Chicago - A message from the station manager

The [Thursday] Papers

By Steve Rhodes

“Comparing the state income tax hike he’d vetoed a day earlier to a ‘two-by-four smacked across the forehead,’ Gov. Bruce Rauner on Wednesday warned lawmakers not to override him and said he would do ‘everything possible’ to try to make sure they don’t,” the Tribune reports.
Everything, governor? Some may wonder if you’re doing anything.


Cue NPRIllinois’ Brian Mackey:

So has he been trying to persuade, cajole or otherwise convince the Republicans who voted yes to change their position? Reporters asked if he’d even been in touch with them, and if so, what he’s said.
“We are doing everything possible to make sure my veto stands and that it’s not overridden,” Rauner said.
“Like what?” a reporter asked.
“Everything possible,” Rauner said.
“What does that mean?” a reporter asked, but she was interrupted by another question and the news conference moved on.

Whoever interrupted needs a stern talking to.

Here’s the thing: At least two Republicans who voted yes say neither the governor nor his office have been in touch.

Politically, the best outcome for Rauner is for predominantly Democratic legislators to override his veto and give him his first budget to govern with, while campaigning on his attempt to block a tax hike. In that sense, Rauner can be a winner even though he has clearly lost his two-and-a-half year fight.
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Back to the Tribune:
“Despite the movement toward a resolution in Springfield, Moody’s Investors Service indicated Wednesday that even overriding Rauner’s budget vetoes might not be enough to prevent a downgrade. The agency cited the state’s ‘most pressing credit challenges’: a $15 billion backlog of unpaid bills and a shortfall in government employee pensions systems that the state has pegged at $130 billion.
“The governor showed little public concern about the threats from ratings agencies, telling reporters Wednesday, ‘Don’t listen to Wall Street.'”
Isn’t Wall Street’s imprimatur what you want most when you pledge to run government like a business?
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But okay, la la la la la . . .
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“Rauner had invited news cameras to a tavern in Chicago’s Hegewisch neighborhood, where he was joined by local businesspeople who complained about high property taxes. Rauner took the opportunity to rail against Madigan ‘and his subordinates’ for ‘using leverage of suffering’ to raise taxes . . .
“Rauner himself, however, has talked before about using political leverage. During an April 2015 appearance before the Chicago Tribune editorial board, he was asked how he would be able to accomplish his agenda with Democrats controlling the General Assembly.

“Crisis creates opportunity,” he said then. “Crisis creates leverage to change . . . and we’ve got to use that leverage of the crisis to force structural change.”

Rauner, then, is the one who thought he could use suffering as a wedge – to dislodge progressive Democrats from Michael Madigan’s voting bloc in an end-around to get his “pro-business reforms.” Think of all the suffering he created – and tolerated – in pursuit of changes to workman’s comp rules, so-called “right-to-work” zones and term limits. And it didn’t even work.
Rauner miscalculated badly, only strengthening Madigan’s hand by stubbornly insisting on “reforms” so ghastly that progressives rallied around Madigan as the grotesque man on the wall needed to protect the elderly, children, the disabled, the addicted, the homeless, veterans, and the mentally ill, as well as the working- and middle-classes.
Let’s face it: Bruce Rauner is a very bad man. Apparently he never read Moby-Dick.
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“If they were just going to do a tax hike with no reforms, they could have done that two years ago,” Rauner said. “Instead they caused a crisis and they hurt innocent people. This is wrong. This is broken politics.”
They.
They did it.
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“Gov. Bruce Rauner, who demagogued his way into office on the back of an Illinois income tax increase, resaddled that trusted pony Wednesday for another campaign ride,” Mark Brown writes for the Sun-Times
“The governor could barely contain his phony outrage on the eve of an Illinois House effort to override his vetoes of a state budget that gifts him with both a functioning government and a re-election platform.
“‘A disaster’ for the people of the state of Illinois, the billionaire governor said of the budget that raises the individual income tax rate to 4.95 percent – slightly less than what it was when he first got out his checkbook to make this state his grandest acquisition.”
Rauner To Public: Drop Dead
If I read this right, the governor’s office simply ignored a FOIA from the Springfield State Journal-Register, and then simply ignored the public access counselor of the state attorney general’s office. Just ignored them. Now they’ve been ordered to turn over the documents in question – and isn’t our interest heightened?
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Tribune’s Disastrous Sale To Sinclair
Conservative TV group trying to sell to completely nutso conservative TV group, changing the face of local news across America for the kookiest worst.
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The Political Odds
Updated to reflect recent developments.
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WTF, Democrats
As far as I can tell, this isn’t a joke.
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The Grocery Store
Man’s inhumanity to man.
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BeachBook
A sampling.

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Middle-Class Americans Were Fleeced By Neo-Liberalism.

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Is Your God Dead?

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TweetWood
A sampling.


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Marty Gangler says: “Try the Gopher.”


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The Beachwood Tronc Line: Get to the point.

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Posted on July 6, 2017