By Sam Singer
The health care debate is already brimming with needless commentary, so it is with some reluctance that I bring up the latest digression, courtesy of two of the legal community’s most notable agitators.
Writing in the Wall Street Journal, conservative lawyers David Rivkin and Lee Casey argue that Congress is without constitutional authority to enact a law requiring Americans to buy health insurance. Under its Commerce Clause powers, Congress can regulate economic activity that has a substantial effect on interstate commerce. But Rivkin and Casey can’t discern what activity, short of having a pulse, Congress seeks to regulate through a mandatory insurance program.

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Posted on September 30, 2009

By Marcus Stern and Jennifer LaFleur/ProPublica
When it comes to golf, Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., has champagne taste.
In California, he’s putted with his back to the thundering surf near the 7th hole at Pebble Beach, where a round of golf costs $495. In Florida, he’s driven the ball down the fairways of the Boca Raton Resort, with its signature island green on the 18th hole and its Waldorf Astoria interior.

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These are among the dozen premiere resorts where Chambliss played golf in 2007 and 2008 at a cost of a quarter of a million dollars. Yet Chambliss is hardly rich. His net worth is between $181,006 and $415,000, according to his 2007 financial disclosure report, ranking him 89th in the Senate in terms of wealth.
Fortunately for Chambliss, a political fund covers the costs of his golf hobby. The fund received $692,618 during the 2008 election cycle, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Almost all of it came from lobbyists, political action committees (PACs) and corporate leaders.
The public might be forgiven for thinking the days are gone when lobbyists and special interests could pay for a lawmaker’s cross-country golf outings. After all, both the House and Senate in 2007 responded to a spate of scandals by banning members of Congress from accepting gifts of any value from lobbyists or the companies that hire them.
But those reforms preserved a major loophole: leadership PACs like Chambliss’ Republican Majority Fund, which have far looser rules and get far less scrutiny than campaign committees. At first, only a few rising stars in Congress had them. Now, 70 percent of the members do. So do a dozen former members.

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Posted on September 28, 2009

By Sam Singer
Last month Chicago police superintendent Jody Weis asked the city to rethink the way it handles police misconduct claims. At his request, the Law Department amended its settlement policy to reflect a more battle-ready posture. City lawyers will no longer have discretion to settle small claims on behalf of police officers. Now lawyers will need the city’s permission, which presumably won’t come, and until it does they will aggressively litigate each misconduct claim that lands on their desks.
By “misconduct claim” I mean a suit against a police officer arising from actions taken in carrying out his official duties. (You may have heard these suits described as “brutality claims,” but while appropriate on rare occasions, that label is under-inclusive and on the whole a bit brash). Because misconduct suits involve official police conduct, the city is on the hook for most of the damages, which explains why city lawyers can typically represent the joint interests of the city and the accused police officer in one proceeding.
The city has understandably grown weary of elective settlements. Plaintiffs’ attorneys have learned to game the city’s settlement policy by bringing – and in some cases manufacturing – claims that cost more to litigate than to settle. In this way they can effectively force payouts by presenting lawyers with the choice of spending, say, $10,000 to try a misconduct case or $7,000 to make it go away.
But if costly, the city’s old settlement policy had some indisputable, if often overlooked, benefits.

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Posted on September 16, 2009

By Voices for Illinois Children
Data released by the U.S. Census Bureau last week show continued improvement in health insurance coverage for Illinois children, due largely to enrollment in the state’s “All Kids” health insurance program, according to an analysis of the data by Voices for Illinois Children.
The option of public health insurance for children has become even more critical during a deep recession, as unemployment increases and state revenues decline.
In 2007-2008, the state’s uninsured rate for children was 6.5 percent, compared with 8.1 percent in 2006-2007. The national average in 2007-2008 was 10.5 percent. In 2004-2005, the proportion of uninsured children in Illinois was 10.4 percent – about the same as the U.S. as a whole.
The latest data also show the continued long-term erosion of employment-based health insurance. In 2007-2008, 65 percent of Illinois children had employer-sponsored coverage, down from 66 percent in 2006-2007 and 71 percent in 1990-2000.

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Posted on September 15, 2009

By Christopher Flavelle/Pro Publica
On Thursday, the president’s Council of Economic Advisers released its first quarterly report (PDF) on the economic impact of the stimulus. The next day’s headlines seized on a single number in the report: one million, the council’s estimate of how many jobs the stimulus had created or saved. But how solid is that number?
According to the report itself, not very.

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Posted on September 14, 2009

By Steve Rhodes
In which I talk back to the president.
This text has been edited for length, clarity and comedy.
OBAMA: There are those on the left who believe that the only way to fix the system is through a single-payer system like Canada’s, where we would severely restrict the private insurance market and have the government provide coverage for everyone. On the right, there are those who argue that we should end the employer-based system and leave individuals to buy health insurance on their own.
RHODES: And there are those who believe those aren’t mutually exclusive.
OBAMA: I have to say that there are arguments to be made for both approaches.
RHODES: And I should know, because I’ve made them!

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Posted on September 10, 2009

By Kiljoong Kim

A century ago, Daniel Burnham’s plan to develop and redevelop Chicago after the Great Fire, commonly known as the Plan of Chicago of 1909, was launched with many great ambitions. And it’s been celebrated and studied as a classic model for urban design and development ever since. The Plan created a boulevard system, a lakefront largely accessible to the public, and many other amenities that we enjoy today. What is not well-known is that upon implementation, the rising cost of housing displaced many working class residents near downtown. Those residents were largely first-generation Czechs, East European Jews, Italians and Poles, as well as blacks from the South seeking factory jobs in the new industrial age.
Nearly a hundred years later, under the names of urban renewal, revitalization, gentrification, and globalization, the rising cost of housing begins to displace yet another set of working-class immigrants and racial minorities – primarily Mexicans and African Americans – out of several neighborhoods throughout the city. Such displacement is nearly complete in Lincoln Park, Bucktown, Wicker Park and the South Loop, and the progress is ongoing in Rogers Park, Uptown, Albany Park, Pilsen, Bronzeville and Kenwood/Oakland.
This brings up an interesting question of who gets to live in Chicago.

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Posted on September 7, 2009

By Green Bay Bill
“Who Runs The City”
To The Tune Of: “In The City”
By: The Eagles
There’s a lady, in the city with a new Harpo sign
A little chubby but she’s kinda pretty
Next week she’ll be screwing up the bus lines

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Posted on September 6, 2009

By Christopher Flavelle and Amanda Michael/Courtesy of ProPublica
Vice President Joe Biden marked the 200-day point of the stimulus package today with a speech at the Brookings Institution, where he spent nearly an hour ticking off its achievements so far. Among other things, Biden said some economists had given the $787 billion stimulus bill credit for creating 500,000 to 750,000 jobs and boosting the gross domestic product in the two most recent quarters.
The administration has benefitted from rosy economic numbers in recent weeks. The Federal Reserve, in minutes released Wednesday night, credited the stimulus with playing a role in stabilizing the economy. But any assessment of the stimulus, particularly when it comes to predicting jobs created or saved, relies on some economic guesswork.

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Posted on September 4, 2009

By Olga Pierce/Courtesy of ProPublica
To curb the lobbying feeding frenzy surrounding the nearly $800 billion stimulus package, in March the Obama administration imposed unprecedented restrictions on lobbyists: All lobbyist communications regarding specific projects were to be submitted in writing, and general conversations between government officials and lobbyists about stimulus policies had to be noted in disclosures posted online.
We decided to track this promise with a clock – so far it’s at 94 days and counting – and there is no sign it will be stopping any time soon.

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Posted on September 2, 2009