"If the governor doesn't meet the needs of the African-American community, then we're not going to support his candidacy, and we're going to move forward with supporting Rev. Meeks," said Ald. Anthony Beale (9th).
Beale was among about a dozen black City Council members who met with Meeks at a South Side restaurant to discuss the funding ultimatum to the governor and the Salem Baptist Church pastor's potential gubernatorial run this fall.
Could start today
Today marks the first day that Meeks (D-Chicago) could put nominating petitions on the street to gather the necessary 25,000 signatures required by late June to join Blagojevich and Republican Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka on the Nov. 7 ballot. There were no signs that effort materialized as of Monday night. Meeks did not return calls left at his Chicago answering service or Springfield legislative office.
Mayor Daley, meanwhile, weighed in on the potentially devastating threat Meeks poses to Blagojevich.
When asked if Meeks had the ability to torpedo Blagojevich and perhaps the rest of the Democratic ticket in the fall, the mayor said, "Sure. Sure, that's happened before. That's a reality."
In 1986, two supporters of political extremist Lyndon LaRouche scored stunning upsets for lieutenant governor and secretary of state in the statewide Democratic primary, wrecking the Democrats' efforts to unseat Republican Gov. James R. Thompson.
Ald. Beale said he expects Blagojevich to deliver on the $1 billion-a-year funding commitment for schools, job training, help for released prisoners and building needs by May 31, or the wheels will be set in motion to get Meeks and a slate of third-party candidates on the fall ballot.
Gov stresses record
A Blagojevich campaign aide sidestepped whether the governor would accede to the group's demand but stressed he has shown a commitment to schools in his first term.
"Gov. Blagojevich has worked closely with Senator Meeks on many issues and will keep working with him. On education funding, Gov. Blagojevich has invested more than $2 billion in new funding in our schools -- more than any other governor in Illinois history has done in a single term," Blagojevich spokesman Doug Scofield said.
Ald. Ed Smith (28th), chairman of the City Council Black Caucus, shied away from demanding specific dollar amounts or imposing deadlines but expressed the same threat against the governor to pony up for African Americans or else.
"Our position is this: We want real dollars coming to our community, and if we don't get that, we're just not willing to support people. That includes the governor," Smith said.
And should that swing the election to Topinka, so be it, Smith said, invoking lyrics from a famous Billy Preston song.
"If we don't have anything, and we change our votes to another candidate, and we don't get anything, nothing from nothing leaves nothing," he said.
DIERSEN HEADLINE: When a black Democrat Illinois Senator makes sexist remarks, its "funny" and "all in fun"
http://www.suntimes.com/output/elect/cst-nws-haze28.html
State senator calls his flirtatious hazing 'funny' - John O'Connor
SPRINGFIELD -- A veteran state senator made sexually suggestive comments to a freshman colleague Monday during the ritual ''hazing'' that occurs in debate over a rookie's first bill.
Republican Cheryl Axley of Mount Prospect was offering legislation on road maintenance by township governments when Assistant Democratic Leader Rickey Hendon of Chicago suggested that Axley go ''on a township road with me later on tonight.''
The presiding officer of the chamber, Sen. Debbie Halvorson of Crete, said the question was inappropriate and told Axley she was not obliged to answer.
Hendon then replied, ''Madame President, don't deny me my opportunity, here. I mean, she looks like she's only 16 or 17, I might be able to trick her, or something.''
''All the more reason you shouldn't be asking,'' Halvorson said.
Not surprised or offended
It has long been tradition for members of the General Assembly to ''haze'' newcomers when they present their first piece of legislation, peppering them with innocuous or highly technical questions. Other senators grilled Axley about the number of miles of township-maintained roads in the state and whether she'd traveled them all.
Axley, 46, who was appointed to fill the position of retiring Sen. Dave Sullivan, said ''the girls tipped me off'' that hazing comes with the territory and said she wasn't surprised or offended.
''It was all in fun. Every freshman is hazed in that matter,'' Axley said.
Hendon, who also asked Axley whether her hair is naturally blonde, denied his comments were ''over the line'' or sexually suggestive.
''It was funny, I was trying to be funny. If anybody took offense, it was only you. She certainly didn't,'' Hendon, 52, a senator since 1993 and co-chairman of the Executive Appointments Committee, said when contacted later.
Halvorson said she interrupted Hendon several times because she thought he had gone too far.
That is too much for the Senate. Responding to the pressure of corporate America and the White House for cheap labor and to demands from ethnic lobbies and labor unions for cheap recruits, senators are likely to insist that any enforcement legislation include amnesty for the 11 million illegal immigrants already here and admit more legal immigrants by a "guest-worker" program and other methods.
Senate panel OKs immigration billThe Senate Judiciary Committee approved legislation Monday that clears the way for 11 million illegal immigrants to seek U.S. citizenship, a victory for protesters who had spilled into the streets by the hundreds of thousands demanding better treatment for immigrants.
Illinois bishops back legal statusIllinois' leading Catholic bishops want a bill that allows for illegal immigrants to move toward legal status.
Sweet: Senate's legislation has a chanceYou're going to be hearing a lot about immigration in the next two weeks.
Sweet blog:• President calls for guest worker program• McClellan: 'A pressing legislative priority'• Bush: Immigration is 'an emotional topic'
O'Sullivan: Does bill cross the line? The U.S. Senate has begun what is likely to be a long debate on immigration reform.
Chavez-Thompson: Real path to citizenshipThey are Mexican immigrants tending Highwood's manicured lawns. They are Indian computer programmers working for major corporations.
In other words, the Senate thinks as follows: In order to have fewer immigrants, we must admit more of them. In order to halt illegal immigration, we must legalize it. And in order to enforce the law, we must reward those who have broken it.
Until very recently the advocates of this upside-down logic -- Senators Kennedy and McCain, President Bush, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, various pro-immigration "experts," and almost all the nation's editorial writers -- maintained that immigration of all kinds, illegal and legal, was not a problem at all. It was a benefit from which all Americans and the U.S. economy gained enormously.
So the federal government simply stopped enforcing the 1986 law some time around, say, 1987. By 2004, though, everyone knows that most of the 11 million illegals hold undercover jobs, exactly four employers nationwide were fined for employing them. Four.
In recent years, however, the evidence has been mounting -- and the voters have been noticing -- that many Americans, mainly unskilled workers on lower incomes and their families, were harmed by the competition of immigrants willing to work for much less. A study by Steven Camarota of the Center for Immigration Studies shows that between March 2000 and March 2005 only 9 percent of net new adult jobs went to native-born Americans.
One comparison of Camarota's is especially striking: the number of adult immigrant workers with a high school degree or less increased by 1.6 million while unemployment among their American counterparts increased by nearly one million -- and the number of discouraged Americans who left the labor force altogether rose by 1.5 million.
The impact of this low-wage immigrant competition has been especially severe on black Americans. According to a recent New York Times report: "The share of young black men without jobs has climbed relentlessly, with only a slight pause during the economic peak of the late 1990s. In 2000, 65 percent of black male high school dropouts in their 20s were jobless -- that is, unable to find work, not seeking it or incarcerated. By 2004, the share had grown to 72 percent, compared with 34 percent of white and 19 percent of Hispanic dropouts."
As statistics show, there are no occupations in which immigrants form the majority of workers. So Americans actually do the jobs they allegedly won't do. Illegal immigrants, despite their impact on wages, are less than 5 percent of the U.S. work force and only between a quarter and third of workers even in those industries most dependent on them. And their disappearance -- as suggested in the pro-illegal immigration movie, "A Day Without Mexicans" -- would result not in the seizing up of the U.S. economy but in the automation of some jobs, the export of others, and an increase in wages for low-paid Americans, including legal and assimilated Hispanic immigrants already here.
For low-paid immigrants, mainly but not entirely Mexican and Hispanic, are among those who suffer from continuing high levels of unskilled immigration. As Robert Samuelson has argued in his Washington Post columns, our immigration policy is a recipe for importing poverty: "Since 1980 the number of Hispanics with incomes below the government's poverty line (about $19,300 in 2004 for a family of four) has risen 162 percent."
Most Americans benefit only slightly, if at all, from the low-wage competition it brings. A survey of recent economic research on immigration by a Cambridge economist and an Oxford demographer concluded with dry British understatement: "The claim that U.S. prosperity has been driven by immigration, as opposed to driving it, appears to lack any academic support."
As these facts have become indisputable, the pro-immigration lobby has switched from simply defending uncontrolled and illegal immigration to arguing that it can only be controlled by being legalized.
That is, of course, the argument used to justify the 1986 amnesty. The tough enforcement measures promised in return for that amnesty resulted in the 2004 prosecutions of four employers. Since 1986 the United States has been admitting about one million immigrants each year through expanded legal channels. But these legal immigrants, far from being a substitute for illegal ones, were a magnet for them. They sheltered newcomers from home, found jobs for them, and provided a sea in which 11 million of them could swim undetected by the law. If past experience is any guide, adding more legal immigrants via a guest-worker program or higher quotas is likely to increase the number of illegals as well.
This time, we're told, the federal government really means to crack down on illegal border crossings and scofflaw employers. Terrific! But why wait until a guest-worker/amnesty bill goes through? After all, the additional tasks these bills impose on the Homeland Security bureaucracy (processing millions of new legal and existing illegal immigrants) will actually get in the way of enforcing a crackdown. Passing the House bill ASAP would enable us to calm and control the situation while working out a sensible long-term immigration policy.
Such a policy must address not only the economic well-being of Americans but also their social and national solidarity. When half the flags waved at rallies to defeat the House bill over the weekend are Mexican, then immigration may be helping to create a divided bicultural society at best -- or a second nation at worst -- within the United States. And having arrived here by breaking our laws, that second nation evidently feels empowered to intimidate us into changing them to suit its power and interests.
VERY VERY SAD: Illinois Catholic bishops back Senator Edward Kennedy - Andrew Herrmann
http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-immilocal28.html
Illinois' leading Catholic bishops want a bill that allows for illegal immigrants to move toward legal status.
Cardinal Francis George was among six state bishops to express support for the reform approach backed by Sen. Edward Kennedy.
The bishops said a stricter House bill would criminalize those who help immigrants -- a provision that would put churches and Catholic-owned or operated hospitals and schools in a ''precarious position.''
The bishops said they are called to see the immigrants as "our brothers and sisters.''
The bishops did say that any new law should include "reasonable penalties'' for those here illegally.
GAY AND LESBIAN ADVOCATES OVERJOYED: Finally, a drug to prevent HIV infection? - Marilynn Marchione
http://www.suntimes.com/output/health/cst-nws-aids28.html
ATLANTA -- Twenty-five years after the first AIDS cases jolted the world, scientists think they soon may have a pill that people could take to keep from getting the virus.
Two drugs already used to treat HIV infection have shown such promise at preventing it in monkeys that officials last week said they would expand early tests in healthy, high-risk men and women around the world.
"This is the first thing I've seen at this point that I think really could have a prevention impact," said Thomas Folks, a federal scientist since the earliest days of AIDS. "If it works, it could be distributed quickly and could blunt the epidemic."
Condoms and counseling haven't been enough -- HIV spreads to 10 people every minute, 5 million every year. A vaccine remains the best hope, but none is in sight.
'A fallback parachute'
If larger tests show the drugs work, they could be given to people at highest risk of HIV -- from gay men in American cities to women in Africa who catch the virus from their partners. That would mean people like Matthew Bell, a 32-year-old hotel manager in San Francisco who volunteered for a safety study of one of the drugs.
"As much as I want to make the right choices all of the time, that's not the reality of it," he said of practicing safe sex. "If I thought there was a fallback parachute, a preventative, I would definitely want to add that."
But some fear this could make things worse.
"I've had people make comments to me, 'Aren't you just making the world safer for unsafe sex?'" said Dr. Lynn Paxton, leader of the project at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The drugs would only be given to people along with counseling, condoms and regular tests to make sure they haven't become infected.
Some uninfected gay men already are getting the drugs from friends with AIDS or doctors willing to prescribe them to patients who admit not using condoms. This kind of use could lead to drug resistance and is one reason officials are rushing to expand studies.
"We need information about whether this approach is safe and effective" before recommending it, said Dr. Susan Buchbinder, who leads one study in San Francisco.
The drugs are tenofovir (Viread) and emtricitabine, or FTC (Emtriva), sold in combination as Truvada.
Animals remain healthy
Unlike vaccines, which work through the immune system -- the very thing HIV destroys -- AIDS drugs simply keep the virus from reproducing. They already are used to prevent infection in health care workers accidentally exposed to HIV.
Taking them daily or weekly before exposure to the virus -- the time frame isn't known yet -- may keep it from taking hold, just as taking malaria drugs in advance can prevent that disease when someone is bitten by an infected mosquito, scientists believe.
Monkey studies suggest they are right.
Specifically, six macaques were given the drugs and then challenged with a deadly combination of monkey and human AIDS viruses, administered in rectal doses to imitate how the virus spreads in gay men.
Despite 14 weekly blasts of the virus, none of the monkeys became infected. All but one of another group of monkeys that didn't get the drugs did.
"Seeing complete protection is very promising," and something never before achieved in HIV prevention experiments, said Walid Heneine, a CDC scientist working on the study.
What happened next, when scientists quit giving the drugs, was equally exciting.
"We're now four months following the animals with no drug, no virus," said Folks. "They're uninfected and healthy."
Republican Cheryl Axley of Mount Prospect was offering legislation on road maintenance by township governments when Assistant Democratic Leader Rickey Hendon of Chicago suggested Axley go “on a township road with me later on tonight.”
Hendon then replied: “Madame President, don’t deny me my opportunity here. I mean, she looks like she’s only 16 or 17, I might be able to trick her, or something.”
“All the more reason you shouldn’t be asking,” Halvorson said.
It has long been tradition for members of the General Assembly to “haze” newcomers when they present their first piece of legislation, peppering them with innocuous or highly technical questions. Other senators grilled Axley about the number of miles of township-maintained roads in the state and whether she’d traveled them all.
Axley, 46, who was appointed to fill the position of retiring Sen. Dave Sullivan, said “the girls tipped me off” that hazing comes with the territory and said she wasn’t surprised or offended.
“It was all in fun. Every freshman is hazed in that manner,” Axley said.
Asked whether men undergo the same treatment, Axley said: “I don’t know. I’ll keep my eye open next spring.”
Hendon, who also asked Axley whether her hair is naturally blonde, denied his comments were “over the line” or sexually suggestive.
“It was funny, I was trying to be funny. If anybody took offense, it was only you. She certainly didn’t,” Hendon, 52, a senator since 1993 and co-chairman of the Executive Appointments Committee, said when contacted later. “You jab, that’s what you do to rookies.”
When asked about his comment that Axley looks like a teenager and he might “trick” her, Hendon said: “She looks young. What’s bad about that? What’s over the line about saying she looks young? That’s a compliment, actually.”
“He means nothing by it. That’s his way,” Halvorson said. “He likes to be funny; unfortunately, we might have to give him a little training.
“Everybody got caught up in the moment. And everybody knows that Sen. Axley is a beautiful, young woman, and sometimes men don’t think about what it (a comment) looks like.”
Nearly 20 years ago, Eddy Batres drove his young sons to Washington, D.C., as tourists awe struck by the country’s political power base.
The 45-year-old Schaumburg man made a pilgrimage of a different kind Monday.
Batres, his son and two workers from his financial services firm drove 700 miles to the nation’s capital, joining 250 other protesters from Chicago and the suburbs calling for immigration reform. Theirs were among more than a thousand voices at the U.S. Capitol.
“What we are seeing here today is like the 1960s with the civil rights movement,” Batres said during a cell phone interview. “Whatever happens, whatever way it goes, history is happening here in Washington D.C.”
Inside the Capitol, senators stitched together an immigration bill to heighten border security, create a road to citizenship for immigrant workers and shield priests, doctors or social workers who help immigrants living here illegally, the latter resulting from an amendment by Sen. Dick Durbin, a Springfield Democrat.
This differs dramatically from a measure that casts as felons those who offer such aid. The U.S. House of Representatives voted in December to criminalize those who give food, shelter, medical care and counseling to illegal immigrants, in a bill drafted by Wisconsin Republican Rep. James Sensenbrenner and supported by many around the country and in the suburbs who believe existing laws need to be enforced and border security tightened.
Members of the Senate Judiciary Committee approved an immigration bill Monday. The full Senate takes up the issue today.
With nearly 12 million immigrants living here illegally and another half million arriving every year, efforts to mend an immigration system dismissed as broken by some and weak by others grow more contentious.
Illinois is home to more than 400,000 illegal residents, making it one of the five most heavily trafficked places for immigrants to this country.
Maria, a 17-year-old “A” student at Carpentersville’s Dundee-Crown High School, is one of them.
Maria, who spoke with the Daily Herald on condition that her last name not be published, traveled by bus Sunday night to reach Washington, D.C., for a morning prayer vigil. Afterward, she planned to join other demonstrators at a meeting in the office of U.S. House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert. The groups were expected to return Monday night so they could return to school and their jobs on Tuesday, Maria said.
“We don’t want anything for free. We came here and we are working hard,” said Maria, who left Mexico three years ago. “We are all here for the same cause.”
That the immigration system needs fixing is a point on which Maria and Hastert, a Plano Republican, can agree. How best to do it is another matter.
“We’re going to hit a point here where everyone needs to take a step back and find common ground where we can agree,” Hastert spokesman Brad Hahn said. “That is going to take people of all points of view coming together to find solutions.”
Elgin’s Connie Zapata thinks she may have found one in the Senate immigration bill drafted by Sen. Edward Kennedy, a Massachusetts Democrat, and Sen. John McCain, an Arizona Republican. The legislation would allow illegal immigrants to gain permanent residency after six years, an idea Zapata supports.
“It’s not as though one day you are undocumented and the next you are a citizen,” Zapata added. “It’s not just a giveaway.”
Still, whether an illegal immigrant must wait three, six or nine years for a green card does not change the fact they broke the law in coming here, said Rosanna Pulido, co-founder of the Illinois Minuteman Project, which has about 600 members.
“The Senate is supposed to protect Americans from foreign invaders,” Pulido said. “To pass the McCain-Kennedy (bill) would be a violation of their oath of office, because we are invaded.”
VERY VERY SAD: "When it comes to recent immigration talk, some Catholic leaders say they are above the law."
http://www.dailyherald.com/news/cookstory.asp?id=171741
Suburban Catholic leaders stand together - Sheila Ahern
When it comes to recent immigration talk, some Catholic leaders say they are above the law.
“We are called to do far more according to the gospel, ” said the Rev. Bill Zavaski, pastor of St. James Catholic Church in Arlington Heights. “What is going on now is so important and what’s going on is a disgrace. At one point, we were all immigrants.”
On Monday, lawmakers stitched together an immigration bill to heighten border security; create a road to citizenship for immigrant workers; and protect priests, doctors or social workers who help immigrants living here illegally, the latter resulting from an amendment by U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, a Springfield Democrat.
This differs dramatically from a House measure that casts as felons those who offer such aid, a bill drafted by Wisconsin Republican Rep. James Sensenbrenner.
While the debate continues, local Catholic leaders from around the suburbs are watching closely. The idea of facing criminal prosecution for helping illegal immigrants has local Catholics writing letters to politicians and denouncing Sensenbrenner bill’s at Sunday Mass.
“If memory serves me correct, this is the first time Catholic churches in the Chicago area have mobilized against a single issue,” said Mike Enger, a deacon at Church of the Holy Spirit in Schaumburg, where about one-third of the church’s 2,500 families are Hispanic.
Other church leaders joined Enger at the Schaumburg church to count and organize postcards Monday night. On April 5, volunteers will drop off the cards at House Speaker Dennis Hastert’s Batavia office.
Pastor John Dumke of St. Andrew Lutheran Church in West Chicago said 40 percent of the parishioners are Hispanic.
“I haven’t a clue who’s documented and who’s not, and I don’t care,” Dumke said. “I guess whatever they pass is not going to change what we do because we’re going to continue to serve people in our community.”
Tom Cordaro is a justice and outreach minister at St. Margaret Mary Church in Naperville. Cordaro sent out an e-mail to parishioners encouraging them to contact their legislators and oppose the bill.
“From a Christian point of view, especially as workers in churches and social service agencies, our faith requires us to help all those in need, not just those the government deems acceptable or that it deems appropriate to help,” Cordaro said.
Other non-Catholic groups, like the South Barrington based-Willow Creek Community Church, are not taking a stand on immigration reform.
Faith groups may be walking a fine line between what is legally permissible and becoming criminals themselves, according to one watchdog group.
“It is currently a crime for anyone to aid and abet, encourage or entice an illegal alien to remain, stay hidden, or protect them in any way from officials,” said Susan Tully, a field director for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, a nonprofit immigration reform watchdog group based in Washington, D.C.
Tully says churches cannot and should not offer illegal immigrants services or guidance that would lead them to believe they can become legal.
“If the Catholic church were to give them good, sound legal advice, they would encourage them to go back home before they have been reported in any way to immigration (authorities), because then the clock starts ticking,” she said.
The Rev. Dan Deutsch, of the Holy Cross Catholic Church in Batavia, said his congregation follows the law when it comes to hiring staff but the question of whether someone has legal resident status never arises when parishioners are providing aid to someone in need of food, water, clothing and shelter.
“We have to follow the law, but at the same time, we have a higher calling, and that’s to take care of each other,” Deutsch said.
DIERSEN HEADLINE: Property values rise in Naperville - Democrats and RINOs will cast that as a negative
http://www.dailyherald.com/news/dupagestory.asp?id=171829
Property values up 8 percent in Naperville - Jake Griffin
The average price of a piece of real estate in Naperville has increased roughly 8 percent over the past year, officials said Monday.
City finance officials originally had estimated a 7.77 percent bump during budget talks, but a larger-than-expected increase in the Will County portion of the city caused the additional spike.
Tim Reading, Will County’s supervisor of tax extension, said the 9.37 percent increase in Naperville property values in Will was largely due to new construction.
“We’ve got a lot of growth in that area,” he said. “Usually the projections are pretty close.”
The increase in the DuPage County portion of the city — which accounts for 60 percent of all Naperville property taxes — was slightly less than expected.
The council is holding a special 3:30 p.m. meeting Thursday to abate taxes and finalize next year’s property tax rate before the April 3 DuPage County deadline.
The proposed tax rate is about 3 cents less than last year at 71 cents per $100 of equalized assessed value.
Last year, the owners of a $400,000 home would have paid about $954 for the city’s portion of their property tax bill.
This year, the same home would be valued at roughly $432,000. That means despite a lower tax rate, the owner would pay about $990 for the city’s portion of the property tax bill.
Because the city’s budget is slightly unbalanced, the council also is expected to approve using $200,000 from previous years’ surpluses to cover this year’s expenses. Officials originally estimated a need for $316,000.
The city expects to generate about $14 million in property taxes this year. The combined property value of the city is nearly $17 billion.
Wheaton juggles funds to find cash Council takes money from Manchester bridge project to pay for new media center - James Fuller
http://www.dailyherald.com/news/dupagestory.asp?id=171719
Wheaton will borrow from Wesley to pay Peter, or at least for Peter’s building.
The city needs about $3 million to raze the building next door to city hall and convert it into a new media/information technology building.
The building is currently leased by Illinois state Sen. Peter Roskam for office space. Roskam does not intend to renew his lease and would not receive city funds to vacate the building.
City staff presented three options for financing the project Monday night. All three required borrowing money.
Council members decided to siphon about $2 million out of a fund earmarked for replacement of the Wesley Street/Manchester Road bridge replacement project. That $2 million will pair up with $1 million from the city’s cable fund to finance the $3 million construction project.
City Manager Don Rose advocated the use of the bridge funds, believing necessary dollars from the state and federal government for the bridge are several years from materializing, delaying the project.
Use of the bridge money would save the city from thousands of dollars in penalties for not using the bridge money in a timely manner as required by law.
The city issued bonds for the project back in 2003. A staff memo indicated the bridge funds may be used for the media building because the bond issuance stated the money could be used for any public capital project.
However, Rose acknowledged using the bridge funds will mean borrowing more money for the bridge replacement once everything falls into place for that project.
That debt may piggyback with even more borrowing the city must do to purchase a portion of the downtown Jewel Food Store’s parking lot. The parking lot land would then be used for construction of a parking garage that will accompany a new office/retail building the council has been wooing. City staff indicated previously that Jewel’s asking price for the land is about $1.4 million.
The plan won approval from the only four members of the city council present Monday.
Councilmen Dave Johnson, Alan Bolds and Phil Suess were absent. Both Bolds and Suess opposed any borrowing for the media building at past meetings. Both have called it an expense the city can’t afford right now.
Cohen ignores vast progress in Iraq - Daniel John Sobieski
http://www.dailyherald.com/opinion/fencepost.asp
Richard Cohen, in his March 22 column, calls the liberation of 25 million Iraqis from the mass murderer Saddam Hussein — who made war on two of his neighbors and launched missile attacks on Israel — a “waste of lives,” and accuses the Bush administration of underestimating the number of troops required and ignoring the requirements of nation building.
No one suggested Eisenhower be sacked when he “underestimated” the strength of German resistance and was caught napping during the Battle of the Bulge. Or that our commanders in the Pacific be fired for the carnage of Okinawa, Iwo Jima, and kamikaze attacks on the fleet. So far we have lost fewer soldiers than we did in the Normandy invasion.
Those who complain, as he and his brethren do, that we still have 130,000 troops in Iraq three years after Operation Iraqi Freedom began, and that the Iraqis can’t or won’t defend themselves, forget that we had several times that number in Europe for over five decades.
Those who voted on March 21 did not do so under threat of death as have the Iraqi people who did so three times in one year. In three years Iraq has gone from a brutal dictatorship to electing a provisional government to ratifying a new constitution to electing a permanent government.
In each of these elections, voter turnout increased, from 8.5 million in the January 2005 election to 12 million in the December election. In Anbar province, where Sunnis are the overwhelming majority, voter turnout grew from 2 percent in January to 86 percent in December.
Some 100 Iraqi battalions are currently in the fight, with 49 controlling their own battle space. About 75 percent of all military operations in the country include Iraqi security forces, and nearly half are independently Iraqi-planned, Iraqi-conducted and Iraqi-led. It is these Iraqi forces that prevented the descent into civil war after the bombing of the Golden Dome Shrine in Samarra.
I’d call the pretty successful nation-building and not a “waste of lives.” Mission accomplished.
Stop kowtowing to illegal immigrants - Phillip E. Ritchey http://www.dailyherald.com/opinion/fencepost.asp In the Daily Herald’s lead front page story on March 11, Uriel Alfaro cannot understand why people think he doesn’t belong in the U.S. “He wants for nothing, except the green card that would make his U.S. residency legal.” Well, Uriel, you do not belong here because you entered the U.S. illegally. It is that simple. What I as a lifelong citizen do not understand is why all of our politicians are kowtowing to these illegals. Gov. Blagojevich wants to give illegals driver licenses, and back mortgages for them. Why? They can’t vote, can they? When President Reagan pushed the granting of amnesty to illegals some 20 years ago, it was stated then that this was a one-time and one-time only grant. Here we are, 20 years later, and there is an estimated 11 to 12 million illegal immigrants in this country. Why? Because amnesty was granted once to those illegally in the country, therefore others had to get here before the next amnesty program. I have absolutely no problem with legal immigrants coming to this country. There is no fairness, to those who are waiting for the legal process to churn forward, to jump illegals ahead of the applicants. Our borders must be sealed against all illegal border crossings for the security of every citizen and legal resident living here. DIERSEN HEADLINE: Illegal immigration advocate Joshua Hoyt loves "Bush’s and Karl Rove’s carefully crafted Hispanic outreach strategy" http://www.dailyherald.com/opinion/fencepost.asp (NOTE: "Socially conservative" people comply with the "rule of law.") Hastert’s strategy is about to backfire - Joshua Hoyt It looks like someone went and kicked the sleeping giant. On Friday, March 10, Chicago’s downtown was paralyzed by an immigrant march of more than 100,000 people. They carried signs saying: “We are America,” “My Mexican immigrant son died in Iraq,” and “I’m a dishwasher — not a criminal.” Marchers were protesting the punitive HR 4437, an “enforcement only” approach to immigration reform. This bill would make the 11 million undocumented dishwashers and nannies “aggravated criminal felons” and would turn priests and nurses into criminals for “aiding and abetting” the undocumented. But the Illinoisan most responsible for kicking the sleeping giant, and who has the most to lose in the long term, was not present at the march. Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert has made a decision to use “illegal immigration” as the Republican Party’s next wedge issue. The political calculation is that the resentment and latent racism felt toward our new Mexican neighbors can be used for political advantage this year. If “gay marriage” worked in 2004, then why not “illegals” in ’06? This strategy has appeared to invoke the law of unintended consequences. Few communities in the United States work harder at lower pay and in worse conditions than the immigrant community. The demagoguery has launched an unprecedented national political mobilization by the Mexican and immigrant communities. The ’04 election showed that socially conservative immigrant Latinos were 40 percent more likely to vote for President Bush than U.S.-born Latinos. Now President Bush’s and Karl Rove’s carefully crafted Hispanic outreach strategy is so much shredded lettuce. What does this mean in Illinois? There are 348,000 legal immigrants in Illinois currently eligible to become U.S. citizens. If a substantial percentage of these folks now become citizens and the immigrant Latinos are cemented into the “Blue” column of voters, it changes the political balance of power in Illinois for the next generation. Regardless, any short-term political gain to be made from the “Kick the illegals” strategy will likely lead to disastrous long-term pain for the Republican Party.
In the Daily Herald’s lead front page story on March 11, Uriel Alfaro cannot understand why people think he doesn’t belong in the U.S.
“He wants for nothing, except the green card that would make his U.S. residency legal.”
Well, Uriel, you do not belong here because you entered the U.S. illegally. It is that simple.
What I as a lifelong citizen do not understand is why all of our politicians are kowtowing to these illegals. Gov. Blagojevich wants to give illegals driver licenses, and back mortgages for them. Why? They can’t vote, can they?
When President Reagan pushed the granting of amnesty to illegals some 20 years ago, it was stated then that this was a one-time and one-time only grant. Here we are, 20 years later, and there is an estimated 11 to 12 million illegal immigrants in this country.
Why? Because amnesty was granted once to those illegally in the country, therefore others had to get here before the next amnesty program.
I have absolutely no problem with legal immigrants coming to this country. There is no fairness, to those who are waiting for the legal process to churn forward, to jump illegals ahead of the applicants.
Our borders must be sealed against all illegal border crossings for the security of every citizen and legal resident living here.
DIERSEN HEADLINE: Illegal immigration advocate Joshua Hoyt loves "Bush’s and Karl Rove’s carefully crafted Hispanic outreach strategy"
(NOTE: "Socially conservative" people comply with the "rule of law.")
Hastert’s strategy is about to backfire - Joshua Hoyt
It looks like someone went and kicked the sleeping giant. On Friday, March 10, Chicago’s downtown was paralyzed by an immigrant march of more than 100,000 people. They carried signs saying: “We are America,” “My Mexican immigrant son died in Iraq,” and “I’m a dishwasher — not a criminal.”
Marchers were protesting the punitive HR 4437, an “enforcement only” approach to immigration reform. This bill would make the 11 million undocumented dishwashers and nannies “aggravated criminal felons” and would turn priests and nurses into criminals for “aiding and abetting” the undocumented.
But the Illinoisan most responsible for kicking the sleeping giant, and who has the most to lose in the long term, was not present at the march.
Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert has made a decision to use “illegal immigration” as the Republican Party’s next wedge issue. The political calculation is that the resentment and latent racism felt toward our new Mexican neighbors can be used for political advantage this year.
If “gay marriage” worked in 2004, then why not “illegals” in ’06? This strategy has appeared to invoke the law of unintended consequences.
Few communities in the United States work harder at lower pay and in worse conditions than the immigrant community.
The demagoguery has launched an unprecedented national political mobilization by the Mexican and immigrant communities. The ’04 election showed that socially conservative immigrant Latinos were 40 percent more likely to vote for President Bush than U.S.-born Latinos. Now President Bush’s and Karl Rove’s carefully crafted Hispanic outreach strategy is so much shredded lettuce.
What does this mean in Illinois? There are 348,000 legal immigrants in Illinois currently eligible to become U.S. citizens. If a substantial percentage of these folks now become citizens and the immigrant Latinos are cemented into the “Blue” column of voters, it changes the political balance of power in Illinois for the next generation.
Regardless, any short-term political gain to be made from the “Kick the illegals” strategy will likely lead to disastrous long-term pain for the Republican Party.
It's a strategy that could prove costly to the people of Illinois, in dollars and in damaging policies.
One Tuesday, even before Topinka won the GOP primary, Blagojevich began his attacks. He touted All Kids, a universal health insurance program for children that lawmakers rushed to approve in the fall with virtually no discussion. "I don't know what she's thinking when she says no to health care for kids," Blagojevich said.
Maybe that Illinois can't afford its existing Medicaid and other health care programs, much less $45 million a year -- for starters -- for a new entitlement.
Then Blagojevich proposed raising the minimum wage $1 an hour, from $6.50 to $7.50 an hour. He challenged Topinka to support the increase.
Why not a $2 an hour increase, governor? How about $10 more an hour?
Businesses, not the state, should decide what to pay their workers. Raising the minimum wage -- already higher than the federal minimum -- would increase the costs of doing business in Illinois, which already has a reputation as unfriendly to business.
Wages are an important part of a company's business equation. Businesses likely would either have to raise their prices to cover the costs or cut the number of employees. Neither would help the people of Illinois.
Next Blagojevich renewed his call for a ban on assault rifles, and said Topinka's opposition was a "shocking and shameful capitulation" to the National Rifle Association and the Illinois State Rifle Association. Never mind that his proposal doesn't stand a chance of passage -- nor is there any evidence it would decrease the crime rate if approved. The federal assault weapon ban expired in 2004, and that hasn't resulted in any increase in crime.
We think the voters will see Blagojevich's tactics for what they are: pandering to the public to make would-be voters think better of him. The challenge is, can Topinka avoid getting caught up in the governor's game and convince the public that she can effectively lead Illinois? Stay tuned.
Blagojevich out and about after campaign hiatus in primary - Deanna Bellandihttp://www.belleville.com/mld/belleville/news/state/14200056.htm
CHICAGO - Gov. Rod Blagojevich has been a whirlwind of activity since winning the chance at a second term in last week's election.
In the week since the March 21 primary, Blagojevich has traveled the state on official business touting his core issues - many of which are also the major themes of his re-election campaign. He's even used his office to pressure his Republican opponent to take a stand against assault weapons.
It's all part of using the power of incumbency and the attention it generates to remind voters what he's all about and to steal momentum from his GOP opponent, state Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka.
"If you're the governor, you get to frame the agenda," explained University of Illinois at Springfield political science professor Kent Redfield.
The barnstorming and politicking are a sharp contrast to the primary, when Blagojevich made few campaign appearances and said he was too busy governing to debate his primary challenger.
On Monday in Chicago, Blagojevich announced new steps to make sure pharmacies comply with his year-old executive order requiring them to fill prescriptions for emergency birth control. Last week, he attended a rally in Springfield where he urged lawmakers to pass a ban on assault weapons and lashed out at Topinka for not supporting it. He also promoted his health care program for children by teaming up with Democratic U.S. Sen. Richard Durbin in Carbondale and St. Louis.
Because he was on official business, Blagojevich used a state plane to fly to Springfield and southern Illinois. His office will be billed $1,439 for the flights, Illinois Department of Transportation spokesman Matt Vanover said.
In events held by his campaign apparatus, Blagojevich proposed a $1 increase in the minimum wage the morning after the primary and challenged Topinka to a series of 10 debates.
There's a fine line between politicking and governing, and it can be tough to distinguish Blagojevich's campaigning from his official events. "I think they skate very close to the line," Redfield said.
The political risk of that skate is that voters will begin to think everything a politician does is with an eye toward the polls and the election, Redfield said.
Take, for instance, the governor's push this weekend to get Topinka to support a statewide ban on assault weapons.
The governor used his official state letterhead to urge "Treasurer Topinka" to support the ban and to use her position as the only statewide elected Republican officeholder to convince GOP lawmakers to do the same.
Topinka opposes a ban on assault weapons, saying it's difficult to define "assault weapon" and that the state should instead step up enforcement of existing gun laws.
Her campaign blasted Blagojevich's letter as a stunt.
"If he worked half as hard at governing as he does campaigning, the state would be in a lot better shape," said Topinka campaign spokesman Dave Loveday.
Blagojevich campaign spokesman Doug Scofield said the governor's primary focus has been, and will remain, on state business because of a compressed legislative session that is scheduled to end in early April.
"You have to do your job first," Scofield said.
One man who knows that is former Gov. Jim Edgar, who also serves as Topinka's honorary campaign chair.
"A governor has the bully pulpit," Edgar said.
But that's a problem for Blagojevich, who has been plagued by low job approval ratings.
He's "going to have some difficulties making people believe all these things he's saying," Edgar said.
PUBLIC AFFAIRS
Jeff Berkowitz interviews Senator Ira Silverstein: Did Blago throw the Jews under the Bus? On TV and video-streaming
http://jeffberkowitz.blogspot.com/
TOM ROESER
Tom Roeser comments Bill Brady and his promoters
http://www.tomroeser.com/
Those blog contributors who predict a bright future for Bill Brady (a U. S. Senate bid, another governor bid) don’t appreciate that Brady has a big reconstruct job to rehab his candidacy after his spoiler campaign which zeroed in on Oberweis and left Topinka alone. A poster symbol: the so-called “Judas kiss” bestowed on him by Topinka, followed by her whispered thank you in his ear. A lot of water will have to go under the bridge before that will be forgotten…
PEORIA JOURNAL STAR
DIERSEN HEADLINE: Phil Luciano promotes Duckworth
http://www.pjstar.com/stories/032806/PHI_B9CF7O7N.050.shtml
Gutsy pilot earns her political wings - Phil Luciano
Tammy Duckworth can't stop fighting.
Lose two limbs in the Iraq War yet push through painful rehab? Sure. Keep serving the military though deemed physically unfit for duty? Not surprising.
Go to Congress to stand up for the little guy? She's halfway there.
A year ago, when Peoria last took a long look at Duckworth, a major in the Illinois Army National Guard, she was struggling to learn how to walk again. But last week, she took a huge step toward election to the U.S. House of Representatives.
"It's going well," she chirps.
Duckworth, 38, lives in suburban Chicago with her husband, a captain in the National Guard. But for most of 1996 to 2004, she was based in Peoria with the National Guard's 1st Battalion, 106th Aviation Regiment.
Over the years, to fulfill her service obligations, she'd make countless drives back and forth to Chicago.
"I found the town to be incredibly diverse," says Duckworth, who still has a fondness for Peoria's varied ethnic eateries.
During her service overseas, she was impressed by "the tremendous support" from Peorians. Residents frequently sent her unit care packages, for soldiers as well as Iraqi children.
"I have a special place in my heart for people who have goodness in their hearts," she says.
On Nov. 12, 2004, Duckworth was in a Black Hawk helicopter in the skies near Baghdad. She was the junior pilot, training to be pilot in command. Insurgents opened fire. She saw a rocket-propelled grenade hurtle toward the helicopter. An explosion thundered below her as a fireball erupted at the floor of the cockpit.
As she lost consciousness, the senior pilot brought the helicopter down safely. She woke up a week later at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C.
Duckworth had lost her right leg, plus her left leg 8 inches below her knee. She has undergone 20 surgeries and intense pain, along with endless rehab to learn to use artificial limbs.
This newspaper ran an update on Duckworth in early 2005. At the time, she had two main goals: walking and flying again.
One down, one to go.
"I walk very well with a cane," she says. "One day, I'd like to walk without one."
During her rehab, she was called to testify at congressional hearings on behalf of veterans. Chicago-area Democrats took note of her energetic, earnest comportment. Party leaders asked her to run for the seat being vacated by longtime U.S. Rep. Henry Hyde, R-Wood Dale, whose 6th District covers west-suburban Chicago.
Duckworth thought about her experience at Walter Reed, where she got top-notch health care. Not everyone is so lucky.
"I just think that (many) Americans don't have access to that health care, and that's not right," she says.
So, she threw her hat into the ring, one of 10 of the so-called "Fighting Democrats" nationwide who parlayed Iraq War service into congressional campaigns. She garnered the support of Barack Obama, John Kerry and Hillary Clinton, plus the endorsement of both of Chicago's major daily papers.
Although Duckworth volunteered to serve in the war, she disagrees with President Bush's decision to invade Iraq.
"We should have been fighting the enemies that attacked us at home on 9-11," she said in December when she announced her candidacy. "We should have been out there trying to catch Osama bin Laden."
Last week, she eked out a primary victory over two other candidates. She had 14,019 votes, not too far ahead of her closest opponent's 12,939.
In November, she'll face a Republican challenge in a district that has voted GOP for the past 32 years. That makes for a tough campaign.
But she's got other things on her mind as well.
After her combat injuries, the Army classified her as unfit for duty. However, she obtained a waiver to allow her to continue to serve.
She now works with the National Guard in Springfield, coordinating training. During trips up and back to Chicago, she plans to make detours to Peoria to train on the National Guard's flight simulator.
After all, she still has to make good on that promise to herself to fly again.
THE HILL
Duckworth, a wounded veteran of the Iraq war, defeated Cegelis by 3 percentage points in last week’s hotly contested primary. Cegelis, a liberal Democrat, won 44 percent of the vote against Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.) in 2004.
On Saturday, Illinois Democrats held a unity breakfast attended by Duckworth, party officials and Cegelis supporters who vowed to help Duckworth. Cegelis did not attend.
Duckworth had favored universal health insurance but changed her tune, advocating a more incremental approach, said the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
The source asserted that Cegelis believes Duckworth has backed away from her opposition to the Central America Free Trade Agreement that the House and Senate passed last year. Despite that perception, Duckworth won the Illinois AFL-CIO endorsement.
Duckworth spokesman Billy Weinberg said that instead of focusing on the differences between Duckworth and Cegelis, voters should consider the differences between her and her GOP challenger, state Sen. Peter Roskam (Ill.).
“I would urge them to consider if that’s in the best interest of the goals we share,” Weinberg said, referring to the focus thus far on the differences between the two Democratic primary candidates.
Cegelis’s refusal has irritated national Democrats who said she had promised local officials that she would endorse Duckworth. The national party officials worry that her unwillingness to support Duckworth’s bid could dampen enthusiasm among some Democratic activists in November.
Democrats had hoped to avoid this scenario as early as last year. Top party officials studied the likelihood of trying to persuade Cegelis to drop out of the race but concluded she would not do so if asked, a Democratic National Committee (DNC) official said.
The heated primary reflected the tension between activist voters who favor a passionate, outspoken candidate and voters who support a candidate they view as having the best chance to win in a general election.
In the Republican-leaning, suburban Chicago district where the Democratic Party has had no real organization in recent years, Cegelis had built support from a coalition of activists and one-issue voters. She also earned the endorsement of Democracy For America, a prominent grassroots movement run by Howard Dean’s brother after Dean’s failed presidential campaign. Dean is now the chairman of DNC.
“There’s no respect now for grassroots support,” the source close to Cegelis’s campaign said, adding that Dean was the only national Democratic leader to call her after the race ended.
In the absence of a strong local party, Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.), the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC), handpicked Duckworth as the establishment choice. Illinois’s U.S. senators, Democrats Barack Obama and Dick Durbin, as well as Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), aided Duckworth’s campaign by recording phone calls to voters, endorsing her in direct mailings and raising money.
Illinois Democrats say that they are not worried about Cegelis’s decision not to endorse Duckworth because most Democrats, even if upset by the outcome, will choose Duckworth over Roskam.
Jim Dean, chairman of Democracy for America, told The Hill, “We’ve seen plenty of reaction in the past when Washington Democrats involved themselves in a race. I’m seeing a different reaction here. It’s not reversed itself into a Kumbaya moment.”
“I don’t sense a recrimination mode. The tenor of rhetoric from the DCCC is one of ‘well, that’s politics,’” he added.
A Democratic Party strategist said, “Maybe [Cegelis] can take some people with her, but with or without her this is going to be a hell of race. We hope that she is part of it.”
So far, the Iraq War veterans’ slate is two for two, with Illinois Democrat Tammy Duckworth and Texas Republican Van Taylor scoring congressional primary wins this month. But that’s not to say there haven’t been mishaps. The same day Duckworth won last week, Marine Lt. Col. Tim Dunn abandoned his Democratic challenge to GOP Rep. Robin Hayes in North Carolina amid reports that his fundraising drive had proven disappointing. And the first Iraq vet to run for Congress — Paul Hackett, who almost won a special House race in Ohio last summer — dropped out of politics altogether last month when Democrats pushed him to drop his bid for the Senate in favor of a second House bid. But the 2006 field still includes at least 10 such vets; these five appear to be in the most competitive races.
Tammy Duckworth, Democrat
-- District: Illinois 6 (Northwest and west Chicago suburbs)
-- Strength: Her compelling story — she lost both legs after the helicopter she was flying was hit — guarantees substantial media coverage. The district is not as strongly Republican as it was when Henry J. Hyde began representing it three decades ago.
-- Weakness: The 6th still does lean distinctly Republican, and Duckworth faces a well-funded and more seasoned GOP opponent in Peter Roskam, a veteran state legislator.
Responding to a Sun-Times News-Group series that detailed how young Illinois veterans are having difficulty finding work, Blagojevich said he wants the state to give tax credits to companies that hire veterans, especially those with disabilities.
"It's a depressing state," Blagojevich said after reading articles published in Sunday and Monday's Sun detailing that the Labor Department ranks Illinois last in its ability to help veterans get jobs, and that many veterans in Illinois complain they have been fired or laid off after they are deployed.
Nationwide, the unemployment rate among the youngest veterans is 16 percent — nearly twice that of their civilian counterparts.
"The first thing I did after reading your article was contact my deputy governor and said, 'We got to do something about this.'"
On Monday, Blagojevich released a six-point plan to get more veterans hired.
Besides tax credits, Blagojevich is mandating that state employment workers aggressively promote veterans to employers. The governor is also asking state education officials to determine how military experience can count for college credit.
Blagojevich also thinks employers who are found to discriminate against reservists and National Guardsmen should face stiffer penalties.
The governor is also considering requiring veterans to provide Social Security numbers when they register for jobs on the state jobs bank. Without the numbers, the state cannot track how many veterans get jobs, which is one of the reasons Illinois was ranked worst in the nation for helping veterans get jobs.
Other lawmakers were angry Monday that young veterans featured in the Sun articles were dismissed or given bad job reviews after they were deployed.
"This is just inexcusable," said U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., who serves on the Senate Veteran Affairs Committee. "It just makes reservists and guardsmen cynical about how serious we are when we proclaim we honor their service."
Obama and U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., have ordered the U.S. Labor Department to determine how the agency is going to improve service in Illinois. Obama said if there aren't enough Labor investigators to research reservists' complaints, he would advocate to increase staffing levels.
Durbin called the veterans unemployment situation "a serious problem" for Illinois and said he is curious to know how Indiana employment workers were able to get veterans there more jobs than those in Illinois. Indiana was ranked eighth in the nation for helping veterans in that state become employed.
Chicago Alderman James Balcer, a Vietnam veteran, plans to introduce a resolution Wednesday that calls for City Hall hearings. He plans to have Labor Department officials there to answer questions from veterans, reservists and National Guardsmen who feel they have suffered discrimination because of their military service.
"The stories brought back a lot of bad memories for me," he said. "It's infuriating."
Balcer said when he returned from Vietnam War in 1970 he also had a difficult time finding a job. In some cases, employers told him they were turning him down because of his service in Vietnam.
"They're like, 'We're glad you served, but we don't have a job for you,'" he said. "It's a sad situation."
Paid for by David John Diersen