The state of Illinois long ago made the embarrassing leap from local joke to national joke. The Land of Lincoln is now the corrupt, insolvent, morally vacuous, leftist dystopia of U.S. Senators Dick Durbin and Tammy Duckworth, Springfield mob boss Mike Madigan, Governor J.B. Pritzker, and Mayor Lori Lightfoot. I guess the lazy, irresponsible, anti-science, and morally vacuous community organizers that comprise the Chicago Teachers’ Union thought Illinois was not getting quite enough national PR, so on Sunday, they tweeted,

The push to reopen schools is rooted in sexism, racism and misogyny.

Say what? Even for head-scratching comments from leftists, that’s a doozy.

Are black and Latino families who want their children back in school learning and socializing racists?

Are mothers who want their daughters back in school learning and socializing sexist and misogynistic?

No need for defining terms, making assertions, and providing evidence that others are completely free to critique through reason and the provision of counterevidence. Just call names plucked from the intersectional name-calling toolbox.

Safety of school openings

Parents have seen the scientific evidence which clearly and consistently shows that if infected, children under 18 have a 99.997 percent chance of surviving COVID-19. These parents wonder why their children should suffer socially, emotionally, and academically from school shutdowns when the health risk of opening schools is negligible.

If the CTU opposes school openings out of fear for the safety of their union members, here are the survival rates for adults by age if they should contract the Wuhan virus:

22-24: 99.996 percent survival rate

25-29: 99.987 percent survival rate

30-34: 99.976 percent survival rate

35-39: 99.960 percent survival rate

40-44: 99.925 percent survival rate

45-49: 99.879 percent survival rate

50-54: 99.793 percent survival rate

55-59: 99.677 percent survival rate

60-64: 99.544 percent survival rate

Over two-thirds of public school teachers (71 percent) are under 50 years old, and only 17% are over 55.  According to the Illinois Policy Institute, “More than 71 percent of [Illinois’ Teachers’ Retirement System] members retired before the age of 60.” So, most teachers are at little risk of dying from COVID-19. Those employees who have co-morbidities that put them at great risk from contracting the Wuhan virus should be free to stay home.

But no teacher whose chance of surviving COVID-19 is over 99 percent but chooses not to work should not be paid one red cent. Their jobs should be filled by teachers who are rational and eager to work.

If teachers think it’s unsafe to work unless they’re guaranteed 0 percent risk of death, then they shouldn’t be working—anywhere. There’s a risk of death by driving to and from work or contracting influenza from a student or colleague. There is a risk of death from tripping over a small child or being bowled over by a strapping high school boy during passing periods. Life carries risks.

CTU tweet straight out of Critical Race Theory

The CTU’s tweet is what Critical Race Theory (CRT) has wrought in America. CRT—whose ideas are taught everywhere including in our public schools—divides society up into two groups: the purported oppressors and the purported oppressed. CRT claims that oppressors are those who allegedly have power and that the oppressed are those who allegedly lack cultural power.

So, who has no power—allegedly? People of color, women, those who are erotically attracted to persons of the same sex, and those who wish they were the sex they aren’t. That’s who. Those with power—allegedly—can’t help but oppress them.

Pastor and theologian John Piper identifies accurately the unbiblical assumptions at the dark heart of Critical Race Theory:

[A]t root [critical race theory proponents] believe a person’s essential identity is self-chosen, self-constructed, not God-designed or God-given. Or another way to say it would be that, when it comes to our own identity, we are our own god. We do not acknowledge or submit to any divine truth or morality as above us, constraining or limiting our own self-definition, self-construction.

So, if I choose to be a woman though God made me a man, I am right to do so. No God, no morality, no religion, no ideology can replace me as the self-determining, self-defining, self-deifying sovereign of my own identity. …

[The] fundamental assumption is that human identity is self-constructed, not God-given. Any group, therefore, that claims to have access to an infallible word of God that dictates human identity and human right and wrong is a manifest threat to human autonomy. Within the framework of critical race theory, the claim of biblical authority can be understood only as a group trying to seize power. …

Inside critical race theory, God is small and negligible. The Bible is small and negligible. Truth is small and negligible. And evil is big, and there is no answer for it. It is a hopeless path.

Who really oppresses whom in America?

While virtually the entire institutional power structure in America now worships at the altar of the gods of melanin, sexual libertinism, and genitalia, the Chicago Teachers’ Union expects us to believe persons of color, the sexually deviant, and women are relentlessly oppressed.

While people can and do lose their jobs for saying they believe homosexual acts are immoral and humans with penises are not women, the powerful in society celebrate those who announce that henceforth they will pretend to be the sex they aren’t.

I wonder, if the CTU believes opening schools constitutes hatred of women, what do they believe the vivisection of minor girls who suddenly believe they’re boys constitutes?

Chicago Teachers Union squeaks “uncle”

Facing a barrage of national criticism and mockery, the CTU deleted the absurd tweet and tweeted this in hope of soothing the justifiably outraged parents:

Fair enough. Complex issue. Requires nuance. And much more discussion. More important, the people the decision affects deserve more. So we’ll continue give [sic]them that.

“Continue” giving people affected by the CTU’s activism “nuance,” “discussion,” and “more”? Does the CTU expect people to be deceived by their inclusion of the word “continue” into believing the CTU has been providing “nuanced discussions and more” to everyone affected by their actions?

Once again, the CTU reveals its disdain for the public that pays their bloated salaries and benefits.

If only the CTU, the National Education Association, and all “progressive” activists working in public schools had the humility and commitment to tolerance, diversity, and critical thinking that they claim to have, we might have a shot at making government schools places of education instead of indoctrination.

If only “progressive” educators really believed what they tell parents about “honoring all voices” instead of censoring all voices with which they disagree, schools could become a “safe space” for even conservative students and teachers.

If only “progressive” educators who use the classroom to assail the beliefs of parents who pay their salaries respected boundaries, perhaps the government school system wouldn’t need to be dismantled.

Imagine a government school system in which “progressive” teachers and administrators admitted that some other things are complex and require nuance and much more discussion and where all voices were included in those discussions without fear or favor.

Imagine a government school system where systemic bigotry against conservative ideas did not reign supreme.

Imagine a government school system in which teachers and administrators acknowledged that ideas about race and racism derived from Critical Race Theory and embedded in the 1619 Project and a host of other resources recommended by CTU members are not objective facts but arguable assumptions.

Imagine a government school system in which teachers and administrators acknowledged that teaching other people’s children that conservative beliefs on sexuality constitute ignorant, hateful bigotry is neither objective, nor factual, nor the business of public employees.

Two chances of that happening: slim and fat.

This rare semi-apology from one of the most arrogant demographics in American society—leftist government schoolteachers—demonstrates one good thing: the collective voices of the great unwashed, ugly, deplorables still have some power remaining. And that’s why leftists want to undermine the First Amendment, pack the Supreme Court, end the filibuster, corrupt elections, and allow Big Tech and Big Media unfettered control over communication.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Absurd-Tweet-by-CTU.mp3

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We encourage you to join us in our efforts. Your support will help us to continue our vital work in 2021. A vigorous defense of biblical truth is needed more than ever in Illinois. 

I wrote this last Friday:

Regressives got a pledge from the thoroughly corrupt Mike Madigan, who rules Madiganistan with a blood-stained fist, to speedily advance Cassidy’s radical abortion bill by any unethical means possible, preventing due deliberation and preventing those who seek to defend life a chance to marshal their forces against it.

When I wrote those words, I had no idea how low Madigan and State Representative Kelly Cassidy (D-Chicago) would stoop in their unholy quest to make Illinois the Land of Liquidation—baby liquidation, that is.

On Sunday night during Memorial Day weekend when most Illinoisans took time to honor the men and women who have sacrificed their comfort, time, safety, and lives to secure our freedom, Illinois House Speaker Mike Madigan (D-Chicago) revealed again the fetid rot that has devoured him and much of the Illinois General Assembly. He suddenly scheduled a meeting of the Appropriations-Human Services Committee to vote on Cassidy’s loathsome Kill-Babies-Bill—deceptively named the “Reproductive Health Act”—with only one hour’s notice. This bill will, among other things, legalize human slaughter throughout the whole nine months of pregnancy (It repeals the partial-birth abortion ban) for any reason—including sex selection—and encode in law the repugnant notion that unborn humans have zero rights.

Early Tuesday afternoon, the Illinois House passed Cassidy’s Kill-Babies-Bill by a vote of 64-50 (with four voting present). It now moves to the Illinois Senate, which has a greater percentage of liberals. (See roll call graphic below.)

Here are some of the stinking rotten details of the egregious violation of public trust that took place Sunday night and of which many Illinoisans may be unaware:

• Cassidy introduced her original Kill-Babies-Bill (HB 2495) on February 13 but it never received even a hearing, so she tweaked it a bit to make it more offensive to the consciences of decent people, including specifically denying that humans in the womb have any legal rights.

• On Sunday, May 26, Cassidy and her accomplices then gutted a different bill (i.e., The Mental Health and Developmental Disabilities Code: SB 25) that had already moved through the first three of the five steps of the legislative process, replacing it with her Kill-Babies-Bill as an amendment to the now-gutted bill. This enables Cassidy’s bill to circumvent the regular lawmaking process before the legislative session ends on May 31.

• Madigan’s House rules require a minimum of one hour’s notice between the posting of a bill and its hearing and vote in committee. Cassidy and her accomplices posted the new 126-page “amendment” at 6:08 p.m. on Sunday night during a holiday weekend and scheduled the hearing at 7:08 p.m., thereby preventing opponents from attending and speaking out against it. The “suddenness” of the meeting explains why Cassidy had an ACLU attorney present with a polished 4-minute disquisition and an abortionist with a 5-minute presentation while opponent speakers Ralph Rivera representing Illinois Right to Life Action and Zachary Wichmann representing the Catholic Conference of Illinois were able to make only extemporaneous comments.

• At the beginning of the meeting, committee members were given a thick packet of letters from only proponents of the Kill-Babies-Bill.

• The spanking new Kill-Babies-Bill/amendment was assigned to the House Appropriations-Human Services Committee—chaired by State Representative Robyn Gabel (D-Chicago), who is a former training coordinator for Planned Parenthood. The bill did not belong in this committee because it contained no appropriations. It was assigned to that committee because that’s the committee where it was assured to pass.

In an inspiring, must-see statement, State Representative Tom Demmer (R-Dixon) succinctly addressed the violations of the public’s trust and the spirit of laws intended to increase the transparency of the lawmaking process that took place Sunday night. Please watch Rep. Demmer in this short video.

Far-left freshman State Representative Bob Morgan (D-Deerfield) tried futilely to dismiss the ethical implications of what Madigan did in calling this hearing by saying the Reproductive Health Act has been out for months, so constituents had plenty of time to make their voices heard.

Yeah, riiight.  Nothing to see there. Pay no attention to Madigan hiding behind the curtain. It’s completely unimportant that Leftists gutted an existing bill to substitute in Cassidy’s radical and pernicious Kill-Babies-Bill. And it’s completely unimportant that the hearing was suddenly scheduled on Sunday night during a holiday weekend. And it’s completely unimportant that Cassidy’s 126-page “amendment” was posted the minimum amount of time required by law (one-hour) before a hearing commences making it impossible for constituents or experts to show up to testify in opposition to this proposal.

State Representative Tony McCombie (R-Savanna)—a woman—responded that the issue wasn’t whether constituents had sufficient time to express their views to their lawmakers. The issue was that because of Madigan’s decision to suddenly call the committee meeting on Sunday night on a holiday weekend with only one hour’s notice, Illinoisans were denied the opportunity to express their views at the committee hearing. Unlike the ACLU attorney and abortionist, Rivera and Wichmann were denied the opportunity to develop and present polished presentations.

Another hero of the evening was State Representative Darren Bailey (R-Louisville) who asked how many of the 39,832 abortions performed in Illinois in 2017 were “medically necessary” to preserve the health or life of pregnant women—which are the reasons emphasized by abortion-shouters to justify the slaughter of humans in the womb. (Watch the video here.)

Cassidy admitted she has no idea because the state does not collect such information. Of course, it’s a moot issue, since allowing abortion to protect the “health” of the mother is so wildly expansive that it includes any and no reason.

In an effort to silence Bailey, Cassidy demonstrated—again—how manipulative and deceitful she is, saying in an increasingly hostile and aggressive tone,

I will tell you that my abortion was medically necessary. It saved my life. It preserved my fertility. It allowed for the creation of my family, my children who are my world.

Cassidy knew that no white man in this anti-white, anti-male climate would dare ask any follow-up questions following her faux-indignant and irrelevant “revelation.”

Here’s what Cassidy didn’t say in her exploitative and misleading response but has said publicly to the Chicago Sun-Times. Her “abortion” followed fertility treatments that resulted in a “blighted ovum” implanted in her uterus and in an ectopic pregnancy, which is when a fertilized egg implants in a fallopian tube rather than the uterus. The termination of an ectopic pregnancy is not referred to as an abortion, and with a blighted ovum, there is no embryo, so her personal story is irrelevant.

As McCombie was graciously expressing her sympathy for Cassidy’s experience, Cassidy, oozing open hostility at the lawmaker’s compassion, interrupted her to say, “I’m not sorry. I’m deeply grateful that that option was available.”

We’re all grateful that women can have ectopic pregnancies terminated—which need not involve the intentional killing of a fetus—and we’re all grateful that anembryonic (i.e., no embryo) blighted ova can be removed via a D & C, but women would have those ethical options even if abortion were banned.

Perhaps Cassidy would compromise with Republicans and agree to limit the termination of pregnancies to ectopic pregnancies and the removal of blighted ova—or as she referred to hers, “abortions.” Ectopic pregnancies account for 1-2% of pregnancies and 93% of that 1-2% result in miscarriages, so such a compromise would reduce the number of humans killed in the womb by a LOT.

Bailey—who urged a “NO” vote on what he rightly called “this disgusting bill”—noticed something odd in the changes Cassidy made to her Kill-Babies-Bill, something that exposes Cassidy’s anti-science/anti-reality ignorance. He asked her why she replaced the word “woman” with “individual” when referring to those seeking an abortion. Cassidy, obviously in thrall to the science-denying “trans” ideology, defiantly refused to answer Bailey’s easy-peasy questions:

Bailey: We’ve changed “woman” to “individual.” Who else can get pregnant besides a woman?

Cassidy (answering stiffly): Anyone with a uterus and ovaries can become pregnant.

Bailey: So, someone other than a woman can get pregnant?

Cassidy: Anyone with a uterus and ovaries can become pregnant.

Bailey: Does anyone other than a woman have a uterus?

Cassidy: Anyone with a uterus and ovaries can become pregnant. (Watch the video here.)

It’s a good thing Cassidy-the-Stepford-lawmaker who robotically repeated the “trans” mantra isn’t also a biology teacher.

Cassidy said, “These efforts [to outlaw abortion] have the greatest impact on the most vulnerable populations.” Say what? Was Cassidy about to express her concern for “fetuses” with Down Syndrome? Was she about to express her concern for babies aborted because their mothers don’t like their sex? Was she about to express her concern for black babies who are being targeted by Planned Parenthood?

Nope. No compassion for those vulnerable populations from Cassidy. Her concern was purportedly for “women of color and the poor.” Of course, everyone knows Cassidy’s central concern is about preserving the legal right of women to hire people to kill their offspring, whether those women are poor women of color or wealthy, colorless women.

Please take the time to watch State Representative Avery Bourne (R-Raymond) in this short video, as well as this short video of State Representative Terri Bryant (R-Murphysboro) who spoke out boldly in committee. Illinois desperately needs more lawmakers like Demmer, Bailey, Bourne, McCombie, and Bryant.

Take ACTION:  Click HERE to send a message to your state senator, state representative and to Gov. JB Pritzker. Urge them to stop targeting innocent pre-born children and vulnerable women in Illinois. Ask them to vote against the grotesquely misnamed “Reproductive Health Act.”

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/SB-25-House.mp3

SB 25 Roll Call

On Sunday night during Memorial Day weekend when most Illinoisans took time to honor the men and women who have sacrificed their comfort, time, safety, and lives to secure our freedom, Illinois House Speaker Mike Madigan (D-Chicago) revealed again the fetid rot that has devoured him and much of the Illinois General Assembly. He suddenly scheduled a meeting of the Appropriations-Human Services Committee to vote on Cassidy’s loathsome Kill-Babies-Bill—deceptively named the “Reproductive Health Act”—with only one hour’s notice. This bill will, among other things, legalize human slaughter throughout the whole nine months of pregnancy for any or no reason (including sex selection) and encode in law the repugnant notion that unborn humans have zero rights.

Read more…

With a cringe-worthy, faux-earnest expression, State Representative Kelly Cassidy (D-Chicago) explained at Thursday’s press conference to promote her radical abortion bill the meaning of the necklace she prominently wore—a necklace adorned with a coat hanger:

My necklace is a little gold wire hanger…. It’s a reminder of what can happen in a post-Roe world.

Her little gold coat hanger symbolizes the illegal abortions she fears will kill women if they are prohibited from legally offing their offspring. So, let’s examine the issue of pre-Roe, voluntarily sought illegal abortions that occasionally resulted in maternal deaths—as distinct from abortions that almost always result in the deaths of human “fetuses,” none of whom had a say in their mother’s choice to have them killed.

As cited in an article on the website Abort73, the CDC reported that,

In 1972 (the year before abortion was federally legalized), a total of 24 women died from causes known to be associated with legal abortions, and 39 died as a result of known illegal abortions.

Here’s more interesting information from the pro-human slaughter, gangrenous Guttmacher Institute:

In 1930, abortion was listed as the official cause of death for almost 2,700 women…. The death toll had declined to just under 1,700 by 1940, and to just over 300 by 1950 (most likely because of the introduction of antibiotics in the 1940s, which permitted more effective treatment of the infections that frequently developed after illegal abortion). By 1965, the number of deaths due to illegal abortion had fallen to just under 200.

Compare those numbers of tragic accidental deaths to the intentional slaughter of 61,000,000 humans in the womb in the United States since 1973 or the 368,000 humans killed in the womb so far in 2019—including 5,520 killings after 21 weeks gestation. I wonder if Cassidy and her accomplices in promoting feticide will shout that stat.

If killing humans in the womb isn’t obscene enough, Springfield regressives decided to add insult to death and dismemberment by having a black woman, State Representative Carol Ammons (D-Champaign) introduce their press conference.

It was obscene—not to mention tone deaf—to have Ammons lead the feticidal charge because as most know, Planned Parenthood (PP)—like its racist, eugenicist founder Margaret Sanger—has set its sights on black babies. A study conducted by the Life Issues Institute “found that 79 percent of abortion-offering Planned Parenthood facilities are within walking distance of black or Hispanic neighborhoods. Sixty-two percent are near black neighborhoods.” While blacks constituted about 13.3  percent of the population in 2014, 36 percent of all abortions were performed on black women.

The difference between Sanger’s goal to rid the world of blacks and Planned Parenthood’s decision to target the babies of women of color is that PP is motivated by greed rather than racism.

Yeah, that’s sooo much better.

At the press conference, Cassidy, the morally vacuous lesbian, “wife” of Candace Gingrich, and sponsor of every culturally destructive legislation to come down and go up the crumbling pike from Springfield said this:

As opponents of reproductive freedom have stepped up their attacks on our access to reproductive health care, it has become very, very clear that Illinois must respond in kind with equal energy behind defending reproductive freedom…. We had a pledge from the speaker that we will be able to move the bill forward, so I am uh looking forward to advancing this bill and getting it over to the Senate. 

Slapping the words “freedom” (or “choice”) on to an issue with nary a mention of the nature of the acts being freely chosen is dishonest and opaque. All decent people know that freedom is not absolute, that not all choices are moral, and that not all choices should be legal.

In the service of sorting truth from the evil Cassidy’s murky euphemistic language is designed to cloak, I will translate her dishonest, opaque words into plain English:

Opponents of the legal right of mothers to hire people to kill their offspring in the womb are having some success and, therefore, Illinois regressives must attack them and their efforts. Regressives must intensify their efforts to defend a legal right to feticide and de facto infanticide. Regressives got a pledge from the thoroughly corrupt Mike Madigan, who rules Madiganistan with a blood-stained fist, to speedily advance this bill by any unethical means possible, preventing due deliberation and preventing those who defend life a chance to marshal their forces against it.

It should be very, very clear that Cassidy and her morally contemptible cronies are mustering their energy to, among other things,

• Legalize the womb-killing of viable, full-term babies for any or no reason

• Compel the public to subsidize human slaughter

• Compel health care providers to facilitate this moral outrage even when doing so violates their consciences and their religious beliefs

• Rob parents of the right to be involved in the life-changing and health-risking decisions of their daughters to have their offspring killed

I wonder what morally regressive Springfield swampsters would say to Nik Hoot whose limbs were ripped off during a botched abortion—you know, when he was a “fetus,” as opposed to a human person. (It’s so weird that the once-bodily-whole human person Nik has a damaged body so like the damaged body of the fetus Nik. I wonder how that happened?)

Maybe pro-life advocates everywhere should wear necklaces from which dangle tiny severed limbs and crushed skulls forged in gold to represent their intrinsic and infinite value—value that regressives in Springfield are too blind to see.

Take ACTION:  Click HERE to send a message to your state senator, state representative and to Gov. Pritzker. Urge them to stop targeting innocent pre-born children and vulnerable women in Illinois. Ask them to vote against the grotesquely misnamed “Reproductive Health Act.”

Then call their offices. Click HERE to find their contact information. Your state senator and state rep. are the last two on the page. Please call today!

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/hANGER-3-1.mp3

A bold voice for pro-family values in Illinois!

The Illinois State House was back in session during the afternoon of July 6th to override Gov. Bruce Rauner’s veto of a 32 percent permanent tax hike on Illinois families (SB 9). This tax grab also raises the corporate income tax rate by 33 percent. As anticipated, the House voted to override the veto this afternoon by a vote of 71-42 — with 61 Democrats and 10 Republicans voting in favor of increasing our taxes.

To see how your state representative voted, please click HERE. To see how your state senator voted, please click HERE.

Much has been written for many years now about how Illinois is being mismanaged. The votes to override common sense is only the latest chapter in that mismanagement.

Some panicked Republicans, fearful of a credit downgrade, decided to join in with Democrats to increase the tax burden on those who haven’t yet moved to other states. As the Illinois Policy Institute’s Michael Lucci reports, however, tax increases won’t help:

Moody’s Investors Service issued a statement July 5 explaining that Illinois is in a deep debt crisis, which the tax hike passed by the General Assembly won’t resolve. Moody’s is reviewing Illinois’ debt and might downgrade the state’s credit to “junk” status even if lawmakers override Gov. Bruce Rauner’s veto of the tax hike and budget proposal and they become law. That’s because the tax increase and budget proposal passed by the legislature don’t tackle the state’s core problems; they merely address the symptoms.

In other words, the General Assembly is putting a tax hike Band-Aid on a gaping financial wound. And that Band-Aid is paid for by raising taxes by $1,100 on the average Illinois household.

No one I know is expecting Illinois Democrats to reform their ways. The Leftists that run their party have no understanding of economics and answer completely to tax-eating interest groups. When 25 percent of the state budget is going to pay pension costs, well, not much more needs to be said.

Twenty-five percent!

A few Republicans have shown leadership. Rep. David McSweeney (Cary) has been outspoken for two years about the no-state-budget crisis. He has never wavered in his stance against tax increases. State Senators Kyle McCarter (Vandalia) and Dan McConchie (Lake Zurich) showed much-needed life by offering a no-tax-increase budget a couple of months ago.

Unfortunately, none of those millions of dollars that are sitting in Governor Bruce Rauner’s campaign account were spent selling that budget to the people of Illinois. Instead, ads were run about masking tape and House Speaker Mike Madigan. Neither message resonated, and no progress has been made moving public opinion.

So, the Democrats do not understand economics, and Republicans do not understand how to fight and win the information war.

Again, here is Michael Lucci:

The problem is that Illinois has unsustainable debts and not enough economic growth to expand the tax base. House Speaker Mike Madigan and Senate President John Cullerton have shepherded a tax hike plan that raises taxes but does nothing to rein in the cost drivers — such as pensions and unaffordable government worker compensation and benefits — that have saddled Illinois with so much debt. And the new tax hike will further hamper economic growth by driving still more people — and taxable income — out of the state, and reducing economic activity.

The legislative Democrats’ tax proposal only prolongs Illinois’ unsustainable spending while putting off the day of reckoning with the debt. In Moody’s words:

“So far, the plan appears to lack concrete measures that will materially improve Illinois’ long-term capacity to address its unfunded pension liabilities.”

Unsustainable debts. Not enough economic growth. Unaffordable government worker compensation, benefits, and pensions. Unsustainable spending.

It is not a complicated situation.

The elections next year will be a contest to see which side can more successfully blame the other for this decades-in-the-making disaster. It won’t be surprising if many people add that to their list of reasons why they should leave Illinois. Who wants to hear grown men and women spending tens of millions of dollars explaining how the other party is at fault?

The money would be better spent explaining how we get out of this mess. It is not complicated. Tens of millions of dollars of effective advertising could win the kind of support needed for serious reform.

Effective advertising would leave out the words “masking tape” and the name “Mike Madigan.”

How Did They Vote?

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Now that the possibility of a tax hike passing with the help of “16 lame duck” legislators is not going to happen, Republicans cheer and Democrats lament, right? Not necessarily.

According to our state’s constitution, the governor has a lot of power when it comes to preparing the state’s budget, and, in fact, is constitutionally bound to present a balanced budget every year. Long-time Illinois House Speaker Mike Madigan has no such constitutional requirement.

Several Republican Illinois legislators have long assumed that Bruce Rauner would willingly sign a tax increase as part of a budget deal with Madigan. Those aren’t the headlines Rauner wants going into 2018’s gubernatorial election, however, so a super-majority Democrat controlled General Assembly doing the dirty work without the need of his assistance would have been ideal. And, of course, Democrats raising taxes again supplies a terrific weapon for all Republican campaigns.

Except that now, as Rich Miller reports, the Democrats won’t be doing Rauner that favor. So it’s back to the status quo, which really isn’t the status quo in that the numbers don’t stay the same, they continue to get worse.

Neither party has offered an honestly balanced budget in many years, and Governor Rauner, as chief executive, might possibly be blamed for the little things — here are just a few facts from the Illinois Policy Institute article “Illinois’ $204B Debt Crowding Out Payment for Social Services” (we have put them into bullet points for easy reading):

• Illinois will spend $1 billion more on annual debt payments than it will on human services in fiscal year 2017.
• Social service agencies in Illinois, such as The Center for Youth and Family Solutions, on average wait almost a year to get paid for the services they provide to the state’s low-income families, disabled and seniors. Many agencies have closed their doors, unable to pay their employees and rent.
• Illinois is sitting on a mountain of debt worth $204 billion.
• Illinois spends so much on debt that those costs now consume almost 18 percent of the state’s general fund budget.
• Illinois’ backlog of unpaid bills is what often gets the most public attention. While significant – the money due to vendors reached $9 billion in November – it only makes up a small part of Illinois’ total debt.
• The real burden lies in Illinois’ $28 billion in bonds and its $111 billion unfunded pension liability. The $139 billion total is double what it was just 15 years ago.
• Another $56 billion is owed on government-worker retirement health insurance liabilities.
• Combined, these debts all add up to $204 billion. And that’s the rosy scenario. If more realistic investment-return assumptions are used, Illinois’ pension debt nearly doubles.
• Unfortunately, the state has just $79 billion in assets to meet its $190 billion obligation, leaving a $111 billion hole for taxpayers to pick up.

So is raising taxes a solution? Fiscal conservatives understand the answer is “no” — the Illinois Policy Institute’s Ted Dabrowski recently laid out the ABC’s:

For many, tax hikes look like the only solution to Illinois’ fiscal woes. But tax hikes will only make things worse. Illinoisans are already burdened with some of the highest taxes in the nation, including the highest property taxes of any state.

As a result of Illinois’ dysfunction, the state is bleeding people and its tax base. Between July 2014 and July 2015, approximately 300,000 people left Illinois for good and only 200,000 moved in, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. This resulted in a loss of 105,000 residents on net to other states – an all-time high for Illinois. Tax hikes will only chase more residents away.

So what is the solution? Fiscal conservatives understand that, too — again here’s Ted Dabrowski:

The only way to keep Illinoisans here is to bring fiscal sanity back to the state through major spending reforms that bring Illinois’ budget in line with what ordinary Illinoisans can afford.

Fiscal sanity? Spending reforms? Uh, yes, and maybe that’s a nicer way of saying it than the plain truth — which is that Illinois needs to cut its spending by many billions of dollars if it is to ever make the budget math work.

Since Democrats have no wish to cut spending, and Republicans completely lack the ability to draw up a genuinely balanced budget and then sell it successfully to the people of Illinois, it’s a good bet we’ll just see more of the same. The budget can will be kicked down the road into the 2018 election year when tens of millions of dollars will be spent by each party trying to portray the other side as the villain.

The Illinois GOP has just launched yet another crusade to make Democrat House Speaker Mike Madigan as the chief villain. Here’s a better idea. Since Madigan knows how to win, Republicans should work on converting him into a Republican fiscal conservative. With Madigan’s political and communications skills, Illinois can then get back on the right track. Who knows, with Madigan’s abilities and Illinois’ potential, our state might soon be competing with states like Texas for businesses and experience the growth levels it once enjoyed.

Take ACTION: Click HERE to send an email to your state representative and to Governor Rauner to urge them to do the hard work of cutting the waste and bloat in Illinois government instead of constantly looking for new ways to tax the people. The size of government is the problem!

Here are just a few recent headlines for your reading pleasure:

State Budget Deadlock Continues To Harm Social Service Organizations

Illinois’ Billions: Pension Debt and Unpaid Bills Total More than $140B

State of Illinois’ Pension Debt Jumps to $130 Billion

Social Services in Illinois Say Situation Still Bad With Temporary Budget

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