Finally

Part of me can't believe it finally happened, part of me can't believe it took this long. But barring something completely unforeseen, HB824, the pay-to-play ban, will take effect on January 1, 2009.

Only in Illinois does it take a Presidential nominee getting involved in order to pass a common sense ethics law. But it's a good day for good government and a good day for Illinois.

In any event, there are a lot of people that deserve a lot of credit for their work on this issue over the last 3+ years. Dan Hynes, Cindi Canary, Don Harmon, editorial boards around the state, and countless disgruntled Illinois taxpayers who said 'enough'. Without all of them, and many others, today would not have happened.

And while I have a couple of ideas, I don't have the energy right now to go into my thoughts on what the Governor will likely do next. But I can't help but think that, regardless of what his next steps may be, that he would have been a lot better off just signing this bill in the first place.

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