepting gifts worth more than $50. Since the tickets to the World Series are selling for thousands of dollars, accepting the tickets at face value would violate that provision of the city’s ethics code.
If the Cubs had offered aldermen tickets at face value, and any aldermen accepted, it could have triggered fines between $1,000 and $5,000.
The Cubs have since withdrawn their offer of face value tickets.
* The Question: Do you agree with this new city ethics policy? Take the poll and then explain your answer in comments, please.
Dan Proft will tell you he was “one of the more despised people” on his college campus.
Since then, he’s been dubbed everything from a “bad apple” to a “carnival barker” by fellow Republican operatives.
So who is the one-time gubernatorial primary candidate and conservative radio show host, and why is he behind an influential super PAC that receives millions from big-name donors like shipping magnate Richard Uihlein and Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner?
Proft’s Liberty Principles super PAC has become a chief conduit for allies of Rauner to influence legislative races across the state without any restrictions.
Super PACs are allowed to accept unlimited sums of money that they can use to campaign for or against candidates — as long as they don’t coordinate with candidates themselves. Unlike Super PACs, most other campaign fundraising committees in Illinois have contribution limits.
* One of the complaints that I regularly hear about Proft’s TV ads is that they’re so cheaply made. He doesn’t put much money into content, so a lot of them look like ads created for small businesses in Downstate media markets. Like this one, for instance…
That announcer sounds like somebody right out of Decatur TV.
I suppose, however, that one could say the amateur look of the ads helps them stand out. Everything else is so darned slick these days.
* Several campaign professionals have mocked this Proft spot, which is now running on Chicago broadcast TV…
It’s the exact opposite of slick. Maybe it’s so unslick that people turn off the message. Then again, I once bought a chair from This Is It Furniture because of the store’s “Where you always get a free onion” TV ads.
There’s a slight problem with the woman’s wardrobe. It’s not her fault, at all, but some people have a real pet peeve about that sort of thing and the director or somebody in the production staff should’ve caught it.
I long ago realized - to my chagrin, since I have a face and body far more suited for radio - that one thing out of place during a TV interview can completely distract viewers from what you’re trying to say. That’s even more true in the age of high definition television.
* So the cheapness of Proft’s ads may work against his message because people have come to expect higher quality in campaign spots.
But some of them stand out for me because they’re the opposite of slick. I kinda like that approach, which should be obvious by looking at this website. I don’t utilize the services of million-dollar consultants. And yet it still somehow works.
There are costs and benefits of re-electing incumbents vs. sending newcomers. If re-electing an incumbent in your district means continuing to empower Madigan, think twice. If it means giving Madigan a supermajority that can ram through budgets that spend beyond Illinois’ means, think thrice. If it means letting Madigan override gubernatorial vetoes to curry favor with special interest groups, think some more. If it means helping Madigan block reforms that even his own Democratic members support, think about sending a new representative to the Illinois House.
Voters have indicated they want term limits, in part to oust politicians such as Madigan. We don’t have term limits in Illinois because he won’t allow the issue to come to a vote.
So if you’re among those who want to oust him as speaker, there is only one way to do it. You have to end the relationship with lawmakers such as Deb Conroy of Villa Park and Michelle Mussman of Schaumburg and Sam Yingling of Grayslake who have strong and capable Republicans running against them.
Breaking up is hard to do. But prolonging and enduring the dismal status quo of Illinois government is harder.
* This quote is by “a GOP operative with knowledge of Rauner’s political operation who asked for anonymity”…
“If Trump is 17, 25 points down, I don’t know how we do in these [state legislative] races. In a presidential year, we normally wouldn’t have an opportunity. We think that Mike Madigan is the great equalizer.”
Gov. Bruce Rauner has pushed off an impending and potentially budget busting day of reckoning to resolve a toxic 2003 state bond deal—to the day after the fall 2018 election in which the Republican is expected to seek a second term.
The governor had been facing a November 27 deadline to renew letters of credit that back the safety of investing in the $600 million bond issue, a procedure fraught with unusual difficulty because of the state’s prolonged budget standoff and fiscal crisis. Expiration of the letters threatened to trigger a termination of bank agreements and require an accelerated repayment of the bonds that could cost as much as $1 billion.
But under a recently announced agreement, four banks will acquire and hold the debt until November 7, 2018. Interest and fees will be close to the current rate of 6.79 percent, according to a senior Rauner administration official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
“Given the state’s credit rating and financial condition, we got a good deal,” the official said.
That buys time to come up with alternative financing schemes to mitigate financial pain, but absent that the state could still find itself in a similar bind when the new agreement with banks expires on Nov. 7, 2018, according to a supplement to the state’s most recent bond offering document.
That date, coming one day after the next election for governor, carries significance for a political leader who has often chastised opponents for putting off tough decisions.
In June 2015, Rauner criticized Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s pension reform proposal as a “kick-the-can-down-the-road approach.” And during budget negotiations in May, he called on lawmakers to stay focused, stay disciplined and “don’t kick the can.”
Saqib Bhatti, a policy analyst at the Roosevelt Institute, a liberal-leaning think tank, said Rauner’s administration also now seems to be entering delay mode on resolving problems with the bond deal rather than confronting them directly.
“They’re kicking the can down to the end of the governor’s term where it may not be his problem,” said Bhatti.
The senior administration official said the expiration coming a day after the 2018 election is merely a coincidence. Two years is standard for these types of deals. “We would have gone longer if we could get three or four years,” the official said.
The union’s Marc Poulos, who heads the Fight Back Fund, says the amendment merely would require that money raised for transportation go toward transportation. Some groups like the Metropolitan Planning Council agree.
But according to Chicago Budget Director Alex Holt, the city might lose discretion over at least $250 million a year in local taxes—not counting the $49 million it gets annually in state gas taxes. (Poulos confirms that’s the case.) That money gets used for many things, including libraries, she says. At the same time, it’s not certain that expenditures for snow removal, streetlights and other items would be eligible under the proposed amendment. “The language just isn’t clear,” Holt says.
The folks at the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning raise other concerns. Though Wisconsin and other states have adopted “lockbox” amendments in recent years, the Illinois version fails to specify planning as a qualified cost, gives little attention to increasingly important intermodal transportation and makes roadwork a higher priority over transit work, according to the agency. It’s also unclear how passage would affect state capital bond issues that depend on various revenue streams.
There was a time when Personal PAC, the women’s reproductive rights political action committee, included 17 Republicans in the Illinois House and six in the Senate among those supporting access to birth control and abortion.
The late Republican state Rep. Rosemary Mulligan of Des Plaines was one of the committee’s biggest advocates and even vacationed in France with Personal PAC President Terry Cosgrove, a Morton Grove native.
Personal PAC still considers itself bipartisan, and moderate Republicans still exist. But Cosgrove says increasing partisanship in state politics and a spike in the amount spent on races mean that, for the first time, the PAC counts no Republicans among those publicly supporting its mission.
Cosgrove’s PAC plans to spend more than $1.5 million on 18 legislative races. Eleven are in the suburbs.
Among those Cosgrove says will be getting up to $250,000 in funding: Democratic state senators Melinda Bush of Grayslake, Tom Cullerton of Villa Park and Laura Murphy of Des Plaines, and state representatives Sam Yingling of Round Lake Beach, Deb Conroy of Villa Park and Michelle Mussman of Schaumburg.
Judging from recent political advertisements which clog my mailbox each and every day, I am so glad that I did not decide to run for public office this year.
If I had run for office, I can just see the bold headlines that would appear under the worst photo of me that they could find:
• He pocketed over $1 million in taxpayer dollars!
• He socialized with convicted murderers, rapists and known drug dealers!
• He accepted free meals, free office space, and free parking all at taxpayer expense!
• He took orders from four notorious convicted felons!
And all of these statements are true! However, the opposition would conveniently leave out a few other pertinent facts:
1) Yes, I worked for the Illinois Department of Corrections for 32 years. (That $1 million spread out over 32 years comes to an average of $31,250 per year.)
2) I did have a case load of murderers, rapists and drug dealers with whom I interacted on a daily basis.
3) Yes, my lunches, parking, and office space were “given” to me free of charge.
4) As a state employee, I did follow the orders given to me by Governors Kerner, Walker, Ryan and Blagojevich, all four of which went on to serve prison terms.
Like so many ads, they contain a truthful statement which becomes horribly twisted when taken out of context.
That’s not far off the mark. He might have a future in politics.
* When you’re a House Speaker with a statewide approval rating somewhere in the 20s and all of your candidates are getting tied directly to you with millions of dollars in advertising, your only play is to drag the other side as far down into the muck as possible.
And when you’re a governor with an approval rating somewhere in the 30s and a presidential candidate imploding before your very eyes, your only play is to depress the other side’s vote as much as you can by dragging the other side as far down into the muck as possible.
In the 117th House District race, incumbent John Bradley, a Democrat from Marion, as well as his Republican opponent Dave Severin of Benton, have been hit with these sex offender ads. One of the ads against Severin opens with a woman named Julie Yana speaking into the camera.
“I’ve worked with sex offenders for over 14 years. I don’t feel a child ever recovers from being a victim of a sexual predator,” she says as a picture flashes of a young girl comforting a younger child with a stuffed animal between them, both with sad looks on their faces. Then a picture of Dave Severin’s face flashes on the screen.
“The sexual predator is very much a danger in everyone’s community,” continues Yana. “I would not feel safe for Dave Severin being a state representative for this area.” Yana then goes on to explain her reason, that Severin is against funding to track sex offenders and owns a business that hired a sex offender.
Yana declined comment to the newspaper. According to the Department of Human Service’s website, Yana is an administrative assistant at Choate Mental Health and Developmental Center in Anna. She also is president of a local chapter of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the labor union representing most state workers. […]
Severin vowed to rise above the fray. But it wasn’t long after his letter that an ad paid for by the Republican Party began airing on local networks against Bradley portraying him as sympathetic to sex offenders as well. A spokesman for Severin said the candidate wasn’t wasn’t aware that Republican Party officials had created that ad and asked that it be removed. But it continued to run for days after that.
As described in a column by Rich Miller, publisher of the Capitol Fax newsletter, that ad opens with footage of a Chicago anchorman saying, “Federal prosecutors now accusing a former state representative of possession child pornography.” A photo then flashes of former state Rep. Keith Farnham and a narrator says, “Unspeakable abuse from a Springfield Democrat.” In 2014, Farnham, of Elgin, resigned from office and pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography.
Footage of Rep. Bradley then appears on the screen and an announcer says, “But as Madigan’s top lieutenant in Democrat leadership, John Bradley stood by as the predator committed heinous crimes on his state computer.
“The sex assault victim was an infant,” the anchorman says, and the commercial closes with the narrator saying that Bradley wrote “a check to the predator’s campaign just to strengthen Madigan’s power. Cowardice so despicable you have to wonder, how does John Bradley sleep at night?”
Among a multitude of contributions Bradley has made over the years, he did give $1,000 to Farnham, but that was three years before Farnham’s arrest, according to Miller. “Nobody had a clue what was going on with Farnham back then,” Miller, a longtime observer of Illinois politics, wrote in his column.
You should go read the whole thing because the premise of the story is whether legislators from the two parties in southern Illinois can ever patch up their differences after this campaign season is over.
I would just say this about the premise: If you want to polarize legislators so that they stick together along party lines during a long, protracted and bitter war, there’s no better way to do that than by doing this sort of stuff.
With little more than two weeks until Election Day, Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner’s personal investment in eroding the ranks of legislative Democrats led by House Speaker Michael Madigan has grown to nearly $46 million, state campaign finance records show.
The massive influx of cash represents the election-year battle lines playing out in Illinois after more than a year of fighting between Rauner, the first-term governor, and Madigan, the nation’s longest-serving speaker, over the future of the state.
Democrats hold supermajorities in the House and Senate and have been able to stymie Rauner’s economic agenda, which calls for changes in laws that would weaken traditional Democratic allies in organized labor and among workers’ compensation attorneys. The Democrats’ refusal to move on those issues led to a lengthy budget stalemate, which culminated in a temporary spending plan that expires Jan. 1. […]
All told, Rauner, his family and his campaign fund have doled out $45.8 million in political contributions this year. Of the $29 million the Illinois Republican Party has raised this year, nearly $21 million has come from Rauner and $4 million this month through Durkin’s campaign fund.
* But the Illinois Republican Party disputes that story…
“Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner’s personal investment in eroding the ranks of legislative Democrats led by House Speaker Michael Madigan has grown to nearly $46 million.”
FACT CHECK:
1. Since the day after the 2014 election, Bruce Rauner has made $31,574,500 in political contributions to various campaign entities. Additionally, at the end of third quarter, nearly $5 million remained in the Citizens for Rauner campaign account.
2. Meanwhile, Mike Madigan Democratic legislative candidates have schemed to raise over $56 million.
HOW IT WORKS:
To calculate Democratic fundraising, many news outlets simply look at how much the Democratic Party of Illinois has raised during the quarter and report that figure. The problem with this type of analysis is that Democratic legislative candidates typically receive campaign funds that never pass through the Democratic party campaign committee itself.
How does Democratic fundraising work in reality?
House:
Mike Madigan controls four interconnected campaign funds. This money can be distributed to campaigns in unlimited amounts. Madigan currently has an estimated $13.5 million stored in these funds.
Madigan also uses over 20 select House members in uncompetitive districts as “piggy banks” to store cash. Madigan has primarily funded House candidates by directing these “piggy banks” to transfer money directly to targeted races.
For example, Reps. Anna Moeller, Marty Moylan, Kathleen Willis each transferred out half a million dollars to Democrats in competitive house districts over the last quarter. These transfers have accelerated in recent days.
Additionally, Democratic House members spent much of 2015 receiving large contributions from trial lawyers, special interests, and unions – even if they had no opponent.
The result of this is that most of the Democrats’ spending never passes through the Democratic Party of Illinois or its related campaign funds.
So how much money do the House Democrats have to spend on 2016?
The answer – at least $41 million. This is the sum total of the money that targeted house candidates have raised this cycle, the money Madigan currently has in his accounts, and the money the Democrats have stored in “piggy banks” and other house accounts.
This is a low ball estimate for Democratic spending capabilities, since it does not include any money that outside groups, trial lawyers, special interests, and unions still plan to contribute.
Raised by Targeted Democratic House Candidates this Cycle: $16.6 million
+ Remaining in Madigan’s Four Funds – Estimated $13.5 million
+ Remaining in Non Competitive Democratic House Candidates: $11.5 million
= Minimum House Democratic Spending Capacity: $41.6 million
Senate:
Senate Democrats also have raised much of their money outside the party structure, mostly from trial lawyers, special interests, and unions. So far, targeted Democratic Senate candidates have raised $10.3 million. But John Cullerton still has $4.5 million in the funds he controls. Cullerton relies significantly more than Madigan on coalescing campaign contributions into his committee, Senate Democratic Victory Fund. The Senate Democrats have at least $14.8 million to spend on 2016.
This is again a low ball estimate, since it does not include any money that outside groups, trial lawyers, special interests, and unions still plan to contribute.
Raised by Targeted Democratic Senate Candidates this Cycle: $10.3 million
+ Remaining in Cullerton’s Three Funds: Estimated $4.5 million
=
Minimum Senate Democratic Spending Capacity: $14.8 Million
Democratic House candidate John Bartman was appointed to the ballot in July when Rep. Jack Franks (D-Marengo) dropped out of the race to run for McHenry County Board chairman. Bartman is not getting help from the House Democrats, who appear to have all but conceded.
Rep. Franks’ district is solidly Republican. President Barack Obama lost it by 8 points four years ago. Franks has been able to win it because, well, he’s Jack Franks. He talks a good Republican line back home and takes some high-profile votes against his own party. Bartman is no Jack Franks.
Even so, the Republicans say they want to “drown” any possible chance that Bartman may have, particularly in a year like this. So, they’ve launched a negative cable TV blitz, with similar ads on radio and in the mail. As of October 21, Republican candidate Steven Reick had reported $187,000 in contributions since October 1st, which is about $65,000 more than he and the Republicans spent in this district during the entire third quarter.
“You can always judge a person by who their friends are,” the spot begins. “Take John Bartman, a hand-picked 2003 IDOT patronage hire of disgraced Gov. Rod Blagojevich, and chosen political tool of Mike Madigan. Under Speaker Madigan’s watchful eye, Barman will be forced to raise your property taxes to fuel more wasteful government spending for his political boss. You pay more and Bartman will side with his boss.”
As we’ve discussed before, the Republicans truly believe they have found the magic elixir this year by constantly invoking the horribly unpopular Speaker Madigan’s name.
GOP Rep. Dwight Kay, for instance, was quoted in the Belleville News Democrat last week as saying: “The first thing we need to do to get the budget balanced is to see that Mike Madigan goes home.”
That’s a pretty tall order, but if it works electorally and the Republicans hold onto their incumbents like Kay and pick up some Democratic seats, they’ll undoubtedly say that Madigan has become so toxic to his own members that it’s time for him to go.
Some of the Republican ads I’ve seen this year mention Madigan’s name even when it’s not particularly relevant to the ads’ messaging. Perhaps the inclusion gives the attack added weight because Madigan is so unpopular. It’s also likely designed to keep the Republican “theme” going regardless of content. But I have also come to suspect it’s being done so they can claim that they used Madigan in almost all of their negative ads and that’s why they prevailed over the Democrats.
And, hey, if it doesn’t work, well, just look at Gov. Rauner’s comments throughout the summer and fall for a preview of what they’ll say the day after the election.
The governor has repeatedly pointed to Madigan’s “undemocratic” legislative district map, which he says has “rigged” the election against the Republicans. You gotta figure he’ll use that as his excuse if Madigan comes out on top, as well as infinite references to Donald Trump’s expected miserable performance.
But, wait. Aren’t quite a few pundits saying that Trump’s repeated refrain that the election will be rigged hurting him further by depressing his base of support?
They could be right, but Gov. Rauner has added a twist.
“We’ve got a system that is rigged,” Rauner told WAND TV’s Doug Wolfe in late August.
But then he did something that Trump isn’t doing. He talked about a solution.
“We’ve got gerrymandered districts that are shaped like spaghetti noodles in many cases designed to protect incumbents.” So, Rauner said, to fix this, Illinoisans need to support reforms, like redistricting and term limits.
And whenever Rauner says this, he adds that the best way to get those reforms is to elect more people who will work with him, mainly Republicans. And the worst thing to do is to vote for anyone associated with his arch enemy Speaker Madigan.
So, what Rauner is doing is quite clever. He uses Trump’s inflammatory rhetoric without all that “nasty” Trump baggage.
Of course, if Trump does unintentionally depress his own base, that would be really bad news for Rauner, who is counting on that base to turn out and vote his way—which is one reason why he won’t say anything that directly criticizes Trump.
What’s that old saying about the best-laid plans?
Jack Franks the Democrat was able to avoid defeat for 18 years in a Republican district, which makes Rauner’s argument about redistricting reform look just a little silly. The point is, though, strange things happen in politics. Stay tuned.
And the “strange things” admonition is exactly why the Republicans are spending money on what should be a surefire winning district in McHenry County.
[Bumped up from Friday to Monday for visibility and comments opened.]
* Gov. Bruce Rauner and his wife Diana have contributed $9 million to House Republican Leader Jim Durkin’s campaign fund. Ken Griffin contributed another $3 million to Leader Durkin. Click here to see the disclosures.
Griffin, the state’s wealthiest man and a major Rauner ally, gave another $2 million to Comptroller Leslie Munger this evening. Click here.
Statement from Susana Mendoza, Democratic nominee for Illinois State Comptroller regarding Comptroller Leslie Munger receiving MILLIONS from Governor Rauner and his billionaire friends
“This is an overwhelming lack of independence for a constitutional office holder. Comptroller Munger is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Governor’s office. Governor Rauner, whom Comptroller Munger should be serving as a checks and balance to, has now given her a $1 million buyout check to his self-proclaimed wingman, and just two of his friends have now given her $7 million. By shamelessly accepting any of these funds, she has demonstrated her utter lack of independence and complete reliance on her political sponsor. The only way for Leslie Munger to keep the constitutionally mandated independence of the Comptroller’s office and not subvert the state constitution in the eyes of the voters is to give back this $1 million takeover bid from Governor Rauner and the $7 million from his two billionaire buddies. The comptroller’s office should not be for sale.”
Well, that’s a first — a major party candidate running for statewide office who does not respond to invitations to interview or to share her issue positions, even ignoring direct appeals from local party officials intervening on this newspaper’s behalf.
So it is with Tammy Duckworth, Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate, who with her conspicuous absences here in both the primary and general elections, has given us every indication she intends to be the U.S. senator of Cook County, not of Illinois. In our experience, if you don’t even see a candidate during a campaign, when they need something — votes, with their very livelihood depending on them — the odds go up considerably that you won’t lay eyes on them once they’re safely seated.
Duckworth, 48, of suburban Hoffman Estates, is a two-term congresswoman with a compelling personal story — she lost both legs in an attack while serving her country in Iraq in 2004 — but she has done little to earn the Peoria area’s support. She’s made but a handful of quickie visits over the last couple of years — two of them in Labor Day parades — in which her engagement with potential voters can generously be described as limited.
On the issues, she falls short in two major areas critical to central Illinois’ economy. She is not a free trader, which is not good news for export-benefiting farmers or for major employers/manufacturers such as Caterpillar. A lot of jobs are tied to such trade. It goes without saying that Illinois is a major farm state, which shines a very bright light on the low mark given Duckworth by the American Farm Bureau; she tied for lowest in the Illinois congressional delegation in 2014.
Duckworth is a viable candidate who’s leading the polls, but bottom line, we’ve never met her and her no-show automatically forfeits this newspaper’s endorsement.
A 48-year-old Murphysboro man has been charged with intimidation and resisting a peace officer in connection with an alleged threat on Monday to burn items inside the Republican Committee Office in Murphysboro.
Robin Leon Little was charged with one count of intimidation, a Class 3 felony; one count of resisting a peace officer, a Class A misdemeanor; and one count of disorderly conduct, a Class C misdemeanor, according to a news release from Jackson County State’s Attorney Michael C. Carr. Little was taken into custody on Monday.
According to court documents filed by Carr, Little communicated to Teresa Easton that he would burn items inside the Republican Committee Office, at 1332 Walnut St.
When Sgt. Timothy Legere tried to arrest Little, he ran from the officer and “then struggled and fought with the officer,” according to the complaint.
Jackson County Republican Chairperson Gloria Campos claims Little was pounding his fists on the walls of the headquarters, and making physical threats toward Illinois State Representative Terri Bryant (R) Murphysboro, and U.S. Congressman Mike Bost (R) Murphysboro. […]
Three days after Little was arrested, officials are calling a fire “suspicious” after it burned a Department of Human Services office just up the road from the republican headquarters.
The building houses the DHS office, as well as the offices of Bryant, and State Senator David Luechtefeld (R) Okawville.
Roberts says that as of October 20th, investigators have not confirmed any correlation between the two incidents.
The fire is considered ’suspicious’ according to Manko, but Roberts says there is currently no indication of political motivation.
*** UPDATE *** Twitter appears to be accessible again, as is Constant Contact, which handles my subscriber e-mails. The afternoon edition has just been sent.
Someone attacked a key part of the Internet’s infrastructure Friday morning, causing some major services such as Twitter, Spotify and Airbnb to be inaccessible for some users.
The attack targeted Dyn, a company that helps people connect to websites, with a huge amount of traffic in an attempt to knock the service offline, according to Dyn’s director of internet analysis, Doug Madory. The digital assault appears to have started around 7:30 a.m. ET, and Dyn said it was resolved at roughly 9:20 a.m.
The service Dyn provides is called the Domain Name System. It works sort of like a phone book for the Internet - it translates URLs into the numerical IP addresses for the servers that actually host sites so your browser can connect to them.
This type of attack is commonly known as a distributed denial of service, or DDoS attack. The effects of the attack were intermittent, and many of the details remain scarce, although it appears to have primarily affected users on the East Coast, according to Dyn.
The initial attack came at 7:10 Eastern time, lasted about two hours and then started again around noon. I can still pull up Twitter on my phone, but I can’t get to it to load on my desktop as I write this.
Is it possible this is the latest from the Mirai botnet? Mirai, if you’re unfamiliar, was a botnet that used unsecured devices in the internet of things – printers, coffee machines, IP cameras, open Linux computers and the like – to send an unprecedented 620 Gbps of data at security researcher Brian Krebs’ website. We talked to hackers following that attack and, now that the Mirai code is open sourced, learned that these sorts of threats are only going to continue and increase in size.
“Once they’ve been hijacked, the devices can be switched from sending normal amounts of data to and from your computer, to sending massive amounts of data at a single target,” I explained in my report about DDoS attacks this month. ” Ultimately, the traffic from hundreds or thousands of these devices can exceed the throughput available to a website or a service, denying additional requests access.”
After the attack on Krebs’ website, the code used to build the botnet leaked online, making more massive DDoS attacks all but inevitable. Although it’s not clear yet whether an IoT botnet is behind the attack on Dyn, it certainly would not be surprising.
“The size of these DDoS attacks has increased so much lately thanks largely to the broad availability of tools for compromising and leveraging the collective firepower of so-called Internet of Things devices — poorly secured Internet-based security cameras, digital video recorders (DVRs) and Internet routers,” Krebs said today.
What all these connected devices have in common is the existence of security vulnerabilities caused by a flawed software design or gross negligence on the part of their manufacturers that all often use the same factory passwords for all their devices, OVH said in a recent post about the attack on its networks.
“While our internal investigation (which is still ongoing) has identified close to 145,000 infected connected devices as the source of the recent attacks, network service provider Level3 has recently assessed their number at more than a million,” according to OVH. “So we’re only at the beginning of the problem, not to mention the fact that Internet connection rates are constantly growing, notably due to the ever-increasing availability of VDSL, SDSL, and fiber optics.”
Ugh.
* So, why is this relevant to us? Well, I’m hearing and reading about how some tech types are growing worried that this sort of attack could be launched against election authorities on November 8th.
A massive hit like this wouldn’t alter the results, but it could delay the results from being posted online for several hours or even a few days.
(S)ometimes just casting a vote for Madigan isn’t enough. That’s what state Rep. Helen Satterthwaite, D-Champaign, found out in 1989.
Madigan easily won the speakership again in 1989 by a vote of 67-51. Satterthwaite was one of those 67 votes. But in casting her vote for Madigan, she offered an explanation for the record:
Mr. Secretary, in explaining my vote, I want to indicate that there are many of my constituents who have indicated to me that they feel that I should not support Mike Madigan for reelection as Speaker of the House. In fact, many of their comments have been down right unflattering both to him and to me for supporting him. They feel that he really has not recognized the dire situation that our educational system is in across the State of Illinois and the impact upon that system of inadequate funding. I’m sensitive to those concerns of my constituents. Yet, I am casting my vote today for Speaker Madigan in the hope that during these next two years of legislative action, we will be able to change that image of Mike Madigan. I certainly hope, Mike, that we can entice you by invitation to come to spend some time in District l03 so that you can get to better understand our viewpoint on the problems that we see created by a lack of a strong educational system and support for that system and that we can have the opportunity to try to better understand your point of view as well. Please don’t let us down, Mike. We look to you for the Leadership out of this dilemma. I cast my vote for Mike Madigan.
At the time, Satterthwaite chaired the Higher Education Committee and was vice chair of the Elementary and Secondary Education Committee. By the time 1991 rolled around, she had been stripped of those leadership roles. And by 1993 she was out of the Illinois House altogether.
* Um, actually, Satterthwaite was elevated by Madigan to the position of Assistant House Majority Leader. House leaders back then usually didn’t hold onto their committee chairmanships when they were moved up the ladder.
And Satterthwaite didn’t lose her 1992 reelection bid because of Madigan. Instead, the new Republican-drawn map put her into a district with a GOP incumbent. From a 1991 Tribune story called “Top Democrats To Be Squeezed By GOP Remap”…
Reps. Grace Mary Stern, John Matijevich, Michael Rotello, Geoffrey Obrzut, Michael Curran and Helen Satterthwaite are in Republican-leaning districts with GOP incumbents. Satterthwaite and Matijevich are also among Madigan`s assistant majority leaders.
* IDNR went downhill fast under Rod Blagojevich. Pat Quinn signed a license fee increase into law to stem the carnage, but the decline continued. And the impasse has just made everything worse…
Illinois has neglected a state park at Carlyle Lake so badly that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is ending its lease with the state and taking back the property.
The Corps of Engineers, in a press release, said it’s terminating a lease with the state and taking back South Shore State Park.
“Due to several years of reduced budgets by the state of Illinois and lack of maintenance, the South Shore State Park facilities have become degraded, resulting in unsafe conditions and minimal useable recreation facilities,” the Corps of Engineers stated in a press release. “As a result, the Corps of Engineers has terminated the lease and closed the area to allow for work to be completed to make the area safe for public access. A portion of the area is scheduled to reopen in 2017.” […]
“The intent was for the state to provide recreation opportunities to the public,” Taylor said Friday. “Obviously, the state has had budget issues, and they haven’t been able to maintain the park, which led to a lack of opportunities and unsafe conditions. Based on that, and the noncompliance with the standards of the lease, it was terminated.”
On p.2 of its Weekly Credit Outlook for Public Finance released late yesterday (attached), Moody’s notes the recent announcement by the State of Illinois (rated Baa2/negative outlook) warning of possible delays in monthly pension contributions in the current fiscal year is credit negative, and could prompt the state’s underfunded retirement plans to sell assets to pay retiree benefits. Such delays would most likely affect state contributions in November, when tax revenues are typically caught in a seasonal slowdown.
Illinois has the lowest rating and the largest unfunded pension liabilities of any state. The adjusted net pension liability (ANPL) of the state’s five plans (covering teachers, state employees, Illinois public university employees, state judges and members of the legislature) total about $193 billion. This unfunded liability is 437% of the state’s own source revenues, compared with a US median of 85%. Illinois’ ANPL will keep rising because the state pays less than the “tread-water” amount that covers current-year benefit accruals and interest on existing net liabilities. Deferral of state contributions, and the possible resulting asset sales to pay retiree benefits, would likely exacerbate this trend.
Meeting the tread-water contribution standard would require a significant hike in actual state pension payments (about 44% based on fiscal 2015 data). Pension contributions are the state’s primary source of budget stress. In the fiscal year that began July 1, the state’s pension contributions are almost $7.9 billion, or almost $660 million on a monthly basis. Most of that, about $600 million per month, is paid through the state general funds. The top-priority general fund monthly commitment, paying debt service on the state’s general obligation bonds, only amounted to about $190 million in October. Despite the lack of a full budget in the current and preceding fiscal years, Illinois’ pension funding statute (Public Act 88-0593) contains a continuing appropriation for pension contributions.
The state’s backlog of unpaid bills reached $9.9 billion on October 19, according to the Illinois comptroller’s office, which seeks to identify high-priority needs, such as bills requiring 30-day processing to meet federal reimbursement requirements. Monthly pension contributions do not fall into a high-priority category, because under statute they can be made up later in the fiscal year.
JOHN BRADLEY: I’m honored to be a part of this celebration of the institution of the House of Representatives. Its constitutional integrity as a political body, and its historical place as a co-equal branch of government. And most importantly, to second the nomination of “the man” Michael J. Madigan, who in our time in history has protected this institution, its sovereignty, and its independence. Benjamin Franklin, constitutional delegate and Speaker of the Pennsylvania Assembly said of the institution of the House of Representatives, “they are of the people, and return again to the people to mix with the people, having no more durable preeminence than the different grains of sand in an hour glass. Such an assembly cannot easily become dangerous to liberty. They are the servants of the people, sent together to do the people’s business and promote the public welfare. Their powers must be sufficient, or their duties cannot be performed.”
Speaker Madigan, as delegate to our Illinois constitutional convention, as our Speaker and a student of history, recognizes our duties and our need for strength to protect democracy and as a check to the other branches of government.
When this body has come under attack, Speaker Madigan has fiercely led our constitutionally appointed duties and so secured our independence.
Pope Francis recently expressed what a public servant should be. “Every man, every woman, who has to take up the service of government must ask themselves two questions. Do I love my people in order to better serve them? Am I humble, and do I listen to everybody, to diverse opinions, in order to choose the best path? If you don’t ask those questions, your government will not be good. Speaker Madigan embodies this. He listens, and although there isn’t always agreement, he respects the institution and all of its members. And we know that both sides, both sides, have a strong leader who will protect this institution, protect this house. I stand in second to the nomination of Speaker Michael J. Madigan as speakers of the 99th General Assembly of the Illinois House of Representatives.
“Mike Madigan has managed to suck all of the life, energy and money out of this state, to the extent that we are now bankrupt,” [Rep. Dwight Kay (R-Glen Carbon)] said. “We’re penniless. In my view, he needs to go, and we need to hit the restart button in Illinois. Mike Madigan is a roadblock to bipartisanship.” […]
“The first thing we need to do to get the budget balanced is to see that Mike Madigan goes home,” Kay said.
Sensing the disdain in Southern Illinois for the Springfield brawl between Gov. Bruce Rauner and Democratic House Speaker Michael Madigan, both Rep. Dan Beiser and his challenger, Wood River Township Supervisor Mike Babcock, are distancing themselves from “Chicago politicians” and attempting to appeal to voters in District 111 through what they believe are sensible approaches to government.
“The middle-class families of the metro-east are under assault from Chicago politicians and a governor who is seeking to drive down the wages of workers and decimate the programs that many folks rely on,” Beiser wrote in response to a BND questionnaire.
Babcock made a similar attempt to cast blame for the Illinois budget crisis, in which the state has gone for more than a year without funding for a variety of services, but put the emphasis on Democrats.
“I want to protect our families from the reckless tax-and-spend policies of Mike Madigan,” Babcock wrote in response to the questionnaire.
Democratic incumbent state Sen. Laura Murphy and Republican challenger Mel Thillens fended off accusations from one another about being beholden to party leaders and special interests during a public debate in Des Plaines.
The campaign for the 28th Senate district seat has grown in visibility in recent weeks with TV commercials, radio spots and mailers funded by party money and super PACs.
During a debate Wednesday night at Des Plaines City Hall, Murphy criticized Thillens for receiving “dark money” from Liberty Principles PAC, which released a commercial last week claiming House Speaker Mike Madigan has helped fund Murphy’s campaign. Murphy said she hasn’t received “one cent” from Madigan or the Democratic Party of Illinois, of which he is chairman, and her campaign filed a cease-and-desist order to have the commercial taken off the airwaves.
A look at Murphy’s most recent campaign finance filings shows no direct contributions from Madigan or the campaign funds he controls, though it shows contributions from other Democratic House members. Proft tells me he’s standing by the ads. “We won’t cease and desist telling the truth about Laura Murphy,” he says.
The latest data shows the number of unemployed Illinois residents is at its lowest since September of 2007.
But officials with Governor Bruce Rauner’s administration say Illinois is still lagging when it comes to job growth.
Illinois Department of Employment Security spokesman Bob Gough says the state has nearly 40 thousand fewer jobs than peak employment, in pre-recession fall 2011.
“When you look at the dichotomy we have in Illinois, the Chicago metro, say, is doing better than downstate Illinois. But even that growth is anemic when you compare it to other major metros,” Gough said Thursday.
Since [Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel] admitted a code of silence existed in the Police Department in December there have been at least four attempts to depose the mayor as part of federal civil rights lawsuits alleging police misconduct, according to court papers and records obtained through the Freedom of Information Act.
Each case is different, but the reason those lawyers want to depose Emanuel is the same: to prove their client has a valid “Monell claim” in court that allows people to seek cash damages from the city for the actions of employees which, in these cases, are police officers.
To do that, civil rights attorneys must prove in court that city officials, including Emanuel, knew of the existence of a policy, custom or practice that effectively permitted the misconduct alleged in a civil rights lawsuit.
City Hall lawyers have actively fought to stop the boss from being forced to answer questions about the culture of lying to cover up misconduct in the Police Department. […]
In a federal case involving allegations that an intoxicated cop accidentally shot a boy in the head, city attorneys argued that Emanuel shouldn’t be deposed because the mayor is “not a policymaker for the city,” according to court papers.
Republican U.S. Sen. Mark Kirk was outraised by more than 3-to-1 this summer by Democratic challenger U.S. Rep. Tammy Duckworth, federal campaign paperwork showed Thursday.
Kirk reported raising nearly $1.2 million for re-election bid from July through September, compared with $4.1 million for Duckworth during the same time period.
Kirk had more than $3.1 million in July but spent almost $3 million during the third quarter, leaving him with nearly $1.4 million to start the home stretch this month. Duckworth had more than three times that amount of cash at the beginning of October at $4.3 million.
Duckworth has now outraised Kirk over five consecutive quarters, including the April-through-June period this year when she raised $2.7 million to just more than $1 million for Kirk.
This is Barack Obama. I want to take a minute to tell you why I believe so strongly that Tammy Duckworth is the right person to fill my old Senate seat.
Tammy knows what’s important to our families. That’s because she’s walked in our shoes. Her father worked in a factory, so Tammy has a real plan to help rebuild American manufacturing by rewarding companies that create jobs here.
Tammy worked her way through college with the help of Pell Grants and student loans. So she hasn’t just embraced my plan for free community college in the future, she wants to allow students to refinance their loans to make college affordable now.
And she’s the only candidate to offer a genuine criminal justice reform plan to make sure the system works for everyone.
It matters who we choose to represent us in Washington. So join me. Vote for Tammy Duckworth, a terrific leader who will never stop fighting for all of us.
Jak Tichenor, whose journalism career with WSIU Public Broadcasting spanned nearly 34 years, will become interim director of Southern Illinois University Carbondale’s Paul Simon Public Policy Institute on Nov. 1.
He will replace David Yepsen, who is retiring at the end of this month after leading the institute for the past seven years. The university will conduct a national search for a permanent director. […]
“Our granddaughter was born with spina bifida, making it very difficult for her to walk,” Tichenor said. “One of the bills that Paul passed while in the Illinois General Assembly required children with disabilities to be able to attend public schools like every other child in the state. He did it here in Illinois and he did it later in Congress. Paul once told me that bill never generated a single headline or editorial, but it was one of the things he was most proud of getting accomplished. Thanks to his good work, she and countless other children living with disabilities are able to go to school and get a good start in life.”
His immediate plans for the institute are to continue working on projects “that David Yepsen and his staff have been working on that need to be successfully implemented and carried out well into the spring semester and beyond.”
In addition, the institute will celebrate its 20th anniversary next year “and we want to organize a series of events and speakers that recognize Sen. Simon’s legacy in an appropriate way, but more importantly, continue to grow that legacy by developing projects and activities that reflect his priorities and engage the citizens of today and tomorrow in meaningful, measurable ways.”
The State Board of Elections has received inquiries from voters, the media and public interest groups concerning the integrity of the November 8, 2016, General Election. The State Board of Elections wishes to assure voters that the allegations of a “rigged” election are completely unfounded. A brief overview of the election process illustrates the numerous safeguards built into the election system to secure the integrity of the voting machines and tabulation of election results.
Initially, the Voting and Registration Systems Division of the State Board of Elections thoroughly tests the voting equipment to ensure compliance with both Federal and State standards prior to approving its use in Illinois elections, and also conducts testing of the voting equipment prior to each Election. This testing takes place in jurisdictions selected by the State Board of Elections both randomly and in those jurisdictions where it is deemed advisable due to any problems in previous elections, and is open to the public.
Each of the 109 election authorities in the State must conduct errorless pre-tests of its automatic tabulating equipment and program to verify that they will correctly count the votes for all offices and public questions. A copy of that program is filed with the State Board prior to the election. Thereafter, not less than 5 days prior to Election Day, the election authority must publicly test the equipment. The public test of the equipment takes place at a minimum of 48 hours after notice is published, and is open to the public and all interested parties.
Following these mandatory public tests, the voting equipment and memory cards are locked and sealed in tamper-proof containers until Election Day. The containers are unlocked and unsealed on Election Day in the presence of the election judges and any authorized watchers that are present. If any tampering has occurred, it would be evident at that time.
In addition to the mandatory testing, the law requires training for all citizens who serve as election judges. Each election authority must establish a 4-hour training course for its judges. Also, the State Board of Elections conducts schools for the training of election judges throughout the State of Illinois. These schools, conducted by Board staff, are well-attended and on-going. Between July 25, 2016, and November 2, 2016, there are 62 schools scheduled.
Significantly, on Election Day the polling places are staffed by 5 judges – composed of both Democrats and Republicans - in each precinct. There are approximately 10,000 precincts in Illinois, which translates to 50,000 election judges present to assure the integrity of the process. Additionally, authorized poll watchers are eligible to be present in each precinct.
Following the close of the polls, the election judges process the ballots in the presence of all the judges and any authorized poll watchers in attendance.
Elections in Illinois are conducted not by the State Board of Elections, but by each of the 109 election jurisdictions. Thus, an attempt to “rig” the election would require involvement with multiple jurisdictions. The results from each of the precincts are totaled by each election jurisdiction and there is no connection to the internet. There is a paper trail in Illinois for each ballot cast, by whatever means it is cast.
Following the election, in those jurisdictions where in-precinct counting equipment is used, the election authority retabulates the total number of votes cast in 5% of the precincts within the election jurisdiction, as well as 5% of the voting devices used in early voting.
Any voter who is concerned about the integrity of the election process may want to consider becoming an election judge. Election authorities are always seeking election judges and serving as such allows the voter to experience first-hand the system from the opening of the precinct to the tabulation of the results. Voters may also consider volunteering as a pollwatcher though to do so they must be affiliated with a candidate, political party or civic organization engaged in overseeing the election process.
The State Board of Elections will provide updates, as necessary, prior to the General Election.
The State Board of Elections is an independent state agency charged with the responsibility of having general supervision over the administration of election laws of the State of Illinois. Elections are administered locally by the State’s 109 election authorities.
* Earlier today, I asked the SBE and the Chicago Board of Elections about this Russian Television story…
The US has rejected a Russian proposal to send diplomats to monitor the upcoming presidential elections and some states have even threatened to bring criminal charges against any that appear at ballot stations, Russian election officials report.
Sources in the Central Elections Commission have told Izvestia daily that its representatives held a series of talks with the US State Department to discuss sending a delegation of monitors to US polling stations on November 8. US officials categorically rejected even the possibility of such a mission, however, instead recommending that Russia join the international mission of the OSCE’s Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR).
The request was also rejected on a state level, and in three states – Oklahoma, Louisiana, and Texas – officials used “very harsh formulas” to do so, the sources said. “In violation of all principles of democracy and international monitoring, in Texas they even threatened to hold monitors who appear at ballot stations criminally responsible,” they added.
I was told that neither board received such a request from the Russians. And, by the way, good on Texas.
* Check out the last, highlighted paragraph in this excerpt…
Today the Pay Now Illinois coalition requested the Illinois Supreme Court to take a direct appeal of their case and confirm the state’s obligation to fully pay social service providers it contracts with to care for vulnerable Illinoisans. The appeal also asks the court to resolve constitutional questions and safeguard the rights of every Illinoisan to be treated fairly and seek legal recourse when dam- aged by illegal business practices. The appeal marks the latest chapter in a story that has garnered national headlines since May, when 97 service providers from across Illinois sued Governor Bruce Rauner and leaders of seven state agencies for impairment of contract.
The defendants do not dispute that plaintiffs have suffered irreparable harm as a result of the state’s illegal business practices, which left hundreds of providers unpaid for an entire fiscal year. And while the election-season “stopgap” bill passed in June allowed the state to pay many of the contracts that were issued a year earlier, this measure expires December 31st. Moreover, it does not include the necessary funding for FY17 contracts, which the state continues to issue and enforce, with no guarantee of payment and no clear access to a remedy, the appeal contends.
In August, when Circuit Court Judge Rodolfo Garcia dismissed the suit, he urged plaintiffs to bring the case to a higher court to expedite redress of the constitutional questions raised by the state’s business practices. In bringing this case to the Illinois Supreme Court, the plaintiffs are asking the Court to clarify an interpretation of a previous court decision that has allowed the state to continue to pay employees, even as it avoids payment to providers the state contracts with to provide services on the state’s behalf. […]
The appeal also asks the Supreme Court to clarify a court decision that has enabled state employees to earn $3.2 billion since 2015, while avoiding payment to hundreds of state contractors that employ thousands of Illinoisans who provide services on the state’s behalf. Pay Now Illinois is seeking only to have its contracts be honored and paid in full in a timely fashion. The initial suit sought payment of $161 million for services rendered.
* Alan J. Ortbals, president and publisher of the Illinois Business Journal, writes about the state government impasse…
For the good of the state and its nearly 13 million people, Rauner should put this fight off for another time and negotiate a balanced budget with the legislature. We’re not as far from solvency as many people think. This is fixable.
The Center for Tax and Budget Accountability, an independent, bi-partisan Illinois think tank has put forward a clear and simple plan that would correct our fiscal path in a few years. […]
I understand that the governor believes that adoption of his Turnaround Agenda is necessary to make Illinois competitive again. Others disagree. So, let’s let the voters decide.
In 2018 Rauner and much of the legislature will be up for election. I think the Republicans should make that election a referendum on his Agenda. Like Newt Gingrich did with his Contract With America in 1994, have all the Republican candidates sign it and run on it. If they can convince the majority of Illinoisans that the Agenda is crucial to our future, they’ll not only return Rauner to office but give him the majority he needs in the legislature to pass it. If he continues on his current path, he’ll not only do great damage to the state but he will be held responsible for it by the voters.
Governor, a good general not only picks his battles, he also picks the time and place. This isn’t it. Put this fight off to 2018 and, in the meantime, get Illinois moving again.
* An otherwise pretty well-reasoned Better Government Association argument against the proposed transportation “lockbox” amendment includes this weird little dot point…
The lockbox could restrict the use of new funds that might not be necessary for decades, including revenues from driverless cars and biking, which could decrease the need for road maintenance.
A bit of a stretch, particularly since “driverless cars” (which aren’t yet driverless and won’t be for a long time) will undoubtedly cost more money because their backers are already demanding things like special lanes and blocked off streets.
Bradley is scared because the video, which shows him nominate and praise Mike Madigan for Speaker, is proof that Bradley is a typical Springfield insider.
Watch Bradley swoon and compare Mike Madigan to Abraham Lincoln here.
John Bradley in his own words:
“I rise to second the nomination of Michael J. Madigan for Speaker of the House of Representatives of the 97th General Assembly of this great state of Illinois. Perhaps our greatest Illinoisan, Abraham Lincoln, said nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power. For his many years as speaker, Mike Madigan has been tested time and time again. And his character has always prevailed. I don’t think any of us can appreciate the pressures, the challenges, the amount of work our speaker faces on a daily basis. The difficult decisions, the heart wrenching choices. But I believe that it is his love of this state, his respect for this institution, and his devotion to principle that keeps him going. As he once again is nominated to assume this great responsibility, he becomes one of the longest serving public figures in the history of this state and the history of this great country. Lincoln also said; whatever you are, be a good one. Speaker Madigan has done just that. He has given his all to this job, and he has given his all to this state, and the mark that he has left and hopes to continue to make is immeasurable. Thank you.”
Creamer told the Chicago Sun-Times that O’Keefe’s allegations that he and his firm had a role in inciting violence at Trump events “are completely untrue.” … A female activist in the Project Veritas Action video identified as Zulema Rodriguez told an unidentified interviewer using a hidden camera that she had a hand in organizing protests at a Trump rally at the UIC Pavilion last March. … Creamer said Rodriguez was organizing anti-Trump protests around the UIC event but wasn’t working for him at the time. […]
White House visitor logs show Creamer has made 340 visits since Obama took office in January 2009.
Creamer told the Sun-Times, “The Obama White House has regular meetings of progressive organizations every week. Lots of people go, including me.”
Explaining the video scenes that included him, Creamer said he thought he was talking to a man who was a potential large donor to Democratic causes. In reality, that man was posing as a donor and secretly recording Creamer. […]
Project Veritas also was able to plant an intern in Creamer’s Washington, D.C., office to secretly video workers. Creamer said she posed as the niece of the fake potential donor, who asked Creamer to give her a job.
He gave her a job before he got a check? That’s awful trusting of him.
SAVE THE NUKES! Assembly and Criticality
Who: Pro-nuclear environmentalists from all over the country.
What: Hone your advocacy skills, help build a movement, and take direct action to save Clinton and Quad Cities Nuclear Plants.
Why: Because nuclear power is in crisis, and we need a unified movement to protect the planet from climate change while lifting all people out of poverty.
Where: The Congress Plaza Hotel — 520 S. Michigan Ave., Chicago, IL
When: 5 pm on Saturday, October 23rd 5:30 PM October 24 2 PM
Clinton and Quad Cities are at Risk —
Nuclear is the only source of clean power to have declined in absolute terms over the last 20 years. The reason is the same everywhere: people fear nuclear. The nuclear establishment (government, academic and industry) has tried and failed for several decades to address public concerns. Over a decade ago, the nuclear establishment, discouraged by its failures, largely withdrew from public engagement. For decades, anyone who dared to speak of the environmental benefits of nuclear energy was branded as an industry shill.
The Boston Tea Party. Gandhi’s Salt March. The Civil Rights March on Washington. Stonewall. These protests helped win freedom and fairness for millions of people. [Emphasis added.]
The American Nuclear Society & Women in Nuclear University of Illinois Student Sections will be out on the Quad giving info about nuclear power, the state of energy in the U.S., and collecting survey data on the public opinions of UIUC students.
Thursday 10/20! There will be a prizes for participation. You could be selected to win a $50 Amazon Gift Card, a $25 DD giftcard and a Nuclear T-shirt!!
* As I’ve already told subscribers, Susana Mendoza tries to tie Munger to Rauner and Trump and actually uses the topic of legislator paychecks against Munger in her first negative TV spot…
1) For whats it’s worth, saw Wordslinger’s comments about hired actors but those are all [Munger] volunteers
2) Susana really went out of her way to cut up and isolate that audio for her commercial. Here is the interview with Tom Miller where he is acknowledging Leslie’s actions in delaying the payments to politicians before the statement.
The Illinois Department of Employment Security (IDES) announced today that the unemployment rate in September held at 5.5 percent and nonfarm payrolls increased by 7,400 jobs over the month, based on preliminary data released by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and IDES. Job growth is still below the national average, with Illinois -38,800 jobs short of its peak employment level reached in September 2000.
“Job growth has been uneven over the past several months,” said IDES Director Jeff Mays. “Even with net job growth this year, Illinois still lags the nation in its recovery from the recession.”
“While we are seeing growth for some in the service sector, Illinois continues to lose middle class manufacturing jobs,” Illinois Department of Commerce & Economic Opportunity Acting Director Sean McCarthy said. “In the last year, Illinois has lost 12,000 manufacturing jobs. That’s an average of 1,000 families losing vital income every month, while manufacturing grew nationally. We need reforms to make sure these families aren’t left behind.”
In September, the three industry sectors with the largest gains in employment were: Professional and Business Services (+5,100); Educational and Health Services (+1,500); and Other Services (+1,200). The three industry sectors with the largest declines in employment were: Financial Activities (-1,300); Manufacturing (-800); and Leisure and Hospitality (-500).
Over the year, nonfarm payroll employment increased by +43,400 jobs with the largest gains in two industry sectors: Professional and Business Services (+23,500); and Leisure and Hospitality (+21,600). Industry sectors with the largest over-the-year declines in September include: Manufacturing (-12,700) and Information Services (-4,000). The +0.7 percent over-the-year gain in Illinois is less than the +1.7 percent gain posted by the nation in September.
The state’s unemployment rate is higher than the national unemployment rate reported for September 2016, which inched up to 5.0 percent. The Illinois unemployment rate is down -0.4 percentage points from a year ago when it was 5.9 percent. The unemployment rate stands at its lowest (for the second straight month) since January 2008. The number of unemployed and the labor force edged down over-the-month, the fifth consecutive drop this year.
The number of unemployed workers decreased -0.9 percent from the prior month to 360,500, down -5.4 percent over the same month for the prior year. The number of unemployed persons stands at its lowest level since September 2007. The labor force grew by +0.8 percent in September over the prior year, but decreased -0.1 percent over-the-month. The unemployment rate identifies those individuals who are out of work and are seeking employment. An individual who exhausts or is ineligible for benefits is still reflected in the unemployment rate if they actively seek work. [Emphasis added.]
Needless to say, we can ill afford to lose those manufacturing jobs. And more losses are on the way.
One of the main suppliers of the boxes for the iconic Frango Mints is shifting a portion of its operations to Wisconsin, taking advantage of government incentives worth up to $1.6 million.
Colbert Packaging will relocate about 65 jobs from a facility in Lake Forest 25 miles north to Kenosha, Wis. The company plans to add another 40 to 45 jobs there over the next two years. President Jim Hamilton said the move allowed Colbert to keep the same skilled employees and easy interstate access while reducing taxes and real estate costs.
“Wisconsin rolled out the welcome mat,” said President Jim Hamilton. “This state has no welcome mat. It’s like, ‘You’re here. Good.’” […]
While Wisconsin offered incentives, Colbert faced the expiration last year of a useful Illinois tax credit Illinois that applied to the purchase of printing presses. A new press costs the company $3.5 to $5 million, Hamilton said, the company would have had to pay sales tax on that purchase if it was made in Illinois.
Wisconsin’s tax package was matched in Illinois by the expiration of a tax exemption carved out for the state’s printers. A press costs the company $3.5 to $5 million, Hamilton said, and with the exemption expiring, it now has to pay sales tax on that equipment purchase.
Scream all you want about corporate welfare, but allowing that credit to expire last year cost us those jobs and likely several more. This impasse just isn’t hurting people who depend on the budget.
Also, where the heck was DCEO on this one? I thought we had a pro-business governor?
…Adding… From the IMA…
In the wake of another dismal jobs report from the Illinois Department of Employment Security, Greg Baise, CEO and president of the Illinois Manufacturers’ Association released the following statement in reaction to recent manufacturing job losses from Colbert Packaging and GE Lighting.
“Another disappointing jobs report punctuates the dilemma Illinois has in keeping middle class jobs,” Baise said.
“The General Assembly must act as soon as possible to fix the problems plaguing Illinois. This news is the latest example that government policies are destroying the manufacturing sector and our middle class jobs. The Illinois economy will continue to worsen until the state has a balanced budget and passes real economic development reforms that will get our economy moving again.”
Acknowledging that in the past, inmates have too often been housed in segregation, the Illinois Department of Corrections is proposing new restrictions on the practice.
“This is going to be a culture change, frankly, for the Illinois Department of Corrections,” department attorney Nancy Vincent said Wednesday in Springfield during a public hearing on the proposal. “And we also want the public to understand that this is just the first step, both in that culture change and in how we administer discipline and segregation.”
Among other changes, the proposal would require that mental health professionals play a greater role in determining whether segregation is an appropriate disciplinary measure for inmates who have committed offenses while in prison. For example, if an inmate is determined to be “seriously mentally ill,” the recommendations of a mental health professional would have to be considered if an inmate has committed an offense for which segregation is a possible punishment.
The department also proposes allowing inmates in segregation to shower and shave at least three times per week rather than just once and requiring that segregated cells “provide visual access to natural light.”
The rules also would require that a mental health professional make rounds in each segregation unit at least once a week and that a chaplain make weekly visits as well.
In the largest prison protest in California’s history, nearly 30,000 inmates have gone on hunger strike. Their main grievance: the state’s use of solitary confinement, in which prisoners are held for years or decades with almost no social contact and the barest of sensory stimuli.
The human brain is ill-adapted to such conditions, and activists and some psychologists equate it to torture. Solitary confinement isn’t merely uncomfortable, they say, but such an anathema to human needs that it often drives prisoners mad.
In isolation, people become anxious and angry, prone to hallucinations and wild mood swings, and unable to control their impulses. The problems are even worse in people predisposed to mental illness, and can wreak long-lasting changes in prisoners’ minds.
“What we’ve found is that a series of symptoms occur almost universally. They are so common that it’s something of a syndrome,” said psychiatrist Terry Kupers of the Wright Institute, a prominent critic of solitary confinement. “I’m afraid we’re talking about permanent damage.”
And then we let those insane people out of prison where they too often can’t get the help they need, and then we all act surprised when more bad things happen.
* This is a very good roundup of some of the major challenges facing Exelon’s push to pry loose ratepayer subsidies for two of its Downstate nuclear power plants during the upcoming veto session…
“The first question we get from the speaker’s office is, ‘Where’s the governor?’” Exelon executive Tim Hanley said last week during a meeting with the Quad-City Times editorial board. “The governor’s office asks, ‘Where’s the speaker?’” […]
Gov. Bruce Rauner has repeatedly declined to comment on the Exelon drama. Democrats in the General Assembly find it ironic that they are being asked to save hundreds of union jobs in a Republican-held Senate district, while Rauner continues to do battle with public unions.
Rauner might have no option but to give in, if Quad-Cities Generating Station is to survive 2018. And Democrats know it. […]
Lawmakers have said that a bailout for a coal-fired Dynergy plant in Southern Illinois would have to be part of the overall package, Hanley said. That’s sure to be another strike against any sweeping energy deal, as far as the influential Clean Jobs Coalition is concerned.
So, in a nutshell, there’s a proposed rate-hike that would include cash from taxpayers in the mix. There’s a politically prescribed bailout for a coal plant just to get any package out of committee in the House. The governor has done little but waffle. And the entire thing hinges on a six-day veto session, three days on either side of Thanksgiving.
It’s basically a game of chicken. Somebody is gonna have to blink first, but then that somebody is gonna catch the blame for a rate hike.
[Sen. Donne Trotter] and other sponsors of the [Exelon] legislation, including Republican state Sens. Chapin Rose of Mahomet and Neil Anderson of Rock Island, say negotiations with Exelon, environmental and consumer groups, the renewable energy industry and downstate utility Ameren Illinois have continued in the intervening months.
“It’s coming together, and hopefully by the time we get back on Nov. 15, there’ll be enough consensus that we can move forward with it and get it through the Senate as well as the House,” Trotter said, noting that some House members were in attendance and that House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago, made a brief appearance.
But, of course, there’s more to this package than just Exelon’s big asks. ComEd, for instance, wants an unprecedented new pricing plan.
Commonwealth Edison is pushing Illinois lawmakers to approve a dramatic change in electricity pricing based on little more than the utility’s assurance that most customers would save money under the novel approach.
ComEd says it has examined customer usage patterns and determined that “demand pricing” would reduce bills for two-thirds of its customers. Under a demand-based pricing system, bills reflect the amount of power each customer uses during periods of peak electricity demand.
ComEd would track how much power each customer uses during the half-hour period of highest electricity use every day—perhaps a time when a hair dryer, refrigerator, washing machine and air conditioner are running simultaneously. The utility would set rates and compute bills based on the average of those daily peaks over the course of a month (excluding weekends and holidays).
Vice President Scott Vogt says the new system would allow customers to control their electric bills by avoiding big spikes in usage. But he emphasizes that two-thirds would save money even if they don’t change current consumption patterns. Those who see their bills rise could mitigate or reverse the increase by adjusting their electricity usage. “We think this is the fairest way to do it,” Vogt says.
Really? It will take more than ComEd’s say-so to convince me, and legislators should be equally skeptical. ComEd is asking them to lead Illinois into unknown territory. No state has yet authorized mandatory demand pricing for residential electricity customers. So far, proposals to impose demand pricing on all residential consumers have been withdrawn or rejected in 13 states, according to the Alliance for Solar Choice.
* You may have noticed that the online version of a Republican TV ad has been taken down by YouTube. The video uses footage of Rep. John Bradley (D-Marion) seconding the nomination of Michael Madigan for another term as House Speaker. If you saw it yesterday, you know it’s brutal.
YouTube explains that it removed the video “due to a copyright claim by Advanced Digital Media, Inc.,” the company which owns BlueRoomStream.com. The company sells its video to TV stations, etc., but it also has some other strict rules…
Programming produced on www.blueroomstream.com cannot be used for political, campaign or commercial purposes without permission. Any re-editing, re-broadcast, or re-use without permission is strictly prohibited.
Tony Yuscius at BlueRoomStream.com told me yesterday that a video snippet of Rep. Bradley testifying in a committee hearing is actually theirs.
* After YouTube removed the video, Yuscius received this e-mail yesterday from the Illinois Rebuild Project, which is sort of the social media arm of the GOP’s paid media this cycle…
Today you submitted a youtube takedown request for our campaign video, hosted on youtube - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CwuSyDLnp-g.
The video in question contains no video footage sourced from Advanced Digital Media. All video content contained was sourced from either the Office of the Clerk of the Illinois House of Representatives or the following Youtube video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bq52iD96Vos - which was not posted by Advanced Digital Media and contains no notifications that it is your copyrighted work. In addition, the roughly four seconds of silent video footage would be allowable under the doctrine of fair use even if it were your copyrighted work.
We request that you retract your takedown request with all haste.
At this point the illegally obtained video has been removed from YouTube. I intend to pursue legal options and strongly protect our copyrighted content. The e-mail received states the video with Rep. Bradley’s audio came from the House Clerk’s office. Perhaps Mr. Brown may want to comment on that?
This live session video/audio broadcast is the property of the Illinois General Assembly. Any use of this broadcast without the prior written consent of the Illinois General Assembly is prohibited.
A desk drawer full of campaign flyers and brochures charging local candidates with everything from being a hypocrite to endangering the well-being of senior citizens and children are being circulated to voters throughout the Northwest suburban area.
The four-color, double-sided pieces, all printed on heavy coated paper stock, focus on the negatives of candidates. The materials are funded by the political committees of some of the candidates and well-financed political action committees.
This suburban area is home to three high-profile election contests that state party leaders desperately want to capture in order to gain or maintain control or leverage of the Illinois General Assembly. Parties and PACs are literally spending millions of dollars collectively in these races.
Here’s a sample of some of the campaign pieces:
• “Blank Check Murphy created this monster”, a reference to State Senator Laura Murphy in the 28th Senate District that includes parts of Des Plaines, Park Ridge, Elk Grove Village and communities to the west. The flyer’s main focal point is a photo of House Speaker Mike Madigan wearing a Donald Trump wig. “Chicago Democrat boss House Speaker Mike Madigan combines the worst qualities of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.” This was paid for by conservative PAC Liberty Principles.
* That same Dan Proft mailer was mentioned often in yesterday’s Question of the Day because the Madigan/Trump/Clinton (notice the earrings and jacket) photo was used in several districts. So here it is in case you didn’t get one of your own…
ICYMI: Susana Mendoza’s Campaign Cash at Odds with Her Labor Message
“When Susana Mendoza isn’t double-dipping, she’s double-talking. Mendoza’s Chicago-style campaign rhetoric and tactics are exactly why Illinoisans are fed up with career politicians who will do or say anything to get elected. We can’t let Susana Mendoza be a rubber stamp for her self-proclaimed mentor, Mike Madigan, and his reckless agenda of tax hikes, pension holidays, and budget-busting deficits.” - Illinois Republican Party Spokesman Aaron DeGroot
Classic concern trolling with the usual 2016 Madigan twist.
In her first run for statewide office, Chicago City Clerk Susana Mendoza hustled across Illinois on Labor Day weekend, marching in parades on the city’s Southeast Side and in Rock Island to show solidarity with union members.
Just a few weeks before that, though, Mendoza’s Democratic campaign for state comptroller accepted a contribution from an O’Hare Airport contractor who has feuded with organized labor for years.
Republican Comptroller Leslie Munger called on Mendoza to give back $1,000 from former Chicago cop and janitorial contractor Richard Simon. Despite heavy union opposition, Simon’s United Maintenance Co. Inc. landed a five-year, $99.4 million deal with Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s administration in 2012.
In calling on Mendoza to return the Aug. 12 contribution from Simon, the Munger campaign cited his company’s recent settlement of a federal wage-theft lawsuit filed on behalf of O’Hare janitors. Without admitting wrongdoing, United Maintenance agreed last month to fork over more than $845,000 to settle the case.
Munger also called on Mendoza to refund a campaign contribution from a contractor for a local charter school chain that’s come under scrutiny from federal investigators.
That’s quite a lot of hype over two $1,000 contributions. Particularly these days.
“Chicago City Clerk Susana Mendoza is asking voters to trust her with the state’s checkbook, but these contributions create real questions about her judgment,” said Munger’s campaign manager, Phillip Rodriguez. “She can show her commitment to ethical behavior by returning those contributions.”
What Illinois needs during the worst fiscal crisis in state history is an independent fiscal watchdog as comptroller, a separate executive office as set out in our constitution, not a wholly owned subsidiary of the Governor’s office.
Governor Rauner, whom Comptroller Munger should be serving as a checks and balance to, just wrote a $1 million buy out check to his self-proclaimed wingman. By accepting it, she has demonstrated her utter lack of independence and complete reliance on her political sponsor.
The only way for Leslie Munger to keep the constitutionally mandated independence of the Comptroller’s office and not subvert the state constitution in the eyes of the voters is to give back this $1 million takeover bid from Governor Rauner.
