Former State Senator and current President and CEO of the Technology and Manufacturing Association (TMAIllinois.org) Steve Rauschenberger gives a detailed, blunt interview not just on manufacturing but on his own Republican party’s failings.

Comment: Seems like the only opponents on the planet to fair map reforms are Madigan and his friends.

The average Chicago citizen is walking around on real estate with a number of different, overlapping governmental jurisdictions, each of which poses financial implications for any single taxpayer. Calculating the full ‘Taxpayer Burden’ for a Chicago citizen requires analysis and assessment of his or her exposure to the multiple layers of government that are borrowing money, with future tax implications. Comment: That’s the key. Any one jurisdiction may look fixable in isolation, but in aggregate they are not.

A great reminder why government “budgets” mean little.

This analysis found that Illinois’ operating deficit, which has led to more than $6.9 billion in outstanding bills, would not exist if, since 2000, state government had simply paid its employees at a rate relative to what other state governments pay their workers.