Why This Election Wasted Illinois’ Time – WP Original

 

By: Mark Glennon*

 

Regulars here may have noticed there hasn’t been much to read in the last couple weeks. The reason should tell you something — something discouraging, which I’m sure is just what you want to hear.

 

We aggregate the best stories we can find about the role of governance in Illinois’ economy, with a particular focus on our state and local fiscal crises. But we try to avoid politics, which is usually rather different. We haven’t found much lately.

 

Attention has properly turned towards the election, and what has that meant? Is there any contest for any Illinois office where governance and our fiscal crises are being seriously discussed? Not that I’ve seen. Maybe I’ve missed a local race or two outside of my area, but I’ve found no candidate in either party even describe, much less try to address, the hard facts and terrifying numbers that comprise our death spiral.

 

Has even one candidate seriously discussed pensions, which are the lion’s share of our problem, or proposed a solution? None.

 

The press is happy to oblige. They are mostly political reporters, and politics are indeed an important topic to cover. But many of them are also just stenographers. It’s easy to write a juicy story if you just regurgitate each side’s spin. Ultimately, however, the public gets most of the blame. Candidates say and reporters cover what people want to hear.

 

It’s better in the races for federal offices from Illinois where at least some races are focused on national issues, and a number of good articles have analyzed the so-called Safe Roads ballot amendment. For other Illinois issues, however, this election has added exactly zero the public’s understanding.

 

For America, today is the most consequential day since World War II (though it’s hard to say what all the consequences will be, regardless of who wins). For Illinois, maybe one side or the other will pick up a few seats in the General Assembly and the outcome of the Comptroller’s race is very important for the reasons we wrote earlier.  Madigan’s supermajority may be lost, but it’s not solid now anyway. Beyond that, this election has been a colossal waste of time, attention and money.

 

*Mark Glennon is founder of WirePoints. Opinions expressed are his own.

 

 

 

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T from Edwadsville
7 years ago

And how about the Munger race. There is not a better example of a Madigan lemming than Mendoza, but look what happened there.

nixit71
7 years ago

Agreed. I was able to convince family and friends who were Hillary supporters to vote Munger. Sadly, those crossover votes are rare, especially in Illinois. Case in point…Schak-the-Hack gets re-elected.

Lawrence
7 years ago

Correct– a sad reflection on our press, but also on Illinois voters. They had the chance to deal with Madigan and Cullerton and did nothing meaningful. It was sad to look at the election maps with only Illinois being the one blue state in the Midwest to stand out so early and all night long. Every other state has tried something different. But not our Democrat sheep voters.

bob oriole park
7 years ago
Reply to  Lawrence

Agreed. I was talking with my brother who lives downstate, and have told him some of the things I’ve found, like the hidden auto tax hike for police pensions starting in 2020, the bonds sold to pay off old bonds presented for payment etc. As I told him, these aren’t top secrets where I had to hack into a file server or web site. This is publicly available information, but people are just too stupid to take the time and effort to read it. Same thing applies to media here. Radio silence.

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A statewide concern: Illinois’ population decline outpaces neighboring states – Wirepoints on ABC20 Champaign

“We are not in good shape” Wirepoints’ Ted Dabrowski told ABC 20 Champaign during a segment on Illinois’ latest population losses. Illinois was one of just three states to shrink in the 2010-2020 period and has lost another 300,000 people since then. Ted says things need to change. “It’s too expensive to live here, there aren’t enough good jobs and nobody trusts the government anymore. There’s just other places to go where you can be more satisfied.”

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