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The [Friday] Papers

By Steve Rhodes

I’ve got a lot of campaign material I hope to post between now and Election Day on Tuesday, so there will be more, better stuff coming. For now, though, a quick run through the day’s news.
Patti’s Back
“Patti Blagojevich is making calls to her Northwest Side neighbors on behalf of her sister, Ald. Deb Mell (33rd),” the Sun-Times reports.
Do they really think that’s a good idea?

She’s not at all concerned that the calls may backfire with voters who remember Patti Blagojevich’s profanity-laced plotting with her husband and how close she came to being indicted herself.
“When I go out knocking on doors in our neighborhood, people ask me how [Rod] is doing and how the family is doing and the girls. They say, `We’re thinking about them.’ I’m not saying every door, but many of them,” Deb Mell said, of the former governor now serving a 14-year sentence after his conviction on federal corruption charges.

Well, maybe not many of them, but some of them.
Well, maybe not some of them, but one of them.
Well, Patti’s door. When Deb knocked on Patti’s door, all she talked about was Rod . . .
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If I were one of Mell’s opponents, I’d be thrilled with this development.
Crocodile Tears
Wouldn’t it be great if Bruce and Diana became a don’t-invitem-item?
Then again, Diana, you helped put him in office with those cynical commercials. You knew what this was about.
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Bruce Rauner’s budget will not be passed by the General Assembly. It is his starting point in the negotiations – though the supermajority Dems could just write their own budget. They won’t, though, because they want the Republican governor to take ownership of both spending cuts and higher taxes, fees, fines or however they will raise revenue. There is no doubt, though, that if Rauner were to enact the budget he wants, he would literally be killing people. And the budget that does pass will probably kill people too.
I mean, my god, cuts to kids on ventilators?
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See also: Critics Slam Rauner’s Budget Over ‘Morally Reprehensible’ Cuts.
Rookie Dookie
The Tribune editorial board considers Rauner’s hiring of the sister of a top aide a “mistake.” Perhaps even a “rookie” mistake.
Really? How is that a “mistake?” Like, “Oops, I didn’t mean to do that?”
And how is Rauner a rookie when it comes to hiring when hiring was his private equity specialty?
Further, is it really a surprise that the man who clouted his daughter into Payton Prep and lied about it through the campaign even as he moaned about patronage – yet got the Tribune’s support – would hire the sister of an aide?
I’d like to call the Trib’s editorial a mistake, but I’m not that naive. And neither are they.
See also the item “Clamp Clout.”
Free Rauner
“More than a few Statehouse types have been wondering aloud for weeks what Gov. Bruce Rauner is up to with his almost daily attacks on organized labor. Just what, they ask, is the end game?” Rich Miller writes in his syndicated column.
“His people say that the governor feels ‘liberated’ since the election to speak his mind about a topic that stirs great personal passion in him.”
I though Rauner spoke his mind about organized labor pretty clearly – and loudly – during the campaign. I also thought Rauner tried to persuade voters that he wasn’t a politician, and therefore he was already liberated to tell them what he really thought – remember, the guy nobody sent?
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See also: When Preckwinkle Met Rauner.
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Weekend Beachwood
Everything that is not on the site yet will be later.
Heh-heh.
All in pre-production: The Week In Chicago Rock, Beachwood Photo Booth, The Beachwood Radio Sports Hour, The Beachwood Radio Hour and more.
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BeachBook
* New York Times Public Editor: Why A Reporter’s ‘Epic Rant’ On Twitter Gets No Argument Here.
* The Cubs Are Awful People.
* Jesse Jackson Jr. Still Needs Accounting Help.
* Brian Williams’ Vienna Sausages.
* A Writing Lesson: Everyone Please Stop Doing This.
* Breaking: Elites Get Away With Corporate Crime.
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The Beachwood Tip Line: No static at all.

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Posted on February 20, 2015