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* My weekly syndicated newspaper column…
As you know by now, Gov. Bruce Rauner toured the state for 2 days last week. He denied that the tour had anything to do with the 2018 election, but it was pretty darned clear that he and his team were tuning up the band for the big show down the road.
Campaign funds not only paid for the tour, but political money was used to promote in it advance. I’m told Rauner’s advertising on social and online media served more than a million impressions in the days leading up to the fly-around.
And like a musician touring to promote a new album, Rauner played up his latest hits. The “Chicago Machine Democrats” just want to “duct tape” the state’s problems instead of fixing them. Rauner’s latest TV ads, paid for by a “dark money” subsidiary of the Republican Governors Association, feature him in a pristine workshop using duct tape to explain how Springfield politicians don’t ever really fix problems.
Whatever he lacks in governing abilities, there’s no doubt that Gov. Rauner is a master at laying out a very simple, popular and easy-to-understand message and then staying on that message no matter what.
During his Peoria appearance, Rauner slammed the House Democrats’ stopgap budget as just “taping over our problems – duct taping cracks in our system.” The only thing missing was the bright, sharply pressed flannel shirt he wore in the TV ad.
As with all established bands on tour, the governor also played popular tunes from his recent albums. Since about the beginning of the year, when he was asked by a reporter to grade his first 2 years in office, Rauner has repeatedly pointed to his own successes at unilaterally cutting unspecified waste from the system (which plays right into the hugely popular notion that waste is the state’s biggest problem) and then contrasted that with the obstructionism of the “Madigan Democrats” in the General Assembly.
“They’ve created the worst crisis of any state in America,” Rauner said of the Democrats while speaking in Springfield. “On things that I can control, we’ve done wonderfully. Where the General Assembly has blocked progress, they’ve made the problem worse.”
Rauner even brought back a line from his February budget address, when he encouraged the Senate’s leaders to hammer out a grand bargain. He spoke about that effort as if he’d never actually knocked the grand bargain off the rails in March.
And, of course, he brought out the old standards that he’s been playing for years: property tax freeze, term limits and becoming “much more pro-growth, pro-business, pro-investment, pro-job creation,” as he said in Rockford.
The Democratic candidates, for their part, stuck to their #DoYourJob theme in response to Rauner’s tour, saying the governor should be getting a budget deal done rather than campaigning. None mentioned that the House and Senate are in the midst of a 2-week spring break, so doing a deal or even meeting with the other leaders probably wouldn’t be possible. Also, governors often use spring breaks as an opportunity to hit the hustings. This is nothing new.
Much of the Chicago-based print media focused on the fact that Rauner denied he was campaigning while obviously campaigning. But they never put that into the broader context of the governor’s habit of saying one thing (cheerleading the Senate’s grand bargain) while doing another (killing the Senate’s grand bargain).
Channel 7, the most-watched television station in Chicagoland, ran a purely positive piece.
“I want all of you to have a better future, I want your children to have great schools, and I want your salaries to go up,” Rauner said during the Chicago station’s report. There was no mention of the fact that none of that has happened since he became governor, and there is no foreseeable time when any of it will happen as long as we have this never-ending gridlock.
Rauner also appeared via phone on several talk radio programs during his tour and faced mostly softball questions from conservative hosts. Even conservative activist Dan Proft, who has sharply criticized the governor on his radio program since the start of the year, allowed Rauner to endlessly rattle on about his main talking points, duct tape and all, without much of a peep.
For those on Rauner’s side, this was a good tour. For those on the other side (and polls show there are a lot of them), well, they wouldn’t like it anyway.
Those in the middle probably got the message that the governor and his team wanted to send, with a big assist from the media.
posted by Rich Miller
Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 9:11 am
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Blame game do your job.
Comment by Red Rider Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 9:17 am
He wants whose salaries to go up? Not anyone who works in the public sector! He apparently thinks everyone has a massive stash they can live on (like him) and they can work out of the goodness of their hearts in true servitude.
Comment by Anonymous Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 9:18 am
They’re on a mission from God.
Comment by Gruntled University Employee Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 9:20 am
Thank you for calling out Channel 7. Shaming specific members of the media hopefully will have an effect.
Comment by Robert the Bruce Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 9:20 am
Lazy, spoon-fed, lapdog media. Maybe we ought to aim some #DoYourJob barbs at them. Geez.
Comment by Ray del Camino Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 9:33 am
Governors own, and when governors speak to their ownership and the media takes a governor’s position and really… refuses… to see where the messaging is off, or where the messaging is just flat out wrong… that’s the governor owning the day, through either a purposeful or accidental vertical integration.
Democrats, if you want to defeat Rauner, you must all, no matter which gubenitorial candidate you “support”, decide that an agreed message that “Rauner fails” and #DoYourJob, until State Fair, is far more important collectively than anything else.
The coverage of this tour tells this is so.
You all are losing to a governor in messaging. Acknowledge it, “yesterday”, and do better collectively, or the window for ANY of you to beat him may start to close by petition time, because by then, Rauner will have his sights to destroy you all, and Illinois too, cause he’s proven… he can.
Comment by Oswego Willy Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 9:33 am
It is good to see someone out there using the power of the press to make sure us poor souls in Illinois get the real truth ..
the Governor is supported by simpletons…
“laying out a very simple, popular and easy-to-understand message and then staying on that message no matter what”..
The press is in the bag for Rauner..”Channel 7…ran a purely positive piece”
Our the problems are due to the Gov actions ..”knocked the grand bargain off the rails in March”
I will say this for Rich’s article, at least we all know which side he is on!
Comment by Texas Red Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 9:40 am
>Lazy, spoon-fed, lapdog media.
For a spoon-fed media, they are picky eaters:
https://capitolfax.com/2017/04/06/new-united-way-survey-finds-the-problem-is-getting-worse/#comment-12713658
I saw very little coverage of the survey, despite the spoon-feeding.
Comment by Earnest Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 9:41 am
“On things that I can control, we’ve done wonderfully…”
How about sitting down at the bargaining table?
Comment by Streator Curmudgeon Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 10:06 am
Channel 7 is there to entertain.
They allow criticism but only with counter-criticism.
Facts are watered down to dumb down and pacify their viewers.
It’s all about keeping their viewers blissfully unaware and happy.
Comment by Chicago 20 Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 10:09 am
Isn’t early spring, in an off-cycle year, time for Ruch to take it a little easy and focus on “it’s just a bill” commentary?
We’re in a new world. If anything, political intensity is just ramping up this year.
Comment by walker Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 10:10 am
I would say the simpletons are the politicians that created the base for the mess that Illinois is currently in. The problems in Illinois have been festering for over a decade and the simpletons that created the problem refused to fix anything and now refuse to change the course at all. Just raising taxes does not solve the underlying problem.
Comment by Arock Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 10:12 am
==I will say this for Rich’s article, at least we all know which side he is on!==
I actually would guess Rich is a Democrat but he has slammed Democrats many, many times when it’s deserved - that’s called journalism. It’s rare nowadays with the hyper-partisan political landscape of today, but refreshing to read here.
Comment by CrazyHorse Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 10:13 am
“The Bruce Brothers? &%$#! They still owe you money, fool!”
– MrJM
Comment by @misterjayem Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 10:13 am
“I will say this for Rich’s article, at least we all know which side he is on!”
And you’re one of them geniuses who blames the weatherman when it rains, ain’t ya?
– MrJM
Comment by @misterjayem Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 10:17 am
===I would say the simpletons are the politicians that created the base for the mess that Illinois is currently in.===
… and yet, when Leader Radogno had a Grand Bargain in the works, it was Rauner himself that blew it up.
===The problems in Illinois have been festering for over a decade and the simpletons that created the problem refused to fix anything and now refuse to change the course at all.===
… and yet, it’s been Bruce Rauner, 3 years running, with proposed “sham, phony, grossly unbalanced” budgets. You are either willfully ignorant or blissfully unaware of facts. You keep commenting the same way, a pattern, so I’m guessing willfully ignorant(?)
===Just raising taxes does not solve the underlying problem.===
… and yet, not one person has suggested that, and everyone agrees Revevue isn’t a “give” or an “option”.
You believe this stuff you type, or…
Comment by Oswego Willy Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 10:37 am
Sometimes the answer is the obvious one as hard as it may be to believe. But after two plus years of very clear evidence it is apparent that Rauner does not care one bit about the consequences of his failures. Not one bit.
Comment by don the legend Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 11:06 am
The Chicago political patronage system that Rauner is talking about has been in place since Jesus turned water into wine. Everybody knows that. The blame Madigan campaign might sound good but the House is only half of the problem and how can he say he wants wages to go up when one of the points in his TA is to lower wages. This guy is a real piece of work.
Comment by Ginhouse Tommy Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 12:11 pm
–“They’ve created the worst crisis of any state in America,” Rauner said of the Democrats while speaking in Springfield. “On things that I can control, we’ve done wonderfully.–
“When I gutted higher ed and contracted social services, I was having the most beautiful piece of chocolate cake….”
Thank you, alleged GOP conservatives, for Trump and Rauner.
Now, you’re all going to take responsibility for them now, right? Because you’re all about responsibility….
Comment by wordslinger Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 5:03 pm
Rauner killed the Senate deal, even the tron edit board saw that. They reported that he threatened to primary any GOP Senators who played ball.
Yet now Rauner cries tears for the Senate deal he killed, blaming others for the the thing that he thinks is bad, yet did himself.
And Barbie and Ken in most Illinois media smile and report it.
Comment by wordslinger Monday, Apr 17, 17 @ 6:42 pm