Governor Flowbeejevich Whines

ArchPundit June 19, 2004 1 Comment

Why is Democracy for America Chicago doing the the Flobeejevich’s dirty work for him?

Here’s the message from the Illinois for Dean listserv:

To the people of Illinois:

When I was elected Governor, I made a promise to the working people
of Illinois that I would fight to protect those things that are most
important to them and their families ? their health, their safety,
and the future of their children.

Back in February, I presented the General Assembly with a balanced
budget for the coming fiscal year. My budget will invest $600
million more in health care for working families, seniors and
children. My budget will invest $400 million more in the education
of our children. My budget will send 8,000 at-risk children to pre-
school. My budget will give more money to state police and to
investigators to help keep the people of Illinois safe.

But now, with the state’s budget deadline looming in less than two
weeks, legislators are dragging their feet in hopes of forcing me to
accept a “no-growth” budget that will make 150,000 people lose their
healthcare and send schools across the state into a financial
quagmire.

I will not do that. I will not compromise my values, because they
are the values of the people who elected me. A no-growth budget is a
no-future budget, and I will not sign away the future of Illinois.

I am asking you to join me today as I fight for your values, your
families, and your state. Call 1-866-757-1032, and tell your state
representative that you want a state budget that is best for you and
your family. Let your representative know that you’re watching
what’s happening in Springfield, and that you expect your elected
leaders to represent your interests, do the right thing, and support
my budget.

Thank you.
Sincerely,

Rod R. Blagojevich
Governor

What the good Governor fails to mention while invoking Howard Dean is that his budget puts the pain on future generations. This is a man who wants to mortgage the future of the State of Illinois on the backs of future taxpayers. Why? Because he can claim that he held the line on taxes—which is BS too if you look at the fee increases this clown has suggested.

Governor Dean was attractive to me because he made a very coherent argument–that to have social justice you must first have fiscal responsibility. You cannot spend money now that you do not have and hope to create a sustainable budget. It will backfire eventually.

The Flowbeejevich has suggested a program of borrowing to pay for current operations. Borrowing is an important tool for government when it is making long term investments such as roads or school construction, but a horrible idea when paying for current operations. After all, what do you do when you can’t borrow anymore? You cut operations because you can’t cut debt payments.

If the good Flowbeejevich had, say, taken on a really hard issue like school finance reform for rural schools, I might give him a little slack. Instead, he has avoided hard issues and tried to demagogue on a few small ones and now he is trying to sound like a reformer. He isn’t reforming anything. He is trying to “run business as usual” TM by borrowing from taxpayers of the future to make his administration look good to taxpayers of today.

There is another example of this kind of irresponsibility and it is Schwarzenegger in California who has sold bonds to cover current state expenditures.

Of course, last year the Flowbeejevich tried to make the budget work by a series of one-time financial changes. The problem again is how do you cover the structural costs you are hiding in a current budget the next year? Maybe you can do it for three or four years, but ultimately the bills come due.

So call your State Lege Members and tell them to back a budget that doesn’t operate under smoke and mirrors. A no-growth budget isn’t perfect, but it certainly leaves us in a position to address problems in the future. Either we deal with structual problems now or later. If later, those programs he claims to be defending today will suffer tomorrow.

Steinberg Seems a Bit Slow

ArchPundit June 8, 2004 1 Comment

His column today misses that the Blagorgeous Administration didn’t get the final agreement to the Attorney General until 2 Days before the closing date.

So Steinberg might be right—it might not be a coincidence, Team Blagorgeous might have tried to set her up knowing full well what a legal analysis would conclude.

A blog being a pithy medium and all, I’m sure I do this sort of thing with some regularity, but I’m not getting paid in a major daily paper.

Two Bits on the Budget

ArchPundit June 5, 2004 2 Comments

Over at the Capitol Fax.

The first is the most damning for the Blagorgeous. Despite his caterwauling, the budget doesn’t add up.

BUDGET HAS BIG HOLE (excerpt) The budget endorsed by Blagojevich and Jones appears to be fatally flawed. A House Democratic analysis claims, with credibility, that even with all the new taxes and a 2.25 percent across-the-board cut, it’s still more than $700 million in the red. Sen. Steve Rauschenberger suggested last night that the governor is spending like the drunken legislative sailors he infamously blasted last spring.

It’s like giving Rauschenberger fodder for good lines. If anything he’s been reserved so far, probably letting the Dems get themselves in to a fine fix. The Blagorgeous obliged so I expect Rauschenberger, now with leverage, will start having fun again.

BUDGET WRANGLING (excerpt) The four legislative leaders met for a short while yesterday, and agreed that the governor’s budget director should provide a list of what cuts he would make if the General Assembly goes ahead with a planned 2.25 percent across-the-board reduction. All but one leader, Senate President Emil Jones, are unwilling to trust the director with such a limitless power. The Senate approved a bill that would give the director carte blanche to skim money from just about everything except the school fund, but including a fund for local governments.

Interesting that the closet Lege ally doesn’t really trust Filan, Rod’s budget director.

It’s Not Just Dawn Clark Netsch Anymore Governor

ArchPundit June 5, 2004 No Comments

Rich Miller has a hysterical column up at the Capitol Fax that debates the different way he could take the column, settling on pointing out that women in the Illinois Government don’t expect to be treated like the pioneering women were decades ago, they now back each other when some dimwit takes a swipe at their gender:

Rep. Sara Feigenholtz (D-Chicago) said Madigan was “just doing her job,” and the governor “shouldn’t insult her.”

Sen. Christine Radogno (R-Lemont) called the governor a “Neanderthal.”

“She is not carrying water for her father,” insisted Rep. Julie Hamos (D-Evanston).

Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka called the governor a “chauvinist pig.”

The lesson here, I think, is that you can get away with throwing all the showy windup fastballs you want at the Springfield establishment. But after years of being dismissed and discriminated against, women at the Statehouse have come together to form a fearsome, bipartisan team, and they’ll hit those goofy pitches out of the park. The governor should stick to safer targets.

And if I may, the Guv ought to remember the last Illinois politician to ignore women’s issues in the Democratic Party. I hear retirement as a lobbyist is working out just fine for Alan Dixon, Governor.

That’s Ms. Attorney General to You Blow Dry Boy

ArchPundit June 4, 2004 4 Comments

I didn’t think he could make this much worse, but The Blagorgeous response to the Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan’s blocking the mortgaging of the Thompson Center is perhaps a classic in stupid things said by public officials.

“It’s her father, you know, I can’t fault her,” Blagojevich said. “I don’t want to get involved in a family deal here, but you know it’s her father. I’ve got two daughters. I hope they back me on stuff that I do.”

Steve Brown, Madigan’s press guy and all around aide responds with just about the nastiest thing I’ve heard in a while in Illinois politics

It speaks more to the pathetic, simplistic world the governor sometimes lives in

So he has alienated the Attorney General and the Speaker of the House of Representatives. But that isn’t all, oh no, our boy Blagorgeous just pissed off the women on both sides of the aisle with that condescending poppy cock:

“She is not carrying water for her father,” said state Rep. Julie Hamos (D-Evanston). “She is the attorney general for the state of Illinois.”

“He is a complete Neanderthal, and I think it’s a complete insult to women,” said state Sen. Christine Radogno (R-Lemont) of Blagojevich. “She’s a professional. There are a lot of professional women, and we don’t necessarily do what our fathers and husbands say.”

State Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka, who also is head of the state Republican Party, called Blagojevich’s remarks “shameful and chauvinistic” and said the governor should apologize to not just Madigan but to all women in the state.

But to really make matters worse, it appears that Lisa Madigan is right:

Though most legislation requires only a simple majority of the House and Senate for approval, Madigan noted in her opinion that the Illinois Constitution requires a special three-fifths vote on measures that authorize new state borrowing. Ironically, Michael Madigan was a sponsor of the Thompson Center bill, which passed his chamber 72-44, one vote more than needed to meet the three-fifths mandate.

But the Senate passed the bill by a 33-25 margin, three votes short of the number needed to attain three-fifths approval.

Blagojevich aides disagreed with Lisa Madigan’s interpretation of the three-fifths rule. But former University of Illinois law professor Ron Rotunda, an expert on the state constitution, sided with Madigan’s view.

“The framers [of the constitution] created this rule to be airtight,” Rotunda said. “The only way the framers could have been any clearer would be to add a sentence at the end of the clause that says, `We really mean it.'”

Never mind that financing current operations out of debt creation is really stupid.

How To Empower The Republicans

ArchPundit June 1, 2004 No Comments

Go into overtime and give them a veto. Brilliant Governor, brilliant.

Now, some sort of consensus budget isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but part of the selling point to the rank and file for voting for Blagorgeous was the Dems would have unified control. He just gave that away. Dandy.

We need less circus and more bread.

ArchPundit June 1, 2004 1 Comment

Go read the whole thing, but Rich Miller does a job on The Blagorgeous

For over a year, political insiders have marveled at how Blagojevich could maintain relatively high approval ratings despite a complete refusal to engage in even minimal governance. Blagojevich must be another Jim Edgar, many figured. Edgar was a highly unpopular governor under the Statehouse dome, but he was a huge hit with the public.

Edgar was disliked because he didn’t come down to the floor and horsetrade. In contrast both Thompson and Ryan were beloved because they did that. Blagojevich won’t do it and that is the real problem though. Not being a good buddy with the Lege isn’t necessary. But being too slick is a problem with the public and eventually it wears thin. The press generally saw Edgar as a decent guy who was aloof at times, but a straight shooter. With G-Rod, you get the feeling they sit in press conferences and mouth the words he’s about to say.

Wrong. Blagojevich has reported spending an average of about $1,000 a day on polling since the middle of 2002, and we haven’t even seen his totals for this year yet

Wow–that’s a lot. During a campaign that makes sense, but during the year?

Taking on the Lege isn’t a bad thing, but you don’t get credit for blasting them for being cronys when your cronies are appearing everywhere.

The Metabolic Screening and Treatment Fund

ArchPundit May 29, 2004 No Comments

OneMan has the details on one of the funds Blagorgeous wants to tap to close the budget gap. My guess this is dead with the Four Tops deal being worked out–some tapping of funds, but dramatically less. But it is disturbing how little the Guv pays attention to the details.

Illinois Budget-Legislative Session

ArchPundit May 29, 2004 5 Comments

The following is from an anonymous reader–I think it is great analysis so pass it along in its entirety:

While there is still no official budget deal yet, there is little doubt that House Speaker Mike Madigan will emerge from the legislative session as the big winner, while Governor Blagojevich has been handed a humiliating defeat. The way Madigan appears to have done this is both simple and brilliant.

Blagojevich spent all session attacking the ?old way? General Assembly. He refused to negotiate on his budget. He demanded that Speaker Madigan and Senate President Jones pass the budget he submitted. He threatened massive cuts and layoffs, overtime session, and/or special session, to ensure he got what he wanted.

In return, Madigan has provided the Governor an important lesson in understanding how government works, and its importance in achieving political goals.

You see, overtime requires a 3/5 majority to pass a budget, and Madigan understood that an overtime session was never going to strengthen the hand of the Governor. It only strengthens the hands of the minority leaders ? neither of whom were members of the Governor?s party or his allies.

Madigan also understood that the 3/5 majority required of an overtime session also happens to be VETO PROOF.

So, while Blagojevich blustered about overtime and made demands of the General Assembly, Madigan spent the legislative session quietly reeling in the two GOP minority leaders from the House and Senate, and making them his allies.

The result has been that, since Thursday, the 3 of the 4 legislative caucuses have been working cooperatively to pass a compromise budget that will attain a 3/5 majority. The only holdout at this point in Emil Jones ? and he?s not holding out for the Governor, rather, he?s holding out for his own spending priorities.

The ?budgeteers? continue to meet through the weekend and are reportedly making good progress toward a final budget. And the Governor?s people aren?t even at the table, nor are they needed, because the budget will have enough votes to become law without the Governor?s approval.

Congratulations, Governor. You just cut yourself out of the process!

The act of crafting a budget that will become law without the Governor?s involvement is a development without precedent in the state of Illinois. It promises to be, quite literally, the most humiliating legislative session for a sitting Governor in recent history.

This might be the appropriate point to crack a joke about the first step to playing with the big boys, is actually making sure you have a seat at the table?.

Really he Meant Lay-off 3100

ArchPundit May 28, 2004 No Comments

Crain’s piles on today nothing that the Blagorgeous’ plan to layoff 5000 state employees comes despite hiring 1900 employees in the last few months.

Critical jobs everyone, I’m sure:

his administration has hired a Spanish liaison for the Lottery

Because, you know, playing the lottery is pretty critical to assist people with.