Of course J.B. will settle; he can then blame Rauner for the wrongdoing

After covering units of government for so many years, there’s one rule of operations that I’ve picked up on.

PRITZKER: Willing to settle, he won't lose

If you sue a government, you’re probably going to wind up getting some sort of settlement – although very few will wind up becoming wealthy for life as a result.

SERIOUSLY, THE RULE that most governments use is that the moment the cost of attorneys fees to defend oneself become too great, the attorneys are under orders to reach a settlement.

Of course, that’s why so many lawsuits against government wind up being resolved with clauses saying there is no admission of guilt or wrongdoing. The government entity will claim this means they really didn’t do anything wrong – even if they wound up having to cough up some cash!

This concept is what pops into my mind as I learn of Gov.-elect J.B. Pritzker’s comments recently about how he wants to settle the lawsuits pending against Illinois government as a result of military veterans who were living at a Veterans Affairs facility in Quincy.

Those were the people who came into contact with Legionnaire’s Disease while living at the facility. Their families are the ones who are now suing, saying the state needs to compensate them for the deaths of their loved ones.

THESE INCIDENTS OCCURRED during the gubernatorial reign of Bruce Rauner – which has just over one more month to run. Pritzker says he fully intends to resolve these lawsuits – once he becomes governor come mid-January.

Of course Pritzker is going to want to resolve these lawsuits. He’ll be able to place full blame for any acts of wrongdoing on the previous gubernatorial administration.

And perhaps by cutting the state’s losses loose sooner rather than later, the state will be saved a bit of financial expense in the long run.

RAUNER: Will get the blame

Not that any of this will produce a definitive result as to what went wrong or who truly screwed up and caused the deaths of military veterans. But if partisan political points can be scored, who really cares about fact? Or the truth?

MAYBE IT’LL BE all about the payoff – with the families who have spent the past couple of years tangled up in court feeling grateful they’re getting some money. Not that money alone will truly make up for the loss of a loved one.

But it’s also about the partisan politics. Which means that a Rauner victory in last month’s general elections would have extended this process – at least long enough until Rauner himself would have concluded that a quest for a dismissal just wasn’t worth the expense in legal fees.

He would have paid them off, provided he got that concession of “no wrongdoing” on the part of the state.

Whereas Pritzker isn’t as concerned, because he can shift off blame to someone else. As for what money has to be paid out in settlements, I suppose Pritzker will be able to argue, “It’s not my money!” and will merely sign on the dotted line to approve the compensation for those who suffered a loss.

IT MAY ALSO be why Pritzker will be willing to go along with the General Assembly’s recent action to increase the amount of money people can win in such lawsuits (from $100,000 to $2 million apiece).

Illinois will wind up having to come up with significantly more in cash to settle the dozen lawsuits that are now pending against the state.

Pritzker would like to turn happenings of Quincy into 'yesterday's news'

But Pritzker will write it off as merely another expense we got dinged with as a result of the partisan gamesmanship of the Rauner administration. The new governor will be more than willing to pay out if he thinks it's his predecessor who will get dinged with the blame.

Which J.B. will regard as the ultimate prize, thereby making him the ultimate political victor with regards to the Quincy “issue.”

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Pure partisan politics at work

I’ve been going out of my way to avoid writing about the lawsuit filed against Illinois state government from back in the days when Tammy Duckworth was a state official.

DUCKWORTH: Decade-old trivia?

Specifically, she was head of the Illinois Department of Veterans Affairs for a time back when Rod Blagojevich was governor. A couple of people who were either fired from their jobs or refused raises claim Duckworth did so purely for political reasons.

DURING THE PAST decade, there have been lawsuits filed in the federal and state court systems by those employees, and judges have been inclined to reject both of them. That led people to alter the lawsuit slightly, and file it again in the state court system – specifically in the Southern Illinois-based court where the initial incidents occurred.

Now I’m not claiming to have first-hand knowledge of what Duckworth did or did not do. Maybe on some level, Duckworth did act inappropriately (although I’m suspicious because of the fact that multiple judges have said “no”).

But what I think stinks about this case is the fact that most of what I know about it comes from countless e-mail messages I have received from Republican sources whose point in sending them out was to let us know what a sleazy character Ms. Duckworth truly is.

And those messages always make a point of telling us that Duckworth likely will be the nominee for U.S. Senate who challenges Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., in the 2016 election cycle.

AS THE CHICAGO Tribune reported on Tuesday, the lawsuit will have several hearings in court this year – but won’t actually go to trial until April. By then, the primary election will be over.

Which makes me suspect that the people now leading the effort are merely using the plight of those one-time state workers to score political points for their own interests..

This lawsuit is about whatever trivial tidbits can be rooted out to try to throw the Duckworth campaign out of whack. I don’t think the GOP political operatives are even interested in defeating Duckworth at this point.

KIRK: Needs a weakened opponent?

They want her to have to go through a primary election cycle getting stained with so much in the way of nasty factoids becoming attached to her that she theoretically winds up in the general election cycle against Kirk as a flawed candidate.

IF DUCKWORTH WERE to lose the primary to the one-time Cook County prosecutor Andrea Zopp, that would be the GOP fantasy come true – because then those Republicans who are racially inclined would then dig out their nasty tricks against the African-American woman.

Which would be a challenge for Illinois voters to overcome, but one that I’m sure they would. Some political people just can’t accept that the old rules against race just don’t firmly apply to our modern-day society.

This is so political because it is likely there won’t be a ruling until after the primary election is over. The actual ruling doesn’t matter.

The courts could easily decide for a third time that the lawsuit doesn’t have much merit. But the political dirt could still stick. Which wouldn’t do the one-time employees any good, but would help the political operatives immensely.

THIS IS ALL because of the fact that Kirk is considered vulnerable – and not just because of questions about his health following a stroke or some of the dumb comments he has made. Let’s not forget that Kirk is not the conservative ideologue on social issues that some Republicans desperately want.

He’s not exactly someone that the party faithful are going to eagerly await their chance to vote for. So for Kirk to win, the opposition has to be taken down to a level where she gets less support than the incumbent senator does.

Which is why we’re hearing tales about decade-old happenings from people who have their own axes to grind.

And the only people who will really benefit are those who believe elections are about getting fewer people to cast ballots – provided they’re the “right” people who vote in an appropriate manner.

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Do we really desire politico sequels?

Officially, we don’t yet have boundaries for the Illinois congressional districts that will be used for the next decade. Gov. Pat Quinn has yet to sign into law the measure that creates the boundaries that will ensure Democrats prevail across most of the state through 2022.

DUCKWORTH: Will she finally run for office?



Yet we have heard some speculation about people being willing to move to run in specific new districts that they technically don’t live in right now.

AND IT SEEMS we have at least one official willing to give up a job to set up the circumstances to run for office in a congressional district that technically does not exist yet. We also have a former member of Congress who seems to have the Judy Garland syndrome in thinking we "really, really love" him so much that we want him back.

For the former, we’re talking about Tammy Duckworth, who earlier this week resigned her job as assistant secretary for the Department of Veterans Affairs. She got that post when Barack Obama became president – as something of a reward for her past political efforts in Illinois.

Those efforts included her campaign in 2006 for a west suburban seat in Congress. That district leaned Republican, but Duckworth was the Democratic challenger who wound up coming close to actually winning. Instead, we got (and still have) the concept of Rep. Peter Roskam, R-Ill.

It has always been believed among Illinois political observers that the campaign put the taste of electoral office in Duckworth, and that she would someday run for something else.

THAT IS WHAT has the Chicago Tribune reporting about speculation that Duckworth’s resignation from her job is about allowing her to have the time to spend campaigning for office – specifically, a seat in Congress.

Not that she would take on Roskam again. The newspaper had her running for a new congressional district that, as of now, has no incumbents living within its boundaries.

Which would mean that, for now, she’d be unopposed. Although I expect the Republican Party would come up with someone to challenge the suburban Hoffman Estates resident.

And there may well be a Democrat or two who decide that it would be worth their while to set themselves up within what is proposed to be the Illinois Eighth Congressional District.

BUT FOR TODAY, at least, Duckworth is the front-runner for a congressional district that technically does not yet exist.

Now assuming that Duckworth actually runs for Congress (which isn’t a sure thing, since she has considered – and rejected – past bids for U.S. senate and Illinois lieutenant governor), it could be an interesting sequel to her most prominent campaign of the past.

That was the one in which Duckworth emphasized her life story (an Iraq conflict veteran who lost her legs when the helicopter she was piloting was shot down) in an attempt to try to make it appear that people with a comprehension of the military and its ways were not restricted to the Republican Party.

It didn’t quite work in ’06 when she ran against Roskam in the DuPage County-based Illinois Sixth Congressional District (the one represented for many years by Henry Hyde). Roskam held onto enough people who knee-jerk voted Republican out of habit in order to win the election.

BUT IF SHE doesn’t have an incumbent to run against this time, it could make it very possible that we (finally) get the concept of “Rep. Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill.” – representing a northwestern Cook and DuPage county district, with a little stretch pushing into Lake County.

Because at least now she’s giving up that post that was providing her with an income – even though the Tribune reports that it is not set yet when her last day on the job will be.

But she still has a long life ahead of her, which makes it seem unlikely that she is finished up in public life. It may be purely my gut feeling, but I sense this will be the time she decides to actually run for an office (rather than fall back on whatever state or federal Veterans Affairs post she happened to hold during an election cycle).

Whether former Rep. Bill Foster ought to be equally as enthused about his chances is also something to be studied.

BECAUSE IT SEEMS that Foster got his chances bolstered on Tuesday when his most likely opponent decided to back away from running for office in a Congressional district (the Illinois 11th) that doesn't technically exist yet.

FOSTER: A comeback?



Foster is the Democrat who managed to take the seat held by former House Speaker Denny Hastert back in 2008 (the year of Barack Obama), only to lose it two years later (the year of the Tea Party nitwits).

Of course, it also helped Foster in winning that Congressional seat that he was running against James Oberweis -- who when he isn't involved with a locally-prominent dairy company comes across as the type of person only a Tea Party type could take seriously.

But this particular district is another one that was drawn in ways to hinder the desires of those voters on the fringe of the Chicago metro area who would prefer to remain separate -- and are having trouble accepting that Chicagoland truly is spreading to include their turfs.

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Does Giannoulias want military veneer?

It strikes me as a bit odd that Democratic Senate hopeful Alexi Giannoulias is so eager these days to campaign with people of military backgrounds.

Last week, he made an appearance in Chicago with retired General Wesley Clark, while on Tuesday he is scheduled to make appearances in Chicago and Champaign with Tammy Duckworth – an assistant secretary with the Veterans Affairs administration who also was once director of the Illinois Department of Veterans Affairs.

MY GUESS IS that he wants to smack down those people who want to criticize him for the fact that in his short life, he never served in any branch of the military.

In fact, the people with too much free time on their hands have in recent weeks been peddling a story that claims Giannoulias – who after finishing college in the United States went to Greece to play professional basketball – somehow dodged a legal obligation to serve time in the army in that nation.

Not that I think the people who want to believe this trite talk really care whether or not he ever served in the Greek army. They just want to enhance the image that Democrats don’t serve in the military, and therefore are opposed to it.

It’s trash talk that deserves to be dumped in the waste basket of life.

BUT THE SUDDEN interest in appearing with people who have devoted their lives to the U.S. military makes me wonder if Giannoulias is taking this kind of rhetoric seriously. I’d hope not, because it is a battle he can’t win.

In fact, about the only way a political candidate of the Democratic Party can deal with this “issue” is to turn it into a non-issue. Ignore it. Let it go away. Because in the end, it really doesn’t matter.

Now I will be the first to admit that neither I nor my brother served in the military. Although we have cousins who did. I also remember the last time I saw an old childhood friend, much of our “catching-up” conversation centered around his oldest son, who was then in the army.

So I appreciate that some people take this seriously. I also realize that for some people (such as one of my cousins who served five years in the Army, including a few months in Kuwait during the Gulf War of the early 1990s), military service is probably their best option for getting ahead in life.

I’M NOT ANTI-military. But I am anti- the idea that it should somehow be a requirement for any sort of advancement in public life. If anything, we probably need a healthy mixture of people in electoral politics who have both served and NOT served in a military uniform of sorts.

The reality of this issue is that perception is everything. Republican candidates get the perception that they are pro-military, and that the Democrats are the opposition to that view. There is little that can be done to change that.

What Giannoulias risks doing by appearing to cuddle up to too many people in uniform is trying to create the illusion that he somehow has some sort of military viewpoint. The truth is that he does not.

If people start thinking that he’s trying to pretend to have more of a military view than he really does, then people who in theory should be his supporters will turn on him. It can hurt him.

BECAUSE PRETENDING TO have some sort of soldiering viewpoint won’t help him gain any kind of traction among would-be Republican voters. The 2000 and 2004 presidential elections ought to be the ultimate evidence of that fact.

George W. Bush ran twice for president against candidates who actually served in the army during the Vietnam conflict. They had legitimate records. Yet the Republican partisans who were determined to put Bush into office went out of their way to denigrate the true military people in favor of the guy who used his connections to avoid having to serve in a combat zone in Vietnam.

Not that I blame him. I wonder if I were alive and of military age back then (I was 2 back in the summer of 1967) if I would have engaged in similar actions.

But as much as the Republican base claims they respect the military, what it really amounts to is that they respect only a certain type of person who serves. Giannoulias isn’t that type of person. He never will be.

TRYING TO PRETEND in any way can only hurt him.

So when Giannoulias makes his appearances with Duckworth, I hope he doesn’t overdo it. In fact, the biggest surprise to me is that Duckworth (who served in Iraq and was wounded in 2004, losing both of her legs and partial use of an arm) is willing to be so visually present.

With the way many people are convinced this is going to be the “gloom and doom” year for Democratic candidates across Illinois (I expect some losses, but not the total annihilation that some GOP partisans have wet dreams about), I’d almost expect her to loom as far into the political background as she could.

So either Duckworth is expecting some political goodwill in return should she decide in the future to run for elective office. Or perhaps she knows something about the public mood that the rest of us are overlooking?

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Duckworth should be respected for taking self out of running for Lieutenant Gov.

Ironically, Tammy Duckworth showed that she has characteristics that would make her worthy of holding public office in that moment when she publicly turned down a chance to gain such an office.

It has been bantered about that Gov. Pat Quinn, who is in search of a new lieutenant governor running mate following the withdrawal of primary election winner Scott Lee Cohen, was interested in having Duckworth in the spot.

DUCKWORTH HAS ONLY run for elective office once, and she lost that bid in 2006 for a congressional seat from Chicago’s far west suburbs to now-Rep. Peter Roskam, R-Ill. But throughout the years, she has constantly had her name come up whenever a post opens up and a replacement needs to be found.

Remember how her name got bantered about for the U.S. Senate vacancy that ultimately went (out of political spite to the establishment) to Roland Burris?

Since losing her electoral bid, she has served in the Illinois Department of Veterans Affairs (picked to be director by then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich) and is currently an assistant secretary for the federal equivalent of that same agency (picked by President Barack Obama).

Duckworth is the Iraq War veteran who lost her legs when the military helicopter she was piloting was shot down. It is because of that life story that she can appreciate the problems that military veterans in our country go through, and why she seems to want to use her time in public life to try to benefit those people.

SHE LITERALLY TOLD Quinn this week that she felt she had an obligation to remain with the federal government through the Obama administration to fulfill her duties to military people. I respect that. I admire someone who is not so eager to jump every time something comes along that could be perceived as a promotion (although how a job that means nothing unless Pat Quinn dies or is impeached is a promotion is questionable to me).

In my mind, it allows Duckworth to maintain a certain level of political “purity” that probably means she will forevermore have her name tossed about whenever a political vacancy comes up.

I only hope for her sake that Duckworth has her “not interested” statement stored away somewhere so she can release it with the touch of a button whenever a post opens up. Because I am not at all convinced about the reality of Duckworth as a political candidate. I don’t think she’d be anywhere near as effective as she is working on behalf of military veterans (and I understand there are some people who question her competence in those posts as well).

Part of it is that I think people who watch Chicago and Illinois politics have build up Duckworth into an idealistic fantasy. I don’t think anyone is as wonderful as some people dream her to be. I think even Duckworth herself would admit that.

PLUS, I WONDER how many votes she’d actually bring in.

I know there are the political observers who follow Democrats who always liked Duckworth for being the real-life soldier who saw combat and didn’t return to our society as a hard-core Republican prepared to kill on behalf of all those conservative ideals.

It was always figured that Duckworth was a way of reaching out to that segment of our society that is enchanted with the military and completely comfortable with its ways of operating. Maybe she could get some of those people to seriously consider casting ballots for political candidates who have the “D” after their names instead of the “R.”

But it always seems that the people who have this mindset aren’t so much enamored of the military itself or all those medals or rituals. It is the ideal of some sort of firm order to our society that people should conform to without giving it a second thought.

THAT KIND OF mentality might be necessary in the military in a combat situation, but it doesn’t work in civilian society no matter how much some people want it to. Those people are going to find a reason to prefer a Republican candidate to any Democrat, regardless of how much military experience she or he has.

Consider that George W. Bush in his two presidential elections defeated two Army veterans who served during the Vietnam War, only to have the military credentials of those two veterans (Gore and Kerry) trashed mercilessly by military-minded people who don’t want to believe that anyone like them could ever turn out to be a Democrat.

The kind of people who are inclined to vote for Democrats largely aren’t swayed by that military record, no matter how heroic or pristine.

If it reads like I’m saying I don’t know that Duckworth brings in that many votes for the Democratic ticket, you’d be correct.

BUT IT’S ALL a moot point, since Duckworth herself said she’s not interested (and that might be for the best, because I’m not sure how Democrats would have gotten around the residency requirements for a statewide constitutional candidate – Duckworth now lives in the Washington, D.C.-metropolitan area).

I’ll wish her the best in her ongoing job to try to improve conditions for our military veterans, while also sitting back to see how the Illinois Democratic Party’s central committee conducts itself on March 15 when they convene to actually pick someone to be Quinn’s replacement, just in case …

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EDITOR’S NOTES: Tammy Duckworth likes her current political appointment enough not to want to move (http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-met-duckworth-lt-governor-0224-20100223,0,29815.story) “up” the ladder.

Not everyone (http://www.southtownstar.com/news/kadner/2042408,021110kadner.article) thinks it is “Tammy Duckworth, Superstar!”

Duckworth dodged a political bullet by not getting too closely aligned with Rod Blagojevich. Did she once again (http://chicagoargus.blogspot.com/2009/02/duckworth-breaks-ties-to-blagojevich.html) spare herself future agony by turning down the lieutenant governor’s nomination?

A site for those of you (http://www.duckworthforcongress.com/) who want to recall Duckworth’s one try at electoral politics, or her life since then.

Duckworth breaks ties to Blagojevich, while Quinn remains true to character

There are some people who believe that if Rod Blagojevich had made a legitimate choice to replace Barack Obama in the U.S. Senate, Tammy Duckworth would have been the one who was moving to be a part of the D.C. Scene.

He didn’t (although Roland Burris wasn't the worst pick he could have made). So she didn’t. But as it turns out, Duckworth will get her chance to be a part of the federal government in the Age of Obama. And she’s better off professionally, as a result.

DUCKWORTH IS THE veteran who lost use of her legs in combat during the Iraq War (a helicopter she was piloting was shot down), and came back with such an inspiring story of refusing to give up on life that politics appeared in her future. She gave Rep. Peter Roskam, R-Ill., a run for the money in the 2006 elections, and later got the director’s post for the Illinois Department of Veterans Affairs as a consolation prize.

She got that appointment from Blagojevich, which made him her political sponsor. That means she owed any political allegiance to him. If he had gone ahead and decided to make her a member of the U.S. Senate from Illinois, that would have strengthened her tie to Milorod.

Duckworth would have been Blagojevich’s girl for good, and her career in public service positions likely would have gone down the political toilet along with that of the former governor.

Instead, she is now a pick of Obama to be an assistant secretary for the federation Department of Veterans Affairs.

SO THERE IS a chance that her one-time ties to Blagojevich will wither away, and she will become a part of the Obama saga (for better or for worse).

Of course, it wasn’t purely Obama who decided to steal the Illinois head of veterans affairs for a top post within the federal VA. She had the backing of White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel and senior adviser David Axelrod.

So the political cynics will cite Duckworth as yet another part of the “Chicago Mafia” that supposedly is taking over the U.S. government (Duckworth herself lives with her husband in suburban Hoffman Estates).

From my perspective, I can’t help but think that this move from the state to the federal Veterans Affairs Department will reinforce the image of Duckworth as an expert in the field of the military and how this country addresses the needs of those one-time soldiers, sailors and Marines once they return home.

IT MIGHT VERY well mean that she will never run successfully for elective office.

She won’t ever serve in the Senate, or the House of Representatives. She won’t be a future governor, or hold any statewide position in Illinois.

But I also get the sense that Duckworth herself is most interested in being a part of the solution for veterans and their needs. It is one she has a first-hand experience with, and it gives her a chance to make a worthwhile contribution to our society.

In fact, it might very well have turned out for the best that Duckworth did not win the Congressional election of ’06. It’s not that Roskam, an attorney and one-time state legislator from Wheaton, has been all that stellar a member of Congress for the past two years.

BUT IT HAS left Duckworth free to pursue other career paths – ones that most likely fall within her true talents and interests.

So it will be interesting to see how the nation responds to Duckworth, who remains a member of the Illinois National Guard (she holds the rank of major, along with her husband, Brian Bowlsbey).

Duckworth got her federal appointment last week, leaving the Illinois agency leaderless.

Until Sunday, that is.

GOV. PAT QUINN showed that despite the fact he is now the titular head of the Illinois “establishment,” he still has streaks of his personality developed during his decades of being the chief gadfly of the Illinois political scene.

He named Duckworth’s replacement on Sunday – the day he used to use to announce his activist causes on the theory that it was the only day newsgathering organizations in Illinois would be desperate enough for news content to cover him.

Hence, we now have 28-year-old Dan Grant as head of the state agency that works with the federal agency to which Duckworth is moving up to in order to provide aid to the roughly 1.2 million military veterans who live in Illinois.

Grant graduated from the military academy at West Point and served in the army as a captain during the Iraq War, but that ultimately is not what got him the position.

HE IS A Chicago resident (but Michigan native) who worked for Quinn and showed his loyalty to the then-lieutenant governor, which means he put himself in line to be promoted to a top post when his political sponsor took over as governor.

As it turns out, Grant established his connection to Quinn during what turned out to be his biggest achievement during his six years as Illinois’ lieutenant governor – promoting military interests.

Quinn is the guy who made a point of showing up at funerals of military people from Illinois to show the state’s appreciation of their sacrifice in Iraq or Afghanistan. On occasion, he also visited VA hospitals to try to cheer up the wounded troops, and it was on one of those visits that Grant and Quinn met in 2007.

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