Governor Late? No…….
ArchPundit
Bill Clinton pulled it off because he was so damn likeable–G-Rod is good, but he’s not good enough to pull off these stunts:
G-Rod
Budget Fiasco: Who Can Argue With This?
Aaron Chambers identifies Madigan’s principles for a budget:
SPECIFICALLY, HE SAID his team would not use borrowed money to cover the state’s operations, would not spend more money than the state collects and would not engage in balloon financing — a type of borrowing championed by Blagojevich that involves putting off principal payments for several years.
One doesn’t have to like the Speaker or even trust him to see that a budget that respects these basic principles is sound and puts the State of Illinois on a basic level of financial credibility to plan for the future. While the Governor has insisted on no new sales or income tax hikes, he has attempted to claim he’d find efficiency and alternative financing.
Unfortunately, we now know the efficiency gains are a disaster and his alternative financing is largely putting off the pain to deal with it in the future.
Blagorgeousapalooza
I had to outdo Rich’s description of the Daily Herald’s coverage fo the Blagorgeous
Eric Krol looks through a number of issues that are surrounding the Blagojevich administration
Appointees, and the money they gave
Tollway a rich font for patronage ? and may get richer
Arts Council a select spot for contributors? spouses
Plenty of state fair attention
Trib Takes Guv to Woodshed
A scathing audit released this week on one of the state’s most powerful agencies bolsters the impression that the Blagojevich administration is taking on the hue of its predecessor. The audit found so many troubling practices regarding how contracts were awarded and managed that Auditor Gen. William Holland turned the findings over to the Illinois attorney general to investigate.
This mess comes amid a growing list of cases in which the governor’s favored people seemingly have been beating the odds to get rich.
Unlike the state’s slot machines, blackjack tables and lottery tickets, this new game isn’t regulated … at least not on the surface.
A soup line of clout-heavy insiders profited from the bond work generated by a $10 billion pension deal Blagojevich pushed through the legislature.
Blagojevich’s campaign political director, John Wyma, has cashed in on his close relationship with the governor. Since being hired by Lehman Brothers to help land business in Illinois, Wyma has scored $400,000 for himself and nearly $2 billion for Lehman in state-connected bond work, according to filings with a government bond oversight board.
Lucrative rights to operate restaurants in revamped tollway oases have been granted to firms with ties to two members of Blagojevich’s kitchen cabinet. Both have raised oodles of campaign money for the governor.
Other close advisers-turned-lobbyists have been hired by hospital groups to influence action by a state board that the governor appoints. There are, however, supposed to be restrictions on lobbying of that board.
Blagojevich usually responds to these questions about insider-deals by attacking the messengers. This time, he should try something more credible and concrete. He should clear out the advisers who are making money off of him. And he should get the state to put all state contracts, including bond work, out for competitive bid.
Blagojevich has an acute sense of drama
One of the best columns on The Blagorgeous was Aaron Chambers’ Saturday column
The set-up is beautiful:
VISUALIZE YOUR CHARACTER. Become that person. It was a remarkable explanation.
With each policy proposal and spontaneous remark, it becomes clearer that Blagojevich has an acute sense of drama. He knows what to say to please his audience in any particular moment. He is engaging.
But he also is a man for whom truth and reality appear to be fluid concepts.
And then he kicks it in with a description of the problems with the Guv’s education plans:
THEN IN MARCH, AFTER months of criticism that he wasn’t taking school funding seriously, Blagojevich said the state could raise $300 million for schools by selling more gaming positions to casinos.
Only, casinos have a disincentive to expand as long as they’re taxed at 70 percent on annual receipts over $200 million. For that matter, not all casinos use the capacity allotted to them.
When reporters asked Blagojevich if he was serious about expanding gambling to improve education funding, he said he was serious about raising high school graduation requirements — another prong of his education plan.
Only, most Illinois school districts already meet or exceed his proposed standards.
Roeser Gives Guv Credit–Hell reports Coldwave
For something he deserves credit for:
Blagojevich has managed to set a good record on health care for the poor, and Republicans ought to recognize it and concentrate their fire somewhere else. Illinois ranks first in KidCare across the Midwest in the number of new children enrolled: 11,600 from June through December 2003. During that period, Illinois ranked first in rate of enrollment growth in the Midwest. Among all the states in that time frame, Illinois ranks first.
From April 2003 to July 2004, Illinois was one of 26 states that did not make enrollment in KidCare and FamilyCare more difficult by raising premiums, freezing enrollment or complicating the registration process. And among the 10 most populous states in that period, Illinois was one of six that didn’t make it more difficult for parents and children to sign up.
Parent Gap
Vial Capitol Fax, but here’s the Full Progressive Policy Institute Study.
Here’s the blurb about why it matters:
The 2004 election revealed a striking gap in the political leanings of people who are married with children: They favored the Republican, President George W. Bush, over the Democrat, Sen. John Kerry, by nearly 20 percentage points — 59 percent to 40 percent. This married parent gap must now take its place in the popular political lexicon alongside previously established voter gaps such as the gender gap (in which women generally lean Democratic and men lean Republican) and the race gap (in which minorities lean heavily Democratic and whites lean heavily Republican).
It was not always like this. Democrats were successful in competing for married parents in the very recent past. Bill Clinton only narrowly lost them in 1992, and then narrowly won them in 1996. Bush opened up a 15-point married parent gap over Al Gore in the 2000 election (winning the group 56 percent to 41 percent). But Clinton’s success shows that Democrats should be able to compete for married parents again in the future — or even win them.
Many people have ridiculed the Governor for this, but above all, one should understand it’s good politics. Parents are concerned about the level of sexuality and violence in a society. More importantly, sex without context is too often portrayed as normal–something few of us want to teach kids. Even if you disagree with abstinence only types of messages as I do, I don’t really want idiots like Britney Spears teaching my kids about relationships. That’s not to say I would ban Britney Spears for sexuality–though I might given the Emporer’s Thrown based on taste.
But more importantly to me personally, is the gratuitous violence in our culture–and violence is harder to control access to because the courts have long held that sexually explicit material is easier to regulate than violently explicit material. The basis is that there is no clear evidence that exposure to violence hurts kids–though I think there is little to suggest that exposure to sexuality is hurts kids irreparably either. The idea that pornography reduces kids inhibitions is about the same as evidence that violence in media does the same. That the two areas are treated differently is the result of a legacy of sex being treated differently in publications than violence with no rational basis.
For adults, it is entirely reasonable to say there shouldn’t be restrictions, but for kids, the idea that graphic depictions of violence should not be regulated while graphic depictions of sex should be boggles the average parent’s mind–and not in the way of being that both should be available to kids.
The courts are relatively clear and G-Rod will probably lose the fight if his bill is passed, but it’s important to note that the bill would only regulate video games that are graphically violent–not just any violent material. Thinking of it this way, it is very similar to bans on sexually explicit material and in the case of the law the Governor has advocated, the restriction is on sales so parents are given control over what their kids see. The restrictions are not a great threat to the First Amendment, and in fact, are less threatening than bans on obscene material given it only affects minors.
The idea that this is a significant restriction on freedom is a bit hard to swallow–given it only affects minors and parents may make the choice to still provide those materials if they deem the minor sufficiently mature. What it does do is allow parents to have another tool to restrict access to materials they find harmful to their children. While a parent might be unwise to do so (which I think is probably true and wouldn’t exercise that veto at an appropriate age), that still seems like a choice a parent should have.
I know the comments will be filled on this one with comments such as “parents should just be responsible,” but that’s the point of many parents–there are so many sources of such images it’s already too hard–this tool just lets them even the balance out.
What Do I Admire about the Governor?
I’d like to know, particularly from the hardcore Blagojevich critics that comment here, what you most like/admire/respect/etc. about our governor.
Add yours over there, but I thought I’d post mine here.
Three things stick out as admirable about the Governor
1) His commitment to adding gays, lesbians and the transgendered to the human rights act.
2) His commitment to Medicaid and children’s healthcare
3) And while he needs to improve and move further on the issue, his commitment to early childhood care and education.
And I’m sure I’ll add more later about the problems that jeopardize these efforts, but in the spirit of Rich’s question I’ll stop for now.
Will Franks Run?
Russ Stewart has a rather good analysis piece on Jack Franks potentially running for Governor. I tend to think Franks will see the effort as ultimately futile, though I wouldn’t be surprised to see him run for the Treasurer’s spot. Perhaps using the scenario to try and get some leverage to clear the field.
The one aspect that Stewart leaves out is the Governor’s fairly strong courting of Jackson Jr. Knowing that he has a problem with the Mayor and that he’s in the tank downstate, the Mayor has forged a fairly friendly relationship with Congressman Jackson over the last few months. At the State of the State he both introduced the Congressman and supported some sort of development of a south suburban airport. The Governor isn’t going to face a serious black candidate in the primary so the courting of Jackson provides for a stronger relationship in Chicago and a base of support that is probably impossible to cobble together a primary win against.
The further problem is that not knowing who is the Republican nominee, it’s impossible to tell if the Governor can, after a strong primary challenge, win a general election. Some of the field is so poor that they’d be toast. See O’Malley and Oberweis. It probably would toss the race to LaHood and perhaps Judy and Rauschenberger depends on where he would leave a primary race.
The Governor isn’t Bob Holden, Missouri incumbent Democratic Governor in 2004 who lost to the Democratic State Auditor. G-Rod has both cash to crush an opponent and where he is weakest–outstate–is not dominant in the primary or the general election. He’s strongest where the biggest chunk of votes resides and that gives him a far strong spot to start.
Franks is ambitious so taking on a sitting Governor means he has to make sure it isn’t a fatal blow to his future and for that to happen he’ll need some party elders to support him in the race even if they don’t do it publicly. I don’t see Daley or Madigan doing that in this race with a guy who cannot win. But might they help Franks run for Treasurer? Maybe.
Via the Cross Guys
Central Management Services Pile-On
The State Auditor’s report of Central Management Services is apparently due anytime, though the Sun-Times didn’t happen to mention when it was to be released…
It doesn’t look to be pretty given past audits of other agencies—all of which identify CMS operations as problems.
The Register Star picked up on these problems more than any other sources
And the original audits are available here
Earlier problems with CMS include problems getting contracts signed
But from the most recent story, this stands out to me as the most telling part of the problem
Paul Campbell, whom Blagojevich asked to take charge of the agency when director Michael Rumman leaves in May, said the agency has made monumental strides to consolidate purchasing, cut costs and document what it’s doing.
”There’s more documentation now than ever existed before about why people buy what they buy,” Campbell said Friday.
The point of making government more efficient is to make less documentation and simply hold agencies accountable. One of the more difficult efforts undertaken by Al Gore’s very successful effort to reinvent the federal bureaucracy, was to allow many purchases to be made by individual units. So if you need a computer, you didn’t have to go through a long process, you got approval and could go to a local store and buy it–now you can go on-line and do so.
More documentation to buy is the goal only when you have such massive fraud you can’t control it any other way. Documentation should be minimal with the agency setting out rules for when acquisition is appropriate and a standard to seek out the lowest cost easily achievable. Why an agency buys something should be because it helps carry out there mission.
If this is the way this effort is going to be defended, it’s not going to be pretty.