Call It A Comeback
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EzvL4oFGdwQ[/youtube]
We’ve already been down the road of skipping pension payments and it’s how you get to where Illinois is. Christie is unlikely to still be around when it gets to that point in New Jersey since he thought Disney World was more important than snow removal. Ask Michael Bilandic about that.
Via Rich
I was on Collateral Damage on KDHX last night discussing the last few weeks of Illinois politics including Rahm getting the boot from the ballot. You can listen in here It’s a spiffy new web site so I’m not sure where the podcast feeds are, but the site is a great improvement other than that small issue.
Even better sign up on the site and become a fan of the show.
Update: A-ha Found the podcasts
It’s hard to decide whether to put this story in the category of things we already knew or DC navel gazing. Either way, it’s a waste of space.
According to Politico, Kirk has been rubbing his Senate colleagues the wrong way with smug behavior. Apparently, he’s too full of himself even for Ego Mountain, as the Senate is sometimes known.
In December, the Senate defeated a $1.1 trillion omnibus spending bill, loaded with the earmarks Kirk campaigned against.
“As the most junior people, for those who don’t understand what just happened, did we just win?” Kirk asked, rhetorically. He knew the Republicans had just won, but wanted to rub it in. Kirk also got into a “heated discussion” with John McCain about their differences on repealing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”
Rahm still gets to appeal to the Supreme Court where I think he’ll still win, but this certainly raises the stakes and decreases his odds.
Worst possible outcome from this–Mayor Braun. Chico will still have time to pull this out if Rahm is tossed. Del Valle’s fundraising suck beyond any reasonable reason to back him at this point. I want to back him, but he’s got to raise money and he didn’t even raise enough to the be scrappy challenger.
Life has intervened so I’ll be back tomorrow, but this appears to be the modern update of Eddie Murphy’s bit about how Jesse Jackson could become President:
Fine moments in bad punditry:
I think I’m like most Chicagoans in finding it easier to understand how someone can go broke than how someone can magically earn $16 million in two-and-a-half years, as Rahm Emanuel did.
“The reality is that unlike Mr. Emanuel and Mr. Chico, who traded on their government relations for vast riches when they left office, I did not,” Moseley Braun said in a press release. “My tax returns are one measure of the fight I have waged to keep my business running. It is not unlike what many small business owners and regular Chicago families are going through.”
The one question I’ve always wanted to ask every politician is, “How has this recession affected you personally?” Now I know the answer for one.
Source: http://www.nbcchicago.com/blogs/ward-room/A-Mayor-As-Broke-As-We-Are-112934019.html#ixzz1ABdnjf4h
There’s nothing in her past to demonstrate any competence or effectiveness other than enriching her own life or self yet she cannot even do that. There’s a reason Bank One wouldn’t hire the woman–she’s grossly incompetent at anything other than aggrandizing herself.
It’s fair to take a whack at both Rahm and Chico for enriching themselves at the public trough. It’s true and it’s an obnoxious practice both of them are guilty. What’s absolutely unacceptable is to put Del Valle in that category. He makes a decent salary as a public servant. He has no history of using that power to enrich himself or his friends which is directly counter to everything in CMB’s public career. Making CMB some sort of person of the people is pure and utter bullshit. She has sold out every principle she claimed to stand for and yet still can’t make money–that is incredible, but not something to celebrate. Complete and utter incompetence is something to marvel at, but not in an approving way. Worse, it takes away credit from a good public servant like Del Valle.
I don’t think Del Valle can win because he hasn’t raised enough money, doesn’t have a really strong ground operation and is at least splitting his natural constituency with a better funded candidate. However, if one wants to base the campaign on who has a clean and honest record in public service he wins hands down.
He hits a fairly thoughtful note here on the African-American community seeking a single candidate:
But there’s another point here–these people didn’t come together in unity over the same policies. Meeks is fairly different from the other two on social issues and education. The guy with the most administrative success was Meeks. Braun doesn’t support a state income tax increase which is at the core of funding the CPS. What is it that brought these three together?
Really? What is she going to do that Daley didn’t? Other than wrought iron the man’s next obsession is with bicycles. That doesn’t mean Chicago couldn’t improve, but there’s nothing in what she would do differently.
Web sites hit the high points, but compare it to Chico, Del Valle, or even Rahm. She’s a candidate with few ideas or reasons for being Mayor other than her race.
Greg Hinz is reporting he’s around there
Contender Rahm Emanuel is believed to have pulled in far more, perhaps $10 million, but isn’t releasing any numbers yet.
The governor’s office wants to pay back the $15 billion plus interest over time with new revenue generated by increasing income, cigarette and gas taxes.
We say some of that new re-venue should be used to pay the state’s bills directly over time. Skip the borrowing.
Proponents of the $15 billion borrowing plan say it would be cheaper for the state than the alternative — continuing to be a deadbeat. That’s because the state, by law, must pay 12 percent interest when it’s chronically late paying its vendors. Alternatively, if the state sells its debt, it may be or 5 percent.
We’re not convinced that those savings will materialize. Borrowing would be cheaper only if Illinois continued to pay its bills late for the next decade or more.
We hope the state ends that shameful practice far sooner than that. Borrowing would work only if legislators passed a permanent income tax increase. We urge them to do so, but a temporary one may be in the cards.
Finally, borrowing would do nothing to encourage the state to spend less, as it must.
The good of catching up isn’t only in saving money–which their estimate is questionable, but also getting vendors caught up and under 60 days as it should be. Right now, the state is months behind in payments to almost all of their vendors and that means social service providers. Remember, the State of Illinois has a fairly small number of state employees with many services provided by private providers and they are all in significant trouble because of the state’s inability to pay on time.
The Sun-Times is suggesting that state vendors, already cash strapped, loan money to the State of Illinois and continue to do so for years ahead. The state is still borrowing money, but instead of doing it from a bank and having set terms, it’s from hospitals, non-profit service providers, local governments, and schools. Given these entities seldom have enough extra cash to be floating the state government a loan, this means they often have to get loans to cover the shortfall where possible raising the costs for vendors.
Stateline writer Dan Vock did a great piece on this:
It’s a safe place in a neighborhood troubled by gang violence. Two years ago, two participants at the Youth Service Project were killed, and two more were injured, in the fighting. The youth at the center, which runs an arts education program, responded to the deaths by painting an indoor mural of their memories of that summer’s events. It shows a SWAT team van, a church cross against a blue sky and a funeral home — although the center’s staff, fearing that the funeral home would be a distressing image for the kids to see every day, have moved a bookshelf in front of it.
The center plays an important role in the life of Humboldt Park. Indeed, the state of Illinois, which provides 95 percent of the Youth Service Project’s funding, expects the center to provide all of the services under its contract. The catch is that, with all the state’s fiscal troubles lately, no one knows when the state will actually hand over that money.
In the past, the center has had to wait a month or two to get paid. This year, the center went six months without receiving a single check from the state. To get by, the center exhausted its line of credit, cut back on services and laid off seven of its 32 staff members. Only half as many children were able to take advantage of the Youth Service Project’s programs as did two years ago.
This summer, gang violence picked up once again. Three police officers were killed, including one who guarded the mayor’s house. While overall homicide rates are down in Chicago, the brazenness of the attacks prompted two state legislators to propose calling in the National Guard. The adults who work at the Youth Service Project have noticed more aggressive behaviors among the teens they serve, making them more difficult to work with.
There’s a good sidebar on a pharmacist as well. But why should the state be borrowing from vendors and not banks? Has Illinois gotten so weird that people just expect it to operate this poorly now?
At least she isn’t trying to make an excuse up:
If Braun had chosen to match their disclosures, she could have exploited a vulnerability of Emanuel and Chico, who have both been accused of cashing in on their political connections.
But when reporters reminded Braun on Monday that she has yet to let reporters see her tax returns, the newly-minted consensus black candidate for mayor slammed the door.
“You won’t either until after the election. No. Not until after the election,” she said.
Asked why, she said defiantly, “Because I don’t want to.” With that, Braun ended the news conference called to repeat her promise to take Chicago parking meters back from private investors.
As she was walking out the door of her campaign headquarters, Braun was asked why she would refuse if she has nothing to hide.
“Oh, get out of here,” she said.
Braun’s refusal might have something to do with the still unpaid $250,000 loan she got from controversial former campaign contributor Joseph Stroud.
ArchPundit