The November General Election Will be Jeanne Ives v. Chris Kennedy

March Primary Winners

And the losers!

Mike Houlihan and I were talking about the looming general election and both of us feel it will be a barn burner, thanks to this March Primary shenanigans ( JB's Black Blago Blather & Bruce's Bosco Bunkum larded with his Ives/Madigan Metamorphosis) indicating a less than vigorous turn-out for JB and a dandy Rauner kick-to-the-curb.

The two people with the millions invested in their own personal interests will be disappointed. Rauner and Pritzker will have wasted more dollars than a rouge Gamblers Anonymous junket to Vegas. 

Jeanne Ives has a mere 3.5 millions dollars in her war chest and Chris Kennedy bests her pile by a mere $2m.


Daniel Biss is the guy that New York wants, but he is still Danny Biss. Chris Kennedy and Jeanne Ives are mirror campaigns; Ives is the right choice and Chris Kennedy is the one the other side will settle upon, by March 20, 2018.

• Black voters won't and JB will need to content himself with marijuana futures.
• Unions will stay for JB, but the rank and file will vote for Chris Kennedy
• Ives will get many Democrat votes, retired, or non-union voters who could careless about drawing a GOP ballot this go-around
• Illinois is more than ready for a huge change and Chris Kennedy's primary victory will be the starting gun for the challenge to Rahm Emanuel
• The beating of JB Pritzker by Primary voters is the thumbs-way-down on Mayor Coon-eyes -definately and the oafish Dick Durbin - early JB cheerleader.

Houlihan and I agree, " The plutocrats have jumped the shark."   Pro Publica's Mick Dumke offers this graphic:

tracking the Illinois Governor's Race

TOTAL RAISED			SELF-FUNDED	PAST MONTH	SPENT
	Bruce Rauner (R, incumbent)	$102.7m	$57.8m	$238k	$46.4m
	Jeanne Ives (R)	$3.6m	$0	$520k	$36k
	JB Pritzker (D)	$63.2m	$63.2m	$14.0m	$34.3m
	Daniel Biss (D)	$6.8m	$0	$1.6m	$2.0m
	Chris Kennedy (D)	$5.6m	$1.3m	$1.3m	$3.0m
$182.0m			$122.3m	$17.6m	$85.9m

I Have One Vote and It Will Go to Jeanne Ives

Tonight Jeanne Ives will join the Irish for Ives crowd at Reilly's Daughter Pub, in Oak Lawn.  Today, I will vote for Jeanne Ives.

I have one vote for Governor in this Illinois Primary Election and it requires that I take a Republican Ballot to cast this vote.   I am early voting today here in the 19th Ward at Mount Greenwood Park    3721 W 111th St, when it opens around 9AM.  First day is always delayed, but our judges and poll watchers do a terrific job.  Alderman Matt O'Shea will be on hand to make sure everything rolls-out smoothly. They usually do, here in a neighborhood Ward that takes voting very seriously.

This is the most important vote that I need to cast in years.  I normally take a Democratic Primary ballot, but not this time. This is a game changing vote.

Illinois is choking to death.

My neighbors, of whom the majority hold public service pensions,  agonize as they watch the IOUs passed to them from Big Jim Thompson to Bruce Rauner, turn into Confederate Money, or Illinois high-speed rail bonds. 

Squeezy the Python is doing very well. 

Hard working people worry about Jeanne Ives and believe the bilge given out by the media and the Rauner Campaign that she wants to take away their IOUs from Republican  and Democrat grifters and oligarchs.

Illinois Public Pensions are the ultimate Ponzi Pyramid.  If you worked for Illinois and have gotten out with your 85%, all is good.

The millions more of you - not so much.

Pensions were looted to make a very few people rich.

Public school teachers,cops, firemen and later AFSCME workers were treated to the following:

•Shorting pension payments to buy immediate budgetary relief. The nonpartisan Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability, the fiscal research arm of the General Assembly, concluded in 2013 that the largest cause of the unfunded pension liabilities was inadequate contributions from the state. Underpayments between 1985 and 2012 totaled $41.2 billion, the agency calculated.
•Enhancing pension benefits. Former GOP Gov. James Thompson agreed in 1989 to establish a compounding, 3 percent cost-of-living increase for retirees. Another round of benefit enhancements followed in the late 1990s. In May, the state Supreme Court ruled that those changes can't ever be revoked for tens of thousands of current and retired government workers.
•Clearing a bloated state payroll by letting workers retire early. A 2002 plan created under Republican Ryan and pushed by Democratic House Speaker Michael Madigan cost the pension systems at least four times more than originally billed and won't be paid off until after 2045, when early-century budgetary ills will be the stuff of history books. David McKinney in Crain's Chicago Business ( emphases my own) 

That is Bi-Partisan Suicide, neighbors.  The oligarchs found their solution - Soak the Rich, code for increase income and property taxes via a heavy progressive tax, or plank # 2 from the Communist Manifesto*.

I believe that Jeanne Ives intends to reform pensions.  She has a plan. None of the other's have anything, except legalize weed and increase Illinois progressive taxes, while feeding  empty pensions and killing off what remains of the middle class in this state for good.

Jeanne Ives is the only candidate who stands against the American Holocaust - abortion. America will never be great again, until this horror of slaughtering a babies is euphemized as health care ends.  Jeanne Ives stands against abortion and the Planned Parenthood abortion industry.

I you are fine with abortion, you are OK with anything.

Jeanne Ives does not pander for votes and understands that the word illegal
 means something.

I might be the only DNA in my vast family of hard-working skilled trades people to cast this vote, but I believe it will topple Bruce Rauner's place-holding tenure as governor.

Come the general election, Jeanne Ives can count on my solitary vote again.

If you stand for nothing, you will fall for anything.

Illinois has had a very long and perilous fall.


*Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, in the Communist Manifesto, advocated a heavy progressive tax as a means of despoiling the “bourgeoisie” and softening middleclass society up for the dictatorshp of the proletariat.

Meatball Soup to Make Way for Friday's Fish Fry

I love Lent.  Fish on Fridays and weekdays dedicated to carnivoric catering at home. One of my favorite recipes for Lenten days-avant Friday is meatball soup.

I use Progresso Italian breadcrumbs and 1 pound of ground beef 90% lean and 1 pound of ground pork from Jack & Pat's Old Fashioned Butcher Shop in Chicago Ridge.  These guys are wizards with meats.

First I make the meatballs

1-pound ground beef 90% lean
1-pound of ground pork
2- large eggs
4-large cloves of garlic smashed and chopped
1 -cup of Progresso Italian Breadcrumbs
1-pinch of kosher sea salt
1-Vigorous round of black pepper mill twisting, choking and turning like it was the neck of an elected official on your front porch
1-pinch of red pepper flakes
1-pinch of Frigo Four Cheeses flakes
A handful of fresh basil chopped up fine.

In a clean bowl and with clean hands mix all of the above

Make meatballs the size of a Titleist Pro V1 about two dozen - place a dozen on each of two cookie sheets that have been cover with wax paper.  Freeze one for later.  Refrigerate the other cover with more waxed paper overnight.

In a two quart pot*add the following:

Make or purchase four cups of Beef Broth
Rough chop a large red, or white onion
Add one cup of fresh lime juice
1/2 cup of brown sugar
Three crushed and chopped garlic cloves
One cup of Lillies' Hot Smoky Barbecue Sauce
One 12 oz. can of chopped tomatoes
Chopped fresh basil

Bring to a gentle boil and add 12 meatballs.

Reduce heat to low and cook until meatballs are done. Usually on the stove top about twenty-five minutes.  I prefer to leave it on a very simmer for more than a bit longer.

Add a couple of handfuls of baby spinach a bit before serving and  cook until wilted.

Serves 4 people or four nice meals with three meatballs each and garnish with Frigo Four Cheeses flakes.

It is mighty fine.  Serve with real crusty Italian bread.

*You may also use a Hamilton Beach slow cooker set on low four hours. Do not set on high, unless you intend to keep a close eye on the soup. Here (above) is what it looks like getting underway.

Ask the Parents of Dead Children Who Gateway'd on Pot, Before You Ask Illinois to Vote on Legal Dope

"I think it well advised for us as members of the Illinois General Assembly, before we possibly take a vote on this issue, to find out what our voters think. As I said, it's been done in virtually every other state that has considered this questions."

-- Sponsoring Sen. Bill Cunningham, D-Chicago,

 People who are addicted to marijuana are three times more likely to be addicted to heroin.
The legalization of marijuana increases availability of the drug and acceptability of its use. This is bad for public health and safety not only because marijuana use increases the risk of heroin use. Robert L. Du Pont in New York Times 2016

I think it well-advised to tally the number of drug related deaths in our neighborhood and maybe ask the grieving parents about marijuana's role in the death of a child

The butchers bill covering the last three years reveals that Illinois drug deaths are mostly white males, between the ages of 25-44.

The lies being told to convince voters to go along with wealthy, silk-suited marijuana advocates are as follows:

• Marijuana Is Not A Harmful Drug; In Fact, It Is Much Safer Than Alcohol And Tobacco. Nonsense it is as dangerous as booze and smokes
• .Weed Has Medical Value. Not really. 
• It Can Help The Government Generate Additional Revenue Like the Lottery and Casino Gaming?
• Legalization Would Help The Government Save Costs. How?
• Prohibition Is Racist. What isn't?
• Legalization Would Produce More Jobs. Where and for whom?
• People Will Take This Drug, No Matter What.   Fewer will.

Like everything that politicians toss at us, recreational marijuana legalization will make a great deal of money for a very few people like the Pritzkers of the Marijuana Policy Project:

MPP and MPP Foundation Board of Directors Joby Pritzker- In the Hat (Chair)
Frayda Levy (Vice Chair)Rene Ruiz (Treasurer)Troy DaytonJohn GilmoreJeff ZuckerJeff Moe

There is also the Coalition for Safer Illinois touting its two legislative champions Heather Steans and Kelly Cassidy.  You can not see its staff or board of directors., but Coalition for a Safer Illinois was formed from Marijuana Policy Project.

These plutocrats and hangers-on will make many more millions.

Many more Illinois parents will bury children who had easier access to weed.

Commander Paul Bauer Legislation Cynical Political Misappropriation of Man's Life

I don't recall reading the late Commander Paul Bauer's words on the banning of guns.  He was very outspoken about the criminals caught for felonies and released back into the public by cynical political judges and elected officials intent on fattening up votes. 

Commander Paul Bauer was respected by the women and men in blue who shared the dangers and ugliness of Chicago's streets, during his career.

Commander Paul Bauer was not killed in a mass school shooting, but killed doing his job, while off-duty.

No cop is off-duty.

A thug with a handgun bought out of state and with an extended magazine clip

I have never owned a gun in my life, nor do I ever intend to apply for, or purchase any firearm.   I live among many people to do and there has never been an incident where a gun was misfired, or directed at another person.

More than a very few times, bullets missed me by inches. They were all used by thugs (BDs, GDs, Stones, Four Corner Hustlers, or Vice Lords) in close proximity to Leo High School between 1996 and 2016. My guardian angle must come with Kevlar.

I have helped bury a dozen students and witnessed as many more wounded by rounds fired from Tech 9s and Glocks, none of whome 'were in the Game.'

Guns are tools and thugs use them to kill people.

Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson, who once commanded the Gresham District 6 near Leo High School, was sent to Springfield to label anti-gun laws in Commander Paul Bauer's name.

The new legislation is a response to the Parkland public school killings, close on the heels of Commander Bauer's funeral here in my neighborhood.

Paul Bauer was a cop's cop.  He spoke out against the root problems of street violence: abuse of existing sentencing laws -

Commander Paul Bauer says there is a “high bar to prosecution” in Cook County, requiring Chicago police to get approval from the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office before a suspect can be charged.
“Sometimes they want to come out and...talk to the victim,” said Bauer at the annual meeting of River North Residents Association. “If you think about it, we’re sometimes victimizing this person twice. You just got your phone snatched from you. You got knocked down. Now you’re going to be in the station. You got to stay here for another couple hours until the State’s Attorney gets out here.”
[...] According to Bauer, 75 percent of the crime in the 18th district is theft-related, whether it’s theft from a building or theft from a person, including a suspect who, while riding a bicycle, recently swiped mobile phones from people in River North.
“We caught that guy,” recalled Bauer. “and we figured he did about 30 [robberies] over the course of a couple months. We were only able to charge him with one felony theft [because] victim identification was a little hazy.”
[...] “Even when we catch somebody,” says Bauer, “there’s still a long way to go to get them off the street.”
In August, Chief Judge Timothy Evans replaced all the judges who presided over bond hearings in Cook County and directed new judges to set bail in amounts more affordable to defendants. This is at odds with Chicago police, who would prefer to see higher bail amounts for career criminals.
“That guy, Willie, he’s a case in point. He needs a high bond. We got him for a number of burglaries. He’s on parole for burglary. He needs to sit. We got to get him off the street. It’s just like if you have kids, if there’s no consequences to your action, those actions are going to repeat.”
And when they do go to jail, they need to stay there longer.
“The Sheriff of Cook County, for whatever reason, is very proud of the fact he has reduced the population of the county jail. Maybe I’m jaded, I don’t think that’s anything to be proud of.”  In Second City Cop

The thug who killed Commander Bauer was not armed with a straw-man AR-15, which Rep. Burke's canned legislation targets.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel talked about the bill after speaking to a room of police recruits, part of a package of legislation that would require gun dealers to be licensed, raise the penalties for illegal use of body armor, ban high capacity magazines for military-style weapons and ban bump stocks.
“We need gun legislation, like a waiting period, like a ban on assault on assault weapons, like what we're talking about on gun dealership that backs up the goals and the public safety goals we have as a city,” Mayor Emanuel said.

Rahm Emanuel did the canning and the sending.

Were he not an oily sneak with a power jones, Emanuel might have helped craft a Paul Bauer Law that would keep thugs out of our community.

Maybe, another family will not need to mourn a father and husband.  Maybe, fewer people will be gun down on streets at any time of the or driving the Dan Ryan and Eisenhower expressways.

Instead, Rahm Emanuel, Mike Madigan, Bruce Rauner and their stooges used Paul Bauer's sacrifice, as an unwasted opportunity.