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| Does Rauner really believe his pot-shots ... |
YET
HOW SERIOUS can we think anybody s being when, in announcing the bipartisan
political meetings, Rauner also goes out of his way to take pot shots at his
political opposition?
“This
election is about the people uniting against a corrupt machine of self-dealing,
unethical behavior, insider transactions, higher taxes that benefit a few against
the people,” the governor told reporter-type people on Monday.
This
comes as the governor sent out an Internet survey (which I happened to receive
in my e-mail as I was writing this commentary), asking me if I support “roll(ing)
back Mike Madigan’s 32 percent income tax hike.”
Which
is about as loaded a question as one can ask, since the increase being referred
to was the one that boosted the state’s personal income tax rate from 3.75
percent to 5 percent. It could raise nearly one-third more money, but it is not
a 32 percent hike (it’s about a 1.25 percent increase).
 |
| ... of Monday will be received well by ... |
NOT
THAT I’M at all “shocked, shocked” Rauner would engage in making such politically-partisan
cheap shots. “Blaming” Madigan is what the governor has been doing throughout his
gubernatorial term. Why should anything change now?
But
you have to admit it takes a certain amount of nerve to so blatantly lambast the
guy you’re talking about wanting to meet with to have serious talks about
government activity.
It
may be as tacky as the behavior of President Donald J. Trump a few months ago
when he complained about Mexico and its governments open refusal to even
consider footing the bill for that silly barricade along the U.S./Mexico border
that Trump keeps claiming is the key to national security.
 |
| ... Madigan and Cullerton on Thursday? |
Trump
has said that because he has made so many political promises to his backers on
this issue, he needs to have the wall and Mexico has no business opposing him
on the issue.
AN
ARROGANT ATTITUDE to have, and one that is similar to Rauner thinking he can
repeatedly bash about Madigan and the Democratic caucus he controls in the
state Legislature because they don’t blindly follow his political whims.
The
governor may say repeatedly they are “reforms,” but many of them are anti-union
measures meant to undermine the influence of organized labor within state
government – and they were measures that no self-respecting government official
with Democratic Party leanings was ever going to support.
All
of which makes me think Rauner fully intends to finish out his current term in
office with the same inactivity that dominated his time in office.
It
was during The Rauner Years that we got just over two straight years with the
state operating without a balanced budget – which interfered with government’s
ability to pay bills and conduct its business and made the state’s financial
problems as severe as they currently are.
COME
JULY 1 (the beginning of the state’s 2019 fiscal year), we’re likely to go back
to no budget; which most likely will run through the Nov. 6 general election
and the rest of this calendar year.
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| Is Rauner more similar to Trump than he admits? |
We
have a governor who’s willing to play partisan politics and behave in a
reckless manner with the state’s finances because the political opponents won’t
blindly go along with his own partisan goals.
I’m
sure the conservative ideologues of Illinois will want to disregard this – they’ll
want to think they took down Rauner single-handedly because he won’t back their out-of-touch-with-many-people views on issues such as abortion and immigration.
But
the reality is that it will be Rauner’s desire to put his anti-union ideology
ahead of the daily workings of government that causes the majority to turn out
come Election Day and cast ballots against Bruce. Because it’s time we remember
the old cliché about government being “the people’s business” – which hasn’t,
by and large, been getting done in recent years.
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