Does anybody really feel compelled to give political millionaire Rauner their own money to help get him re-elected?

My guess is that Illinois’ governor is disappointed with me, and everybody just like me, who ignored his plea on Monday for cash to supplement the personal wealth he plans to commit to the 2018 electoral efforts to keep himself in office, and also to get a more sympathetic state Legislature to rubber-stamp his efforts.

RAUNER: Wants your President Grants

While many people were paying attention to the Statehouse to see if Bruce Rauner really would instantly amendatorily veto any Education Funding bill sent to him Monday by the General Assembly (the bill was sent to him so late in the day that he wound up not being able to act on it -- maybe Tuesday?), my attention was caught by his fund-raising plea.

AS IN RAUNER insisting that Monday night was a deadline by which people had to send their contributions to him if they want to support his desire to stay in office for another four-year term.

“This month’s contributions go directly to sending the Madigan Machine a clear message; Illinois is not going back to the old way of doing things,” he wrote, while suggesting that $50 was the recommended donation.

In fact, Rauner was hoping to get 32 people to donate $50 each – with the 32 being symbolic of the figure he’s repeatedly using to describe the income tax adjustment that was made over his objections when the General Assembly in early July finally settled on a budget for state government.

Of course, one could argue that the “old way of doing things” within state government entailed actually approving budgets and keeping the mechanics of state government operating.

THE OLD WAY didn’t involve being willing to put things at risk just for the sake of partisan politics – just as the governor’s desire to mess with approving an Education Funding bill is also a willingness to put partisan politics ahead of ensuring that the schools get their initial state aid payments as scheduled on Aug. 10.

If that deadline is missed, we could have some sort of delay with the public schools being able to open, since so many districts rely upon their state portion of funding in order to operate.

I’ll admit that the delay in getting an Education Funding bill to Rauner for his consideration was a political maneuver by Democrats – who knew that Rauner intended to play politics with the issue so as to take pot shots at the Chicago Public Schools while hopefully appeasing the rest of the state.

Our state, at times, feels all topsy-turvy

This is the new way, it seems, that Rauner wants us to support with our campaign contributions. Although I suspect the reason he asked for only 32 donations is probably because he suspects there aren’t many more than 32 people in all of Illinois willing to give their money to his campaign.

A RAUNER ELECTORAL effort truly is going to be a self-funded campaign, as we’re going to see just how far people will go in order to buy themselves a government post with which to assuage their egos.

One other part of Rauner’s campaign appeal caught my attention. Many modern-day e-mail appeals for contributions by Democrats go out of their way to imply that tiny amounts of money can build into the large sums needed to operate a credible campaign.

Appeals for as little as $3 are not uncommon.

Yet Rauner wants for his efforts to build a Republican Party in his image some $50. It certainly wasn’t inspiring enough to make me rush out to find a debit card so as to type in my personal information so that they could get my money instantly – in time to beat their July 31 Midnight fundraising deadline.

WE’RE IN A political mindset. Just about everything is going to be given a spin. Such as the announcement last week that the Illinois State Fair this year won’t include an official “Democrat Day” political rally at the fairgrounds.

MADIGAN: Giving the fair back to fans

There are those who are trying to claim that this is Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago, being afraid to publicly face people at a time when the school funding is uncertain.

Although considering how few Chicago people attend the state fair, it makes some sense that the urban types who do come probably want to see the rest of the fair attractions and don't want to hear more campaign blather.

Give ‘em a lemon shakeup and maybe a ticket to a Foghat or Alabama concert (even though the latter is technically on the fair's "Republican Day"), and they’ll enjoy a little less political rhetoric being spewed about.

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