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| Archie wasn't always so ridiculous |
Because
the governor’s routine of trying to portray himself as some poor little victim
who’s being abused by the politicians who just don’t have the common sense to
do what he tells them to do is getting way too old.
IT
HAS LITERALLY been 100 days (almost three-and-a-half months) into the current
fiscal year, and we’re nowhere close to having a state government with a
balanced budget – which is a requirement under the Illinois constitution.
Yet
rather than acknowledge that his insistence on tying assorted restrictions on
organized labor and unions into the negotiations is what is causing the
inability to reach a budget deal, he continues to claim he’s being picked on.
Because
political people whose own ideological leanings don’t view those unions as some
source of evil aren’t going to meekly give in. Heck, it is likely the people
who voted those legislators into office did so because they want government
officials who work with organized labor.
Rauner
made his latest attack on Wednesday during an appearance in suburban Oak Lawn
before the Southland Chamber of Commerce where he said he insists that the
anti-labor measures be included in order to get gubernatorial support for any
measure that raises taxes and fees to help balance out the state budget.
THE
ONLY ALTERNATIVE, he claims, is for Democrats to use their supermajority status
to pass their own idea of a balanced budget – one that would include some
massive tax hike.
Meaning
that Democrats would have to take all the blame and accept the public outrage
for such an increase. Which, of course, they won’t want to do. There is a time
and place for Rauner to pursue his anti-labor agenda. The budget isn’t it.
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| RAUNER: 100 days of nonsense talk being spewed |
Although
it is dishonest for Rauner to say that such a scenario is even possible.
Because even if Democrats in the General Assembly were to try to use such a
political tactic to come up with a budget, Rauner as governor can say “no.”
The
“veto” power. Democrats can’t pass anything all on their own. Unless they’d be
willing to then take a gubernatorial veto and try to override it.
IT
SEEMS THAT Rauner is guilty of believing all those polls his private wealth has
commissioned to show him with some moral high ground. He thinks the public
would become “outraged!!!” by such a brazen political move.
I
actually think it would appear that the governor is truly weak and ineffectual;
as if all his blather on behalf of the “right wing” and those voters who want
to isolate Chicago from the rest of Illinois was for naught and that it took
the “old pros” in the Legislature to actually get something done.
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| No solution in sight. Photograph provided by State of Illinois |
I
brought up the issue of regionalism because I found it intriguing that Rauner
made his latest pronouncement in suburban Cook County. I wonder if he believes
he can gain the support of all the rest of Illinois – and make it possible for
him to disregard the concerns of any Chicago-oriented legislators.
That
was the strategy back during that two-year gap when Republicans dominated state
government – the GOP made no inroads into the city, but dominated elsewhere in
Illinois.
THE
PROBLEM BECAME when those people near Chicago began to see how their interests
weren’t that different from those of the city.
It
is why elections in Illinois aren’t city vs. everybody else, but are really
Cook County vs. everybody else. I don’t think Rauner realizes how the people he
spoke to are as unsympathetic to him as anyone from Chicago proper.
Because
they perceive just how self-interested Rauner’s pronouncements are. I don’t
think anybody took the man literally when he made his latest rant.
In
fact, I wonder how many people had another Archie Bunkerism pop into their
minds, as in, “That is pure crapola!”
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