Ethics in Illinois politics? Well ... maybe not.
Cross-posted on From Where I Blog
To continue with the previous post by Abraham Lincoln ... there is certainly a cause for concern from my little corner of the world about political corruption in Illinois, although many of our elected officials would like to make us think it is much ado about nothing.
Consider that former Gov. George Ryan (a Republican) is on trial on corruption charges and our current governor (a Democrat) is perhaps the target of a federal investigation. Couple in the allegations of 'pay to play' and this is a troubling issue, an embarassing issue -- but certainly not a partisan issue.
Consider this.
I was heartened yesterday when I received a press release from Carol Knowles, a spokesperson for Illinois Comptroller Dan Hynes. On Wednesday in Springfield Hynes led a bipartisan group of legislators and activists in calling for sweeping eithic reforms aimed at ending the appearance of pay-to-play practices in Illinois and restoring integrity and public confidence in government.
The press release contained a lengthy list of proposals to try and clean up Illinois government.
Many of those proposals dealt with campaign contributions and lobbyists. On my Wednesday night radio show, "Sound Off" (WQRL in Benton) I had as a guest, Cindi Canary, the executive director of the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform.
Canary, during the 20-minute interview, noted that she had attended the press conference in Springfield on Wednesday and admitting that it is an uphill battle, said that she was motivated by the attendance and the bipartisan tone of the event. Canary stressed that campaign finance reform and limiting the amount of contributions by special interest groups was the top priority.
After reading the press release and talking with Canary I was even a little optimistic.
And of course that's saying something because when it comes to politics I'm cynical by nature and from experience. You know the old saying, 'puffery me once, shame on you ... puffery me twice, shame on me.'
But, I went to bed optimistic that maybe, just maybe, as Dylan predicted ... 'the times they are a changin.'
So, I jumped out of bed at 5 a.m. Thursday morning full of vim and vigor and ready to tackle the day. As I was reading my morning newspapers on-line I ran across these two stories back-to-back.
Here's the first story.
Now, here's the second story.
Oh well, so much for ethics and vim and vigor ... and so much for that fleeting moment of optimism.
3 comments:
Jim,
I hear where you're coming from, but this is exactly why we need to redouble our efforts to get these bills passed. It took me four years (and endless grief)to pass the ban on campaign solicitation by state inspectors, and the bill had been around for four years before I even got there.
If we give up the fight, it is a certainty that nothing will get done. If we keep pounding away at it, eventually we make progress.
Naive? No. Hopeful? A little. But we have a good group of folks working together and I believe that sooner rather than later we will get these bills passed. I'd like to get them passed as the result of people's sense of doing what's right. But if we can pass them as the result of people's fear of political repercussion from not passing them, I'm okay with that as well. But for that to happen, public outcry has to outweigh public cynicism.
One of Cindy's gruop's proposals is to limit campaign contributions. I have no problem with eliminating contributions from state vendors and forcing the return of contributions from those who score. You can prohibit contributions from those substantially regulated by the state, too, e.g, gambling and utility interests.
But an absolute limit similar to the Fed rule will just increase the power of rich guys who own the mass media and their managers.
It is not fair to penalize the other rich guys, in my opinion.
Hey, at least Illinois has a (proud?) history of turning former Governors into license plate manufacturers. Might one argue the system works?
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