2006

Mississippi River Bridge

ArchPundit June 5, 2006 No Comments

Illinois is clearly under the impression that Missouri is not Mississippi with pro sports.

Illinois is wrong. Despite all the ranting about trucking companies going to other states, they won’t in Metro East because the alternative is a miserable ass backwards state that thinks infrastructure is less important than low taxes.

The number one priority in all local highway spending at the federal level around Saint Louis is the Mississippi River Bridge. The federal team came through with cash, Governor Boy Blunder cannot. In fact, Governor Boy Blunder wanted to further restrict taxes and revenues with a TABOR amendment.

If Illinois wants a bridge in Metro East, then it needs to sponsor a regional taxing district on the west side that will allow Metropolitan Saint Louis to tax itself for basic infrastructure from education to roads. Otherwise, Illinois is picking up the bill.

Tollway Lease Coverage

ArchPundit June 5, 2006 No Comments

Via Rich

A really good article on tollway privatization. Pat Guinane explores the issue in good depth. One of the issues not covered is ensuring that when public assets are leased, sunshine laws are extended to the private companies’ operations of the public assets.

The second thing is that no funding is used upfront if it diminshes future money in regular expenditures.

That’s The End of That

ArchPundit June 5, 2006 No Comments

Madigan’s letter to legislators pretty much means the Lottery sale is dead.

“The governor?s multi-faceted, far-reaching plan would have profound long-term consequences for state finances and schools,” Madigan wrote.

Madigan?s call for scrutiny of the proposal is important because the speaker controls much of what gets voted on in the Illinois House.

While Madigan said the governor?s plan deserves “serious consideration,” he said questions must be answered on a number of fronts, including how the governor determined the lottery was worth $10 billion.

The hope would be that several elements of the plan could be salvaged from the consolidation portions to the elements that would give the state more standing to intervene in failing districts. Blagojevich, actually had the right idea in ending the current system of regional superintendents. If you combine that idea with professionalizing the system with curriculum and finance specialists, struggling schools would receive far more useful aid.

The funding is still the problem and with a hard and fast rule that he will not increase sales or income taxes in the State of Illinois, there is little chance to find the money for a large scale reform effort in terms of educational policy.

Strangely, Phil Kadner blames Madigan.

And you’re a mischief-maker.

You have been a leader downstate longer than anyone. If the state has financial problems, if the schools are in trouble, you are responsible.

Yet you have no solutions.

You simply pass around notes.

All you care about is keeping your gang of hooligans and no-accounts in control.

Yes, I hear all your little buddies snickering.

You are a disappointment, Mr. Madigan.

Unlike most of the others, you know better.

You are smart enough to realize that this state is falling apart financially.

You know the state’s system of funding public schools is unfair and inexplicable.

And you realize that all the other legislators look to you whenever someone proposes a solution.

The problem is that the Speaker pretty much said he’d seriously consider an income tax increase if the Governor wouldn’t veto it. The Governor said he would. Count the votes in Springfield and there aren’t enough for an override. Count the votes in swing districts and that means lots of Democratic candidates would get beat with a Democratic Governor vetoing a tax increase voted upon by Democratic House.

If you want that to change, you need to have a Governor who is willing to sign such a bill. Judy won’t answer the question clearly to date, and Blagojevich won’t do it. I think it’s a safe bet to say Blagojevich isn’t the Speaker’s first choice for Governor, but he’s what he’s got for now. Governor’s come and go, but Mike Madigan is always there. He’d like to be able to pass bills that help people in general in the majority instead of fighting to stop some really bad ideas in the minority–does anyone think that if Republicans controlled the General Assembly it would be better?

I want Madigan to pass the bill too, but I’d prefer he do it when it can actually pass and not just to make people feel better.

Brady Calls on LMadigan to Immediately Protect the Evidence

ArchPundit June 2, 2006 No Comments

Hey dumbass, the Grand Jury has been empanelled for nearly 18 months.

Selfish Hedonism

ArchPundit May 31, 2006 No Comments

Is alive and well in North Carolina’s 13th Congressional District where Representative Brad Miller was attacked by Vernon Robinson for not having kids

Soon after winning the GOP primary in the 13th District in May, Robinson mailed literature to more than 400,000 households portraying Miller’s voting record and personal life as being out of the mainstream.

Among many other things, the literature calls Miller a “childless, middle-aged personal injury lawyer.”

Miller said he was “stunned” by the letter.

“I think that should not be part of what you agree to take on if you want to be involved in politics — that kind of personal attack without any basis,” Miller said.

Miller said his wife of nearly 25 years, Esther Hall, could not bear children because she had endometriosis and then a hysterectomy at age 27 before the couple were married.

I believe Robinson sinks to being more despicable than Keyes on this one. I can’t wait for the commercial suggesting Miller shouldn’t be having sex with his wife since they can’t procreate. You’ll notice that Keyes standard was that in principle a woman and a man can procreate so it’s okay if a sterile married couple have sex. In this case, the plumbing was removed so it’s hard to tell how that fits the idea of being in principle.

The Problem with Freedom Fries

ArchPundit May 31, 2006 No Comments

It used to be fun to make fun of the French for things like this

The crusade against Lance by the French Press can only be matched by the interest in the US press concerning the Clenis.

The Fountain of Bad Ideas

ArchPundit May 26, 2006 No Comments

Roeser’s little empire of personal pet peeve pushing is far more connected to much of the right wing crap brought up in this state. Case in point is the recent kerfluffle in District 214 over novels deemed pornographic by a few well organized angry folks.

How well organized? Check out one guy quoted in the Daily Herald, The Pioneer Press and Tribune as if he were just another resident (misspelled his name).

Resident Bruce Pincknell was one of the few who supported Pinney’s plan, saying that teachers promoting the books were motivated by their own progressive social agendas.

And from the Herald:

Bruce Tincknell, a former Prospect High parent, read an excerpt from the book, omitting some terms he felt were too inappropriate.

“This is unacceptable to many of us,” he told those in the room. “We want better.”

Pioneer Press

Arlington Heights resident Bruce Tincknell said although he does not have children currently attending District 214 schools, he is concerned about the content of the required novels.

Tincknell said he has read The Perks of Being a Wallflower and How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accent, as well as excerpts from the list of books.

“When I read some of the excerpts, it concerned me as a parent, as a taxpayer. It’s quite outrageous. I can’t see any literary value,” he said prior to the board’s decision.

Who is Tincknell?

He’s a Board of Director at the Illinois Family Institute

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

The IFI Board of Directors consists of:

Dr. John & Dena Koehler (Chairman)
Dr. Gary & Mary Draper
Mrs. Virginia Nurmi
Dr. Don & Sandra Helfer
Mr. Bruce Tincknell

This is a case of the Right Wing Wurlitzer continuing the efforts to make a controversy out of something where the community doesn’t find anything controversial. I don’t blame the reporters since Tincknell, Pinney and the others affiliated with IFI and Roeser probably set it up to get exactly this kind of coverage, but it is something to watch out for.

It gets better, his affiliations go unmentioned in other articles where is more of the focus. In one from the Herald on February 12th,

“It’s branded Paul Simon. It is an institute representing the Democratic Party,” said Bruce Tincknell, a former District 214 parent who’s heading up Citizens for Quality Education, a watchdog group focused primarily on District 214 goings-on. “It’s more than a name.”

He’s also in a December 3rd article challenging the current superintendent in relation to his record in Stevens Point.

Funny, the guy shows up talking about public education funding and ‘family values’, two of Jack Roeser’s hobby horses, but he never is identified as attached to Roeser affiliated groups.

Now to Erin Holmes credit, she does identify Tincknell on April 1, 2005 as

Meanwhile, Illinois State Board of Elections records show Jack Roeser, head of the Family Taxpayers Network that endorsed Pinney, made a $12,000 contribution this week to Mount Prospect-based “Just the Facts,” a group headed by Tincknell.

This was during the election which Pinney won.

The point here being the amount of noise from a small number of people is awfully loud and this ought to be pointed out more regularly.

Matt Drudge, Douchebag

ArchPundit May 26, 2006 No Comments

Referencetone has it–I’ll link after the all clear sign, but here’s the text

On CNN a couple of minutes ago, Dana Bash reported on a new message that went out to locked-down Rayburn HOB staffers over the loudspeaker detailing how they can be sure that the person knocking on their office door is a police officer as opposed to, say, a gun-wielding madman. Bash wisely decided to withhold some of the details just in case a gun-wielding madman happened to be watching CNN and was curious how to make frightened office-dwellers open their doors to him. Enter Matt Drudge: