Will we be able to get a federal budget deal before coming of New Year?

The worst that could occur is happening – our federal government is closed for business.

No matter what he says otherwise, it's Trump's fault

And not just because of the fact that our members of Congress want to extend the Christmas holiday weekend into a period of being off-from-work as long as possible.

YET THE FACT that this shutdown is coinciding with the winter holidays (a phrase I’m sure will irritate the very sensibilities of everybody who thinks President Donald Trump is justified in his actions) may well be the reason Trump will be able to get away with it.

For those who haven’t paid too close of attention to detail – it became a fact on Friday that there would be no agreement by all of Congress and signed off by the president towards a federal government budget.

This time, we really can’t blame our rank-and-file of the membership of Congress for being unable to get their act together.

This inability to get things done is something for which the totality of blame can be laid at the feet of Donald Trump himself.

Trump would like our national border to be something … 

IT COULD BE that Congress could piece together something resembling a spending plan that nobody really likes, but would keep the government going. But Trump is insistent that a federal budget include federal funds for what seems to be the most important of all the trash-talk rhetoric he has spewed during his presidency.

The border wall!

As in he’s determined to have that barricade erected along the U.S./Mexico border regardless of how stupid or trivial the idea truly is. It has become a matter of personal pride – he’s determined to erect a U.S. equivalent of the Berlin Wall of old.

At this point, I don’t even think it’s about appeasing the ideological nitwits who back him in large part because they like to hear trash talk that implies those “foreigners” are to blame for everything that is wrong with their lives.

I ACTUALLY THINK it is a personal thing with Trump – as though he thinks his presidency would be regarded historically as a complete and utter failure if he can’t get that wall erected.

… similar to the Berlin Wall of old?

In reality, there are so many other issues so much more important that will be the reasons why Trump will be regarded as a failure as president. The fact that he’s obsessed with a border barricade is just one tiny piece of the Trump puzzle.

The problem with a border wall is that for a large segment of Congress, it is a debate-stopper. When one considers that a new House of Representatives with a Democratic majority will be taking power soon, it is safe to say there’s no way there ever will be funding for a border wall approved that Trump can sign into law.

It ain’t a gonna happen.

YET TRUMP LIKELY figures this issue is more about trash-talk rhetoric – figuring that by continuing to tout a wall that won’t do a thing to keep people out of this country (that’s the reality, no matter how much the ideologues want to deny it), he’s ticking off people who were never going to vote for him or support him in any significant way.

When will negotiation resume on Capitol Hill?

But we’re in the holiday weekend this week. As in the federal government will be closed Monday and Tuesday, and likely would have been running on limited shifts this week and next – with full-time work crews not expected back until after New Year’s Day.

Meaning if something can happen in terms of political procedures by then, it would be as though the federal government didn’t really close. Kind of like that line of logic that asks if a tree falls in the woods and nobody’s around to hear, does it make a sound?

My guess is that Trump is counting on the populace not paying any attention this week – meaning he can ask if government REALLY shuts down under such circumstances.

  -30-

Rauner remembrance of tragedy – an effort to divert public’s attention?

Reading Gov. Bruce Rauner’s formal address to present a state budget for Fiscal 2019, I couldn’t help but notice his opening bit.

RAUNER: Trying to redeem his pol priorities?

The reference to it being exactly 10 years since the day a former Northern Illinois University student felt compelled to fire off his weapon – killing five students before he turned his gun on himself.

THE NEWS EVENTS of the day even called for a last-minute rewrite, also offering a mention of the death Tuesday of Chicago Police Cmdr. Paul Bauer – the officer who tried to stop a fleeing suspect being chased by other police, only to get shot and killed.

Both tragic happenings. In the case of the DeKalb slayings a decade ago, I’m sure the memories remain as strong now in the minds of those who were there as they were back then.

But a part of me couldn’t help but wonder how much this bit of rhetoric was an attempt at misdirection.

Rather than get worked up over the details of the budget proposal Rauner wants the General Assembly to approve for Illinois government for the fiscal year beginning July 1, he’d rather we think of these other happenings.

BECAUSE IF WE think too much of budgetary matters, then we wind up touching on some sore spots of the Rauner era of state government.

Let’s not forget that Rauner, although in his third year of government, has never managed to get a budget proposal of his implemented into law. Heck, he’s never offered up anything that wound up becoming policy.

The only reason we have a budget in place now is because Democratic legislators were joined by a few Republicans willing to put the daily workings of government at the forefront to pass a budget that Rauner himself tried to use his veto powers to kill off!

Because Rauner is the guy who came into the governor’s post thinking he could strong-arm the rest of state government into going along with his vision – one in which organized labor and unions take a severe blow to their influence over Illinois.

THAT CONCEPT WAS more important for the past two years to Rauner than anything concerning the daily operations of the state, which does have responsibilities to fulfill – regardless of one’s ideological hang-ups.

The question we ought to be asking ourselves is whether Rauner is willing to get serious and try to put together budget proposals this year – or if we’re headed for another budgetary standoff.

The last of which stretched out over two years, caused serious complications for daily government operations and created financial problems that will take Illinois years (if not decades) to resolve.

You’d think that Rauner, facing a re-election cycle complicated by the fact that the conservative ideologues the governor is counting on to support him have their own partisan objections (being anti-union isn’t conservative enough for them), would want a straight-forward budget process. Something to ensure that he signs into law the Fiscal ’19 budget on or before June 30.

BECAUSE THE $37.6 billion spending plan for state government the governor put forth includes some serious changes to the way retired teacher pensions are funded – mostly by sticking them on the school districts.

Something I’m sure will tick off the Chicago Public Schools, where officials would actually like to have the state assume a larger share of those pension costs. Is the governor’s budget address merely another excuse to set up a political brawl with Chicago interests later this year?

Some reports made mention of the fact that Wednesday’s budget address, in addition to being 10 years since the bloodshed at DeKalb, was 225 days from the end of the budget standoff.

Will it also become the beginning of a political sequel – one in which Rauner will try to redeem his political self-image at the expense of the people of Illinois. Elections day are March 20 and Nov. 6; those dates can’t come soon enough.

  -30-

EXTRA: Pop tax falls flat, while judicial temperaments soar sky high

Friday was the day that the Cook County tax on sweetened beverages (a.k.a., the pop tax) came to an end. With it being a new fiscal year for county government, a new budget takes over the finances.

Cost declines 21 cents

And this is the budget that made some $200 million in spending cuts to replace the revenues that were expected to be raised during Fiscal 2018 through pop sales.

A GREAT MANY people are trying to pass off the county’s action to rescind the tax as some heroic measure by which the Cook County Board listened to the electorate and took away that tax of 1 penny per ounce.

Which usually boosted the price of one of those plastic pop bottles by about 21 cents.

But there are those who are upset by the fact that the entities that comprise Cook County government got their spending cut. One of those is Chief Judge Timothy Evans (remember back when he was supposed to be Harold Washington’s successor, but wound up losing to Richard M. Daley?)

Evans is suing Cook County government, and in fact a hearing was held Friday on that lawsuit – although Friday’s hearing which will resume Tuesday was on the merits of bringing in a judge from outside of Cook County to preside over the case.

EVANS CONTENDS THE Cook County Board has no legal authority to cut employees from the courts payroll. He wants some 100 people restored to his payroll, and the county to find somewhere else to cut the $26 million it contemplated whacking from his portion of the county budget.

EVANS: Suing his own home county

Although county officials argue that the cuts they made to balance out the Cook County budget for Fiscal 2018 does not impact any front-line employees of the state’s attorney or public defender’s offices.

This is likely to be an ongoing argument. So for any of you who thought that the issue was resolved by reducing the cost of a bottle of pop back to previous tax levels, you appear seriously misguided.

And for what it’s worth, I’ve heard from some potential voters who say they admire county board President Toni Preckwinkle for at least trying to find a solution that didn’t involve cuts in government services.

PRECKWINKLE: She tried!

I DON’T KNOW exactly how this will all be resolved in the end – other than to say there are bound to be a few individuals for whom essential services wind up being whacked at in the name of balanced budgeting.

Just something to think about when you get all excited about saving 21 cents on a pop bottle – or 64 cents on those two-liter jugs some people like to buy!

  -30-

Make up your mind, Todd

I’m sure some political watchers choked on their own phlegm when Todd Stroger, the one-time Cook County Board president who has become the ultimate example of someone who got into politics due to family connections, said he plans to seek re-election to the post that he lost some seven years ago.

STROGER: Changing his mind

Stroger, who also served as a state legislator before becoming the county’s chief executive, told WFLD-TV he will challenge incumbent Toni Preckwinkle come the March 20 primary.

IF STROGER REALLY does take such actions, he will be one of three people in the Democratic primary next year. Since one-time Alderman Robert Fioretti also has said he wants to run for the post.

And like Fioretti, Stroger indicates he plans to beat up on Preckwinkle over her effort to impose a “pop tax” that caused a massive public stink. The tax that will cease to exist at the end of next week was capable of boosting the price of a can of Coca-Cola by a notable amount.

Yet Stroger is the guy whose own political unpopularity rose to ridiculously high levels when he tried balancing the Cook County budget many years ago with a sales tax increase – the one that when piled on with all the sales taxes that local governments charge rose the overall tax to over 10 percent in Chicago.

It will be interesting to see just how capable either Fioretti or Stroger will be in terms of challenging Preckwinkle.

BOTH OF THEM are convinced that she is so unpopular because of the pop tax that anybody can beat up on her.

I don’t doubt that Toni could be defeated by the right challenger. But I’m skeptical that either of these guys is capable of filling that role.

In the case of Stroger, his unpopularity is so intense even now. The thought of Stroger running for any government post is usually enough to outrage political watchers – particularly if they have their hang-ups over the way that Todd got into office to begin with.

PRECKWINKLE: Seeking a third term

His father, John Stroger (the namesake of the Cook County Hospital) was the county board president when his own health took a turn and he had to step down. He orchestrated his son being chosen to replace him in a way that made many feel Todd was forced down their throat.

OF COURSE, IT should be noted that the Chicago political scene has had so many multi-generation families holding elective office so that it shouldn’t have been strange that John would turn to Todd to replace him.

I don’t doubt that for some people, the fact that John Stroger was a black public official somehow aroused their ire. As though white pols can get away with semi-sleazy behavior while we expect our black pols to be on the straight-and-narrow.

But that’s the situation we’re going to be in – that is, if Stroger really winds up getting himself on the ballot to run for Cook County Board president. I’ll be curious to see if he can get the necessary nominating petitions filed by the Dec. 4 deadline.

And let’s not forget that Stroger for a while was the guy talking about a political comeback by running for a seat on the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District. Not the most public of posts, but it would put Stroger on a public payroll and give him a title that would allow him to think of himself as a government official again.

WE’LL SEE WHICH post Stroger winds up running for. Will we really get a three-way fight for the Cook County Board’s boss?

FIORETTI: Seeking a political comeback

And if so, will it be truly competitive? Because a part of me wonders if Fioretti and Stroger will be the long-shot guys who take votes from the Anybody But Toni voters, while a plurality of more sensible people will wind up picking Preckwinkle – who until the pop tax came along was regarded rather highly by the electorate.

Largely, of course, because she wasn’t Todd Stroger. Does anybody seriously think that voters would return to Todd to replace Toni?

  -30-

EXTRA: Which one do we believe?

Perhaps I should get used to this -- campaign fliers cluttering my mailbox. Candidates trying to sway me to think of themselves as the only seriously legitimate politicos -- and everybody else as corrupt!
 

Pro-pop tax ...

The next primary election is March 20 and general election more than a year away in November.

YET THAT DIDN'T stop my mailbox from having a pair of leaflets stuffed in them -- rather glossy things trying to sway me on the merits of the pop tax.

It literally was a split decision -- one flier paid for by Michael Bloomberg telling me of the health risks of pop consumption, and the other from the Can the Tax Coalition (and paid for by the American Beverage Association) telling me of the evils of the penny-per-ounce tax on sweetened beverages sold within Cook County.

I think the Coke-like cans labeled "heart disease," "diabetes" and "obesity" look corny and cheesy. But the other spot looks just a bit too phony, as in the so-called real people who supposedly are opposed to the tax look a bit like beginning actors earning a fee by playing the parts of real people.

So which of these fliers should I take seriously? Should I bother paying attention to either one?

THEY'RE NOT THE first handouts I have received on this issue, and I'm sure there will be many more to come in upcoming days before the county board's Finance Committee holds the hearing Oct. 10 that is meant to review an ordinance that (if passed) would repeal the pop tax that barely passed the county board earlier this year.

... and con

One-and-a-half more weeks of this rhetoric about carbonated beverages, then we can move on to the assorted cheap shots we'll be asked to endure about the gubernatorial candidates and other officials who are up for re-election come 2018.

Including Toni Preckwinkle herself. The county board President may wind up not having to face a primary election challenger. But I'm sure many other people will take her name in vain as they try to bash about other politicos with whatever rhetoric they think will tie someone else to the pop tax.

  -30-

Is our long Ill. nightmare finally over?

The word came out Thursday, first from Republican leaders of the Illinois General Assembly, then from the Democrats who hold the majority power – we have an agreement on the way the state will fund public education.

RAUNER: Has he lost?

That issue has been tied up for nearly the past two months – ever since state government passed a budget for the current fiscal year despite Gov. Rauner’s objections. Rauner, feeling the need for a political victory over urban Democratic interests, continued to fight on with this issue – even though it created a potential situation where schools might not have the money on hand to open on time.

PERSONALLY, WHEN I first heard the Republican legislative talk, my suspicion is that this was some sort of political talk by which GOP interests claimed a deal that didn’t really exist – then would try to blame Democrats for failure when nothing wound up happening.

You might think I’m being politically paranoid, but I’m not alone in being suspicious.

Several education administrators I have spoken to have said they’re equally suspicious – saying they’re not going to believe a deal is in place until they actually see the governor sign something into law.

One school board president I know went so far as to say that while he was convinced Republican and Democratic legislators were in agreement, there still is the issue of Bruce Rauner.

“WE’LL SEE IF his people (Republican legislators) can talk him into going along with this,” that official said.

For the record, legislators aren’t really willing to say what their deal is – other than that much of the funding that was to be provided to Chicago Public Schools to cover pensions for retired teachers will be restored. That despite Rauner’s efforts to use his amendatory veto powers to remove it from the education funding bill that was passed by the Legislature back during the spring.

For what it’s worth, Mayor Rahm Emanuel says he is pleased with the deal, as it provides the city school system with what it desired. “That, and more,” he told reporter-type people.

MADIGAN: Can he complete deal this weekend?

Whereas Rauner said in his prepared statement he “applauds” legislators for working together. Although the Chicago Sun-Times wrote in its report that the legislative agreement did not include any of the collective bargaining changes that are supposedly the reason why the governor has been so ridiculously stubborn with regards to the budget and education funding.

SO IS IT possible that Rauner, who has never made a secret of the fact that he desires changes in state government structure to undermine the influence of labor unions, really will wind up coming out the big loser – with legislators feeling the need to keep state government functioning and the public schools open more than they need the financial support he’ll be providing to GOP officials in next year’s election cycle.

The key will be to see what happens on Sunday. For while legislators have met just about every day this week to discuss the issue, we’re now at the point where their staffers (the government geeks who actually know how to write legislation) are taking the grand concepts of the agreement and turning them into the legal language of a bill.

Things could still fall apart between now and then. But officials say that if a bill is crafted without anyone feeling like the other side is trying to pull a last-minute, double-cross (that’s really the way political people think!), then a vote could come Monday.

Our long state nightmare could finally be over. Or maybe?

BECAUSE WE’LL STILL have to go through the upcoming 15 months before the 2018 general election, and I don’t doubt that at this point, Rauner is desperately searching for a publicity team to replace the ideologue twits he recently fired to help him figure out the proper spin for his actions.

Nixon 'nightmare' over, is Ill. budget one too?

Rauner is likely to go into a re-election campaign being unable to say he accomplished much of anything, and was actually the cause of much of the “state nightmare” that may well be an Illinois equivalent of the “long national nightmare” that then-President Gerald Ford alluded to upon the resignation of Richard Nixon.

We’re likely to see a governor who overplays the regionalism card (urban vs. rural voters) and who banks his re-election chances on one gamble.

That the Democratic Party gubernatorial candidates wind up bungling their efforts so badly that they hand a second term at the Statehouse to Rauner, all gift-wrapped. Which isn’t completely out of the question, if you want to be honest.

  -30-

Let the (political) games resume

I’m feeling little more than a sense of sluggishness as I write this particular commentary, because it feels like the same old story being told over and over again.
 

DURKIN: GOP likely to back Rauner on edfund

I’m referring to our state’s General Assembly, which continues to haggle with Gov. Bruce Rauner over the way public education will be funded in Illinois, which itself is nothing more than a sequel to the two-year time period during which Illinois operated without an official budget in place.

THAT POLITICAL SQUABBLE eventually ended just over a month ago when just enough members of the Republican caucus broke with the governor to side with the idea of approving a budget. Which now has the governor doubling down his efforts for a political victory.

Which he seems determined to get with the education funding measure that he used his amendatory veto powers to alter in ways that Chicago Public Schools officials see as detrimental to their interests.

Rauner, however, continues to insist the Chicago schools were getting too much under the education funding bill that had been approved earlier this year by the Democratic-led General Assembly.

This fight was to resume Wednesday when the state Legislature was scheduled to reconvene, with the Illinois House having on its agenda the education funding measure. Although Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago, made a last-minute decision Tuesday to postpone the vote indefinitely.

RAUNER: Desperate for political victory

THE STATE SENATE previously voted to override the Rauner amendatory veto – which would reinstate the measure as approved by the General Assembly and restore funding for the Chicago schools pension program that Rauner is determined to see as an unfair city perk.

But the Senate has a large-enough Democratic caucus that it could override the governor all by itself. It didn’t need the one Republican who switched sites.

Yet the Illinois House, while Democratic controlled, doesn’t have a caucus large enough to spit in the governor’s face, so to speak, on vetoes. Republicans are making it very clear they’re not about to switch sides on this issue in order to back the Dem-desired education funding bill.

MADIGAN: Eager to deprive GOP a victory

“It is unfair for Chicago to continue to receive excess advantages that are not afforded to any other school district in the state,” Illinois House Republican Leader James Durkin said earlier this week in a prepared statement.

EVEN THOUGH THERE are people who insist the changes being made for the Chicago pension funding are merely meant to balance out the fact that the Chicago Public Schools was funding its own program without outside help – which does differ from other school districts in Illinois.

Democrats already have made clear they have created another bill that is identical to their education funding bill so that the general concepts will remain alive even if Rauner winds up prevailing in his amendatory veto. Theoretically, the issue could come alive once again at a later date.

Which makes the results of Wednesday’s legislative activity fairly pointless in terms of actual public policy.

Would the measure have gone down to defeat, thereby giving Rauner a win – only to have that political victory undermined at some point in the future? Or would Wednesday have been some sort of procedural move meant to stall a legislative defeat and keep the measure alive for a little while longer?

TECHNICALLY, DEMOCRATS AND Republicans in the Illinois Legislature have spent the past few days (as recently as Tuesday) meeting privately to try to work out some sort of compromise plan with regards to the issue.

Ill. CAPITOL: Complicated manner for nothing to occur

But those meetings haven’t exactly been productive. Unless you want to literally believe the official legislative statements where leaders say the sessions were “productive” and refuse to elaborate.

Personally, I’m not expecting to learn a whole heck of a lot following Wednesday’s legislative activity. I expect we’ll continue to be in the same stalemate – with everybody taking actions that they believe will bolster their re-election chances come the 2018 election cycle.

It makes me wonder if our pols behaved like President Donald J. Trump did when he stared directly at the sun during the eclipse without special viewing glasses -- perhaps frying out a portion of their brain cells in the process.

  -30-

Rauner getting desperate to change the story we’re all talking about these days?

I don’t expect political candidates to say nice things about their opponents, but I couldn’t quite get over the level of ludicrousness expressed Thursday by the Illinois Republican Party on behalf of Gov. Bruce Rauner.

RAUNER: 57 days, or 63 percent?

Until, that is, I saw the level of unpopularity Rauner is sinking to in a new survey by the Democratic Governors Association – which isn’t exactly an unbiased source.

BUT IT SEEMS that Rauner has desperately to do something to shift attention away from the fact that his actions as governor are creating scenarios by which Election Day of 2018 can’t come too soon for many people as they eagerly wait for their chance to vote Bruce out of office.

It’s about the only explanation for the nonsense-talk spewed by the state’s GOP where they emphasize 57 Days Madigan Machine Holding Schools Hostage.

Their line of logic is that Democrats who run the General Assembly should have sent the education funding bill (the one that is at the heart of the latest round of partisan bickering in Springfield) to the governor for consideration immediately upon its approval May 31.

That bill is still pending even though already approved by both the Illinois House and state Senate; where President John Cullerton has hinted he may send it along to the governor come Monday.

Which of these political entities ...

WHICH HAS RAUNER claiming that Democrats, particularly Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago, are to blame for the potential threat to public schools across the state being able to open for the new school year come mid-August.

GOPers literally have created a clock ticking down the amount of time since then that Dems are supposedly to blame – even though most public school officials I have talked to in various districts are more inclined to blame Bruce Rauner for the fact that public school funding for the upcoming fiscal year isn’t set in stone yet.

It’s why we’re getting nonsense-talk such as “It’s a blatant assault on our democracy in order to create pressure for their Chicago bailout.” Even though his “Chicago bailout” is really just a measure long needed to specify the way in which the state ought to be involved with the retirement benefits for public school teachers in Chicago the way they are with teachers in any other district across Illinois.

OF COURSE, THE bill that supposedly has a 57-day countdown means nothing. It wouldn’t have meant anything until a budget for the state was put in place in early July. Which makes any 57-day tally as of Thursday nothing more than pure nonsense.

... warrants more credibility these days?

But Rauner wants to tar Madigan with a count similar to the 735-day count that was done during the budget talks (as in just over two full years without a state in budget in place, a figure that was used to blast Bruce repeatedly).

It’s also meant to detract from the latest poll by the governor’s association – one that shows 63 percent of Illinoisans thinking Rauner has done a “poor” or “not so good” job as governor.

Only 34 percent of those surveyed think Rauner is doing well as governor – which is actually worse than the 39 percent approval rating that the Gallup Organization gave to President Donald Trump on Thursday.

CULLERTON: Will bill advance Monday?

MUCH OF THE politicking is meant to stir up outrage amongst voters in the rural parts of the state; making them think that Rauner is their protector against the urban monstrosity known as Chicago. He hopes he’s stirring up voter support in the other third of Illinois.

For his sake, he’d better be. Because the same survey shows Rauner with a 68 percent negative rating in Chicago and 54 percent in the collar counties that make up the outer Chicago suburbs – usually the one part of metro Chicago where a Republican can count on some support.

MADIGAN: What will next move be?

The scary part of all this is that we have just over 15 months to go until the 2018 gubernatorial election cycle. We’re going to have to endure a lengthy period of this spiel – particularly since the poll shows Rauner losing to any unnamed Democrat.

For even long after this current partisan spat over the opening of the school year is settled, we’re going to hear the details repeated over and over and over yet again until the level of nausea reaches a record peak.

  -30-

EXTRA: Guv withholds allowance?

I got my chuckle for the day Wednesday from reading Gov. Bruce Rauner’s public schedule of events for the day.
 

RAUNER: He tampered w/ Lege money

Among the three events either he or his spouse, Diana, will do during the day is to sign a bill “freezing legislative per diems.”

AS IN THE $111 daily payments that members of the General Assembly receive when they are at the state Capitol. The money is meant to cover the cost of their meals while in Springfield (not that the Illinois capital city has much to offer in the way of fine dining) and housing – whether they choose to rent an apartment or stay at a hotel.

Since another Rauner public event for the day will be to offer up public comment when the General Assembly completes its activity on what is supposed to be the beginning of another special session related to the education funding bill, it really comes across as though the governor is docking legislators their allowance because they’re being bad.

As in refusing to advance the education funding bill to him so he can impose the amendatory veto that Democratic leadership of the General Assembly is trying to thwart.

Now I’m not necessarily feeling sorry for legislators losing some money (although I know if I had a job requiring me to travel to another city, I’d expect some financial help in coping with the added expense).

BUT THIS MOVE really does come across as being so petty a gesture.

 

MADIGAN: How will Lege retort?

It almost makes me wonder if Rauner is trying to show he can be more petty and juvenile than our president – the guy whom his campaign has desperately tried to keep distance from for the past year.

Does this mean our legislators will feel compelled to behave in an equally childish manner as a retort to losing their money?

And then we wonder why the non-ideologue segment of the electorate (a.k.a., real people) just shudder in disgust at the very thought of the nitwits who they sent to the capitol to do “the people’s business.”

  -30-

Saving jobs? Or cheap pop!

Are we really on the verge of putting some 1,100 people out-of-work because we want to keep the price of pop and other sweetened drinks as low as possible?
 

Is this worth 20 more cents?

That’s the line of logic being offered up by Cook County government these days, where officials say layoff notices will have to be issued in coming days to a significant number of county employees.

THAT IS BECAUSE the penny per ounce tax increase on the carbonated drinks too many of us consume at too high a rate has been stalled by the courts, meaning it can’t be charged and Cook County government can forget (for now, at least) about raising the revenue it mentally had already spent to maintain its operations.

For the record, the county was expecting some $67.5 million for the rest of their fiscal year (through Nov. 30) and more than $200 million for the next fiscal year – which begins Dec. 1.

That’s a big hole to suddenly have crop up in the budget. I can see where county officials would be dismayed at the various restraining orders that have prevented them from charging the penny per ounce fee they wanted to start collecting back on July 1.

Those restraining orders, as of now, run through July 21 – at which time there will be more hearings in the Cook County Circuit Court and a judge could eventually issue an order that strikes down the pop tax outright.

 

Will county government services need to be cut?

NOW AS ONE who has experienced the “wonders” (sarcasm most definitely intended) of job layoffs, I’m not thrilled about the idea of any worker being let go for any reason – particularly one that isn’t their fault.

But I also don’t doubt that many people aren’t terribly sympathetic to the idea of the county wanting to preserve its operations – which some may have their own ideological hang-ups about in thinking have grown too big.

If you really are the type of person who thinks it’s a good thing that the county will have fewer workers, I’ll say you’re a cold-hearted person.

Having a pop not the same experience of old

But there may be those who view the tax bills they’re already paying and figure they don’t like the idea of paying one penny more.

WHICH IS WHY the notion of this particular pop tax being only one cent per ounce may sound terrible. Besides, that’s about a 20-cent increase in the typical plastic bottle of pop meant to evoke the image of the old glass Coca-Cola bottles we all used to drink from.

And as for the 2-liter bottles that are all so popular, that’s another 65 cents added to the price.

Personally, I don’t that’s overly excessive – although I’ll also admit that I have been making an effort during the past year to reduce the total amount of carbonated beverages I consume.

I still enjoy an occasional Coke, but have to admit to finding ice water equally refreshing, Maybe I’m just getting boring in my old age.

BUT SERIOUSLY, IT would not be the worst thing in the world if people would think twice about the amount of carbonation they feel the need to consume. Which, if you think about it honestly, can create a gassy condition that can’t possibly be good for any of us.

If you think I’m somehow trivializing this issue, keep in mind that this is the essence of all the legalese that eventually will be spewed in open court as attorneys argue on the merits of the county being able to use a pop tax as a revenue-raising source.

At some point, a judge is going to have to decide on the merits of carbonated beverages in general, and the right of an individual to have a Coke (and a smile, according to the old jingle) for as cheap a price as possible.

Is that really a right? In order to properly express my thoughts on that concept, I’d have to guzzle down a Coke or two in order to get the proper tone to my belch!

  -30-

EXTRA: No ‘junk bond’ status for Ill. – does it bother anybody except Rauner?

It’s a bit of good news financially for the entity otherwise known as Illinois government. We're not junk!!!!!

RAUNER: Who else wanted Ill. to be 'junk?'

The Standard & Poors bond-rating agency on Wednesday let it be known that our state is no longer listed on their negative credit watch list. We’re not going to face the prospects of having our state credit rating reduced to junk.

THE BOND RATING agency that is one whose potential actions against Illinois for being so inept that we went through just over two full fiscal years without a full-fledged budget in place now says we’re “much closer to structural alignment” what with the way we managed to put together a budget for the state fiscal year that began July 1.

That budget, of course, includes the permanent increase in the state individual and corporate income tax rates that Gov. Bruce Rauner is determined to lambast from now through Election Day 2018 as a “32 percent tax hike.”

There were those who really believed the state would have been better off prolonging its financial ineptitude so as to avoid the increase – even though it can be shown the state needs the money in order to meet its financial obligations.

We were hearing the speculation that even with a budget in place, the state’s bond rating might still be dropped to junk status – which would mean the professional financiers were writing off the state’s future and saying our fundraising bonds would be virtually worthless.

A VERY BAD financial investment not worth making.

But with the Standard & Poors statement, it makes it clear that only the hardest-core of Republican ideologues are going to be able to spew out the Rauner campaign line. The irresponsibility and recklessness of the state’s actions during the past two years are going to wind up being a part of the gubernatorial legacy.

Rauner, I’m sure, will remain in “Blame Madigan!” mode for the next 16 months – but only the silliest of voters will take any of that seriously.

 

MADIGAN: Gained from S&P move

Madigan, of course, will enjoy every bit of this. Both with Standard & Poors, and the likelihood that Moody’s Investors Service will follow up with similar statements in coming days.

IT WAS MADIGAN himself who put out the word to the Statehouse Scene on Wednesday that he had achieved a sense of victory – or that Rauner rhetoric was exposed as being a little bit more phony than it previously was regarded.

“It’s clear from (Standard & Poors) statement that ratings agencies, like all Illinois residents, are hoping Governor Rauner will work in good faith with legislators to address those challenges rather than rejecting compromise by turning further to the extreme right,” the Speaker said, in a prepared statement.

Or will the Rauner types, whom I think are really just anti-Madigan rather than caring one bit about Gov. Brucie himself, continue to spew their trash talk – all desperately hoping for an Illinois version of what we have nationally.

A government meant to appeal to the same types of people as the 46 percent who actually voted for this Age of Trump. Perhaps they view a Reign of Rauner where only certain Illinoisans matter as being desirable – although I think they’ll be disappointed with the election results come Nov. 7, 2018.

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Rauner prepares for political battle, so why not McCarthy on his team?

A part of me can’t help but speculate these days if Garry McCarthy, the one-time Chicago Police superintendent who appears to be in desperate need of help in gaining stable employment, will wind up finding a niche within the Bruce Rauner administration.
 

RAUNER: Preparing for political warfare?

For it seems Rauner is shaking up his own staff to be prepared for the upcoming election cycle – one in which he’s going to be willing to demonize everybody around him and claim that only his anti-union ways of doing things will resolve the state’s problems.

I COULDN’T HELP but notice the reports by the Chicago Sun-Times about McCarthy, who hasn’t had a real job since he was dismissed as police superintendent back in 2015.

He’s done a couple of consulting-type things and has been in the rumor mill for some significant posts. Which lead to the current rumors being spread that he’s contemplating running for mayor come 2019.

Apparently, his distaste for Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who let him go, remains to the point where he’d want to challenge him and try to appeal to that segment of Chicago that wants Anybody But Rahm. Or Chuy Garcia, or anybody else whose melanin content level is too high for their taste.

In short, somebody who’s going to claim that the current establishment has to go, and that they’re the man who would bring radical change to the way things are done. Although his vision of radical change would be perceived by some as bringing back a conservative white vision of doing things.

 

RASMUSSEN: His general?

WHICH IS WHY I wonder if there would be a place for McCarthy within a Rauner administration. I’m sure including him on the gubernatorial team in some role would appeal to those people who can’t stand Rahm Emanuel because he’s just so Chicago, just like that Mike Madigan character that Rauner has spent the past few years demonizing!

I’m sure a McCarthy would be willing to come up with less-than-kind things to say about the way things are done in Chicago. He could even claim outsider status, being a former New York cop and former police chief in Newark, N.J., and might even try to claim that the fact he was rejected in Chicago was just further evidence as to our hostility to “reform.”

Which, as defined by Rauner, isn’t really reform. But really just an ideological agenda that he wanted to impose upon us, and is now shocked and appalled to learn that the masses amongst us in Chicago have little interest in accepting.

 

McCARTHY: Could he have a role?

Why am I so willing to believe that Rauner would make such a move whose sole purpose would be to irritate people and to try to benefit his own re-election chances?

IT’S THAT I see the move he made for a new chief of staff. The announcements were amongst my e-mail messages when I woke up Monday morning, where we learned that chief of staff Richard Goldberg has decided to return to the world of foreign policy and national security. Unless you think of Chicago as an alien land that is a threat to the rest of us, he really didn’t fit in here.

He was replaced by Kristina Rasmussen, who was head of the Illinois Policy Institute, an ideologue think tank consisting of people who are very inclined to think of Chicago as alien and threatening to Illinois.

Speculation is that Rasmussen will be toughening up the Rauner staff and setting policy for the remainder of this term so as to push the message that we need to re-elect Bruce Rauner to four more years so as to keep the Madigans and Emanuels from taking over everything we hold dear.

Because that is exactly the kind of thinking we’re going to get – those who want to view our governing process as a battlefield where somebody needs to be conquered.

IT WOULDN’T SURPRISE me to see that a place could be found for McCarthy in such a mentality – and perhaps he could then run for mayor in ’19 with financial help from Rauner; should he manage to get himself “four more years” as part of the Statehouse Scene in Springfield.

The problem, however, is that this kind of thinking merely means we’re going to prolong the sense of stalemate that has come over our government – the mentality that resulted in us going for just over two full fiscal years without a budget and has some people thinking we’d be better off if the stalemate were still ongoing.

 

Rauner fans probably think Charlie really kicked the ball

I kid you not, there are those who are so upset about the solution (which is less than ideal, but keep in mind there is no good solution to our state’s financial mess) that they think we should now be on Day 740, and still counting, without a budget.

Which means that the funny pages “philosopher” Charlie Brown may well have summed it up best with his immortal words, “Oh, Good Grief!”

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