By Steve Rhodes

“After months of promising a major grass-roots effort to win public support for reforming the state’s government worker pension system, Gov. Pat Quinn on Sunday unveiled a plan that featured an incomplete online strategy, children wearing red plastic megaphones and an animated ‘Squeezy the Pension Python’ mascot,” the Tribune reports.
“There were, however, no solutions offered on how to fix the nation’s most underfunded retirement system.”
First, let us behold what our cartoon governor hath wrought.

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Posted on November 19, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

In which the winners of a 46-3 budget vote are the poorest sports in the universe. With gratitude to @DriXander for her invaluable tweeting.)

Rahm’s budget passes 46-3. Dead fish industry facing layoffs. #chicago

— Beachwood Reporter (@BeachwoodReport) November 15, 2012

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Posted on November 16, 2012

By Journeyman Pictures

“When Barack Obama first claimed victory four years ago his message of hope, change and jobs resonated across the nation. But have any of those promises been delivered to Chicago’s poorest neighborhoods?”

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Posted on November 15, 2012

Turns Out Food Deserts Have Land

First, from the Heartland Alliance:
“We are so excited about one of our newest projects, Chicago FarmWorks which will break ground on a 2.6 acre urban farm in East Garfield Park today.
“As Chicago families look forward to Thanksgiving, Heartland Alliance’s Chicago FarmWorks reminds everyone of the importance of community and how we all must work together to eradicate hunger and poverty in our city.
“We estimate that 24,000 pounds of produce will be grown in the first year, which will be distributed to low-income families by the Greater Chicago Food Depository. The project will create 90 transitional jobs in the first three years, allowing hard-to-employ people to get the training they need to re-enter the workforce on a full-time basis.”

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Posted on November 13, 2012

By The Chicago Justice Project

For weeks now, a debate has raged in the press with Mayor Emanuel saying Chicago’s current police staffing levels are fine and the police unions arguing that we need more police if we are to stem the rising tide of crime.
How are we, the public, to make a judgement about who is right?
Did you know that Chicago has the most murders per capita among major US cities and the most police officers per capita?

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Posted on November 12, 2012

By Paul Kiel/ProPublica

The Obama administration launched its main program to prevent foreclosures in the spring of 2009 with $50 billion and abundant promises. What the Home Affordable Modification Program, or HAMP, lacked – and wouldn’t have for years – was effective oversight of the big banks that were crucial to the program’s success.
Documents obtained by ProPublica shed new light on this failing in 2009 and 2010, when the foreclosure crisis was at its peak and six million American homeowners were in danger of losing their homes. HAMP required mortgage servicers to offer loan modifications to eligible homeowners so that their monthly payments would be lower. The servicers – the largest of which were owned by the banks that had fueled the crisis in the first place – were in charge of reviewing homeowner applications, but the government set the rules and was supposed to supervise their work.
But the documents show that the government did not complete a major audit of the two largest banks in the program, Bank of America and Wells Fargo, until more than a year after the program launched.

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Posted on November 9, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

The apoplectic reaction of some Republicans to Tuesday night’s loss is a bit perplexing; after all, President Obama managed to snag just 50% of the popular vote, a mere two-point margin over Mitt Romney.
Put another way, Romney won 57,821,399 votes to Obama’s 60,662,601. Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson won nearly 1.2 million votes (Green Party candidate Jill Stein won just a bit over 400,000).
Sure, we elect presidents through the Electoral College, but even there Obama’s 303 votes – Florida, with 29 electoral votes, is still too close to call – isn’t particularly impressive for an incumbent. Obama won 365 electoral votes in 2008. Bill Clinton was re-elected in 1996 with 379 electoral votes, a nine-vote increase from 1992. Ronald Reagan was re-elected in 1984 with 525 electoral votes, a 36-vote increase from 1980. Richard Nixon was re-elected in 1972 with 520 electoral votes, a 219-vote increase from 1968. Dwight Eisenhower was re-elected in 1956 with 457 electoral votes, a 15-vote increase from 1952. FDR’s electoral vote totals were 472, 523, 449 and 432.
Now, perhaps this reflects a more divided country than in those days.

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Posted on November 8, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

“Democrats literally mapped out their victories in Illinois congressional races this year, winning most of the big prizes in districts that had been redrawn to squeeze out Republicans or throw them into Democrat-friendly territory,” AP reports.
“The party picked up four congressional seats, including three held by GOP freshmen, Tuesday night as President Barack Obama scored an easy home-state victory en route to re-election.”
What was described by one top Republican strategist as a “bloodbath” includes veto-proof Democratic majorities in both the state Senate and state House. Democrats, of course, already control the governorship, as well as Cook County government and Chicago government. A Chicagoan is also in the White House – along with his Chicago cronies.
Memo to Democrats: You unmistakably wear the jacket in these parts.

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Posted on November 7, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

Remember. you can print this out and take it with you into the voting booth and/or use it for rolling papers.
PRESIDENT:
It’s a close call.
U.S. SENATE: Neither Illinois senator is up for re-election or indictment this year.
U.S. HOUSE: Congressional races by district:

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Posted on November 6, 2012

By Dafna Linzer/ProPublica

A former brothel manager who helped the FBI bust a national prostitution ring. A retired sheriff who inadvertently helped a money launderer buy land. A young woman who mailed ecstasy tablets for a drug-dealing boyfriend, then worked with investigators to bring him down.
All of them and hundreds more were denied pardons by President Obama, who has granted clemency at a lower rate than any modern president, a ProPublica review of pardons data shows.

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Posted on November 2, 2012