Who’s the bigger political whiner?

Mark Janus or Anne Stava-Murray – both of them are in the news of concern to people with an interest in Illinois state government.

JANUS: Continuing the fight against unions for state officials

And the question may well be which one is being more of a malcontent in terms of their political behavior.

BOTH OF THEM are engaging in rhetoric and actions intended to express their discontent with the standard operating procedures in existence at the Statehouse scene.

Both of them are managing to tick off the people who are part of the operations of the state government.

Janus, of course, is the guy who became the namesake of the court case that eventually resulted in labor unions losing the authority to automatically require union dues from all state government employees who benefit from those union contracts.

But in ruling that Janus was wronged by being forced to join the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the courts also determined that it wasn’t practical to require the unions to “pay back” any of the money they collected.

AFTER ALL, THE unions merely were charging the dues that were permitted under the law at the time.

So Janus – who has since retired from the state payroll and now does work for the ideologues who led the anti-organized labor group that filed the lawsuit that bore his name – now wants the courts to refund the money he had taken from his state paychecks to cover the dues.

He claims he’s owed some $3,000. The federal appeals court based in Chicago will have to take on this case.

STAVA-MURRAY: Still opposes Madigan

It would seem that Janus and his ilk are really after a devastating blow that would financially cripple the labor unions altogether. Being the namesake of the court case isn’t enough to appease him. He’s out for financial blood – which is bound to ensure his name becomes Mudd, in the eyes of state government officials.

BUT IT MAY be that Janus won’t be the one who offends political people the most.

That may well be Stava-Murray, as in the state representative from Naperville.

She’s the woman who made a public stink by being the lone Democrat who refused to support the notion that Michael Madigan ought to be retained as Illinois House speaker.

Is it really a surprise that since Stava-Murray deliberately went out of her way to snub Madigan, that he and his allies are not all that enthused about doing anything that would be of benefit to her? In the real world, the answer is “no.” To Stava-Murray, however, it comes as a shock.

FOR STAVA-MURRAY SAYS her bill meant to protect the rights of people who file complaints against state government officials with the Inspector General’s office is being thwarted deliberately by Madigan & Co. She says her bill has a “do not call” order placed on it that will prevent the measure from ever getting a vote

Now I’m not going to argue the merits of this particular bill. Maybe there are some legal protections that people with complaints about the state ought to have.

It just seems absurd for Stava-Murray to be surprised that she can be so openly critical of her political party’s leadership, then expect their full cooperation. It reeks of “Casablanca” and Capt. Renault being “shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on here.”

Perhaps even more ridiculous than Janus thinking he’s entitled to a refund just so he can ideologically screw over his one-time colleagues on the job who derived benefits from their union membership.

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