August 8th, 2008 05:15pm
Aaron Chambers
Rep. Chuck Jefferson, D-Rockford, set out to help people.
He sponsored a bill requiring health insurance policies to continue providing coverage to dependent, full-time college students who must leave school or reduce their classload to part-time because of a catastrophic illness or injury. His fellow lawmakers approved that plan overwhelmingly; the House voted 105-3 and the Senate voted 56-1, sending the measure to Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s desk.
Little did Jefferson know that his bill might amount to nothing more than ammunition in Blagojevich’s political war with House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago. Now Jefferson is staring at a bill that may be dead. And if it’s dead, he will need to start all over again by re-introducing it and maneuvering it through the legislative process all over again.
What did Blagojevich accomplish in hijacking and possibly killing Jefferson’s bill? He took a swipe at Madigan and other House Democrats. He won a day of favorable publicity. And that’s that.
So much for Jefferson trying to help people.
On Wednesday, Blagojevich vetoed Jefferson’s bill to add language giving parents the option of keeping their children on their private health plan until they turn 26 — or, in the case of veterans, the age of 30.
That may sound like a well-intentioned initiative from the governor. But the fact is that lawmakers — both Republicans and Democrats — are tired of Blagojevich attempting to force his will upon them.
Blagojevich, notorious for his absence from Springfield while lawmakers are in session, didn’t bother attempting to maneuver his initiative through the legislative process. Instead, he hijacked a bill sponsored by somebody who had already done that work.
Oh, and that person — Jefferson — just happened to be a Madigan surrogate.
Jefferson told the Register Star: “Whatever feud might be going on between Speaker Madigan and the governor, I’m not a part of that. And I don’t think that you need to make me a part of that by hijacking one of my bills.”
But Jefferson is a member of Madigan’s exclusive leadership team. That means he joins high-level meetings not attended by other House Democrats. And it means he’s under additional pressure to act in lockstep with Madigan — particularly when it counts, like when Madigan is waging a political war with the governor. In Blagojevich’s view, Jefferson is very much a Madigan guy.
It’s no accident that Blagojevich targeted one of Jefferson’s bills.
And if there was any doubt that Blagojevich had escalated the war by personally attacking Madigan’s closest allies, any such doubt was removed Friday morning when Blagojevich used an appearance at the State Fair to verbally attack Rep. Gary Hannig, D-Litchfield, for helping Madigan engineer the defeat of Blagojevich’s capital plan. Hannig is one of Madigan’s top lieutenants.
In 2007, Blagojevich’s administration canned the wife of Tim Mapes, Madigan’s trusted chief of staff.
There’s a chance that lawmakers could vote to override the governor’s veto of Jefferson’s bill, thereby putting Jefferson’s bill — without the governor’s language — into law. But it’s not such a great chance. For as long as Senate President Emil Jones Jr., D-Chicago, continues to serve as Blagojevich’s ally in chief, then it’s unlikely Jones will allow the Senate to vote on an override.
Lawmakers are even less likely to vote to accept the governor’s changes.
If both chambers of the Legislature don’t agree on whether to accept or reject the governor’s changes, then the bill is dead.
Blagojevich certainly knew all of this when he decided to hijack Jefferson’s bill. He did it anyway.
Update 1
Wow, Blagojevich sure did rip into Gary Hannig, the Madigan lieutenant, at the State Fair today. The audio is here.
He also ripped a group of 10 House Democrats he labeled the “double-dippers” — 10 state lawmakers also on the City of Chicago or Cook County payroll.
Basically, the governor argued that these 10 people, who all enjoy two paychecks, are hypocrites for sticking with Madigan, who engineered the defeat of Blagojevich’s capital plan. Blagojevich says the capital plan would generate hundreds of thousands of jobs.
According to a Blagojevich spokeswoman, the 10 “double-dippers” are:
Rep. Edward Acevedo
Rep. Luis Arroyo
Rep. John Bradley
Rep. Annazette Collins
Rep. John D’Amico
Rep. Monique Davis
Rep. Deborah Graham
Rep. Joe Lyons
Rep. Susana Mendoza
Rep. Cynthia Soto
“There’s nothing more important than getting our economy going in Springfield, in Decatur, in Rockford, in Carbondale, in Danville — than investing in our infrastructure and putting people to work,” Blagojevich said.
“And we have the Republican leaders supporting the capital program. We have the Democrats in the Senate supporting the capital program. And Mike Madigan and 10 double-dipping Chicago Democrats who work for the City of Chicago full-time and then have part-time jobs as state reps killed the jobs bill that impacts people in downstate Illinois,” he said. “So if people feel there is this sense that some from Chicago don’t care about them, just look at that roll call and I can appreciate their frustration.”
Yep, it’s safe to say the political war is on.
August 8th, 2008 01:15pm
Aaron Chambers
Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s relations with so many Illinoisans are so horrible that some wondered recently whether somebody might physically assault him had he decided to attend the Thursday parade marking the start of the Illinois State Fair. He didn’t show at the parade, but the point stands: His unpopularity among Illinoisans, particularly those outside of Chicago, is extraordinary.
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| Is that you, governor? |
It’s unlikely Blagojevich will turn that image around any time soon, if ever. But in the spirit of State Fair fun, I hereby propose a way for Blagojevich to begin the healing: He should find a dunk tank at the State Fair, climb in, take a seat and hold his breath. If there’s no dunk tank at the State Fair, his people certainly could arrange one on the fly. If they do anything well, it’s manage a gimmick.
Yes, there would be complications to having Blagojevich in a dunk tank:
1) Hordes of people would make a special trip to the State Fair and line up for their chance to dunk the Blago. State Fair staff would have to work overtime — maybe around the clock for the entire fair — to manage the giddy, ball-carrying crowd.
2) The dunk tank would need a heavy-gauge grate over its face to guard the guv against errant balls. Hey, accidents happen. Maybe lots of them.
3) The governor’s mane might absorb all the tank’s water the first time he drops, rendering the tank not so much a tank as an empty box. A backup supply of water is a must.
Each point is surmountable. And the benefits are vast.
Ordinary folks could ventilate their pent-up anger with Blago and state government, generally. The governor could raise a bundle of cash for state coffers, potentially restoring much of the spending he recently cut from the budget. And most importantly, the governor would have a chance to show some true humility — a trait sorely lacking from his character.
It’s been a long time coming. Take the challenge, Illinois.
How Much Would You Pay for a Shot at Dunking Blago?
Update 1
Blagojevich, at the State Fair this morning, responded to a reporter’s question about whether he would climb into a dunk tank to help raise money for the state.
“Gimme a number. How much could we raise? I’ll look at it,” Blagojevich said.
The audio clip is on this page, which also includes other Blago audio.
August 7th, 2008 03:00am
Aaron Chambers
Gov. Blagojevich wants to install speed-enforcement cameras on interstates across Illinois to generate more money for Chicago cops …
To make good on his offer to help Chicago combat violence, Gov. Blagojevich envisions putting speed cameras on interstates across Illinois — and using the revenue to form an “elite tactical team” that would operate in Chicago and other cities.
In other words, drivers from the Rock River Valley and around Illinois would help pay for Chicago’s police needs, if Blagojevich has his way.
Do You Support the Governor's Speed-Camera Concept?
Update 1
The governor’s afternoon press release …
SPRINGFIELD – To further enhance traffic safety and reduce fatalities, Governor Rod R. Blagojevich announced today that the Illinois State Police (ISP) will join the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) in a new enforcement program that would put speed cameras on highways to crack down on reckless drivers.
This new program involves reducing the speed of motorists on Illinois interstates with the deployment of Photo Speed Enforcement (PSE) cameras. PSE cameras will be deployed on each interstate throughout Illinois. An administrative citation will be generated as a result of the PSE camera. The goal of these cameras is to target motorists who chose to drive at excessive speeds. The revenues generated from the initiative would be targeted to hire an additional 500 troopers to the ranks of the Illinois State Police over the next three years.
“The Illinois State Police have already done an exceptional job reducing the number of lives lost from traffic crashes,” said Governor Blagojevich. “The use of speed enforcement cameras on interstate highways throughout Illinois will mean that even more lives will be saved by targeting motorist that drive at excessively high and reckless speeds. At the same time, we will try to assist the Chicago Police Department in reducing gun-related crimes.” […]
The PSE cameras will be strategically placed in high speed corridors and high crash areas as determined by enforcement and crash data. […]
With the additional 500 troopers hired with revenue from the new safety initiative, the ISP will create 10 elite Statewide Enforcement Teams to focus on gangs, guns and criminal and traffic activity within communities throughout the state who are experiencing high crime. The remaining officers will focus on all aspects of public safety including some new initiatives such as; an Anti-DUI Strike Force, Fatal Crash Investigative Follow-up Teams, Child Victimization and Death Review Units and Cold Case Homicide Investigations.
Meanwhile, effective immediately, the Illinois State Police will also work in conjunction with the Chicago Police Department, re-deploying troopers to the Chicago area in an attempt to reduce violent crime in the city of Chicago and collar communities. Multiple Strategic Enforcement Teams (SET) will increase patrols in the area, experienced investigators will be assigned to the Chicago Police Department (CPD) Anti-Gun Enforcement (CAGE) Unit, and Criminal Intelligence Analysts will be reassigned to create a Gang Intelligence Unit.
The SETs will patrol the Dan Ryan and Eisenhower Expressways near high crime areas within the city of Chicago. ISP officers will aggressively enforce Illinois traffic and criminal laws and assist CPD within the city as requested. ISP officers will also patrol high crime areas in the collar communities.
Investigators assigned to CAGE will concentrate their efforts on tracing the history of weapons located at or near crime scenes. Instead of focusing exclusively on the crime itself, CAGE realizes gun violence can be reduced by investigating individuals who purchased guns used in crimes. Officers will focus on arresting and prosecuting the purchasers of weapons who are the source of illegal weapons.
The ISP will also appoint a statewide Gang Coordinator and expand the Statewide Terrorism and Intelligence Center through the assignment of Criminal Intelligence Analysts. Analysts will work 24/7 on this initiative to provide a strategic focus for statewide gang intelligence concentrating on gang hierarchy, methods of gang operations, and gang territories. Additional ISP resources including fixed wing air support and manpower for special events are available upon request by CPD.
August 6th, 2008 09:18am
Aaron Chambers
As you probably know already, the powers that be in Springfield are more interested in battling egos than in reaching a compromise over a new statewide capital construction plan.
What isn’t clear is whether the state’s failure to adopt a new capital plan might compromise its ability to attract millions in federal matching dollars earmarked for Illinois building projects in the last federal highway bill. In other words, will Illinois forfeit federal dollars because it doesn’t have its own money to spend first?
U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin helped answer that question in a recent WTTW interview with Carol Marin.
“Next year we start negotiating the next federal highway bill,” Durbin said. “What do you think I’m going to say walking into those meetings, that Illinois needs more money? They’re going to say, ‘You didn’t use the money we gave you last time.’”
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August 6th, 2008 06:00am
Aaron Chambers
In today’s Register Star, we told you about how law enforcement organizations and victims’ advocates are paying more attention to the Illinois Prisoner Review Board after some lawmakers in May tried to oust one of the board’s more conservative members.
In June, the coalition sent a letter scolding lawmakers for playing politics with the board. That letter is here.
“Convicted murderers and cop-killers, the unbelievably damaged families left behind, public safety, and the integrity of the criminal justice system are not political footballs to be played with in this manner,” they wrote.
One lawmaker, Sen. Dale Righter, R-Mattoon, took the time to offer a detailed response. He makes a number of valid points, but his letter also reeks of brazen, election-year partisanship. His letter is here.
Effectively, Righter tells the victims’ advocates they ought to back Republicans to reverse what he labels as the Democrats’ push toward an “anti-law enforcement agenda.” As he put it, “There is no doubt that if (Senate President Emil Jones Jr., D-Chicago) and his leadership team felt their power could be threatened by the continued pursuit of an anti-law enforcement agenda with regards to the PRB, this agenda would come to an abrupt halt.”
In other words, Righter appeared to say, they should elect more Republicans. For as long as Democrats control the Senate and for as long as Jones wishes to continue serving in that role, Jones will be Senate president. His power isn’t “threatened” unless Republicans manage to win a majority — or, at the least, a few more seats than they have.
Democrats control the Senate, just as they control the House and the governor’s office. They rule the roost, and Republicans have little power to stop them.
But Righter’s flat refusal to accept any responsibility for the perceived ”anti-law enforcement agenda” — even as he admonishes the victims’ advocates to more directly name Senate leaders in their own letter, and as he implicitly encourages them to back Republicans – is nonetheless striking.
Go read the whole thing for yourself. It’s a gem.
Terry Rudeen, whose husband was killed by a bank robber while working as a Winnebago County sheriff’s deputy in 1974, gracefully responded to Righter with an e-mail. A copy is available here.
August 3rd, 2008 09:47pm
Aaron Chambers
The Register Star reported Fridaythat U.S. Rep. Don Manzullo and other Republicans stayed on Capitol Hill and continued speaking on the House floor well after Democratic leaders officially closed the chamber in an attempt to pressure the Democrats into allowing a vote on an offshore drilling bill.
Now comes word that the Republicans might continue their rhetoric into this week …
The session will not be televised, since C-Span does not control the cameras inside the House chamber. Rather, those come under the purview of Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and the Democrats, and they’re unlikely to do anything to help Republicans.
But Republicans felt they got a lot of good press out of Friday’s “revolt,” so they will be back at it again, and younger GOP lawmakers were clearly energized by the tactic, something not evident among Republicans for most of the 110th Congress.
There must be an election looming. Oh yeah, there is.
August 1st, 2008 10:30am
Aaron Chambers
Nevada Democrats are trying to claim the title of “worst governor” for their very own Jim Gibbons …
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| Blagojevich at the U of I in 2006 |
The state Democratic Party has launched a Web site asserting that Jim Gibbons is “America’s Worst Governor.” […]
The party has cobbled together multiple press clippings documenting some of Gibbons’ gaffes, including the tax scandal he’s now embroiled in over a piece of property he owns in the Elko area and what Democrats have labeled text gate, referring to how he sent hundreds of text messages to a female friend.
“Everything is documented, because we couldn’t make this up – obviously,” said Travis Brock, the executive director of the Nevada Democratic Party, in a conference call this afternoon with reporters.
The clever site is here.
But can the Nevada Dems move so fast to claim the crown?
July 28th, 2008 01:41pm
Aaron Chambers
We’re just 100 days from the Nov. 4 presidential election.
Are you rooting for Obama or McCain?
Why?
July 28th, 2008 01:34pm
Aaron Chambers
Ever wonder how the silly characterization of Barack Obama’s dap with his wife Michelle as a “terrorist fist jab” got its start?
A Slate.com political writer takes credit for dragging the phrase into the main stream …
The morning after Obama locked up the nomination, I was writing a “Trailhead” item that mocked the media’s difficulty in figuring out what to call the now famous gesture. “Fist-pound,” “knuckle-bump,” and “fist-to-fist thumbs up” were among the funnier examples, but one of them—”Hezbollah-style fist jab”—was particularly risible. It came from the Web site for Human Events, a hard-right weekly. Unfortunately, I failed to note that its provenance was not the magazine itself but a reader comment posted below an unrelated column by Cal Thomas. I linked the phrase to the column but didn’t explain that the words weren’t Thomas’.
And in this Internet Age, it takes just moments (sometimes less) for nonsense to spread.
When I realized the confusion I’d helped cause, I posted a correction. But it was too late. Liberal bloggers from all over had already seized on the phrase. Time and Politico misreported that the words were Thomas’.
And then it was in the hands of a reckless talking head at Fox News. E.D. Hill wondered aloud whether the Obama dap might qualify as a “terrorist fist jab.”
Naturally, Hill didn’t say who or what she was characterizing. She didn’t even bother elaborating. She just plopped the phrase on the national television screen, as if it were totally valid. (She later apologized.)
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In related (and just as thoughtful) news, a Tribune reporter wonders whether Obama may have patted his wife on the tush the same night as the notorious fist bump.
July 24th, 2008 12:37pm
Aaron Chambers
Rep. Jim Sacia, R-Pecatonica, used his weekly column (distributed to local newspapers) to explain lawmaking …
“Pork barrel” spending, “pay to play” opportunities, lobbyists and their relationship to legislators – how does it all play out and what does becoming “one of them” really mean? These are issues that are often brought up to me but seldom really understood. I hope I can help with that understanding.
“Pork barrel” projects are projects in a legislator’s district chosen by him or her to receive state funding. The purpose is to benefit residents of the district, but abuses by some have given an unpleasant connotation to the entire system. An example that is often cited is the now infamous “bridge to nowhere” in Alaska, federally funded by request of one of their congressmen. Here’s the rest of the story: Our federal government grants our federal legislators “earmarks”. That is their term for pork barrel. Our Congressman, Don Manzullo, has been very dutiful in ensuring any project he secures “earmark” funding for is highly meritorious. Don has contacted me each year since I took office to ensure money being distributed in his congressional district is needed. That’s just how it should work.
State legislators like me are granted “member initiative” monies for local projects. In my time in office I have only received an allocation once, and that is this year. Every dime of the funding I secured went to desperately-needed infrastructure improvements in Milledgeville (sewer and water), Lena (sewer and water), Forreston (sewer and water), Pecatonica (sewer and water), East Dubuque (sewer and water) and Apple River (fire station).
Why have I only received funding once? It’s the Governor’s decision. Prior to this year, he only granted “member initiative” money to Democrat Legislators. This year, he chose to give only to Republican House members. You can read into that anything you choose.
Legislation to ban “pay to play” politics in our state is currently sitting on the Governor’s desk awaiting his signature. Simply put, “pay to play” is the trading of state jobs or contracts for campaign contributions. The Governor has received more than $200,000 in campaign contributions this year alone from companies that have contracts with the state.
We all hope he signs the bill into law very soon which will stop this very controversial practice.
Lobbyists are ranked by most people at the bottom of the employment scale. The Tony Rezko situation and other similar cases have attached a sleaze factor to what, for the most part, is an honorable profession. During the months of April and May, it is not uncommon for us to act on as many as 100 bills a day. Lobbyists are a huge asset in providing us factual information on many issues. I truly appreciate the hard work so many of them put into making sure we are educated.
Becoming “one of them” – Shortly after I was first elected I was told by many “don’t become ‘one of them’”. There are 118 State Representatives each representing 105,000 citizens and what a diverse group we are. Our views range from ultra-liberal to ultra-conservative and include everything in between. We represent all ethnic groups. Each of us worked hard to get elected and each of us is very proud of our unique district. I can never become any of them, and they can never be me.
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